The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design. – F.A. Hayek
Posted in Methodology, Welfare State, You Can't Have it Both Ways, labor markets on May 18th, 2012
We had a senior honors student do a paper on the Social Security Disability program that highlighted the trend in Disability takeup rates over the past 30 years and its impact on the federal budget and long-term budget outlook for the entire Social Security program. Today 1 in 5 social security dollars are paid out [...]
Posted in Politics, Welfare State, You Can't Have it Both Ways, labor markets on Apr 8th, 2012
Did you ever notice that when someone tries to point out how “stingy” government support for the poor is, or how “stingy” Walmart is or how bad the conditions of the low-skilled labor markets are that they invoke a kind of rugged individualism that would make Herbert Spencer blush? Seriously. I’ve seen many an argument [...]
Posted in Institutions, labor markets on Mar 7th, 2012
Following an example David Friedman used over 30 years ago when he wrote Machinery of Freedom, let’s ask the question of what it would take for all American workers to buy out the oppressive, exploitive, greedy firms that are keeping them down for the benefit of the 1%. The market value of all stocks listed [...]
Posted in Politics, labor markets on Feb 4th, 2012
It is likely that the decline of private sector unions has led to additional pressure on the federal government to provide a more state-centered medical system. Why? One defining feature of the old-style union firms was their top-notch health care benefits. Therefore, unions would be natural opponents to government intrusions in the health care sector. [...]
Posted in You Can't Have it Both Ways, labor markets on Jan 2nd, 2012
Last Friday’s post may have been uninteresting, but thinking about the grading process reminded me of another “argument” that is presented to me as counter-evidence to some labor market information I present at times. A surprisingly small share of Americans earn the minimum wage or less. When I query students about this, I routinely get [...]
Posted in You Can't Have it Both Ways, labor markets on Dec 10th, 2011
Here’s a light weekend thought to chew on. I accept that many firms are thought to pay “excessive” amounts to compensate their top managers. Indeed, this is one reason the “99%-ers” are dismayed at the world. Under what model are we operating then that finds that firms are extremely benevolent toward one class of employees [...]
Posted in You Can't Have it Both Ways, labor markets on Nov 30th, 2011
By now I am sure you have heard that there are laws being floated which will make it illegal for firms to discriminate against the unemployed when it comes to hiring decisions. Forget for the moment any literal difficulties with identifying whether this is happening, or any other objections you might have to the difficulty [...]
Posted in Fun Facts, Methodology, You Can't Have it Both Ways, labor markets on Oct 23rd, 2011
Steve Malanga reports: Steve Malanga at the Manhattan Institute’s PublicSectorInc.org, Oct. 21: [T]he Bureau of Labor Statistics released 2010 rates of injury and illness in the American work force, and once again state and local government workers on average missed far more days from illness and injury per worker than workers in the private sector. [...]
Posted in labor markets on May 21st, 2011
I just want to say thank you to the waiter from the diner I ate at last Monday. He was one of the few people that I get to interact with in so called “service sector” jobs who genuinely seemed to take pride in his work. I am sure he was not paid great. But [...]
Posted in labor markets on Mar 31st, 2011
Suppose you read a story with the headline: “Study Finds that Smaller Percentage of Women are Admitted to Graduate School than Men: Government Moves to Address this Discrimination.” Is the data evidence of discrimination? Does the policy proscription follow? Let’s put some hypothetical numbers to it. Suppose that for your university, 30% of male applicants [...]
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