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James Gattuso has a very good piece on the Fairness Doctrine. The Fairness Doctrine, like most regulation, serves to provide new tools for government to serve its own interests. Both Nixon and Kennedy used it to cow opponents in the bad old days, by making controversial speech expensive at best and punishable at worst. Give it a read.
The Economist, citing Tyler Cowen, describes how a Scandinavian welfare state struggles with immigration:
But note that there are two definitions of "compatriots". One is "people who share my culture and heritage"; the other is "people who are legally entitled to live (and/or vote) within the geographic and political boundaries of my country". [...] The welfare state is a means of expressing solidarity with people who are mostly just like you are. Other people with different values cannot be trusted not to abuse the system; worse, they don't much care what you think of them, and so they are immune from the social pressure that regulates consumption of benefits in homogenous communities. [emphasis mine]
I've said in the past that welfare states can only exist in places where most people agree as to what the priorities are. The article frames it in terms of cultural trust, but I prefer to see it as a question of diversity.
After all, in a socialist system, the government makes more decisions on behalf of the citizens. If you and your neighbors generally see things the same way, this can be done with relatively little conflict. The countries of Scandinavia have long fit this description.
Such a system is much less likely to work if not everybody has the same priorities. A variety of ideals is a good thing, but it means that if you want (or have) a diverse population, you need a system that is fundamentally built to allow citizens to pursue different economic goals.
Socialism is not compatible with diversity, as history repeatedly demonstrates. A free market, however, not only can survive cultural differences, it often thrives on them. (Think specialization of labor.) Paradoxically, by allowing economic diversity, we achieve greater assimilation.
The countries of Scandinavia are often cited as places with vibrant economies accompanied by generous social protections. What isn't cited is that these countries are historically among the least diverse in the world.
Immigration is a fantastic thing, not least for the country on the receiving end. Immigrants display the best kind of self-selection; these are people who are willing to sacrifice many comforts for the sake of bettering themselves. Their work ethic often puts natives to shame. And, in aging populations like the West, they represent an influx of productive young people.
Tyler asks:
Does immigration bring Nordic welfare states to the verge of collapse? They all seem to think so, but I've long found this fear puzzling.
It doesn't have to be that way. But it clearly requires at least a partial abandonment of the social welfare model.
Immigrants are willing to go through great changes for their own economic survival. Are their hosts willing to do the same?
I don't talk about Iraq all that much, and when I do, it's typically about domestic politics more than the war itself. I have noted in the past that the supposed "left" in this country and others has abandoned any claims to humanitarian goals -- which is to say, there was and is an important liberal case for using force in Iraq. This idea led me to folks like Christopher Hitchens, no righty he, who made that case from the start.
Today I came across Bob Kerrey's argument along those lines, it's a must-read. Here are a few bits:
The critics who bother me the most are those who ordinarily would not be on the side of supporting dictatorships, who are arguing today that only military intervention can prevent the genocide of Darfur, or who argued yesterday for military intervention in Bosnia, Somalia and Rwanda to ease the sectarian violence that was tearing those places apart.
Suppose we had not invaded Iraq and Hussein had been overthrown by Shiite and Kurdish insurgents. Suppose al Qaeda then undermined their new democracy and inflamed sectarian tensions to the same level of violence we are seeing today. Wouldn't you expect the same people who are urging a unilateral and immediate withdrawal to be urging military intervention to end this carnage? I would. [...]
Those who argue that radical Islamic terrorism has arrived in Iraq because of the U.S.-led invasion are right. But they are right because radical Islam opposes democracy in Iraq.
That last point is a subtle one. The presence of terrorism in Iraq has less to do with the presence of US troops, and more to do with the presence of would-be Iraqi democrats (lowercase-d).
Understand the difference? For this reason, violence will not subside if we leave Iraq. The presence of such democrats would ensure that their repudiation (read: genocide and exile) remains a violent priority.
If violence were to subside in our absence, it would be due to the successful elimination of anyone fighting for first-world values, ie, the true liberals.
I really don't know who Rachel Lucas is, but bloggers are talking about her and if they are linking then clearly I must and she is kinda funny. Here.
Tyler Cowen has a very interesting article over at the NYT on the main driver of inequality in this country:
The most commonly cited culprits for the income inequality in America — outsourcing, immigration and the gains of the super-rich — are diversions from the main issue. Instead, the problem is largely one of (a lack of) education. [...]
For the economy as a whole, labor’s share of national income has stayed roughly constant at just above 70 percent. What has changed is that highly skilled laborers earn more labor income than low-skilled workers. [...]
Starting about 1950, the relative returns for schooling rose, and they skyrocketed after 1980. The reason is supply and demand. For the first time in American history, the current generation is not significantly more educated than its parents. Those in need of skilled labor are bidding for a relatively stagnant supply and so must pay more.
This supports my previous riff on the education premium. Similar to many free-market types, I do not believe than reducing inequality is a feasible or even desirable goal. This is for two reasons.
First, if our goal is to improve lives, we must focus fundamentally on economic progress, ie, wealth creation. A shorthand for this is to increase the size of the total pie. The mechanisms that increase the total pie (education, good salaries, low taxes) also have the effect of increasing inequality.
Secondly, and relatedly, when one talks of reducing inequality, what one typically means is clipping the high-flyers, as if they were the problem. High income earners, pretty much by definition, are the ones creating wealth -- read, jobs and products. To argue that their success should be limited in the name of equality is to argue that a smaller pie will serve our needs better than a larger one.
Cowen puts it this way:
Nor should we be distracted by the gains of the top 1 percent. The goal should be to elevate the poor, not knock down the tall poppies. Microsoft has created cheap software and many jobs, and its co-founder, Bill Gates, is giving away most of his fortune.
The next time that a privileged person complains about inequality in this country, you should kindly point out that education is its primary driver. Outsourcing, unions and immigration are very small potatoes by comparison.
If a person really believes that inequality must be reduced, then it follows that having a four-year degree contributes to the problem. Can one live with that on their conscience?
Of course, such an argument is reductio ad absurdum. Education is obviously good for all involved, and we should consider the possibility that this is true for other drivers of wealth.
Most arguments which advocate equality over progress, when you look at the evidence, are similarly self-defeating.
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Update: Here is a bit more from the WSJ [may require subscription], which cites that educated workers earn 75% more than less-educated workers, even after factoring out experience levels and gender. Lots of good info, read the whole thing.
Ann Althouse has some fun with a NYT article on why men aren't found at adult education classes:
You want to explain the behavior of the people who are not doing something, so... why not ask the people who are doing it? Talk to the women and the educators who attract them to find out what's motivating the men who aren't there. [...]
But it would be so easy to turn that around and present the male side as positive.
Men prefer to look at something they have decided to do and figure it out on their own. They like to observe, analyze, and discover. They accept the risks and enjoy the excitement of trial and error. They don't like sitting around having someone tell them what to do, and they aren't intrigued by the prospect of meeting women who spend so much time doing something they loathe.
Funny stuff. When trying to understand why men don't take classes, they talk to women who do. This is a journalistic technique I call "conspicuous absence" -- a piece that goes on at length about a type of person, while not actually talking to that type of person.
(This is a lesson I am learning in business, too. It is often most valuable to talk to those people who aren't your customers.)
Ann may be on to something with her alternative take on male learning. For me, I like the idea of classes, but often find myself bored by the reality.
When I research a topic (usually something techie), I prefer to do it on my own. I know what my priorities are, what I am trying to accomplish, and can browse a lot of sources to pick one which suits the need. I have more "ah-ha" moments, which triggers some pleasure center in my Neanderthal male brain.
Hell, it's probably the same part of brain that holds the hunter-gatherer instinct. Scan for clues, pick up a trail, follow it through the brush, and (hopefully) get a payoff at the end. «Snort, grunt»
A teacher would have a hard time replicating that experience. The great ones do, I suppose.
Business Week reports on the struggles of municipal wi-fi to gain a foothold. I think it's a fine thing that private companies are trying to make this work -- but the fact that it inevitably involves the local government means that it won't die when it should.
The first rule for promoting a new technology is to make sure it works. So it's a surprise when a four-person team from EarthLink Inc. (ELNK) tells me that the wireless broadband service the company is rolling out for the city of Anaheim, Calif., won't work in a coffee shop there. This is the same Starbucks (SBUX) where the EarthLink folks had just spent an hour pitching their Feather service. "The walls are too thick," explained Cole Reinwand, vice-president of products strategy and marketing. [...]
[I]n buildings of more than three stories, you need additional receivers to boost the signal. [...]
With only 2,000 subscribers in the five cities that are up and running, CEO Mike Lunsford told analysts in April that it will reduce plans to bid on more cities so it can "demonstrate the marketability" of Wi-Fi.
As I've mentioned before, municipal wi-fi is a solution in search of a problem. Most people have their needs served indoors and outdoors, and muni wi-fi seems to be aimed at a strange niche: people that want mobile Internet, yet only out of doors and only within the city limits.
Cynthia over at IP Democracy offers her own experience:
Get too far away from the transmitters and you’re out of luck. Go into a building with thick walls and the signals just can’t through. If too many people are on the network, the speeds drop to below dial-up levels. Most of the time muni-Wi-Fi is a Rube Goldberg proposition and, to make matters worse, even when everything is working well, customers aren’t flocking to it.
I don't mean this as schadenfreude -- I live on technological progress. The great thing about truly free markets is that we get a lot of hard information, very quickly, about the applicability of a solution to a problem. If there is city money involved, however, that market information tends to fall on deaf ears.
There has been talk of shield laws for both journalists and bloggers lately, promising to protect us from being legally compelled to reveal sources. Sounds well-intended enough -- certainly we would like our journalists to be able to operate without being punished for doing their jobs, right?
And yet few people have recognized the risk entailed in the idea of a shield law: it gives the government the power to decide who is and isn't a legitimate "journalist".
As with most well-intended regulation, it will likely have the effect of aligning the interests of government and journalists. After all, a journalist with special legal protections (ie, a license) now has something to lose -- and it would be a shame to lose that privilege, wouldn't it? Many, consciously or otherwise, will find that the best way to protect the privilege is to stay in the government's good graces. (My friends on the left would call this "co-opting".)
We've seen this dynamic again and again in the case of industries that have been regulated with the goal of "protecting" some constituency or another. That industry's loyalties are no longer simply with consumers -- now they have also to keep the rulemakers happy. Shouldn't journalists' primary benefactor be their audience?
If there is to be a shield law of some sort, it must apply to citizens, not a newly-created class of citizen. In other words, I don't think journalists are special. Asking government to define "journalist" or "journalism" is an Orwellian exercise.
Or am I looking a gift horse in the mouth?
I am about as qualified to speak about immigration as Tom Tancredo is to talk about technology. But that's never stopped me and John Carroll, an eminently sensible nerd, from doing so. Check out this column while you are in the neighborhood. Here are some previous rantings of mine. Aren't you a lucky son of a gun.
Municipal Wi-fi projects are getting scaled back further as cities and companies begin to realize that no one is actually demanding them:
[...] the stark reality is that someone still needs to pay for the infrastructure and the cost of running the network.
Now as operators move beyond proof-of-concept networks, they are re-evaluating their business models to ensure they can make money. This means carefully selecting the cities where they want to build networks and demanding more assurances from cities that they can get enough subscribers to make building the network worthwhile.
The biggest sign of a shift came last week when EarthLink, which has won 13 citywide Wi-Fi contracts, said it plans to cut its spending for municipal Wi-Fi and will refocus its strategy to build out networks in cities where it already has contracts. Chief Executive Michael Lunsford said during the company's first-quarter conference call that it would only consider taking on new contracts in larger cities, such as Chicago or Los Angeles, where presumably the chances of turning a profit are higher.
I am glad that the market is bringing some rationality to the situation. I've pointed out in the past that these sort of government initiatives have very few of the disciplines of a free market. Which is to say, money is spent independent of any verifiable demand.
Municipal wi-fi has been a consistent money-loser [pdf] because the market simply won't support it. Why? Think of it this way...
There are two places we use the Internet. Indoors, most people have a fast, reliable connection that is anywhere from 5 to 20 times faster than the wi-fi that SF is promising.
Outside of the house, a wireless service has many attractions. But why would anyone pay for a service that only works within the city limits? Sprint, Verizon and AT&T offer wireless Internet throughout the country, and WiMax is developing apace. The advent of the iPhone will goose this demand further.
So really, the niche for city-wide wi-fi is quite small. It's good for those people who want a mobile Internet, yet rarely leave the city. Funny demographic, no?
The good news is, the market is routing around our slow-moving, wasteful municipalities. Ubiquitous wireless Internet is happening, and (god willing) government will have little to do with it.
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Sadly, cities and their anointed vendors are sticking taxpayers with the bill for these unwanted toys (from link at top):
Recently, MetroFi, which has signed contracts for several major cities including Portland, Ore., also shifted its business strategy. The company is now requiring cities in which it provides free, ad-supported Wi-Fi access to commit to being anchor tenants. This means that the city will be contractually obligated to buy an agreed upon level of service from MetroFi in exchange for the company building the network in that city.
The economic term for this is "circle jerk". It goes like this:
This is the model that gave us our current public utility system, by the way.
My prediction: municipal networks, even the successful ones, will be largely ignored by the public, even if they continue to make news. We'll keep paying for them, though.
