SOCIALISM IN AMERICA

Excerpt from Democracy Project

According to today's New York Times: "The strongest job market New York City has had in decades has not helped the city's youngest workers find jobs, leaving them at risk of becoming permanently unemployable..."

New York is the city with the strongest unions, the highest taxes, the most government intervention and the most welfare. It is the city closest in the nation to a socialist model. Yet, New York has largely excluded minority youth from employment. The reason is in part lack of access to a failed educational system that relies on the failed theories of John Dewey, but also, that union entry restrictions limit minority employment in the construction crafts, and that political and business connections are necessary for jobs that rely on government support and political largess. Those without connections or an Ivy League education find themselves excluded from New York's socialist economy.

In this regard, there is a marked parallel between Paris and New York . Just as the French have relied on a heavy dose of socialism or dirigisme in their economy and have excluded low income minorities from participation in their economy, resulting in the riots in the banlieue, so New York has excluded low-income minorities. Both Paris in New York can be proud of their socialist policies.

The process by which socialist economies exclude minorities is administered wages. Administered wages are wages above the market clearing level. One key cause of administered wages is labor unions. Labor unions push for higher wages, but in order to pay higher wages employers must reduce the number of workers and substitute capital for labor in the form of machinery. The excluded workers can move to Colorado or London or start their own businesses, but if they lack basic skills they may end up unemployed. This crowding out effect is characteristic of socialist economies where workers are paid above-market clearing wages.

India is a more extreme example of socialist oppression of the poor through this crowding out effect. In recent years liberal economists have complained about income inequality and its supposed ill effects. There is no data or economic theory to support this argument. In fact, when income inequality was at its apex in the late 19th century and early 20th centuries, the United States first developed the telephone, kerosene (and subsequently gasoline), the light bulb, AC electricity, mass production of the automobile and a wide range of other innovations that subsequently improved life.

When income equality increased in the mid twentieth century due to punitive income taxes, innovation slowed. The mid twentieth century is best remembered for Elvis Presley rather than technological innovation. It wasn't until after the Reagan tax cuts in the early 1980s that the pace of innovation increased. Now our geniuses from the liberal economics establishment, the ones who brought us our piddling social security benefit and who apologized for Stalin in the 1930s, for Mao in the 1970s, and gave us stagflation in the 1970s, are arguing for a renewal of punitive taxation. True geniuses.

****************************

ELSEWHERE

Excerpt from an NYT editorial. No political bias, of course: "The Bush administration's assault on some of the founding principles of American democracy marches onward despite the Democratic victory in the 2006 elections. The new Democratic majorities in Congress can block the sort of noxious measures that the Republican majority rubber-stamped. But preventing new assaults on civil liberties is not nearly enough. Five years of presidential overreaching and Congressional collaboration continue to exact a high toll in human lives, America's global reputation and the architecture of democracy. Brutality toward prisoners, and the denial of their human rights, have been institutionalized; unlawful spying on Americans continues; and the courts are being closed to legal challenges of these practices."

Fresh doubts about the dubious "Lancet" study of Iraqi deaths: "The implication of the Lancet study, which involved Iraqi doctors knocking on doors and asking residents about recent deaths in the household, was that Iraqis were being killed on an horrific scale. The controversy has deepened rather than evaporated. Several academics have tried to find out how the Lancet study was conducted; none regards their queries as having been addressed satisfactorily. Researchers contacted by The Times talk of unreturned e-mails or phone calls, or of being sent information that raises fresh doubts.... Professor Spagat says the Lancet paper contains misrepresentations of mortality figures suggested by other organisations, an inaccurate graph, the use of the word "casualties" to mean deaths rather than deaths plus injuries, and the perplexing finding that child deaths have fallen. Using the "three-to-one rule" - the idea that for every death, there are three injuries - there should be close to two million Iraqis seeking hospital treatment, which does not tally with hospital reports. "The authors ignore contrary evidence, cherry-pick and manipulate supporting evidence and evade inconvenient questions," contends Professor Spagat"

Blacks who want to be "Indians": "The Cherokee Nation vote this weekend to revoke the citizenship of the descendants of people the Cherokee once owned as slaves was a blow to people who have relied on tribal benefits. Charlene White, a descendant of freed Cherokee slaves who were adopted into the tribe in 1866 under a treaty with the U.S. government, wondered Sunday where she would now go for the glaucoma treatment she has received at a tribal hospital in Stilwell. "I've got to go back to the doctor, but I don't know if I can go back to the clinic or if they're going to oust me right now," said White, 56, a disabled Tahlequah resident who lives on a fixed income. In Saturday's special election, more than 76 percent of voters decided to amend the Cherokee Nation's constitution to remove the estimated 2,800 freedmen descendants from the tribal rolls, according to results posted Sunday on the tribe's Web site." [We also have in Australia whites who claim to be Aborigines]

Rare union realism: "In an about-face that bespeaks the stark reality of the financial situation facing the United Auto Workers union and the Big Three U.S. auto makers, members of the UAW local at Ford Motor Co. are taking various initiatives to help the financially beleaguered car company cut costs, concessions that would have been unthinkable years ago. "Ford is in a desperate situation. If this company goes down, I want to be able to look in the mirror and say I did everything I could,A" Jerry Sullivan, head of the largest United Auto Workers local at Ford Motor Co., was quoted as say by The Wall Street Journal. After years of fighting for higher pay and job protections, Sullivan, for example, has encouraged his members now to accept the outsourcing of company factory jobs to lower-paid workers and to work new shifts without being paid the overtime they would have earned under better times. Once rated the most efficient Detroit auto maker, Ford lost $12.8 billion last year"

Pakistani policeman murders Ahmadi "infidel": "The Ahmadi sect is one of the few Muslim groups that eschews jihad violence, and for this reason among others it is persecuted and vilified as heretical by other Muslim groups. Westerners sometimes point to the Ahmadiyya as evidence that Islam can reform and become peaceful, and attach a great deal of hope to the sect. But before they can become the vanguard of Islamic reform, other Muslims will have to stop killing them."

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

**************************

"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party".

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

****************************