“The government can require that children be vaccinated and pay for their vaccination without manufacturing vaccines. Similarly, it can require that children attend school and pay for their schooling without operating schools, something it doesn’t seem to be particularly good at; politics and teachers’ unions drive up costs and drive down quality. The government would […]
Archive for August, 2005
Aug22nd2005
Jay Hancock, writing in the Baltimore Sun, gives us the good side to high oil prices.
Aug22nd2005
The Wall Street Journal($$) writes:
Bowing to busy consumers who are less willing to spend time searching for deals, some traditional grocery stores are cutting back on promotional discounts and moving toward the everyday low prices of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and other discounters.
In recent months, several regional grocery chains have reduced prices on everything from Kraft […]
Aug22nd2005
“When you come to understand retailing, [you realize] that the industry of retailing has gone through its own evolution. 50 years ago or so, retailing was much more similar in the rich countries to each other than it is today in that it was primarily dominated by general stores of relatively small scale and mom […]
Aug20th2005
“It was 2 percent in the 1960s, and it’s risen to 20 percent. And you ask, what do the GEDs earn? They earn what high school dropouts who do not get GEDs earn, once you adjust for their somewhat higher cognitive ability. And what’s the difference between GEDs and high school graduates? Well, GEDs have […]
Aug19th2005
Economists Debate: Is The Labor Market Doing Good?
Published by in Debates, Economics and General. 0 CommentsIs the labor market doing good? Does the falling unemployment figures give an accurate picture of how the economy is doing? Economists on both sides of the aisle debate precisely that. This time it is between Max Sawicky and Tom Walker on one side, and David Altig on the other. The debate should be free […]
Aug19th2005
“You know, that is something I must say that bothers me a lot. I am more sympathetic on the abortion issue than I am on most right wing socially conservative issues, because you know, you don’t have to be religious to be against abortion. I do sort of understand what they’re saying. If you’ve ever […]
Aug18th2005
Even The Sciences Are Wrong 1/3 Of The Time
Published by in (modern day) Liberalism, Economics and General. 0 CommentsLive Science has an article stating that one third of medical studies are wrong:
CHICAGO (AP) — New research highlights a frustrating fact about science: What was good for you yesterday frequently will turn out to be not so great tomorrow.
The sobering conclusion came in a review of major studies published in three influential medical journals […]
Aug18th2005
Quote Of The Day
Published by in Economics, Europe, Foreign Policy, General and Hispanics (Minority Issues). 0 Comments“Because the U.S. does not have a generous safety net–because it is still a nation in which the risk of economic failure is significant–it tends to attract immigrants who have values conducive to upward economic mobility, including a willingness to conform to the customs and attitudes of their new country. And because the U.S. does […]
Aug17th2005
Politics And Immigration
Published by in (modern day) Liberalism, Economics, General, Hispanics (Minority Issues), Immigration and Personal. 20 CommentsGive me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.
—Verse engraved on the base of the statue of liberty
Readers of my blog know that I am overall very pro-immigration. I have a strong belief […]
Aug17th2005
“The ultimate irony of the [National Education Association’s] boycott against Wal-Mart is that the union is asking parents to exercise a choice in their back-to-school shopping. Choice, however, is the one thing the union opposes most when it comes to education policy and the teaching profession. The teachers union aggressively opposes measures and policies that […]
Aug16th2005
The Power Of The Government And Why It Should Be Checked
Published by in Economics, General and Judicial Nominees. 0 CommentsThis is unbelievable:
The U.S. Supreme Court recently found that the city’s original seizure of private property was constitutional under the principal of eminent domain, and now New London is claiming that the affected homeowners were living on city land for the duration of the lawsuit and owe back rent. It’s a […]
Aug16th2005
Three Cheers For The Bush Tax Cuts
Published by in Economics, General, Hispanics (Minority Issues) and Taxes. 7 CommentsFirst comes this recent report from The Wall Street Journal:
First, more Americans have jobs today than at any other time in history. Second, over the past two decades or so, the U.S. has created more than 40 million jobs — twice as many as Europe and Japan combined. And third, the U.S. has one of […]
Aug16th2005
“I do not favor foreign aid, debt relief (which is simply another form of such aid), or other financial transfers to poor countries, in Africa or anywhere else. Countries that are not corrupt do not require foreign aid, and foreign aid to corrupt countries entrenches corruption by increasing the gains to corruption. Foreign aid to […]
Aug15th2005
No Child Left Behind And Minority Students
Published by in Education, General and Hispanics (Minority Issues). 5 CommentsGreat news coming out of our new education test scores:
Oddly, you heard the sound of one hand clapping last week as the Education Department released national data showing dramatic narrowing of racial learning gaps among elementary and middle school students. The news deserved ringing applause.
Rarely can education trends, good or bad, be described as […]
Aug15th2005
“With vastly more money available around the world as private investment than there is as foreign aid, why do Third World countries want or need foreign aid? Because private investors will seldom put their own money into projects that have no realistic chance of working or into countries too corrupt and unreliable to expect the […]
