TTSR Union Myths

Writing Inspired by The Thomas Sowell Reader, by Thomas Sowell, pages 71-72, Union Myths.

When a jar is not broken, you do not fix it, unless of course you are one of the many Government Unions looking to steal the contents of the jar in the name of improvement.  This is the situation of the so-called “Employee Free Choice Act”, which does not actually provide employees with more freedom but enables unions to control them. 

The way the current system works when decisions of company unionization arise is by taking an employee ballot.  The National Labor Relations Board oversees the ballot to ensure that it is fraud free and that a person’s vote is kept completely confidential unless that person shares his decision with others.  In the new “Employee Free Choice Act”, a union does not need to win a ballot to gain control over a business; they simply need to collect enough signed cards to have a majority.

Since the first Presidential election in 1788 ^[1], the purpose of elections has been to enable voters freedom of choice without fear or coercion.  This freedom is loathsome to the unions because it allows workers the choice to refuse unionization in their workplace.

In the world of “Employee Free Choice”, the unions will have the power to harass citizens into signing them in for multiple terms since most people will give in to per pressure or other forms of intimidation.   Therefore, the union has the ability to force its way into office.  It might still be expected of the union to serve the people by doing their job of organizing and helping the workforce, but the union’s wonderful work can be seen in the way they siphon money off the businesses that provide a living for hundreds of people.  Unions do not make money, for businesses or for themselves, but take it from tax paying workers, although there is a limit to how long they can siphon it.

The president of the United Mine Workers from 1920 to 1960, John L. Lewis ^[2], was the most famous union worker of his time because of his increased wages and new job benefits for coal miners.  Although the workers could not have gained these advantages through the free market, they came at a cost.

Between the high wages and the strain on the coal supply, prices went up, causing many businesses and homes to switch to oil.  This caused many coal miners to lose their jobs and even more when the high wages increased the incentive to replace workers with machines.

The end result by the 1960s was a huge decline in the employment of coal workers, leaving many mining towns desolate and virtually abandoned.  

Four years after John Lewis retired, on September 14, 1964, he was awarded the Presidential Medal Of Freedom that read "[An] eloquent spokesman of labor, [Lewis] has given voice to the aspirations of the industrial workers of the country and led the cause of free trade unions within a healthy system of free enterprise."^[3]

Even when unions are utterly and completely failing, they still stop to congratulate themselves for the wonderful difference they are making in the lives of the unionized workers.

[1]Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UMWA

[2] Wikipedia: Lewishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_L._Lewis

[3] "John L. Lewis". Retrieved July 23, 2011.

TTSR One-Stage Thinking

Comments on The Thomas Sowell Reader, pages 69-70, One-Stage Thinking.

In our busy lives, how many of us stop to think about the future results of our current action?  How many times have you wished to change a decision because of unforeseen consequences?  The importance of thinking ahead cannot be overstated, for the lack of it produces poor choices and even worse outcomes. 

The question “What will happen after that”, helps us to look past the short-term benefits and into the long-term outcomes.  Asking this several times will dig even deeper into the possible future outcomes to expose minor and major problems. 

All the time, people make dreadful decisions based on current circumstances that are not sustainable.  In Zimbabwe, the government issued serious price cutbacks in June of 2007.  The people enjoyed the bounties of this decree during a short-lived shopping spree.  After that, the market halted and devastation hit.  The later benefits were clearly described:

  “Bread, sugar, and cornmeal, staples of every Zimbabwean’s diet, have vanished…Meat is virtually nonexistent, even for members of the middle class who have money to buy it on the black market…Hospital patients are dying for lack of basic medical supplies.” ^[1]

What the decision makers failed to consider was that suppliers usually meet a high demand with a high output but when the demand is low, the output slows to a low.  The supplier has difficulty functioning with a low demand and forcibly low prices because his profits may be too low to acquire the materials for his output or it may not be worth his effort to be a supplier anymore.  This is not a confusing principle, especially for people trained in economics.  Yet, this shortsighted decision still happened and for just that reason, it was short sighted and not properly thought out, if it was thought out at all beyond the first wave of benefits.

[1] Michael Wines, “Caps on Prices Only Deepen Zimbabweans’ Misery,” New York Times, August 2, 2007. Pp. A1, A8.

 “By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.”

― Benjamin Franklin

Lamentations 1:9  

“Her uncleanness was in her skirts;

she took no thought of her future;

therefore her fall is terrible;

she has no comforter.”

Proverbs 15:22

“Without counsel plans fail,

but with many advisers they succeed.”

Acts 24:2  

“…Since through you we enjoy much peace, and since by your foresight, most excellent Felix, reforms are being made for this nation,”

TTSR Anti-American Americans

Comments on The Thomas Sowell Reader, pages 60-61, Anti-American Americans.

Some of the most complicated and difficult things to ponder, outside the topic of religion, are alternate choices in history.  Some Americans  say we should not have bombed Japan in World War II but are they considering the alternatives.  If atomic bombs Little Boy and Fat Man were not used to defeat and bring Japan to a complete surrender, would the alternate war endings be any better than the real one?  If an invasion was attempted, American and British troops would have met harsh opposition on the landing beaches and in civilian homes.  Besides having military troops, the Japanese were training and propagating civilians, children included, to die defending their homeland.  Even if by some miracle the Allies losses were not astronomical, Japan would still have suffered great casualties from combat and suicide.   As it was, 90,000–166,000 Japanese were killed in Hiroshima ^[1] and 60,000–80,000 were killed in Nagasaki ^[1] while the Allies suffered zero casualties.

We can theorize and calculate statistics of the ‘what if’ scenarios but we can never know what things would be like if the atomic bombs had never been dropped. 

[1] "Frequently Asked Questions #1". Radiation Effects Research Foundation. Archived from the original on 19 September 2007. Retrieved 18 September 2007.

“Anyone who doesn't take truth seriously in small matters cannot be trusted in large ones either.”

-Albert Einstein

“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex... It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.”

-Albert Einstein

TTSR Mascots Of The Anointed

Comments on The Thomas Sowell Reader, pages 57-59, Mascots Of The Anointed.

A recent New York Times article ^[1], that told the sympathetic story of fading prison inmates, had more purpose than just enlightening its readers.  This article was centered on Allen Jacobs, sentenced to two to four years of prison at the Coxackie Correctional Facility in New York City for passing forged checks.  Jacobs lived life hard for fifty years and now, due to his liver failure, he faces a fate he never wanted, death in prison.  While one of the facilities volunteers was with him he broke down crying and explained how much he did not want to die in Jail.  Of course he did not want to die in jail, but it was his choices that lead him to poor health and a prison sentence.

Stories like this are circulating the news constantly.  Although they do encourage people to take action for change, many articles have a twist.  One of these reports started out about releasing handicapped and sick convicts and it ended by advocating prison inmates over fifty be released.   The night and day difference between releasing criminals who are weak, dying, or impaired as to releasing healthy criminals who are hiding under the umbrella of age is appalling.  I’ve seen my eighty-year-old Grandfather shoot clay pigeons dead-on with a shotgun.  Fifty-year-olds are not going to have any trouble causing trouble, but that is all hidden under the mascot’s costume.

So why are the Anointed ^(*) taking pains to publicize the unfortunate circumstances of others?  Because those whom society has condemned---criminals, illegal aliens, bums, ect.--- are eligible to become mascots for the Anointed, symbols of their superior knowledge and overflowing goodness.  By showing concern for those society shuns, they think themselves morally superior to the rest of us. 

Is it worth all this?  To them it is of the most importance.  Abraham Lincoln said that the greatest danger to the future of the United States was not from foreign enemies, but from the class of people which “Thirsts and burns for distinction.”

Now, after you have read this, and seen an example of the Anointed’s use of these people, will you question whether the News you read and shows you watch are setups for the Anointed’s distinction?

[1]  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/18/health/18hospice.html

(*)  “The Anointed” refers to those that have bestowed on themselves special regard, higher authority, and greater insight.  Those three things make up who the anointed see themselves as.

 “Some of the biggest cases of mistaken identity are among intellectuals who have trouble remembering that they are not God.”

― Thomas Sowell

Proverbs 26:16  

“The sluggard is wiser in his own eyes

than seven men who can answer sensibly.”

Psalm 64:5  

“They hold fast to their evil purpose;

they talk of laying snares secretly,

thinking, “Who can see them?””

TTSR Little Things

Writing inspired by The Thomas Sowell Reader, pages 54-56, Little Things.

Is it a reasonable expectation for the younger generation, children in elementary school, to grow into respectful, law-abiding adults?  Most people would say yes, but if they really thought about it and knew what is being expected of and taught to these young children, they might not. 

I was shopping at a mall recently when I noticed some parents explaining to their daughter that they would not see Santa that day.  The little girl stomped her feet and became very angry, yet, the parents did nothing.  They kept walking through the store as if nothing was wrong.  I have to wonder whether the parents care about training or disciplining their daughter, but either way, doing nothing will get the same results as not caring.  If that little girl turns into to an unruly teenager, her parents will probably ask themselves “What happened?”

At just about any time of day, you can see rebellious teens on TV.  On an episode of “World’s Strictest Parents” I saw a teenager refuse to eat with his family.  His mother asked him nicely, and he refused, she reasoned with him and he rudely walked away.   There was no firmness, no authority, and no discipline yet the parents wondered “Why are they like this?”  The teen commented later “She doesn’t understand me or why I’m doing what I am and I can’t explain it.” Bad behavior like this does not appear overnight.  It all starts with just a few incidents that were not properly corrected.

If you did not discipline your toddler and he became troublesome, would you send him away during the day to be the responsibility of a schoolteacher?  Many parents do, thinking that the teachers will straighten them out.  Teachers do not want to deal with wild children any more than the parents do.  Some teachers will try to help them; some will look the other way.  At the end of the day, it is not a teacher’s job to imprint their own ideals of obedience upon students.  

The day that parents leave their role as a parent to teachers is a sad day indeed, but why should we be surprised?  Those parents were probably raised in a very similar way, being sent to school to become the responsibility of a tax funded teachers union, therefore, the cycle is repeated.

Proverbs 22:15  

“Folly is bound up in the heart of a child,

but the rod of discipline drives it far from him.”

Proverbs 23:13  

“Do not withhold discipline from a child;

if you strike him with a rod, he will not die.”

Proverbs 29:15  

“The rod and reproof give wisdom,

but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother.”

TTSR Meaningless “Equality"

Comments on The Thomas Sowell Reader, pages 51-53, Meaningless "Equality"

In the abundance of a politician’s vocabulary, ‘Equality’ seems to be used most in matters where it is completely inapplicable.  For equality to be honestly discussed, the subjects must be commensurable ^[*] which in most cases, they are not. 

Conflict between men and women for equal rights has been about equality the whole time, but did any of the campaigners for women’s equality ever stop to consider that men and woman are not commensurable?  If they did, they would see that no matter how men and women are treated, they are never going to be equals.  First of all, God created man first and then woman to be man’s helper.  Secondly, women are the reproducers of the human race.  They cannot do it independently but men cannot even try.  Men will never know what it is like for a woman to go through nine months of an emotional roller costar, and that is just the beginning.  After a baby is born it needs constant care from its mother that a father cannot provide.  In short, men give up nothing for a person to be born, while women sacrifice a part of their lives.  Totally incommensurable.

So then, lets take an example of an equality struggle that is commensurable, like Northern Europe vs. Southern Europe.  Northern Europe has been ahead of Southern Europe for centuries industrially and technologically.  They were not always this way though.  Before Northern Europe’s time of glory, the South was the dominant power.  It was the desire to surpass their rival that helped the North achieve such advances.  These two are commensurable because both can be held to the same standards.

Similarly, a century ago Japan was inferior to the West as far as their productive capabilities.  No one felt this more than the Japanese themselves, but that feeling of inferiority was what drove them to improvement.  A country is like a person.   He will not rise to prominence through meaningless debates or pointless speeches.  There must be a purpose or a goal that people desire for a nation to prosper.

[*] Measurable by the same standard. Two concepts or things are commensurable if they are measurable or comparable by a common standard.