no third solution » Seen and Unseen
On Immigration: The Good Stuff
The video I watched last night says that the 1990s saw the biggest population boom in U.S. History. This is undoubtedly true. What NumbersUSA does not tell us, is that this is in strictly nominal terms. Sure, the country’s population grew by more persons during that decade than in any other decade in history. But is this the relevant metric? I submit that it is not. Furthermore, does NumbersUSA present that information in a useful format? Again, the answer is no. The relevant metric, first and foremost, would be population growth as a percentage of population. To the latter point of contention, the numbers are not readily comparable unless they are measured over standard intervals. The video that razorgator submitted for my … Read entire article »
Filed under: Economic Fallacies, immigration, Seen and Unseen, World Politics
Bad Economics
I’ve noticed that a lot of bad economics is based on some notion of the “socialist man,” who, according to Marx and Engels, was to rise from the lifeless body of the greedy capitalist who sold his hangman the very noose that hanged him. Or something like that. The “socialist man” is a paragon of virtue and self-sacrifice; he is not beholden to the incentive for personal, financial, or material gain – his only incentive is the abstract community, and he will do anything to further whatever interests are the community’s. But “socialist man” is no more real than the orthodox “Homo economus,” whose is basically a Benthamite, utility-maximizing automaton. Crafting policy, based on either assumption, or with the intent of forcing man closer to these ideals, is … Read entire article »
Filed under: Economic Fallacies, Seen and Unseen
Are Women Underpaid?
An article in today’s Detroit Free Press informs us that our bureaucrats in Lansing are proposing four bills for equal pay legislation, that would make it a crime to pay a woman less than a man, provided they’re equally qualified, for the same job. Of course, evaluating talent and qualifications of any prospective employee, regardless of gender, is a very subjective task. The article does not indicate, nor do I imagine the bills stipulate, how such merit is to be objectively quantified. But this doesn’t really matter. What does matter though, is the very real cost of such legislation, to society in general. Defending lawsuits alleging gender-based pay discrimination would probably be quite expensive. As a result, some women would probably be paid more than they … Read entire article »
Filed under: Economic Fallacies, Michigan, Seen and Unseen, Women's Studies 101