Posted on 09/02/2011 10:32:22 AM PDT by Kaslin
Older people almost always seem to think they had it tougher than “kids today” do. So some older folks are striking back against the privileges enjoyed by today’s young people. And this doesn’t bode well for the future of society.
Consider a recent story out of Pennsylvania. “The owner of a small restaurant outside Pittsburgh is banning children under the age of six, saying they regularly disrupted other customers’ meals,” the Wall Street Journal reported recently. “I’ve decided someone in our society had to dig their heels in on this issue,” the owner (a former teacher, luckily not of grammar) told reporters.
Well, it’s his restaurant, and if he wants to turn families away, that’s his choice. And he doesn’t seem to be facing a lot of pushback. The Journal reports that receipts at the restaurant are up, and notes: “A poll on the website of a Pittsburgh TV news channel found 64 percent supported the under-six ban, compared with 26 percent who said it was a bad idea. About 10 percent said they didn’t care. More than 10,000 people voted.”
Meanwhile, CNN columnist LZ Granderson opines that this restaurant is on the right track. “I don't know about you but I would gladly support an airline or restaurant that didn't make someone else's yelling, screaming, kicking offspring my problem,” he writes. “If you're the kind of parent who allows your 5-year-old to run rampant in public places like restaurants, I have what could be some rather disturbing news for you. I do not love your child. The rest of the country does not love your child either.”
Maybe I’m eating at the wrong restaurants. I’ve had more flights and meals disrupted by unruly (drunk) adults than by uncontrolled children. Still, it seems obvious that many Americans have no patience for the idea that “children will be children” and are instead embracing the wisdom of the Middle Ages: “children should be seen and not heard.”
Ah, but they will be heard from eventually, and we may not enjoy hearing what they’ll have to say. As journalist Michael Barone noted recently, Americans will soon depend on today’s youngsters to pay for the country’s lavish retirement promises.
“[U]nder Social Security, as with most public pension systems, current pensions are paid for by current workers. As lifespans increase and birth rates fall, the ratio of pensioners to active workers falls toward one-to-one,” Barone warns.
“That’s not enough to support the elderly in anything like the style to which they have been accustomed, unless tax rates are sharply increased. And sharply higher tax rates, as Western Europe has shown over the last three decades, reduce long-term economic growth. That’s the problem, often abbreviated as ‘entitlements,’ facing our political system.”
Still, many of today’s political leaders oppose slowing the size and scope of federal entitlement spending. In May, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi told the Washington Post she would fight to ensure “no benefits cuts” in Medicare. “It is a flag we’ve planted that we will protect and defend. We have a plan. It’s called Medicare.”
As for Social Security, “Two decades from now, I’m willing to take a look at it,” Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid told MSNBC in March. “But I’m not willing to take a look at it right now.” Earlier in the year he declared that changes to the program were “off the table.”
Keep in mind that, because parents are having fewer children, each of those youngsters is on the hook for a steadily-growing share of the federal budget deficit. “Our social insurance programs have slowly created a massive and immoral shift of wealth and obligation from today's middle class to future generations,” Stuart Butler of The Heritage Foundation warned in 2007. “Medicare alone now has a $32 trillion unfunded obligation -- a tab that is being passed to our children and grandchildren. Medicare and Social Security together now constitute an unsecured ‘mortgage’ of $170,000 placed in the crib of every newborn American.” The tab Butler cites has only increased in the last four years.
When the time comes to pay that “mortgage” off, however, some of today’s youngsters might decide to change the laws instead. “If, for instance, Congress were to adjust the formula by which Social Security cost-of-living increases were calculated or change the age of eligibility, future federal liabilities would shrink by trillions of dollars instantly,” John Steele Gordon noted recently in the Wall Street Journal.
The lesson? We can either put our own fiscal house in order by reducing the amount we’re promising in entitlement benefits to future retirees. Or we’d better be nice to today’s children, since we’re counting on them to be nice to us when they’re running the country in the decades ahead.
The person who obtains a license agrees to operate under these laws so it's no mystery or surprise to them that I can be refused what is freely provided to others without a sound business reason and not liking kids isn't one of them.
If you watch threads carefully, you will find many of those on FR claiming to be conservative don’t support property rights in any area in which government theft of those rights benefits them. Moreover, there are many here who hate “redistribution” by the government, unless it is to them - typically in the form of an SS check or Medicare.
I think every business owner should be able to free to refuse service to anyone for any reason. The market can decide whether a particular business owner has been taking wise choices regarding whom he will and will not serve.
I think every business owner should be free to refuse service to anyone for any reason. The market can decide whether a particular business owner has been taking wise choices regarding whom he will and will not serve.
read “cannot be refused”
Really? You would disrespect the wishes of the owner and lawyer up instead of just going elsewhere?
That's a real conservative position there - NOT.
Why can't you respect the property owner? What do you have against private property rights?
Would you lawyer up if the policy of the establishment required a tie and you weren't wearing one and you were turned away?
It's actually totally amazing. And it has been getting worse, rather than better over the years.
The number of so called conservatives that actually applaud the ever increasing nanny state laws seems to be increasing rather than decreasing around here. And the vast majority of nanny state laws all encroach on private property rights in one way or another. Yet they are applauded right here.
It is scary.
You may disagree with what the law says but as a business owner you would still have to comply or face crushing legal costs.
It’s that simple. If you really think every, every business, should serve only whom it wishes then the private water company in my old neighborhood should be able to refuse water service to blacks or Jews or old people.
Maybe the the electric company could too since it was privately owned or the ambulance service.
How does that sound? Who should sit and freeze in the dark until the market decides against the business?
Wells.
Generators.
Private transportation of my own.
Nice attempt at diversion, but it won’t work.
You can not compare being served on another’s property with being provided necessary services on your own property. There is no comparison.
Admit it, you support nanny state laws to prevent private property openers from making what they consider to be best business sense decisions because they inconvenience you.
That is a fantastic example of what is known as 'begging the question'.
My kids behave better at restaurants than they do at home. They’ve been told for years that the owner of the restaurant does not have to serve them. He can throw them out if they cause trouble, and never welcome them back again.
I think kids should be given the chance to eat at restaurants. They need to learn about that part of life. But if they cause trouble, out they go. And, yes, when our kids were little, we had a number of times where one of us took the loud kid out to the parking lot while the other parent and child finished their meal.
I don’t like this policy of no kids in the restaurant because it is like they’re guilty until proven innocent.
These type policies have been around forever. It is nothing new. It is only making headlines because some folks have complained, and they are most likely the guilty parties that have kids that have caused these businesses to implement these policies.
Would you support a law that stated the restaurant could not do this?
Amen. If a business says no kids, fine. If a business wants a “no guidos” sign, fine by me.
Guido-friendly establishments will pop up and those who like to be around guidos will go there.
Hmmm, no. It’s a cultural debate and I’m for cultivating a better American culture, not a larger matrix of laws.
I only asked because that is exactly what this debate is going to be the precursor of. Someone will go to their city councilman or state representative and request introduction of an ordinance/law to prohibit restaurants from instituting these policies.
There’s nothing “conservative” about turning away a child from a restaurant. And you’re quite right I would get legal help in protecting his rights and mine in a heartbeat.
Racism, class discrimination and the like are not “conservative” by any definition I’ve ever heard and they most certainly are not rights to be exercised against others. And “conservatives” do obey even the laws they disagree with don’t they?
As to dress codes they may represent a legitimate business need like not wearing Levis in an office setting or must needs a coat and tie in an upscale eatery.
There’s nothing conservative about telling a private business who they have to let in.
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