Category: Government

This can’t be right.

From a story about a teen bride and her 40-year-old husband suing to get a few of her belongings back from her parents, I found this statement from the attorney for the teen’s parents a bit odd:

[Robert] Tatum said case law establishes that a minor’s property and earnings belong to the minor’s parents if obtained before emancipation. That was the case with Windy, since she was given all her gifts before getting married, he said.

That can’t be the case law. Can it? I have no idea, and I’m sure the specifics refer to North Carolina where the case is located. But that’s just bizarre to me.

I’ve said that permitting parents to force circumcision on their infant sons is tantamount to treating the child’s body like property. It’s easy to understand that a minor’s earnings are more nuanced than his physical body. Still, how can this be seen as anything other than treating children like productive assets for the parents?

Link via To the People.

UPDATE: Point #2 in Kip’s comment is the key. Mr. Tatum spoke in terms too general for the lay person. In the proper context of understanding the law, I have no problem with such precedent. As I suspected but left unclear, the nuanced part of the case law is the key. It wins here.

If you can vote, you’re blameless to a politician.

From George Will in today’s Washington Post:

Moral hazard exists when a policy produces incentives for perverse behavior. One such existing policy is farm price supports that reduce the cost to farmers of overproduction, and even encourage it. Another is the policy of removing tens of millions of voters from the income tax rolls, thereby making government largess a free good for them.

If there’s one thing government is good at, it’s repeatedly amplifying moral hazards into a populist zeal for worsening the problem. Will’s column deals with the sub-prime mortgage meltdown and how Democrats are inevitably going to exploit it to push stupider economic policies to “protect” the little guy. Will points out that the primary problem with this is that the little guy who gets protection is the same little guy who willingly entered into the deal that is now causing him problems.

Granted, Democrats would seek to take from him if he’d won, exactly as they want to take from the big guys who won. So we should just ignore that some little guys won, too, and some big guys lost. That’s capitalism. Democrats don’t like capitalism.

Never trust a politician with your wallet.

I understand the appeal of a Pigou tax to counter the negative effects of gasoline use/carbon output. Theoretically, it’s perfect because it puts the burden on the user creating the problem, which is where it should be. In practice, I see no reason to trust politicians to stay within the bounds of the plan and not dip a finger or shovel into the funds. For example:

President Bush spoke out Thursday against increasing the gasoline tax, an idea being discussed as a potential part of a new Congressional plan to shore up the nation’s bridges after the deadly collapse in Minneapolis.

I get the idea that those who use the road would be paying for the road. That’s fine, except why should bridges be federal expenditures? So why should a national gas tax, collected and managed by the Congress, be used in this capacity? And isn’t a gas tax supposed to offset the negative environmental outcomes of burning gasoline?

Representative James L. Oberstar, Democrat of Minnesota and chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, suggested this week that a tax increase might be needed to finance a proposed trust fund to repair bridges in the Federal Highway System, [sic] A large percentage of the bridges have been identified as having structural problems.

The key here is that, under current Congressional “leadership”, a large percentage of bridges managed by the federal government have uncorrected structural problems. The same legislative body that allowed this situation to develop without adequate (though, not necessarily appropriate) funding is somehow competent to manage a new influx of cash. Gotcha. I certainly trust the Congress to spend increased gas taxes where they’re needed. It’ll be just like shoring up Social Security with the trust fund receipts.

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On an amusing side note, President Bush is certainly bold:

Asked about the gasoline proposal, which could amount to an increase of 5 cents a gallon under schemes floating around Congress, Mr. Bush said, “Before we raise taxes, which could affect economic growth, I would strongly urge the Congress to examine how they set priorities.”

More than six years in and he’s finally suggesting that Congress examine how it sets priorities. It’s not like he could’ve vetoed any excessive spending and request that it be redirected to infrastructure. (Again, I’m only conceding that the federal government is involved in infrastructure, not that it should be involved.) No, he’s solely the tool of Congress to approve what they approve.

Or he could examine how he sets priorities. If I recall correctly, and I do, several years ago President Bush was busy demanding that the Congress pass a bigoted constitutional amendment. Apparently hating gays is a higher priority than preventing bridges from falling down.

Legitimate is the enemy of more revenue.

I never got around to writing about the egregious fines (multi-year fines for minor infractions to “generate revenue”) for traffic offenses that went into effect in Virginia July 1st. As expected, they’ve already been struck down as unconstitutional, although not for the reason I would’ve guessed. There’s still a long path before the fines are history, but the political nature of the discussion is fascinating in exposing exactly how uninterested politicians are in leadership.

Del. David E. Poisson (D-Loudoun), who voted for the transportation package, said he expects the fees to surface in his race against Republican challenger Lynn Chapman.

“I was never a fan of the abuser fees,” Poisson said. “I spoke against them when the session ended and continue to maintain that they’re not a reliable source of transportation revenue. But it was very, very clear to me that this was, at least in the view of the majority, an essential ingredient in the overall package. Had we opposed any element of the package, it all would have failed.”

If the majority (Republicans) supported it, I don’t understand why it would’ve failed if the minority (Democrats) had opposed it. What I see is political shenanigans on both sides. Republicans wanted to get something done without raising taxes to pay for it. Democrats wanted money to spend, period. I won’t accept “I voted for it but I really opposed it.” Principles, principles, principles. This is more conspiring than opposing forces compromising.

Economics won’t bow to populism.

Because Democrats incorrectly believe government is part of the solution, not part of the problem¹:

While John Edwards was winding up a tour of America’s most impoverished areas, another Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), came to Anacostia yesterday to stake his own claim as a poverty warrior — and to present a vision for fixing struggling inner cities that directly challenges that of Edwards.
…

To the Edwards campaign, Obama’s move to address poverty is a sign that Edwards has shifted the debate. “This is another example of Edwards leading on the issues and other candidates following,” campaign spokesman Eric Schultz said.

The Edwards campaign should refrain from patting itself on the back. Every economic populist in this (or any) campaign will wrap himself in this issue. That’s what economic populists do. It’s always a marketing push to the middle rather than an economic push to the top.

¹ Note that this does not mean I’m against a limited public safety net, which is the claim levied against libertarians. There is a difference in believing that government is ineffective at solving the problem and believing that Americans living in poverty “deserve” to be there or should stay there until they can dig themselves out.

Don’t just “Do Something”.

Never let it be said that Democrats in Congress aren’t living up to their promises to reform the system.

Farm bloc lawmakers yesterday offered the U.S. fruit and vegetable industry $1.8 billion in new federal grants over the next five years as part of a farm bill that would leave in place far larger subsidies for grain, cotton and dairy producers.
…

The package, unveiled yesterday by Committee Chairman Collin C. Peterson (D-Minn.), also increases funding for land conservation, wetlands protection and nutrition programs — popular with environmental groups and urban lawmakers.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) called the package “a good first step toward needed reform.”

Right, so reform means keeping large subsidies and adding smaller subsidies. Can we have the old status quo?

I looked through the entire article, and the only mention of reform, defined quite loosely as a change in actions, is this:

Federal payments to private crop insurers would be reduced by about $1 billion over 10 years to free funds for other priorities.

An earlier subcommittee draft of the farm bill would have merely extended the current farm subsidy programs. The proposed new version would do away with some price guarantees and allow farmers to opt for an income guarantee instead.

Taxpayers will save $1 billion over 10 years, which will be immediately shifted to some other spending “need”. Like income guarantees. But at least Congress wants to phase out price guarantees.

I was not blind to the devil’s bargain in 2006 I used to vote for Democrats to replace Republicans. They’re both irresponsible. But I don’t know what’s worse, abandoning principles or being so stupid that you ignore the electoral justifications behind your victory. I’d already made up my mind that I won’t make that mistake in 2008. I’m just amazed that Democrats keep trying so hard to reinforce my decision.

Witnessing Violence Against the Constitution

Here’s a reminder that politicians are the same, regardless of party affiliation. Politics is about power, to the exclusion of ethical statecraft.

The long-awaited Rockefeller TV-violence bill will be introduced before the August recess, says Steven Broderick, press secretary to Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.). The bill would give the FCC the power to regulate violence on cable and satellite, as well as on broadcast.

It will also likely require the FCC to define indecent violent content, a call the FCC punted to Congress in a report it issued several months ago.
…

He also is buoyed by the change in congressional leadership. A similar bill that Rockefeller introduced in 2005 did not go anywhere.

“Last time, Congress was under different management,” says Broderick. “Times have changed, and programming on TV has changed.”

Broadcast restrictions on cable and satellite will never hold up to court scrutiny, so it’s not worth discussing. It is useful as a reminder that politicians consider the Constitution a mere suggestion for legislating.

I’ll also be quite amused if the FCC can come up with rules for indecent violent content. It’s perpetually ignored such demands for verbal and sexual indecency, preferring the power option that allows it to threaten with unwritten rules. Also, it shouldn’t be the FCC’s job to set the rules. If Congress feels it should make such laws in the face of “Congress shall make no laws”, it should at least determine the specifics of its disregard. Eventually, that must fall to court review, as well.

With that out of the way, let’s look at broadcast schedules (remember, cable and satellite are irrelevant here) to examine Mr. Broderick’s statement that “programming on TV has changed.” The Fall 2005 broadcast television schedule:

  • 24
  • Prison Break
  • CSI
  • Law & Order
  • Bones
  • Ghost Whisperer
  • Criminal Minds
  • Lost
  • Alias

The Fall 2007 broadcast television schedule:

  • 24
  • Prison Break
  • CSI
  • Law & Order
  • Bones
  • Ghost Whisperer
  • Criminal Minds
  • Lost
  • Heroes
  • Jericho

If I’m reading that correctly, the only difference in the two schedules is the subtraction of Alias (boo!) and the addition of Heroes and Jericho. Comparing Alias and Heroes strikes me as an even trade on the violence scale, so Mr. Broderick is essentially saying that the addition of Jericho now justifies government regulation of television content. Does Sen. Rockefeller really want to hang this bill on that argument?

Link via Hit & Run

House Backs Meddling in Different Ways

When writing legislation to tinker with an already broken system, it’s best to understand which assumptions are flawed. First, the set up:

House Democrats pushed through legislation yesterday that would boost government-subsidized student loans and other college financial aid by $18 billion over the next five years, despite strong opposition from Republican lawmakers and a White House veto threat.

The legislation, passed in a 273 to 149 vote, would cut interest rates on federally backed student loans in half and increase Pell grants for low-income students. It would pay for the measures by slashing subsidies to lending companies by about $19 billion over five years and use about $1 billion of remaining savings to reduce the federal deficit.

Cutting subsidies is always good, but to divert the savings to grants and interest-rate cuts, as if Congress can legitimately and arbitrarily cut them to a desired rate and have the outcome be economic efficiency is folly of the highest order. This plan will no more help students go to college affordably than anything else Congress has tried since it began subsidizing higher education.

But that’s not the fun part. Consider this:

House Republicans also offered a plan yesterday to substitute increased Pell grant funding for the interest rate cuts. They said they favor that approach because more of the money would be targeted to lower-income students, whereas interest rate cuts benefit middle-income borrowers as well.

The most fundamental flaw in higher education is the silly notion that government policy should establish parents as best suited to pay for college. Nonsense. College students are adults, and should be expected to bear the burden. If their parents want to pay, fine. That’s a decision within the individual family. Government should not step in the way.

But undergraduates are almost exclusively lower-income students. They would be lower-income borrowers. If the student’s parents are middle- or high-income, but choose not to pay for college, how is that student any different than the student whose parents would pay for college if they could afford it? The outcome is exactly the same, except the student whose parents are lower-income will get free money from the government. Once again, the government is picking winners and losers based on criteria other than facts.

I wonder why?

[Rep. George] Miller said the changes were necessary to make college affordable to all Americans. “We have an obligation to make sure that students have the maximum opportunity to take advantage of a college education,” he said.

Congress does not have any such obligation. It only has a Constitutional obligation to stay out of the market for college and student loans. If having a college degree is so wonderful, and my two degrees suggest I think it is, supply and demand will sync without help from Congress.

Full disclosure: I received Pell grants all four years as an undergraduate. I also had to repay a significant portion of my student loans early because it was in my mother’s name. Government requirements wouldn’t let me borrow everything in my name, even though I received zero financial support. I repaid the loan early because it was restricting my mother’s access to credit for her needs.

Partisanship vs. the People

Michael Gerson, who’s too regularly full of wrong ideas, discusses child health insurance in today’s Washington Post.

The column is useful enough, since it discusses how to get children covered by health insurance, as well as a glossed-over failure within the existing government structure of providing insurance for children. There’s room for disagreement, despite his opening suggestion, but his conclusion is better than creating a new bureaucracy to do what the government already does. (The government shouldn’t be doing this, and his solution for adults is lacking.)

One sentence is worth excerpting. The story is lost a bit when reading this in isolation, but the context remains.

Fulfilling the most basic parental responsibilities can’t be legislated.

Why not? Politicians (and pundits) seem convinced that many such actions can and should be legislated. At least in Virginia, the laws for restraining children minors under the age of 16 while riding in motor vehicles suggests that basic parental responsibilities are legislated.

I happen to agree with his original statement. (We legislate feeding children sufficiently, for example, but that’s not what Mr. Gerson means by most basic.) As he mentions in his column, almost 6 million children eligible for Medicaid or State Children’s Health Insurance Program aren’t signed up because their parents haven’t filled out the paperwork. That makes no sense. I’m sure most of those 6 million children aren’t signed up because their parents don’t know they’re eligible, but I don’t see how a free society can force people to sign up for public insurance, just because they’re eligible. Providing health care to their children, yes. Accepting public assistance, no.

When we hear that 47 million Americans don’t have health insurance, that means 250 million do. We should learn from the majority more than we decipher problems from the minority. I’m left wondering why, with programs already available, we should create new programs for children and adults in the hopes that we’ll eventually get to everyone. Shouldn’t we investigate why parents aren’t signing up for something that already exists rather than create a new boondoggle that will fall short of politicians’ plans? Our current crop of presidential candidates don’t think so, so the real lesson is that big government conservatism and big government liberalism are more interested in big government than political philosophy. Surprise. Won’t single-payer health care be fun?!?

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A little Michael Gerson bonus, extending from his statement. As he concluded in his Independence Day column:

In America we respect, defend and obey the Constitution — but we change it when it is inconsistent with our ideals. Those ideals are defined by the Declaration of Independence. We have not always lived up to them. But we would not change them for anything on Earth.

So what’s in the Declaration of Independence that Mr. Gerson cherishes?

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

How is same-sex marriage, which Mr. Gerson opposes, not the pursuit of happiness? Is he going to get ignorantly stuck on the reference to the individual’s Creator, read that as a euphemism for his God, and call government intervention okay? He clearly believes he can legislate happiness. If he believes we can’t legislate the most basic parental responsibilities, why not? Legislating signing up for insurance is easier and likely to be more effective than legislating happiness.

Stirring Incomplete Information from Michael Moore

I touched on this yesterday, especially in the comments, but Michael Moore has trouble with facts. I wouldn’t call him a liar, because he’s a skilled propagandist. The facts, out of context, are still the facts. Forget that such abuse of context fails to reveal anything intelligent about policy. As long as it’s a fact, it can be defended.

That’s his tactic today in challenging CNN’s reporting on Sicko, with the requisite omission of any context. For example, Moore praises Cuba’s health system, although the WHO ranks Cuba 39th compared to the U.S. ranking at 37. Moore rebuts this “gotcha” moment from CNN by stating that he put this figure in the movie. Fair enough; I don’t doubt that he did. He’s generally guilty of omission, not commission. He’s a propagandist, so no surprises.

What he fails to do is provide any context for those rankings. The latest link I can find describes it’s methodology in determining that ranking:

In designing the framework for health system performance, WHO broke new methodological ground, employing a technique not previously used for health systems. It compares each country’s system to what the experts estimate to be the upper limit of what can be done with the level of resources available in that country. It also measures what each country’s system has accomplished in comparison with those of other countries.

WHO’s assessment system was based on five indicators: overall level of population health; health inequalities (or disparities) within the population; overall level of health system responsiveness (a combination of patient satisfaction and how well the system acts); distribution of responsiveness within the population (how well people of varying economic status find that they are served by the health system); and the distribution of the health system’s financial burden within the population (who pays the costs).

Broke new methodological ground. Oh, and employing a technique not previously used for health systems. Don’t forget comparing to what the experts estimate. Is it possible to have methodological flaws, or to at least draw irrelevant conclusions based on estimates?

But let’s get to the last two measures. For distribution of responsiveness, how many people in the United States are denied adequate health care, a question independent of whether or not they’ll face an economic burden from that health care? In the answer, would you rather be the average American or the average Cuban? I suppose if you believe that Moore’s visit to Cuba first-rate hospitals was more honest than mere propaganda from a Communist state, the answer isn’t obvious. But any answer other than the U.S. is wrong.

Of course, that doesn’t mean we have the financial burdens perfectly figured out, which is the last measure from the WHO. Again, no one is denied medical care, which should matter. Moore ignores that when he (apparently¹) fails to mention long waits and rationing for essential services in countries with single-payer health care. But specifically to funding, it’s not objective to decide that too many people face economic ruin (not a percentage of bankruptcies, as Moore states, but how many people?) from the system we have, so we should place the burden exclusively on taxpayers. That’s a pre-determined solution without concern for the actual problem, which is economic burden.

If we’re looking to reduce the economic burden from a health crisis, insurance to cover catastrophic medical care is the way to go. Have people pay for their own preventive care, or buy separate insurance for that, if they choose. But disentangle coverage for catastrophic events from coverage for routine care. The current situation we have where the two are co-mingled is largely a government-created problem. Fix the broken government incentive problem by removing improperly targeted incentives, such as tax-subsidized employer health insurance.

Instead we’re left with disingenuous framing of the problem while ignoring what would actually resolve the issues we face. This quote exemplifies focusing on wrong assumptions:

“It is especially beneficial to make sure that as large a percentage as possible of the poorest people in each country can get insurance,” says [Dr Julio Frenk, Executive Director for Evidence and Information for Policy at WHO]. “Insurance protects people against the catastrophic effects of poor health. What we are seeing is that in many countries, the poor pay a higher percentage of their income on health care than the rich.”

Dr. Frenk’s opening sentence is fine, if he understands the true problem. The rest of his quote suggests he does not. If he understood, he would’ve stated that insurance against catastrophic medical events protects people from the catastrophic financial effects. He didn’t, offering only the empty, obvious fact that the poor pay a higher percentage of their income on heath care than the rich. Of course they do, just like the poor pay a higher percentage of their income on food, housing, gasoline, clothing, and every other generally necessary expense. This is not news, nor is it specific cause for government intervention through economic redistribution² and health care financing and provision, contrary to what Moore believes.

Moore also thinks the 20 to 30 percent of Canadians who disapprove of their waiting times for health care don’t matter. The minority never matters to a populist, or the liberty lost to mob rule. Now ask yourself if Moore’s comparison of American and Cuban infant mortality rates, for example, might have a bit more nuance than he’s letting on.

Link to Moore’s rant via Boing Boing. Moore’s rant on CNN here.

¹ Full Disclosure: I still haven’t seen Sicko. Viewing it isn’t necessary for my analysis here. Also, I have no respect for the WHO, since it promotes a gender bias in unnecessary, forced genital cutting, and it’s incapable of understanding that circumcision to prevent HIV infection is better suited for sexually active adults who volunteer for the procedure based on their own evaluation, rather than forcing the surgery on infants who will not be sexually active for well over a decade.

² I wonder what Dr. Frenk’s position would be on taxes to pay for health care. Would he be as distressed that the rich pay a (much) higher percentage of their income in taxes than the poor? If it’s about fairness in percentage, a little fairness in analysis might be useful.