The Divisiveness Between Our Police and Our Citizens

“There are no words to describe the atrocity that occurred to our city. All I know is that this must stop, this divisiveness between our police and our citizens.”

-        Dallas Police Chief David Brown, in the wake of the recent shooting of five police officers and several others

Mr. Brown, most (but not all) of the causes behind the divisiveness are due to decisions made by individuals well above your pay grade. 

I offer a few simple actions that can be taken immediately in both Washington DC and in every state capital around the country – these actions will have immediate beneficial effect toward ending the “divisiveness between our police and our citizens.”

1)      Eliminate all laws regarding victimless crimes – including, and especially, drug laws

2)      Eliminate minimum wage laws

3)      End civil asset forfeiture

As soon as these are ended, several benefits will be immediately realized: the number of negative interactions between police and citizens will be overwhelmingly reduced; more fathers will be free of prison, available to tend to their families; low-skilled and unskilled individuals can work legally; police will have far less incentive to stop and search the citizens.

I could write more – end the subsidies for fatherless families and end public education, for example.  However these are much more complex.  The above items can be ended tomorrow without concern. 

Of course, that we live in a society where it is legal for government employees to commit crimes contributes to this divisiveness.  It is also true that residents of high-crime neighborhoods can and should take matters into their own hands.

But if we don’t want to continue on this certain slide toward ever-more divisiveness, enacting the above-listed items will go a long way.  Police and citizens are fighting an uphill and losing battle as long as measures such as the above remain in place.

Tonight (July 14) Obama will hold a town hall on the topic of race relations, justice, policing and equality.  Let’s see if he is truly interested in improving race relations, justice, policing and equality or if he is interested in doubling-down on the status quo.

Sadly, I know the answer already.

Miscellaneous Debris

I have always wanted to find a way to use the title of this album as the title of a title of a post; well, here it is.  None of the following topics is significant enough to merit an individual post – but I want to clear my mental inbox.

When Life Really Stinks

Perhaps more than any other post, my recent post on the forced famine in Ukraine has really remained with me.  When thinking about people living in impossible situations (picture Iraq or Syria), I try to put myself in the position of a father sending his children off to school, not knowing if they will return safely; of a husband seeing his wife off to market, carrying the same burden of possible finality; of the breadwinner living in a place in which the economy has been destroyed.

The following – taken from the author of the book Bloodlands – has struck me and is what has stuck with me:

First weeks of 1933: with starvation raging through Ukraine, Stalin closed the borders of the republic such that the starving couldn’t flee, and closed the cities such that the starving couldn’t beg.  As of 14 January, citizens were required to carry internal passports.  The sale of long distance tickets to peasants was banned.

No food left to requisition, so none left to eat.  No way to flee.  Nothing left to do but die...in place.

In Soviet Ukraine in early 1933, the communist party activists who collected the grain left a deathly quiet behind them…Ukraine had gone mute.

The stillness: bodies barely able and eventually unable to move…yet alive…for a while longer; the body automatically consuming first its fat, then its muscle; fathers unable to do anything to provide or protect.

The lifelessness: there are no cats or dogs – all have been eaten; the birds have been scared away because to remain meant to be eaten; the livestock and chickens gone long before.

The silence: not a creature was stirring because there were no creatures left to stir; not a human was stirring because there was no energy to move – all energy was diverted to the body automatically consuming itself. 

Or consumed:

People in Ukraine never considered cannibalism to be acceptable.  Even at the height of the famine, villagers were outraged to find cannibals in their midst, so much so that they were spontaneously beaten or even burned to death.

The author wrote of the cannibalization by permission – the mother telling her children to make a meal of her remains after she dies.  He also wrote of the pre-meditated cannibalization – killing the infant in order to eat.

I think about people stuck in such impossible situations.  I always try to put myself into the frame of mind that says I must not make ethical judgments when impossible choices are the only ones offered.  This doesn’t mean condoning, it doesn’t mean to suggest what I might do in their place; it means accepting the impossibility of the situation.

But sometimes getting into this frame of mind is harder than at other times.  I can mentally get there with the first type mentioned; not the second.

Enough of that.

Why do they Hate Customers?

One-hundred percent of the people on earth are customers.  Well, except for those who live totally and completely off the grid and grow or kill everything they eat and make everything they wear from materials they find in nature, etc.  In other words I doubt there are more than three exceptions on the entire planet.  So, just say 100% for rounding.

I recently had some feedback, bashing Wal-Mart – the typical stuff: they aren’t fair to suppliers, they aren’t fair to employees, they are cut-throat with competitors. 

I will caveat my comment: Wal-Mart, like every major corporation, probably gains much more from corporatocracy (the relationship between large companies and the government) than it loses.  But this rambling isn’t about that.

It also isn’t about the employees, suppliers or competitors.  The employees and suppliers are not forced to work at Wal-Mart.  Full stop.  As to the competitors, they have no property right in customers.

Which gets to my point.  Add up all of Wal-Mart’s employees, suppliers and competitors – they have 1.3 million employees in the US, I have no idea how many employees of suppliers or competitors but let’s say all of it adds to 10 million people.  Out of a population of over 300 million customers.  Yes, I know, not all 300 million of them shop at Wal-Mart; however Wal-Mart directly has impacted the competitive nature of every other retailer.

Virtually every individual in the United States benefits from Wal-Mart.  Even if one grants that 10 million people suffer because of Wal-Mart (I do not), why are so many people desirous to take it out of the hide of the three hundred million who benefit?

There is no better democracy than the vote of the customers’ dollar.  There is no better freedom than the vote of the customers’ dollar.

So, I wonder: why do they hate customers?  I think it must be because they hate freedom.

Pope Francis Decries the Wrong Evil

Pope Francis is concerned about the state of the global economy and the impact that persistent, long term unemployment has on the dignity of those so unemployed.  He has talked about this before, just a few months after becoming Pope:

"We risk having a generation that hasn't held a job. Personal dignity comes from working, from earning your bread," the pope said. "Young people are in a crisis."

More than the loss of personal dignity is the potential loss of a lifetime of productive employment.  When the first steps on the ladder of experience are delayed for an extended period of time, catching up is rather difficult.  The lifetime impact of persistent unemployment when young is potentially overwhelming.

He is wading in economic waters again: “Pope Francis decries idolatry of money over man”

Pope Francis denounced what he called big business's idolatry of money over man as he traveled Sunday to one of Italy's poorest regions to offer hope to the unemployed and entrepreneurs struggling to hang on.

Unemployment in Italy is at 12 percent, with youth unemployment a staggering 39.5 percent. In Sardinia and the rest of Italy's south and islands, the figures are even worse: Unemployment is nearing 20 percent with youth unemployment at 50 percent.

Francis told the crowd, many of whom wore hardhats from their defunct factory jobs, that the problems in Sardinia weren't the island's alone. He said the problems were the result of a global economic system "that has at its center an idol called money." (emphasis added)

Not that I am qualified to comment on theology when in the company of the Pope, however I will humbly suggest that he is aiming at the wrong targets and for the wrong reasons when he wades into such views about the economy. 

The problem isn’t big business, but a certain type of business; the idol isn’t money, but entirely another false god.

Perhaps the most well-known verse in the Bible regarding money being the root of all evil is found in I Timothy, chapter 6 verse 10:

For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.

Alternatively, there is Francisco d’Anconia:

"So you think that money is the root of all evil?" said Francisco d'Aconia. "Have you ever asked what is the root of money? Money is a tool of exchange, which can't exist unless there are goods produced and men able to produce them. Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is not the tool of the moochers, who claim your product by tears, or of the looters, who take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil?”

Where does one turn for an answer?

Poor Economics

Paul Craig Roberts is always good when it comes to US foreign policy. His economic analysis is often lacking, stuck in protectionist thinking.  He accurately sees faults and shortcomings in the current system, but his recommendations are some version of protectionism – instead of going after the root of the problem, he deals with the leaves.

He properly calls into question the mirage of recovery:

Officially, since June 2009 the US economy has been undergoing an economic recovery from the December 2007 recession. But where is this recovery? I cannot find it, and neither can millions of unemployed Americans.

The recovery exists only in the official measure of real GDP, which is deflated by an understated measure of inflation, and in the U.3 measure of the unemployment rate, which is declining because it does not count discouraged job seekers who have given up looking for a job.

But he looks to protectionism to provide the answer.  He faults Republicans in Congress for looking to expand the number of visas for foreign workers at a time when so many are jobless:

…if skilled employees were in short supply, they would not be laid off. Moreover, if the skills were in short supply, salaries would be bid up, not down…

Of course, I will set aside the point that government has no business getting in the middle of a company and its desired employees.  Globally, demand for skilled workers likely is increasing (I don’t have data, but given what is happening in India and China, I believe I am on firm footing here).  This is likely true in the US as well (but what “skills”?).  But workers in the US don’t compete only with other workers in the US.

In any case, while demand is likely increasing, this says nothing about the impact to salaries.  The supply is growing as well – witness the glut of over-educated Americans thanks to government subsidies of higher education, as well as the tremendous increase in higher education in the developing world.

Roberts tangentially suggests the supply glut:

The National Science Foundation's report, "Doctorate Recipients From U.S. Universities," says that only 64% of the Ph.D. engineering graduates found a pay check.

I will suggest that they have not found a paycheck on terms that they desire.  At what price?  That is the question that the market demands.

Roberts goes on to castigate all businessmen:

There was a time not that long ago when US corporations accepted that they had obligations to their employees, customers, suppliers, the communities in which they were located, and to their shareholders. Today they only acknowledge obligations to shareholders. Everyone else has been thrown to the wolves in order to maximize profits and, thereby, shareholders' capital gains and executive bonuses.

There are likely as many variations on this idea as there are business leaders.  Suffice it to say that most companies that focus solely on the bottom line while completely ignoring everything else will soon find they have no bottom line.  In other words, understanding all aspects of the company and its relationships results in a more profitable corporation.

Even if one accepts his blanket characterization as correct, who is Roberts to say what the owners of capital should expect from the managers of their capital?  Should someone other than the owner of capital make the decision?

Offshoring jobs reduces labor costs and raises profits, but it also reduces domestic consumer income, thus reducing the domestic market for the corporation's products.

This is economic nonsense.  Lower prices do not destroy jobs.  Lower prices are a boon to consumers.  They leave wealth in the consumers’ pocket.  This can be used to buy other goods, or to invest in productive opportunities.  The seen and the unseen – this is not a new economic concept.

John Maynard Keynes made it clear long ago, as has Greece today, that trying to reduce the ratio of debt to GDP by austerity measures doesn't work.

This is also economic nonsense. The problem is that there is no such thing as austerity today – where is government spending being significantly reduced?  What passes for austerity is actually a method to place the weight of the banks and other politically connected classes on the backs of the middle class.  This is not austerity; it is only the final convulsions of crony-capitalism.

Roberts touches on the crony capitalism, but doesn’t lay the blame squarely on it.  This is where the blame lies – not on companies trying to lower cost and increase profits, but on companies using government to gain advantage through central banking and favorable regulation. 

The conversation begins and ends here.

Jack Welch and Unemployment

Jack Welch, retired CEO of General Electric, has made big waves since he suggested that the recent unemployment print was manipulated for Obama’s political benefit.  I haven’t seen much reaction from the media, but what I have seen is enough – all some version of “do you really believe the employees of government would do such a thing?” 

A senior Treasury Department official said Friday that any suggestion the figures had been manipulated for political gain is “simply absurd.”

Welch suggests he is just using facts to come up with his assertion – the numbers don’t add up:

Here are Mr. Welch’s facts. To hold the unemployment rate even as the population grows, he said, the economy needs to add between 150,000 and 200,000 jobs a month.

I have heard similar numbers from many others, so I expect Welch is not far off on this view.

“We haven’t reached those numbers at all,” Mr. Welch said. Employers added a seasonally adjusted 114,000 jobs in September, down from a revised 142,000 jobs in August. The economy, however, has added 143,000 jobs a month after revisions this year.

Welch has a point.  But wait, the macro-economists are quick to impress with their magic:

Still, several economists have pointed out exactly how the unemployment rate can diverge on a month-to-month basis from nonfarm payroll growth.

Figures don’t lie, but manipulators figure.   This statistic is regularly pushed and pulled in dozens of ways before it is published. 

Much of the data used by macro-economists is useless, certainly the unemployment data falls into this category.  It isn’t just that the numbers are manipulated – it is that they are meaningless on their face.  What does the number of jobs say about the quality of the jobs?  How many of these jobs are truly a result of transactions freely arrived at – the only method by which wealth can be created? 

The only objection one might make about Welch’s comment is the timing.  This figure is manipulated in every which way on a regular basis.  Why raise the objection now?  Of course, his timing was political.

But perhaps the real reason all actors are lining up in attack mode is the thought underlying Welch’s critique - Welch crossed a line when he suggested that civil servants might be acting in a manner other than for truth and accuracy.  This truth flies in the face of the myth that people enter low-paid civil service jobs purely for the altruistic reason of wanting to help their fellow citizens and their country.  They have no personal agenda in anything they do.  They do not succumb to political pressure by their superiors – many of whom are political appointees or elected officials.

One of many myths of state.

(h/t EPJ)

Plenty of Jobs Available in California

Yes, a shocker to me as well.  It seems there must be something else else going on with unemployment other than a lack of jobs. 

There's a different sort of drought plaguing California, the nation's largest farm state. It’s [sic] $38 billion agricultural sector is facing a scarcity of labor.

The Western Growers Association told CNBC its members are reporting a 20 percent drop in laborers this year.

There is no need for demand created by government spending; no need for extended jobless benefits.  The jobs are available, and these aren’t minimum wage – paying the greater of $9.25 / hr. or $5.00 per bucket for peppers, for example.

Surely there must be a rush to fill these jobs.  Let’s ask a local farmer:

When asked if any local residents have come out to apply to work in the fields, Craig Underwood replied, "None. Absolutely none." He is even having trouble finding truck drivers and other semi-skilled labor for jobs that pay $12-$18 an hour.

Eighteen dollars an hour?!?!  Where is Jerry Brown?  Where is Barack Obama?  Why aren’t they extolling the virtues of good solid employment, instead of making matters worse by increasing taxes and spending?

The industry lost many workers to home construction during the housing boom, but those workers have not returned.

One more consequence of the Greenspan bubble, it seems.

Well, this situation will resolve itself – let’s check in with Craig again:

While standing in a field of peppers, Underwood realizes even if he doesn't have enough labor to pick his crop, Americans will still have food.

"It'll just be grown in Mexico," he said. "Or China."