Archive for May 27th, 2006
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I know that my post title will not set well with many people, but this is not about a popularity contest. Delphi is fighting for its life. There is something wrong with our system when a company can not make the decisions necessary for survival without court approval. Whether people like it or not, it is an economic reality that we are in a global economy. It is more vital than ever that companies are able to take the necessary steps to remain competitive, failing that, they will fold. It is not rocket science and does not take a p.h.d. in economics to figure that one out.
The unions have turned the delphi situation into an “us against them” battle. Us being the unions, them being management. That is utter BS. One can not survive without the other and both sets of jobs are important. The unions are willing to tank the whole company if they don’t get their way, in the process it is likely that GM could be dragged down the drain too. Can someone please explain where the victory is in that type of foolish action? The “if I can’t work, you’re not gonna work” mentality has got to end. It serves no purpose and inhibits free trade and competitiveness, both of which are vital to not only survive, but to also prosper in the world as it stands today.
There are no guarantees in life and unions have to learn that lesson. Putting something on a piece of paper does not trump the natural laws of economics, it just leads to a greater loss of jobs.
This country was founded on principle of freedom, liberty and justice for all, that includes private industry. The unions have to respect that and deal with it or we will travel down the road to being a socialist economy. One only needs to look at the U.S.S.R. to see the results of central planning while ignoring market conditions.
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Run, don’t walk, when someone starts spewing urban planning ideals vs. sprawl. Those lofty dreams have proved time and time again to be nothing but money-sucking ideas. Here’s the latest:New Report Says Restrictive Land-Use Rules Add Billions to Housing Costs
Housing shortages caused by restrictive land-use planning have added hundreds of thousands of dollars to the cost of buying homes in California, says a new report from the Independent Institute, The Planning Penalty: How Smart Growth Makes Housing Unaffordable. The report estimates that planning added anywhere from $69,000 to the cost of median homes in Bakersfield to $850,000 to the cost of median homes in the San Francisco metropolitan area (including Marin and San Mateo counties).
California cities pioneered the use of urban-growth boundaries and other growth-management planning tools in the 1970s. This caused housing prices to increase much faster than incomes and by 1979, California cities that had been affordable in 1969 became some of the least affordable housing markets in the nation.
The penalties of planning are far greater than the so-called costs of sprawl, says the report. The most widely cited study of the costs of sprawl estimates that urban-service costs to low-density homes are about $11,000 more per home than to compact neighborhoods.
“How smart is ‘smart growth’ if it makes every home in a city cost $70,000 to $850,000 more so the city can save $11,000 on a few new homes?” asks the report’s author, economist Randal O’Toole, a Research Fellow at the Independent Institute. O’Toole recommends that cities set user fees and taxes to make sure new development covers its costs and let people make their own choices about where they want to live.
Yesterday’s gleeful dancing on the grave of Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling elicited an unusually large number of anonymous posts from readers eager to pin the blame for Enron on the Clinton administration –”all that bad stuff happened on his watch, so it’s his fault!”
How the World Works welcomes readers of all political stripes, though we prefer it if they attach real names, or at least persistent identities, to their arguments. We generally aren’t predisposed to take an argument seriously if it’s signed “No Name Given.”
Then again, the argument that Enron was Clinton’s scandal and not Bush’s is so absurd that one can understand why no one would put an actual name behind it. Let’s review some history, shall we?
Ken Lay was George Bush’s number one financial backer. During the 2000 election campaign, Bush frequently flew on Enron corporate jets. Bush’s first cabinet included a former Enron executive, Thomas White, as Army Secretary, and two former Enron advisers, Lawrence Lindsey (Bush’s first chief economic adviser) and Robert Zoellick (Bush’s first United States Trade Representative).
Many people are under the impression that the government knows what is best. The government should pass laws regulating people’s actions, even when no one else is affected. All of this legislation has 2 effects - 1. It takes away our liberty, 2. It costs billions and billions of dollars that could be feeding a robust economy.
This is a must read for an enlightened perspective on “big government”.
Visionary leaders of all political stripes have argued against a “paternalistic,” or parenting, role for government. Former President Ronald Reagan argued that “government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves.” Similarly, George McGovern warned, “Our choices may be foolish or self-destructive, but we cannot micro manage each other’s lives. When we no longer hold people responsible for their choices, civility and common sense will be diminished.”
Nonetheless, government seems to micromanage most aspects of our lives these days. Protecting us from ourselves seems to be a common theme in the halls of Congress, regulatory agencies, and state legislatures, be it through anti-smoking laws, laws aimed at curbing obesity, seat belt laws, or the range of other laws aimed at influencing personal behavior to make us healthier.
Government makes us wear our seat belts. It tells us what we should and shouldn’t eat. It tells us which medications we are and aren’t allowed to take and which intoxicants we are and aren’t allowed to ingest, and under what conditions we’re allowed to ingest them. Government tells us some products aren’t safe enough for us to use, even if, fully aware of the risks, we would like to use them anyway. The Department of Justice is now actively pursuing criminal charges against distributors of pornography involving consenting adults. Governments at all levels are also actively attempting to shut down online sports betting and poker sites, apparently alarmed at the amount of money we spend on wagering and games of chance (though they seem to be less concerned about the amount we spend on state-run lotteries).
