Category: Uncategorized

The most popular church in our Boston suburb contains bulletin boards filled with messages about sanctuary for illegal immigrants, a trip for parishioners to the “borderland” of Arizona where hands-on aid to migrants will be administered, and some stuff on how to oppose potential initiatives by Donald Trump. A friend who sings in the choir says that every week the sermon is about the merits of diversity and inclusion. (Which is why these folks decided to live in one of the whitest towns in one of the whitest states? The pastor delivering the sermons cannot be accused of hypocrisy. He identifies as a gay man. He and his husband have adopted two black children.)

A friend went to the Boston Women’s March (a protest against the existence of Donald Trump? Or that there were Americans who voted for him?) on a schoolbus chartered by a religious group in a different suburb. I asked if it would be possible for someone to stand up in his group and say “I voted for Trump because he promised to eliminate the estate tax and I want my children to inherit all of the money that I have saved and already paid taxes on.” The answer was a resounding “no.” Such a person would not be motivated to join nor would he or she be welcome. “You have to remember that I’m already an unconventional member,” he said, citing the fact that he lives with a person who identifies as a woman and their two biological children. “A more typical family is a lesbian couple with an adopted black child.”

Maybe it is just Massachusetts, but I’m wondering if organized religion has become force for division and if this is new. In the days when pretty much every American had to go to church, and religion was much more powerful than party affiliation, wouldn’t it then be common for parishioners to have differing political beliefs? The sermon would focus on individual sins and how to avoid them? Today, however, maybe the political beliefs are actually the religion (e.g., government-run health care will make us healthier and more prosperous; government spending will boost the economy; growing the population via immigration is a moral imperative; etc.). So a modern-day church is a venue for people with shared political beliefs to congregate and discuss the sins of those who don’t share their political beliefs. This leaves the workplace (for those who haven’t discovered the miracles of SSDI and/or child support) as the only place in American society where people with differing political views might come together on a regular basis?

Full post, including comments

“Illegal Voting Gets Texas Woman 8 Years in Prison, and Certain Deportation” (nytimes) came out just before I went to the airport and got on a United Airlines flight (thanks to the flight attendant who offered me cough drops when I asked for hot water and lemon due to a sore throat).

When I showed up at the airport, United was able to look at my ID and figure out whether or not I was a customer.

The unfortunate subject of the above-referenced article was given the task of self-certifying her eligibility to vote (“be a customer” of the government?). It turns out that this is not straightforward due to the fact that in some jurisdictions non-citizens are able to vote in at least state or local elections (Wikipedia). The only ways to become a citizen are by being in the U.S., in which case the government is supposed to issue a birth certificate, or by being naturalized, a process controlled by the government. Wouldn’t it make sense for the government to operate more like United Airlines? Find out who the person is and then offer him or her the appropriate level of voting?

[Separately, though my heart was saddened by the story of a basically harmless person going to prison for 8 years (many of the Germans who attended the Wannsee Conference were given shorter sentences), my brain was drawn to the fact that “she has a sixth-grade education.” How is the U.S. economy supposed to grow, on a per capita basis, when our population growth comes from people with sixth-grade educations? (Ms. Ortega, age 37, had a higher-than-average fertility: “Her four children, ages 13 to 16..”; she also had a 27-year-old fiancé, according to the article, so a few more kids might have been forthcoming.)]

Readers: What do you think? Instead of fighting about “voter fraud” why not use a system where the only way to commit “voter fraud” would be by assuming someone else’s identity?

Alternative formulation: If United Airlines doesn’t rely on self-certification (“I am pretty sure that I paid for a ticket!”) before taking you to Chicago, why does it make sense for the government to rely on self-certification when it is time to determine who will run the government?

Related:

• Texas family law (shows the potential child support profits available to the single parent of four kids; they would be more than twice as lucrative if from four different fathers, assuming all had the same income, though capped at a maximum of about $82,000 per year (tax-free))

Full post, including comments

Working 22 days per month, 16 hours per day, and earning $19,000 per year doesn’t help your mood: “Think Your Job Is Depressing? Try Being an Airline Pilot: New study suggests pilots are more depressed than the average American” (Smithsonian).

Related:

• my 2009 article on the steps of a U.S. airline career
• how unionization leads to airline bankruptcy (and pilots starting over at the bottom)
• our program to help young people become depressed

Full post, including comments

My Facebook friends are expressing literal terror at the prospect of the repeal of Obamacare. Without Obamacare there will apparently be no health care services available at all to some of the richest people on the planet. I think it is kind of interesting for what it reveals about how people think about government and government programs.

Nobody asks “How did Americans survive from 1630(ish) through 1965 when there was no Medicare or Medicaid?” or “How did Americans survive from 1630 through 2013 when there was no Obamacare?”

It is sort of the same thing with the federal Department of Education, created by Jimmy Carter in 1979. The assumption seems to be that U.S. states, most of which have populations larger than countries with successful education systems (see Finland, for example, with 5.5 million people), couldn’t possibly run schools without federal assistance.

Given the paranoid psychology of so many U.S. voters, terrified that a fairly new government program might be discontinued, can we conclude that growth of government is inevitable? We have a mechanism for creating new programs and handouts, but no way to shut down an old one.

Full post, including comments

In the old days a successful politician could say, well, impolitic things and then, after a bit of reflection, write a more delicate and filtered version. Voters would see only the written version. Today, however, a huge percentage of the time a politician is being recorded electronically. A minor slip can be replayed on national TV 20 years later by an opponent.

Thus the only people who are practically qualified to be politicians are those who managed to filter every spoken sentence before it goes out. “Frankly, we do give a damn: The relationship between profanity and honesty” (Feldman, et al. 2016; Social Psychological and Personality Science) says that people who use profanity are more likely to be honest.

Ergo we will elect an increasing percentage of liars?

Full post, including comments

I talked with a guy in his 50s who does creative work for a company in the San Francisco Bay Area. His employer recently went public advocating against Donald Trump’s positions regarding immigration and travel from certain countries. He described his employer’s stance as “principled.” I said “Wouldn’t Econ 101 suggest that the executives are doing it to keep costs low and thereby help themselves to larger bonuses? Classical supply-demand economics predicts that the only principle an employer needs to support immigration is self-interest.” He responded that this might be right for other kinds of companies but his employer was bringing in immigrants because they wanted extra creativity that could only come from having grown up in an exotic foreign land. He argued that his employer’s ability to hire immigrants would not depress wages for himself or other American-born employees in the same area.

What has actually happened to inflation-adjusted salaries in his industry over the past 30 years? “People get paid about half as much as they used to.” How is he doing personally? “I am not making as much as 20 years ago.” His workplace has gone from basically “no immigrants” to somewhere around one quarter immigrants (but maybe closer to one third).

[On the same day I talked to a hotel manager here in Hawaii. His previous job was managing a hotel in Singapore. He said that it was a tough challenge. How could that be? Weren’t people there educated and efficient? “You never had to tell anyone twice to do anything,” he responded. “And the level of education, skill, and dedication to doing things right is amazing.” What was the problem then? “The government required that 50 percent of our workers be citizens and it was very tough to hire locals to clean rooms or work in the restaurant.” Why not pay more? “Then we would have had to raise our rates to uncompetitive levels.”]

Full post, including comments

“The price of doing a postdoc” (Science Magazine, January 10, 2017) confirms the Chinese expression “poor as a professor; dumb as a Ph.D.”:

For the overwhelming majority of Ph.D. holders who do not become tenured professors, spending time as a postdoc comes at a hefty price. Compared with peers who started working outside academia immediately after earning their degrees, ex-postdocs make lower wages well into their careers, according to a study published today in Nature Biotechnology. On average, they give up about one-fifth of their earning potential in the first 15 years after finishing their doctorates—which, for those who end up in industry, amounts to $239,970.

The financial sacrifice begins during the postdoc. As detailed in the new report, which uses National Science Foundation data to track the careers of thousands of people who earned Ph.D.s between 1980 and 2010, a typical postdoc in biomedicine lasts 4.5 years with an annual salary of about $45,000—as compared with the $75,000 or so paid as a median starting salary to Ph.D.s in industry. Biomedical postdocs who later enter the nonacademic workforce then face a pay gap that closes only after another 8 or 9 years.

[The Chinese expression is from a friend who was a professor in Hong Kong. His grasp of Mandarin and Cantonese was tenuous, so it is unclear if this is truly a standard term.]

Related:

• “Women in Science”
• “Child Support Litigation without a Marriage” (ways to make more than $45,000 per year without going to college or grad school)
• Book Review: The Redistribution Recession (economic growth in an era where it is straightforward to get more than $45,000 per year in welfare benefits)

Full post, including comments

I visited a daycare/preschool last month and was introduced to the teacher of the oldest children. She’d retired from the local public school after 35 years of teaching kindergarten and, despite earning a comfortable pension, had chosen to continue teaching 5-year-olds.

A few days later I spent time with two women who’d earned Harvard Law School degrees and jobs at excellent firms. Neither of them had worked at any waged job for 20 years. Another woman at the same event had a Harvard Business School degree. She hadn’t worked for at least 8 years, the age of her single child.

I’m wondering if “career quit rate” would be a useful statistic to compile for young people. If people continue to do a job despite not desperately needing the paycheck, we can infer that it is a satisfying job, right? If people quit despite high potential pay, we can infer that it is not a great career from an emotional point of view.

“Why Women Are Leaving the Workforce in Record Numbers” says that “only 35 percent of women who have earned MBAs after getting a bachelor’s degree from a top school are working full time, compared to 66 percent from second-tier schools.” This is consistent with anecdotes from friends who attended the MIT Sloan School and Harvard Business School. Most of their female classmates have children and no longer work (see Real World Divorce for which states make this a viable long-term personal financial strategy).

Medical doctors may scale back, but not quit entirely (see “Don’t Quit This Day Job” (nytimes) for “nearly 4 in 10 female doctors between the ages of 35 and 44 reporting in 2010 that they worked part time”). Either it is easier to be a part-time MD than it is to be a part-time business manager or being an MD is more satisfying.

I can’t find any good statistics on what percentage of trained and qualified people, organized by field, drop out of the workforce, but I think gathering data would be valuable.

Readers: Know of any good sources for a working/trained ratio by vocation?

Related:

• Book Review: The Redistribution Recession (government paying people to drop out of the workforce)

Full post, including comments

Conversation between a(n immigrant) friend and a 10-year-old child:

• I don’t want to go to the fencing competition! I am always the youngest and the smallest! I have no chance!!!
• I know you can do it. Just focus and do your best! I believe in you!
• Papa, you are now trying to talk like Americans do: “You can do it! You are amazing! You can totally win!” This sucks and is not going to work on me. Please be yourself.

Full post, including comments

My Facebook friends are outraged that Donald Trump is trying to reverse a decision by Barack Obama to accept a bunch of immigrants from prison islands run by Australians. My dumb question for today: if the Australians don’t want these folks as residents/citizens, why do we?

Full post, including comments