Dec 29, 2016 | Business, Politics
George F. Will highlights two important principles on productivity and protectionism, in A plan to make America 1953 again - The Washington Post:1. Productivity Improvements Mean Less Workers Are Necessary
Since 1900, the portion of the U.S. workforce in agriculture has declined from 41 percent to less than 2 percent. Output per remaining farmer and per acre has soared since millions of agricultural workers made the modernization trek from farms to more productive employment in city factories. Was this trek regrettable?
[...] According to a Ball State University study, of the 5.6 million manufacturing jobs lost between 2000 and 2010, trade accounted for 13 percent of job losses and productivity improvements accounted for more than 85 percent: “Had we kept 2000-levels of productivity and applied them to 2010-levels of production, we would have required 20.9 million manufacturing workers [in 2010]. Instead, we employed only 12.1 million.” Is this regrettable? China, too, is shedding manufacturing jobs because of productivity improvements.
2. "Protecting" Particular Companies From More Efficient Producers Decreases Jobs In Unprotected Industries (Shifts Unemployment)Levinson notes that Ronald Reagan imposed “voluntary restraints” on Japanese automobile exports, thereby creating 44,100 U.S. jobs. But the cost to consumers was $8.5 billion in higher prices, or $193,000 per job created, six times the average annual pay of a U.S. autoworker. And there were job losses in sectors of the economy into which the $8.5 billion of consumer spending could not flow.
[...] In 2012, Barack Obama boasted that “over a thousand Americans are working today because we stopped a surge in Chinese tires.” But this cost about $900,000 per job, paid by American purchasers of vehicles and tires. And the Peterson Institute for International Economics says that this money taken from consumers reduced their spending on other retail goods, bringing the net job loss from the job-saving tire tariffs to about 2,500. And this was before China imposed retaliatory duties on U.S. chicken parts, costing the U.S. industry $1 billion in sales. Imports of low-end tires from Thailand, Indonesia, Mexico and elsewhere largely replaced Chinese imports.
In the long run, the best way to create real jobs, that raise the standard of living, is a free-market."Protecting" particular domestic sectors from foreign competition ends up punishing other Americans on the whole with higher prices, less jobs and a reduced standard of living.Dec 24, 2016 | Politics
Interesting analysis: The Syrian War Condensed: A More Rigorous Way to Look at the Conflict.The author compares the Assad Syrian Baathist regime to the alternative of the "moderate Rebel's" anything-but-moderate Islamofascism, and wonders how the Regressive Left that is "mourning the defeat of the rebels in Aleppo" can be "that stupid?"The Assad regime is by no means benign, but cheering the overthrow of it with something worse is no solution.
Dec 24, 2016 | Politics
Brian Phillips has an excellent post on Houston's success because of its' lack of zoning. Writes Phillips in Planning Versus the Central Planner:
What they are really denouncing is the fact that Houston has developed without a central planner. [...]Houston’s development has been guided by millions of plans and visions. Each individual has his own plan and vision. Through the lack of zoning, Houston has protected the freedom of its residents to pursue their personal plans and visions. The critics resent the fact that Houstonians have this freedom.
The entire post is worth a read.
Dec 24, 2016 | Politics
Writes Kimberley A. Strassel on Obama’s Midnight Regulation Express - WSJ:1. Obama Administration is "actively working to undermine a Donald Trump presidency."
Unnamed administration sources whisper stories about Russian hackers to delegitimize Mr. Trump’s election. [...] Trump transition-team members report how Obama officials are providing them with skewed or incomplete information [...] Sen. Ron Johnson recently sent a letter to President Obama voicing alarm over “burrowing,” in which political appointees, late in an administration, convert to career bureaucrats and become obstacles to the new political appointees.
2. Obama Administration is issuing a "final flurry" of midnight regulations ("one issued between Election Day and the inauguration of a new president.")
This past week we learned of several sweeping new rules from the Interior Department and the Environmental Protection Agency, including regs on methane on public lands (cost: $2.4 billion); a new anti-coal rule related to streams ($1.2 billion) and renewable fuel standards ($1.5 billion). This follows Mr. Obama’s extraordinary announcement that he will invoke a dusty old law to place nearly all of the Arctic Ocean, and much of the Atlantic Ocean, off limits to oil or gas drilling. This follows his highly politicized move to shut down the Dakota Access pipeline in North Dakota. And it comes amid reports the administration is rushing to implement last-minute rules on commodities speculation, immigrant workers and for-profit colleges—among others.
3. Trump Administration should repeal every "midnight regulation."
Dec 8, 2016 | Politics
How do devout Muslims born in the West feel about Jews? How do they feel about Western values in general? Kasim Hafeez, who was raised a devout Muslim in England, explains.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCQEmeGfFmY
