Economics and Social Policy XXV

Welcome to the December 17, 2006 edition of E&SP.

Steve Bainbridge takes on Tyler Cowen on Investment Banker Salaries on Professor Bainbridge's Journal.

Because managing the compensation of top executives is less than perfect, and is often only subject to competitive pressure after continuously poor performance.

Of course, the more relevant question is why can’t I get one of these gigs?

Tom Blumer presents Women?s Workforce Participation in 7-Year Drop: The Economic Impact on BizzyBlog. “GDP has gone up at a rate comparable to the 1990s in spite of women not participating in the workforce to as great an extent as they did durng the 1990s."

As Mr. Blumer notes, at least some of this is due to measurement issues. This is likely to increase as the economy continues to shift toward a dispersed and contractual workforce.

On the plus side (WARNING! Sexist UN-PC Commentary Ahead!!), there will be a positive societal benefit to having the mothers of young children work less and mother more. The idea that motherhood can be contracted out to a mini-parent factory was always on shaky ground. As the late Jeanne Kirkpatrick noted, you can have it all, just not at the same time”.

Trevor Burrus presents Milton Friedman RIP posted on Symbolic Order, saying, "A retrospective on Friedman's life and a discussion of how his works helped expose the difference between "being" and "seeming" moral."

A nice tribute to Prof. Friedman.

In the “picking at nits” department, I’m not sure that I’d group Sowell and Gilder in with Hayek and Mises, two of the heavy lifters in economics of the last century. Sowell may get there – Knowledge and Decisions was an important book. Gilder? I’m skeptical.

Charles Feldman: U.S. Solves Housing Shortage-Puts Everyone Behind Bars on The Feldman Blog. .

There’s certainly some truth to the notion that the ‘war on drugs’ has both increased our prison population as well as reduced our liberties and increased the size and scope of government.

However, why would anyone believe the official prison statistics for, say China? Or why not count the entire (non-CP member) populations of North Korea or Cuba? They’ve essentially been sent to life in prison for simply being born in the wrong place.

Leon Gettler notes that Laws undermine trust posted at Sox First, saying, "When things go wrong, the usual response from politicians is to bring in laws to restore public trust. But it never works. In fact, tough laws only make things worse."

Yup, nothing like adding an ‘enrich the auditors and consultants’ level of regulation to slow down your economy. Follow his link to the article in The Age.

Mister Juggles presents The OJ Simpson Corollary posted at Long or Short Capital.

Riversider presents One Law For Them - One Law For The Rest posted at Riversider.

I’ll confess to being amused at the ‘loans for peerages’ scandal, since the Lords haven’t had any power to speak of in a hundred years or so. The English system is unbalanced precisely because there is no effective check on the government’s power.

Stephen W. presents My Perspective on Smoking posted at Project Paradox.

I’m not a smoker, but I’m contrarian enough to want to start after hearing some of the more inane anti-smoking commercials.

From the State’s perspective, the more smokers the better. More tax revenues, more settlement dollars from the tobacco companies, and less health care and social security issues since smokers die younger.

Think that there might be a conflict of interest here?

Allan Wallace presents School Choice and Alternative Education posted at BFU - self directed learning for visionaries, saying, "request for comments about alternative education"

Wenchypoo presents This Thing Called Hunger Part III: Personal Abdication posted at Mental Wastebasket.


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