Economic Freedom In 60 Seconds

I've been working all day, helping the guys at my largest warehouse get some rush orders moving out to one of the world's largest retailers. 

The drivers of these "hot-shot" vans are, without exception so far, immigrants.  They're from The Ukraine, Turkey, the former Yugoslavia, Albania and Russia (so far).  All of them are in the process of buying their own van, if they haven't so far.  The ones I've asked have said that they want to start their own trucking companies. The only exceptions are the older guys, and they want to help their sons start trucking companies.  

I don't think people are that ambitious when they move to, say, Cuba.  Or even Sweden, which has a relatively high level of freedom.  People come to the USA to make stuff happen. 

Here's something from the Charles Koch Foundation called "Economic Freedom In 60 Seconds".  I love it, love it, love it.  If you get a chance, watch it on Youtube and read the comments.  It has the Statists in a mad, frothing rage.  You know, "How can the Koch brothers say these things when 25% of Americans are in the lowest quartile, and only one American out of a hundred gets to be in the Top One Percent, and blah blah blah". But not a word to contradict the video.  

Enjoy. 

Stuff saved from reading the Internetz

I've been too busy making a living to write anything.  I hope you enjoy all of these in the meantime! 

Our First ObamaCare Meeting

My employer, known on this site as Jukt Micronics, had its first real ObamaCare meetings today. 

Fun, fun, fun.  Lots of Democrats, in Nancy Pelosi's immortal phrase, found out "what's in the bill". 

The good parts, in order.....

1) The rep from the insurance company explained that for the 1st time since 1984, the year of Jukt Micronics' founding, our employees would have to pay for part of their insurance coverage.  Up until The Year Of Obama 2013, we've had 100% of our coverage paid by Jukt Micronics.  That pissed 'em off. 

2) Then they explained that the government (i.e. - The White House) had decided to ignore the law of the land and push back the employer mandate to provide coverage, but did NOT push back the individual mandate to purchase coverage.  The employer mandate doesn't kick in until January 2014.  That pissed 'em off. 

3) Then the poor bastards from the insurance company had to explain that if you didn't purchase their product (or that of a competitor), you had to pay a $95.00 fine, or pay 1% of your income to Obama at tax time.  ($95.00 or 1%.  Whichever is greater.)  And the 1% penalty increases rapidly over the next few years.  That pissed 'em off. 

4) I couldn't help myself.  I asked for some clarification on the pre-existing conditions bidness, the part where insurers can't turn anyone away, and where individuals can sign up for insurance in the ambulance on the way to the hospital, which negates the purpose of insurance.  That pissed 'em off (the insurance reps, not the dumbass Democrats). 

5) They explained that the pre-existing conditions bidness doesn't kick in until January of 2015.  That pissed 'em off. 

You get what you vote for.  Unless, of course, it turns out to be very unpopular.  Then, you get what you voted for, but not until after the November 2014 election cycle. 

This site is now healed

I think, hope, and pray that this site is now healed, and the bugs and viruses are gone....
I can now write on the "compose" page of this thing. 
Can I post pictures? 

Yep.  Looks like I can post pictures. 
Dammit, I just got an error message.  Something about the "autosave" feature not working properly. 

Oh well.  It's free. 

Why stuff you pay for is always better than free stuff

In my quest to read every Pop Economics book ever written, I've come across numerous discussions about why items you pay for are better than things that are free.

Look at the mess going on with Britain's National Health Service. Thousands of patients have needlessly died, but the NHS is "free". Nobody is interested in making a profit, or pleasing customers/patients. The priority is to maintain one's place within the NHS hiearchy by following certain rules. No more, no less. Medical staff don't work for the patients, they work for Her Majesty's Government.

Or try this... Next time Facebook goes through one of its new format changes, try griping to the owners about it. They don't care. You're not a customer. You're a "user".

I got royally pissed when Fox Business cancelled John Napolitano's show. Fox Business doesn't care about my opinion, because I never paid anything to watch Fox Business.

Google's Blogger/Blogspot program is free. Doesn't cost me a dime. I make a trifling amount of money for Google (and myself) with the ads, but Google has bigger fish to fry. They don't care that I can't write anything on the "compose" page. And they shouldn't, even though it's frustrating the crap out of me. I don't send them a check for this thing every month. But if Google's Blogspot staff were a car dealership, I would've driven this thing through their display window sometime yesterday.

That's why Socialism doesn't work, and Capitalism does.

Sorry for turning my little 1st World Problem into a gripe and moan session. I grew up Baptist, spent about 3 decades listening to Baptist sermons, and I now see everything that I experience as a parable.