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Single-Provider Education, Ideology, and Lunch

16 Sunday Feb 2020

Posted by Nuetzel in Education, School Choice

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Tags

Identity Politics, New York Times, Packed Lunches, Private education, Public School Monopoly, Scale Economies, School Choice, School Lunches, Slate, Social Justice

Advocates of public education sometimes can’t help themselves from demanding that parents abandon their own informed judgments and principles for the good of the collective. A friend sent me the links below along with his misgivings about the motives at play. These are his words:

“Here are two examples of something that drives me crazy and amounts to little more than treating my child (and me) as a [resource] to be spent for the improvement of others. The first calls for parents who pack lunches (because they are healthier and cheaper than school lunches) to stop packing and use the school hot lunch so the added scale of moths could improve foods for everybody.

The second is the same, but about attending public school instead of private – again, so that the parental force added to the public schools will help improve public schools. Never mind if public schools are actually good for you.” 

The links are from the New York Times and Slate, respectively:

Why Are You Still Packing Lunch for Your Kids?

If You Send Your Kid To Private School, You Are a Bad Person

In terms of the simple economics, I’d boil these motives down to two things: a desire to achieve scale economies, which is forgivable as far as it goes; and a desire to strengthen the public education monopoly. Of course the latter brings perks for all those who participate in the management and operation of public schools, which have absorbed an ever-increasing volume of resources with little or no improvement in academic results. But the motives involve politics as well as economics. The apparent mission of the public school monopoly encompasses more than the mere provision of education. As I have discussed in more detail in an earlier post, it fosters the inculcation of collectivist values in our children. Public schools, and a few private schools catering to wealthy progressives who would say public schools are good for your kids, are hotbeds of social justice doctrine and identity politics.

Here are my friend’s closing thoughts:

“I’ve always been resistant to private school because we already pay for public [schools] and public [schools] are good enough. But lately I’ve been thinking about private school, in large part to keep [my son] away from these sorts of folks who want to use him for their own purposes…”

Those purposes can be kept in check only through school competition and parental choice. Like any creditable provider of services, schools should cater to their customers, not the other way around.

 

 

Must Support For “Family Planning” Be Compelled?

05 Monday Oct 2015

Posted by Nuetzel in Big Government, Liberty, Presumptive rights, Property Rights

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Abortion, Compulsion, Federal funding, Free Association, Libertarians, Nonexclusive benefits, Planned Parenthood, Property Rights, Public goods, Reproductive rights, Sheldon Richman, Slate

Fund Me

Where do Libertarians stand on the issue of federal funding of Planned Parenthood? What sort of balance should be struck between the rights of conscientiously-objecting taxpayers and the rights of women to use Planned Parenthood (PP) services? The correct answer has nothing to do with abortion, an issue on which Libertarians lack unanimity. However, the existence of moral objections by any segment of society, whether considered valid by a majority or not, is an important consideration.

Do Individual Freedoms Require Taxpayer Support?

Sheldon Richman discusses the funding question on his Free Association blog in “Planned Parenthood, Social Peace and  the Libertarian approach“. He first makes a basic point: “… no one’s freedom is violated by lack of access to taxpayer money.” I agree, but this statement requires some context. For Libertarians, the baseline is a society in which individual liberty is a presumption. That cannot be the case if taxes and transfers dominate our economic lives. If we’re all busy picking each other’s pockets, then perhaps anyone can lay claim to a dollop of public funds to pay for any damn thing they want. But in a society that explicitly limits the powers of coercive government, private individuals cannot, on the public dime, lay claim to whatever they wish to compel from others. What they desire, after all, is almost always available privately. Therefore, the denial of public funding for PP does not constitute a denial of anyone’s rights.

Individual’s are free to exercise their reproductive or non-reproductive rights as they see fit, and to pay for related services themselves or by seeking a benefactor. Nothing is deprived to that individual other than an invalid claim on the belongings of others.

“Individual rights ultimately boil down to the single right to be free from aggression, that is, to self-ownership. Rights would be defined out of existence if they could be ignored whenever doing so would make someone else’s objectives easier to accomplish. Such an approach to “rights” would turn rights theory on its head by making us a mere means to other people’s ends rather than ends in ourselves.“

Consistent Application of Property Rights

Richman asserts that the right of ownership of one’s body applies equally to the right of individuals to the income they produce:

“Ironically, the right to choose abortion is defended as an application of the right of women to their bodies, that is, as a property right (self-ownership). Another implication of the right to one’s own body is the right to control the fruits of one’s labor (income). No coherent theory of rights can permit a clash of the right to one’s body with the right to the fruits of one’s labor. Thus implicit in the pro-choice case is an argument against tax funding of Planned Parenthood (and anything else), that is, against taxation itself.“

Leftist elites say that a denial of public funding for PP is tantamount to a denial of service to low-income women. Richman asks the elites to put up or shut up: if they believe the services in question are critical, they are free support PP financially, but they much prefer to extract resources from taxpayers without regard to possible moral objections.

Protection of Religious and Moral Principles

Richman adds the following thoughts on public funding of Planned Parenthood near the end of his post:

“Reasonable people of all persuasions should see that it is simply unreasonable to force people to finance an organization they find morally offensive. Thomas Jefferson famously said, ‘To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves is sinful and tyrannical.’ Compelling men and women to furnish contributions for the performance of services they deem immoral (whether or not they are) is worse.“

Supporters of public PP funding have sought to deflect morality-based opposition with the contention that abortions represent only 3% of PP’s services, but Slate debunked that claim over two years ago. It was based on a count of tests and procedures performed, not on revenue. PP also claims that tax funds never pay for abortion, but as Richman points out, once available, the revenue is fungible and may be used to cover the cost of any procedure. In short, the argument is specious.

The Public Good Argument Is Weak

One more elephant in the PP funding debate concerns the appropriate functions of government. Does PP provide a truly “public” good, one having benefits that are nonexclusive to the primary user? Health services are sometimes assumed to confer public benefits; that is an easy argument in the case of infectious diseases and to some extent for medical research, but not for most health services. The benefits of individual health services are largely private, providing little justification for government funding of PP from a public finance perspective.

Collective Action Needs Strict Limits

Collective action should be confined to the provision of public goods, but even then it can be fraught with conflicts, such as the difficulty of accommodating pacifists during wartime. A truly liberal society will do all it can to accommodate diverse beliefs by allowing objectors to opt out, if possible, or avoiding the funding of private activities, especially those over which there is significant dissent. Under no circumstances should one be compelled to pay for private services that they find to be morally objectionable.

White House Spins Weak Obamacare Enrollments

24 Monday Aug 2015

Posted by Nuetzel in Markets, Obamacare

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Tags

ACA, ACA Exchange enrollment, ACA premium increases, Cronyism, Death Spiral, Heartland Institute, HHS Inspector General report, Insurer subsidies, Marco Rubio, Medicaid enrollment, Obamacare, Open enrollment, Rand Corporation, Reason Magazine, Robert Laszewski, Scott Walker, Slate, Somewhat Reasonable blog, Special enrollment period, Verification of eligibility

obamacare-humor-Screw

The Obama Administration is trying desperately to burnish the record of the President’s signature “achievement”, the Affordable Care Act (ACA), a.k.a. Obamacare.  That’s a tall order, unless the subject is the ACA’s remarkable triumph for excellence in high cronyism. Otherwise, little wonder that they tell only part of the Obamacare story. Robert Laszewski recently examined ACA’s enrollment in more detail and found the record rather dismal. He notes the following:

“… the Obama administration is just reporting the good news and a good share of the press appears to be happy to pass these numbers along–albeit in a technically correct but hardly complete way.“

Here are two examples provided by Laszewski:

  • The Rand Corporation reported that a net total of 16.9 million people were newly enrolled through February 2015. This was picked up by the press, which attributed the increase to Obamacare. But only 4.1 million of those newly insured came from the individual marketplaces (as noted by Rand). Most of those eligible for coverage through the marketplaces have not enrolled. Most of those who have enrolled were qualified for subsidies. Another 6.5 million came from Medicaid, which is free to those who qualify for that program. 9.6 million came from employer-provided plans, which has much to do with improved hiring over the past two years, as opposed to the ACA.
  • There were almost 950,000 new enrollees during the “special enrollment period” (after open enrollments ended) this year. This was heralded by the media, but little was said about the 1.3 million who dropped off the Obamacare rolls by the end of March. That number will grow once the administration comes clean on the number who have dropped coverage since then.

From Laszewski:

“The Obamacare insurance exchanges aren’t enrolling anywhere near the number of people they were supposed to. And, there is no proof Obamacare has grown since the close of open enrollment. In fact the anecdotal and historical evidence would suggest it is now shrinking.“

Going forward, the prospects for ACA enrollment are not good. As Slate belatedly reported last month, substantial premium increases are expected for 2016. The Heartland Institute‘s “Somewhat Reasonable” blog reports that “Millions of Americans Refuse to Buy Obamacare, Prefer to Pay Penalty“. The total who have refused is 7.5 million, much more than expected, while another 12 million people have claimed that they are exempt from the ACA’s requirements. Obamacare pricing and subsidies contain perverse incentives. It remains to be seen whether the insurers dominating the exchanges will have a sufficient number of young, healthy individuals enrolled and paying inflated premiums to offset the claims of more heavily-subsidized, high-risk enrollees.

There are many other problems plaguing Obamacare, including limited access to health care providers for many enrollees. Reason.com recently asked whether Obamacare is simply too complex to work, a question based largely on the findings of an HHS Inspector General’s report. There are massive issues related to verification of eligibility for subsidies and back-end payment systems for compensating insurers:

“Think of it this way: Before Obamacare, the U.S. health system was like a giant tangled knot. If you’ve ever tried to untangle a big knot, you know that it can take a while, and that the trick is to patiently loosen one bit at a time.

Obamacare’s designers, in contrast, saw that they couldn’t undo the knot, so they added more string, and tied it into the knot that was already there. Now it’s an even bigger mess.“

The so-called Obamacare success story is wishful thinking and shameless propaganda. It has failed to accomplish its goals in terms of coverage and especially cost, it has resulted in lost coverage to millions in the individual market who “liked their plans”, and it has caused millions of others who “liked their doctors” to lose their doctors. Things are not looking any rosier as we approach the implementation of the employer mandate (which was delayed twice) in 2016.

There are many ideas in play for improving health care coverage and access post-Obamacare. Here are summaries of the plans floated so far by Republican Presidential candidates Scott Walker and Marco Rubio. Though neither plan is a detailed as I’d like, some of the proposed high-level features are promising, at least relative to the ACA. There will be more proposals from other candidates before long. I’m hopeful that they will all remember to let markets work.

Nice Splice: New & Old GMO Varieties Blossom

16 Thursday Jul 2015

Posted by Nuetzel in Biotechnology

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Bill Nye the Science Guy, Bt gene, Dan Charles, David Wolfe, GE food., genetic engineering, genetic modification, Glyphosate, GMO food, golden Rice, herbicide resistance, Lydia Ramsey, Monsanto, NPR, Ringspot virus, Roundup Ready, Slate, William Saletan

image

Good for Bill Nye the Science Guy! And separately, good for Slate! First, the pop “scientist” Nye has turned the corner and now understands that genetic engineering (GE) and genetically modified organisms (GMOs) represent wonderful technology, holding great promise for humanity. Here is what he describes as the key:

“This is what changed my mind, is being able to do [sequence genes] 10 million times faster than they used to be able to do it … and being able to eliminate the ones not suitable for farming and susceptible to diseases and so on. We’re farmers, and we want them to come out the way we want them.“

Lydia Ramsey, whose post at Business Insider is linked above, distills Nye’s position this way:

“We are a society of farmers, and for thousands of years, farmers have been doing everything in their power to get the most product from their labor. Genetically modified crops are a way to do that.“

Apparently Nye is also impressed with the lengthy selection process and careful testing  that takes place before GMOs are ever brought to market. That contrasts with the nonexistent testing that is typical of conventional cross-breeding and irradiation, which can result in millions of gene mutations.

Nye, a mechanical engineer by training, probably knows enough science to recognize that there is a massive volume of literature that testifies to the safety of GMO crops (see here and here).

In Slate, William Saletan has written an excellent report entitled “Unhealthy Fixation“, and subtitled “The war against genetically modified organisms is full of fearmongering, errors, and fraud. Labeling them will not make you safer.”  Saletan emphasizes that GE is not any one single “thing”, but instead is a process. He discusses the histories of four distinct GMO issues:

  1. Overcoming the devastation of the papaya ringspot virus;
  2. Crops with a single Bt gene inserted versus Bt insecticides used on organics;
  3. Malnutrition, childhood blindness, and Golden Rice;
  4. Herbicide tolerance, farm productivity and herbicide overuse;

The fourth issue is an unfortunate aspect of our experience with GMOs, even to this day: much of it has related to strains of GE crops that are resistant to herbicides, glyphosate being the most prominent (until the patent expired in 2000, Monsanto’s Roundup was the only brand). In the public imagination, GMOs are almost synonymous with “Roundup-ready” crops. Glyphosate is only one type of herbicide, however, and there are significant benefits to herbicide-resistant crops, some of which are created without the help of GE. But herbicide-resistant crops are only one type of GMO. There are many other GMO varieties, and Saletan provides a long list of varieties in the pipeline:

“… drought-tolerant corn, virus-resistant plums, non-browning apples, potatoes with fewer natural toxins [and fewer carcinogens when fried], and soybeans that produce less saturated fat. … virus-resistant beans, heat-tolerant sugarcane, salt-tolerant wheat, disease-resistant cassava, high-iron rice, and cotton that requires less nitrogen fertilizer. … high-calcium carrots, antioxidant tomatoes, nonallergenic nuts, bacteria-resistant oranges, water-conserving wheat, corn and cassava loaded with extra nutrients, and a flaxlike plant that produces the healthy oil formerly available only in fish.“

Saletan bemoans the dominance of the herbicide industry in commercial applications of GMOs. He wants the food industry and regulators to move forward with the many other promising GE applications like those listed in the quote above. He also rightly blames anti-GMO activists for holding up promising varieties:

“First, it’s true that the issue is complicated. But the deeper you dig, the more fraud you find in the case against GMOs. It’s full of errors, fallacies, misconceptions, misrepresentations, and lies. The people who tell you that Monsanto is hiding the truth are themselves hiding evidence that their own allegations about GMOs are false. They’re counting on you to feel overwhelmed by the science and to accept, as a gut presumption, their message of distrust.“

There is a lot about GE technology for farmers and consumers to love. Many detractors seem unaware that life-saving products like insulin are made with GMOs, or that GMOs are in widespread use in the production of products like cheese, beer, and wine. The anti-GMO drumbeat goes on, however, promoting myths like the five discussed here by Dan Charles at NPR. This includes the fallacy that farmers saved their own seeds for planting until Monsanto came along. A particularly egregious piece of recent propaganda was a video promoted by the huckster David Wolfe. It involved a family who ate only organic food for two weeks and saw the trace levels of pesticides in their urine vanish. Of course, the researchers did not test for organic pesticides, such as Bt, but that escapes the notice of Wolfe’s uncritical acolytes.

You’ll find eight earlier posts related to GMOs on Sacred Cow Chips at this link.

Is Travel Attire So Controversial?

11 Thursday Sep 2014

Posted by Nuetzel in Uncategorized

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Tags

Curb Your Enthusiasm, Endless Summer, Glen Reynolds, Jon Hamm, Larry David, Mark Perry, Slate, Travel Attire

attire-yokozuna

I love this little uproar over appropriate attire for air travel. I’m guilty of wearing jeans, or shorts when I travel to warmish climes, but hey, I wear nice shirts! Mark Perry quotes Larry David on the subject, complete with a video from “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” Perry and Glen Reynolds both link to an article in Slate, “In defense of looking nice for your flight or train ride.” This quote is nice:

“Alas, the general lack of respect for travel, itself, as a worthwhile human experience, seems to be the root of this lazy dressing phenomenon. Many of us act as if we’re trying to create a private, instantaneous bridge through folded space-time between our bedrooms and our hotel rooms by flying in our pajamas or busing behind oversized sunglasses; the bad news is, barring a sudden forward leap in technology, wormhole creation is impossible.”

Reynolds agrees that you’ll be treated better if you don’t look like a slob; he likes to wear a sport coat for air travel because of the extra pockets. He also quotes Jon Hamm on the movie ‘Endless Summer‘ from a Facebook post: “These two surfer dudes travel the world to find the best waves, but whenever they got on a plane, they put on coats and ties.”

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Ominous The Spirit is an artist that makes music, paints, and creates photography. He donates 100% of profits to charity.

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To estimate, compare, distinguish, discuss, and trace to its principal sources everything

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A Commonwealth immigrant's perspective on the UK's public arena.

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The world's most viewed site on global warming and climate change

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Commentary from a Paleoconservative and Nationalist perspective

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In advanced civilizations the period loosely called Alexandrian is usually associated with flexible morals, perfunctory religion, populist standards and cosmopolitan tastes, feminism, exotic cults, and the rapid turnover of high and low fads---in short, a falling away (which is all that decadence means) from the strictness of traditional rules, embodied in character and inforced from within. -- Jacques Barzun

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