Posted on 08/24/2011 4:02:43 AM PDT by Kaslin
We grow up learning that some things are just bad: child labor, ticket scalping, price gouging, kidney selling, blackmail, etc. But maybe they're not.
What I love about economics is that it can show that what seems harmful is actually good for society. It illuminates what common sense overlooks.
This is all covered in the eye-opening book "Defending the Undefendable" by economist Walter Block.
Most people call child labor an unmitigated evil. David Boaz of the Cato Institute and Nick Gillespie of Reason.tv say that's wrong.
"If we say that the United States should abolish child labor in very poor countries," Boaz said, "then what will happen to these children? ... They're not suddenly going to go to the country day school. ... They may be out selling their bodies on the street. That is not an improvement over working in a t-shirt factory."
In fact, studies show that in at least one country where child labor was suddenly banned, prostitution increased. Good economics teaches that as poor countries get richer and freer, capital investment raises the productivity of labor and child labor diminishes. There's no shortcut through government prohibition -- unless you like starvation and child prostitution.
What about price-gouging? State laws attempt to prevent people from charging "unconscionable" prices during emergencies.
"If I'm in the neighborhood of Hurricane Katrina," Boaz said, "what I want is water and ice and generators. ... If you are in Kentucky (and) you've got 10 generators in your store, are you getting up at 4 a.m. to drive all day to get to Louisiana to sell these generators if you can only sell them for the same price you can sell them for in Kentucky? No, you're going to go down because ... you can sell them for more."
Also, if prices rise during an emergency, that's a signal for people to buy only what they most need. That leaves more for everyone else. If the price remains low, an incentive to conserve is lost.
Ticket scalpers are seen as sleazy guys who cheat you by marking up the price of tickets. Profits go to middlemen instead of the performers. What good could they possibly do?
"I like to think of ticket scalpers as the guy who stands in line so that I don't have to," Gillespie said.
Time spent in line is part of the ticket cost. Scalpers let you pay entirely in money, rather than partly in valuable time.
Most people say that selling body parts is wrong.
"It also seems wrong to have people dying because they can't get a kidney," Boaz said.
Some 400,000 Americans are on a waiting list now for a new kidney, and they are not allowed to pay for one.
"We sell hair. We sell sperm. We sell eggs these days." Boaz added.
Gillespie added, "The best way to grow the supply and allow more people to live is to allow the market to price those organs."
Maybe the most counterintuitive position argued on my show was that blackmail should not be a crime. Blackmail (unlike extortion) is the demand for money in return for withholding information. Robin Hanson, a George Mason University economist, defends blackmail.
"The thing you're threatening when you're threatening blackmail (is) gossip," Hanson said. "If it should be all right to tell people, it should be all right to threaten to tell people."
What we don't like, however, is the blackmailer saying, "Pay me to keep quiet."
"But the effect of that is to make people behave," Hanson said. "If we (allow) blackmail, people behave even more because they are even more afraid of what might happen if they don't."
Maybe Ponzi-schemer Bernie Madoff would have been caught earlier?
"That's right. ... Blackmail is actually a form of private law enforcement."
Also, since gossip is free speech, blackmail is simply selling the service of not engaging in free speech. Why should that be outlawed?
I subtitled my last book, "Everything You Know Is Wrong." I was exaggerating, of course, but many things we're taught are fallacies. That's why I like economics. It explodes fallacies.
“When and if we are out bred in sheer numbers and Islam is the government, will you say the same? Are you ready then for government enforced morality?”
There is only one true God...your argument is flawed in it’s entirety.
“Lets stick with Christians. Which sect? Where do you draw the line? Will government enforce morality by plucking out the eye that has committed lust?”
There is only one true God...and the laws of God are plain for all of us.
Human reasoning without consideration of God’s laws is what gave us the Holocaust from the Nazi’s and from Communists. It is what gives us millions of abortions per year. It gives us death, perversion, and all sorts of negative actions and behavior. Libertarians seem to think that they are above all that, but truly just become a part of it by their lack of moral compass. Legalizing drugs is a good example of the flaws in their philosophy. So would legalizing blackmail as was put forth in the article. The assumption is that the blackmailer is telling the truth, but just wanting to get paid for not spreading the truth. That is hardly ever the case...I know from experience. Generally blackmailers take a small truth and add a bunch of distortion and lies to make it seem worse. Then they try to extort money so that whomever the blackmailer does not want to get hurt doesn’t get hurt.
Sometimes I think that our educational system exist for the teachers and not the students.
No educators know why the drop out rate is so high, they just hope the suckers don't catch on. BTW, H.L. Mencken was a high school drop out, Thomas Edison only got a far as second grade and Bill Gates was kicked out of Harvard after his Freshman year.
Of course, it happens. The difference is that it is not tolerated. Someone who is bullied on the job has legal options. Likewise, legal action can be taken against a bullying neighbor. The only area in which bullies can act with impunity is at school, where even if the parents know and complain to the school, action is, far too often, not taken. Too often, the attitude is either that it's just kids being kids, or that the victim should just learn to tolerate such treatment. Just because it's kids involved, doesn't mean it shouldn't be taken seriously.
That's fine until another blackmailer steps forward with knowledge of the crime.
Did I suggest that blackmailing was an appropriate methodolgy? I was responding to the notion that so called rich people prefer paying off someone with affordable cash as opposed to facing the consequencxes of their actions.
I do not buy the argument that blackmail is simply contolled gossip. It is extortion.
The whole reason for the summer break from school was so kids could work on farm in growing season. Kids SHOULD work for their money. Its just a great thing that they no longer have work to contribute to the family income!
Now those who wish to go to an NFL game can buy tickets on the Internet from other fans right up to a few hours before the game. (you just print out the ticket)
Such has made those dudes who want to scalp tickets outside the stadium akin to buggy whip manufacturers.
What is bribing Congress for favors?
Lets stick with "Modern Day Washington Politics" for 200 Alex...
Don’t get me wrong - I’m not down on Stossel. I watched a clip of him earlier explaining the “Broken Window Fallacy”, which was very well done. And I enjoyed “Give Me a Break”.
But this “it’s the economy, stupid” inanity has really infected this country...so much so that we end up applauding blackmail.
Maybe we should start saying, “You’re so stupid you think it’s the economy.” When you’re so “smart” that you can’t learn from the simplest truth, that is stupidity indeed. That’s Stossel sometimes, but I suspect it’s his libertarianism clouding his thinking.
Not tolerated? It is the norm for many managers!
There is almost a complete lack of evidence that the current classroom routine is anywhere near optimal.
Those who come out of public schooling with an education gained that education despite the best efforts of the public school system.
How do you erase the ideas held by 1.5 billion people? Do you erase the people or convert them all?
Will government enforce morality by plucking out the eye that has committed lust?
Are you sure they wont?
Whether blackmail equates to sound economics is arguable in itself, so it hardly qualifies as a case specific arguement for or against your assertion.
Employees have many legal recourses, and I believe that the laws are becoming more proactive on the matter. If certain employees tolerate being harassed at the workplace, chances are, it's because they don't know their rights.
“How do you erase the ideas held by 1.5 billion people? Do you erase the people or convert them all?”
I think you are confused...God’s laws are universal. We all understand them. You don’t have to erase the “ideas” held by 1.5 billion people...or do you think that they exclude those laws somehow??? Only the bad folks do that...
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