Another Modest Proposal

Go here to see a list of the misfortunes hitting young workers in the ObamEconomy. 

Sad, isn't it?  And research suggests that the longer you go without that first job, the more you'll exponentially fall behind those who were able to get a job. 

But I have an idea....

Let's make it illegal to pay workers less than a certain dollar amount per hour.  That way, there will be more earned money in circulation, the workers will have more to spend and it'll help the economy, and greedy corporations won't be able to "exploit" young workers by paying them less than the amount that I think is appropriate. 

That should help. 

Globalization - Whose Wife Will She Be In The Resurrection?

This is from the Gospel Of Luke, Chapter 20:27 

Now some Sadducees, who claim there is no resurrection, came to Jesus and asked him, “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies and leaves a wife but no child, the man should marry the widow and have children for his brother.  Now there were seven brothers. The first one married and died childless.  Then the second.  And the third married her. In the same way, all seven died and left no children.  Finally, the woman died, too.  Now in the resurrection, whose wife will the woman be, since the seven had married her?”

It was during moments like these that Jesus would freak out and start throwing things and calling people "Sons Of Vipers" and "Whited Sepulchres".  He supposedly wanted to worry about the big questions.

Fast forward 2,000 years.   

If you are a U.S. citizen, you pay people to walk around the countryside, into our ports, ships, warehouses and trucks, and ask the following questions.....

Who made this?
Where was it made?
Who paid for it to be made? 
Did it ship assembled or unassembled?
What is it made of ?
For what purpose?

Billions of dollars are paid, or not paid, based on the answers to these questions.  There are tens of thousands of different import rates for different products and purposes.  It all depends on which lawmakers have been paid off, and if they've remained paid off.  (I'm working on an epic post about the tariff implications of X-Men Action Figures representing humans or non-humans.  True story.  It made hundreds of thousands of dollars' difference in the taxes/tariffs. Stay tuned....) 

Anyway, I work for a Texas company that hired a Cambodian to design this clothing fixture that was prototyped by a Serbian for an Italian clothing company and made in China under the oversight of a French manager for use in stores in Japan and Russia. 

It's called "Globalization".  I hope that you all are adjusting to it nicely.  Whatever you're using to read this rant, that device is affordable because of Globalization. 

When goods and services can cross national boundaries as easily as they currently cross zip codes, you will be able to knock another 10% off the price you pay for just about everything. 

So.... If you had to put a nationality on this clothing rack, what would it be?  Whose wife will it be in the Resurrection?  How long is a string?  How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?  And why does it still matter? 

Why We Don't Need To Wait For Superman

A few nights ago I finally watched the documentary "Waiting For Superman".  It's about the experiences of several families who are trying to get their kids out of failing or sub-standard public schools, and into charter schools, magnet schools, or other experiments. 

The critique of the current system is devastating.  Principals and superintendants can't fire teachers (without devoting their lives to the process, anyway), some kids run wild, and a lot of the kids get put on the public school-to-prison-pipeline. 

Here's the trailer for the documentary.  It has seen some vicious attacks by the unions, but the fundamental premise of the film remains intact: Give people a choice, and the people and systems will improve.  




And boy-howdy, do we now have some choices.  If you're the type of person likely to read the blog of a redneck shipping manager, you're probably the type of person who was bored out of his freakin' mind during school.  You had to learn at the pace of the slowest person in your class.  You despised the busy-work designed to keep you quiet while the teacher graded papers. 

Look at the amazing stuff that is now out there.....

Several years ago, MIT's Salman Khan was trying to tutor his cousin in math.  He got frustrated with the crap handed out by the schools, and started making math videos.  He's now made FOUR THOUSAND OF THEM.  Yes.  FOUR THOUSAND.  Visit Khan Academy.  Prepare to be amazed.  Still a work in progress, but look at the effort that has gone into this thing.  A kid can watch the video whenever he wants, take the tests, and pass on to something new.  No waiting around.  (I'm brushing up in a few areas where I was the slowest kid that everyone else had to wait on.) 

Tyler Cowen and Alex Tabarrok have done something similar with MRUniversity (Marginal Revolution).  I'm taking the Development Economics course.  If you can hit this link without wanting to take a course, then watching American Idol just might be why God made you.  People pay tens of thousands of dollars for this info.  I'm just sayin'.....   

And for the true-believers out there, you can always Learn Liberty. 

We have a lot of kids, especially minorities, who are being forced to sit in a cinderblock room all day without accomplishing anything. 

Let's give them a choice.  Let's turn them loose in another environment and see if they don't do better.  Absolute loyalty to petrified opinions about education has never broken a single chain or freed a single human to a better life. 

This is almost a solved problem.  Great time to be alive, if we'll just let it happen. 

Margaret Thatcher - R.I.P.

I've been trying to think of the right things to say about the Iron Lady's passing.  I've failed. 
Perry de Havilland, my good buddy that I've never met says it all: 

Maggie Thatcher pissed off all the right people and I swung her name around like a handbag with a brick in it.


Go here.  Read the whole thing. 

Barack Obama on the Boston Marathon bombing

Someone programmed The Teleprompter Jesus to make the following statement about the Boston Marathon bombing: 

"On days like this there are no Republicans or Democrats....We are Americans, united in concern for our fellow citizens ... We still do not know who did this, or why. But make no mistake, we will get to the bottom of this."

Let me fix that for you, Barack. 

"On days like this there are no Republicans or Democrats, only subsidizers of Lockheed-Martin, Bell Helicopter and Northrop Grumman.  We are hostages of the military-industrial complex, united in concern for saving jobs at General Dynamics and this is the price we pay for full employment in those industries.  We still do not know who did this, but if you had a foreign army in your nation, you would probably do the same thing and set off a few bombs yourself.  But make no mistake...I'm not going to chance my stance on undeclared wars, the military-industrial complex, the American empire, or colonialism." 

Hope this helps. 

A Hypothetical Question On Why You Took Your Income Tax Deductions

Thanks to heroic efforts on the part of Mrs. Sepulchre, we're going to get a $4.00 check (of our own money) back from Obama. 

We claimed every possible deduction.  Work mileage, political activism for non-profits, charitable deductions, and on and on and on. 

I don't speak for Mrs. Sepulchre on this website. 

But the reason I like to take every possible deduction is that I think I can spend my money better than Barack, Boehner, Reid, Rick Perry, and whichever Monsanto employees are running the FDA this week. 

I believe that every single dollar given to the U.S. government will be, at worst, spent on very bad things for very bad reasons, and at best, spent more inefficiently than it would be spent in the private sector. 

That's why Libertarians take every possible tax deduction. 

If you're not a Libertarian, what was your excuse for doing the exact same thing?