Wednesday, February 9, 2011

FDR on Public Sector Unions

Fred Siegel has an interesting article in the WSJ (January 25, 2011) on liberals and government unions:

Liberals were once skeptical of public-sector unionism. In the 1930s, New York Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia warned against it as an infringement on democratic freedoms that threatened the ability of government to represent the broad needs of the citizenry. And in a 1937 letter to the head of an organization of federal workers, FDR noted that "a strike of public employees manifests nothing less than an intent on their part to prevent or obstruct the operations of Government until their demands are satisfied. Such action, looking toward the paralysis of Government by those who have sworn to support it, is unthinkable and intolerable."

More here and here. More complete quote from FDR below (FDR to National Federation of Federal Employees, 1937):

All Government employees should realize that the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service. It has its distinct and insurmountable limitations when applied to public personnel management. The very nature and purposes of Government make it impossible for administrative officials to represent fully or to bind the employer in mutual discussions with Government employee organizations. The employer is the whole people, who speak by means of laws enacted by their representatives in Congress. Accordingly, administrative officials and employees alike are governed and guided, and in many instances restricted, by laws which establish policies, procedures, or rules in personnel matters.

Particularly, I want to emphasize my conviction that militant tactics have no place in the functions of any organization of Government employees. Upon employees in the Federal service rests the obligation to serve the whole people, whose interests and welfare require orderliness and continuity in the conduct of Government activities. This obligation is paramount. Since their own services have to do with the functioning of the Government, a strike of public employees manifests nothing less than an intent on their part to prevent or obstruct the operations of Government until their demands are satisfied. Such action, looking toward the paralysis of Government by those who have sworn to support it, is unthinkable and intolerable.

Also, unionization typically leads to higher salaries and benefits for employees, which is generally laudable, but with an important caveat: the more expensive you make something, the less of it you can have. If cops and teachers cost $150K a year, you can't have as many of them--at least not absent massive tax increases that will cause businesses to expand outside the state, thereby harming immigrants and poor persons who rely mostly on the private sector for jobs.

Also, isn't it generally better to have more teachers and police officers than fewer of them? If so, the more benefits and money you give them, the fewer of them you can hire down the road, especially if you're spending hundreds of millions of dollars a year on retired/non-working officers and teachers (in the form of pensions). By switching government workers to 401(k) plans rather than pensions, the same money we're using to pay non-working government employees could be used to hire more teachers and police officers and to pay them higher starting salaries.

One last point: when government unions cause a significant portion of their members' compensation to be back-ended, i.e., in the form of pensions and lifetime medical benefits, you have two major problems: one, the politicians involved in negotiating the promises won't be around to suffer any consequences if they made unfair, overly generous, and unsustainable promises; and two, budget planning becomes very difficult because governments are not life insurers and cannot accurately or fully predict the costs of their employees' lifetime health care and pension benefits.

[This post was updated on June 8, 2012.  More here, from Bruce Bartlett.]  

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Interracial Marriage Stats

Interesting data on interracial marriage from the Pew Center:

http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1616/american-marriage-interracial-interethnic

Basically, according to the Pew Center report, 26% of Hispanic women, 9% of white and black women, and 40% of Asian women marry outside their race in America.

Monday, February 7, 2011

Superbowl Sunday Edition

My mom and I watched parts of the Super Bowl together. Here's one of our conversations from that day:

Mom: every touchdown is 7 points?

Me: it's 6 points, and if you make a free kick, it's 7.

Mom: you mean if it goes through that thing?

Me: [sigh] Yes. If it goes through the thing, it's an extra point.

Mom: what if it doesn't go through the thing?

Me: Then it's 6 points.

Mom: When is the halftime?

Me: At the half.

Mom: What do you mean the half? The time, or the score?

[P.S. We both liked the halftime show. I have no idea what people expect from a live halftime show, but some people's expectations seem unrealistic.]

Saturday, February 5, 2011

Accuray CEO Euan Thomson

Dr. Euan Thomson, CEO and President of Accuray (ARAY). Congrats to Mr. Thomson for Accuray's most recent results (2011), which drove up the company's share price approximately 30%.

Bonus: review of Accuray's 2010 shareholder meeting here.

Disclosure: I have owned shares of Accuray (I haven't checked, but I might still own a few shares). My ownership positions may change at any time.

Under no circumstances do any statements here represent a recommendation to buy or sell securities or make any kind of an investment. You are responsible for your own due diligence. To summarize, I do not provide investment advice, nor do I make any claims or promises that any information here will lead to a profit, loss, or any other result.

Friday, February 4, 2011

Milton Friedman on Immigration and Free Markets

One cannot be pro-socialism and pro-immigration. Immigrants are usually needed for private sector jobs, usually either highly specialized or low paying ones. Despite the prospect of a low paying, tough job, immigrants come to America and other non-socialist countries because they believe their children will be able to have a better life. But most union and socialist jobs are reserved for citizens, not immigrants. Thus, the sina qua non of the immigrant story is a large private sector rather than a large government sector. In other words, someone who is pro-immigrant must be capitalist, not socialist, assuming that socialism means a large government sector.

If you're still not convinced, please listen to Milton Friedman:

[Ch 7] "one of the paradoxes of experience is that, in spite of...historical evidence, it is precisely the minority groups that have frequently furnished the most vocal and numerous advocates of fundamental alterations in a capitalist society. They have tended to attribute to capitalism the residual restrictions they experience rather than to recognize that the free market has been the major factor enabling these restrictions to be as small as they are...the purchaser of bread does not know whether it was made from wheat grown by a white man or a [black man], by a Christian or a Jew. In consequence, the producer of wheat is in a position to use resources as effectively as he can, regardless of what the attitudes of the community may be toward his color, the religion, or other characteristics of the people he hires.

Furthermore, and perhaps more important, there is an economic incentive in a free market to separate economic efficiency from other characteristics of the individual. A businessman or an entrepreneur who expresses preferences in his business activities that are not related to productive efficiency is at a disadvantage compared to other individuals who do not. Such an individual is in effect imposing higher costs on himself than are other individuals who do not have such preferences. Hence, in a free market they will tend to drive him out...

[Ch 1] As this example suggests, the groups in our society that have the most at stake in the preservation and strengthening of competitive capitalism are those minority groups which can most easily become the object of the distrust and enmity of the majority--the African-Americans, the Jews, the foreign-born, to mention only the obvious...[Yet] instead of recognizing that the existence of the free market has protected them from the attitudes of their fellow countrymen, they mistakenly attribute the residual discrimination to the market."

Bonus: Our minds tell us, and history confirms, that the great threat to freedom is the concentration of power. Government is necessary to preserve our freedom, it is an instrument through which we can exercise our freedom; yet by concentrating power in political hands, it is also a threat to freedom. Even though the men who wield this power initially be of good will and even though they be not corrupted by the power they exercise, the power will both attract and form men of a different stamp.

Thursday, February 3, 2011

CBO Slideshows

Neutral, non-partisan data is hard to come by these days. Thank goodness for the CBO. Its slideshows can be found here:

http://www.slideshare.net/cbo

One of the CBO's most recent (at least as of 2011) slideshows is about immigration. It includes the total number of immigrants apprehended and lots of other interesting statistics.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

One of the Best SNL Skits Ever: Democratic Edition

Here's a bone to the Democrats--a fantastic 1998 skit that eviscerates the GOP:

http://snltranscripts.jt.org/98/98crepublicans.phtml [Season 24, Episode 3: Lucy Lawless]

Henry Hyde: Recently, the Republican Party has been accused of conducting a witch hunt aimed at overhrowing an elected President. Some even say we're in the midst of a coup d'etat. Well, I'm here to say, "You're damn right!" And, you know what, America - what the hell you gonna do about it? Okay? Most of you are too busy watching "Road Rules" and drinking Frappuccinos to go out and vote. We're gonna boot this hillbilly out! And then give tax breaks to the rich! So suck on that! Suck on it a real long time, then suck on it some more! Then keep sucking on it, and then suck a little bit more, and suck some more! And just keep sucking on it! Now, to further drive home how little respect I have for you as a nation, here's my good friend Sen. Jesse Helms.

Jesse Helms: Clinton raised the minimum wage, and I'm gonna cut it in half, mofos! [Will Ferrell as Henry Hyde claps ecstatically.] Everyone one o' ya gonna be workin' at Arby's for $2 an hour! And I'm-a gonna be gettin' off on it!

Republicans are your pals, they want a proud America, they don't want blacks anywhere! Oh.. oh.. I mean, no affirmative action, oh yeah.. Think of good things, America. Think of the TV show "Friends".. think of dancing babies.. fruit roll-ups.. that little kid from "Jerry Maguire".. Beanie Babies.. sharks fighting monkeys.. Ohhhh, you feel good? What's the point of votin'? Go to slee-eep.. slee-eep.

I tend to agree with the Democrats on social issues and with the GOP on economic issues. At the same time, my primary allegiance is to good and peaceful political opposition, because it promotes discussion and forces the other side to re-evaluate, explain, and/or strengthen its positions. Ridicule and satire are two effective forms of peaceful dissent. Just ask Jon Stewart and the Daily Show.