Typical...

How about actually being a business person??

 

Thought of the Day

Scenario 1: After spending several years as a volunteer in very poor areas of former Soviet countries, a dentist is struck at how many do not have access to toothpaste because it is too expensive and because people are not aware of its benefits. Out of compassion, he starts a company to produce and sell toothpaste for a low price. Because of this, there is a huge decrease in the incidence of cavities in these countries. He also advertises his product often to promote the use of toothpaste and almost everyone becomes a customer.

Scenario 2: A very greedy, evil man decides he wants to become rich. He sees an opportunity in the market. In the former Soviet Union, he sees very few people using toothpaste. He decides to manufacture and sell toothpaste, but because there is some competition, he offers the lowest price to maximize market share and sales. He often thinks to himself how much he hates the people in the country in general. To get the seal of approval from the Dentistry association, he meets all the safety standards.

In both scenarios, the price of the toothpaste, the number of customers, and the advertisements are identical. In effect, both produce the same results. The population is just as well off in both cases. This is why capitalism is a good system. It does not depend on the morality or goodness of the people involved. In scenario 2, if the entrepreneur produced low-quality toothpaste or harmful toothpaste, he would not get the seal of approval. If the price was too high, he wouldn’t get customers. Capitalism means all people must provide for others. Unfortunately most people do not see this. They say to have good economics, people must be morally good. This is only true of authoritarian regimes. Another common criticism of businesspeople is they are “greedy”. But again, as the example above shows, this is irrelevant. That’s why capitalism is superior to other systems.

Sometimes I wish I was a Liberal!

As a libertarian, we have to give tough answers to tough questions. You realize that 99% of the people you talk to are not on the same wavelength and will summarily dismiss your ideas. Explanations cannot be given in quick sound bites, and even a well thought-out response is routinely accused of being heartless or unworkable. You are accepted by neither conservatives nor liberals. It’s a true uphill battle.

On the other hand, liberals have easy answers. The solution to any given problem lies in simply restating a question as an answer. It’s like a child talking to Santa Claus. He can just ask for whatever he wants. Any questions as to how it happens is answered with “magic”. The kid is satisfied. Asking a libertarian is more like a child asking a parent for something. The parent reminds the child of trade-offs, expenses, limits. The child might be asked to sacrifice, and sometimes after some calculation the child decides the sacrifice is too much.

The “magic” for liberals is the government. The government in the liberal mind is similar to Santa. There are no trade-offs, no expenses, nothing to consider except for the fact that you want something. For example:

Problem: People want education, education is too expensive.

Solution: Government should provide free education because education is a right.

Problem: Healthcare is really terrible. Wait times are extremely long, there are too few doctors, drugs are too expensive, etc.

Solution: Hire more doctors, spend more money.

Problem: Parents find daycare expensive

Solution: Government will pay for it instead!

Problem: I have a pet project that no one wants to pay for.

Solution: We’ll tax people and give you some of the money!

Problem: We want 35 hour workweeks, 5 weeks vacation, a living wage, and plenty of other perks!

Solution: Government will make those all mandatory!

The list goes on and on and you can surely imagine thousands of similar circumstances. It’s an easy Problem-Solution way of thinking. The problem with this thinking is it’s not real. It assumes an omnipotent government that creates laws of the universe, rather than seeing the government as simply one factor in an overall set of factors which can have either positive or negative influences. Trade-offs are rarely considered, and several fallacies are employed, especially the seen vs. the unseen fallacy.

Liberals have solutions which can be spray-painted on placards and chanted at a rally. A libertarian enjoys no such luxury. Going back to the Santa Claus analogy, liberals sit on Santa’s lap and ask for all the stuff they want and Santa, a god-like figure, simply grants them. The libertarian attempts to explain to these children that although what they want *sounds*good, there are other factors they must consider. A person asks for a puppy and the liberal simply says “Sure!” A person asks a libertarian and the response is more like “Well, you must walk the dog every day, you must feed him, clean him, take care of him. You can’t always go on vacation, and you must pay all the expenses. Is it still worth it?” Which one do you think fits on a placard.

Liberals have bought into the idea that far from being a necessary evil, the government is the main actor in an economy. Businesses are pesky toys of the rich, but serve little utility. All good emanates from the government. All action of consequence is a government action. In Newfoundland, this is the dominate view. On open line radio shows, almost invariably the caller will present a problem with the inevitable solution that the government must do something. The absolute dependence on the government is sometimes so shocking it borders on comical, if not sad.

One person wrote into a newspaper about her brother who recently took his own life. After admitting that she thought about contacting him to see how he was, she decided against it. But who did she end up blaming? The government of course. It was the government’s fault there weren’t more people looking after veterans.

This attitude is extremely common. For instance, instead of bemoaning how bad of a son or daughter they are for not providing for their elderly parent, people will get all up in arms about how the government doesn’t have enough retirement homes. Instead of working harder to make more money so one spouse can stay at home, citizens complain there are not enough daycares or daycare employees. This whole attitude removes personal responsibility and thrusts it upon a nameless, faceless entity and is very damaging to society.

I know libertarianism is right, but sometimes it would just be simpler to have easy answers like liberals.

economics vs. freedom

Some people argue in favor of coercion on the basis that it is effective. But that's an immoral an untenable position. I don't really have a whole lot to say here. But we must first understand human rights. Freedom is one such right. So to say we will arbitrarily restrict someone's freedom because that's "better for the economy" is placing expediency above morality. Then humans are nothing more than cogs in the wheel.

You do not have the right to anyone else's money except your own. Stealing it is immoral. That should be a pretty basic fact.

Are Changing Tables in Restaurants a Human Right Now?

Yes, any whim a person has should be turned into a law, enforced by police and military. This is the modern-day thinking process. You want something, demand a law that makes it happen. Of course, there can be no negative consequences to such laws! What stories like this should say instead are: “There should be a law making it mandatory for restaurants to have a changing room for children, even if that means the price of a meal in large places will increase by an average of 10% and the price in a small restaurant will go up by 20% to cover this new cost. I’m okay with reducing millions of people’s quality of life to have my whim of a change room realized. Also, I refuse to entertain the idea of being limited to choosing restaurants which cater to my specific needs of which there are many. Instead, all places, whether they are targeting families or not, must follow my orders!”

At least this would be honest. But instead of this, those demanding such things imagine their orders will have nothing but beneficial results. It would be as logical as saying “I demand that every restaurant I enter gives me a free appetizer! This is a basic human right!” and then expecting prices not to increase or there to be any negative side effects.

Would places which clearly do not cater to children be required to follow this law? What about downtown restaurants which are open late at night for downtown people? What about tiny small-business restaurants with a single small bathroom? Are they required to add a huge extension onto the tiny restaurant that will accommodate a change area?

One response to such questions is that the legislators should take those things into consideration or make precise laws that will meet the needs of the citizens or some other such pie-in-the-sky declarations. As we all know however, laws are almost never precise. They paint broad brushes.

The proper response to such a request is for businesses to provide changing tables in order to attract customers. Similar to this is many restaurants already offer free meals to kids if accompanied by parents. And many currently offer changing tables and many other services.

Another thing concerned people can do is form groups which ask for such things and say they will boycott anyone who fails to comply. That’s fine. Everything is voluntary. But to force a business to take on an expense which they do not believe is in their or their customers’ best interest is simply authoritarianism.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Evil vs. Good Companies

Some people seem to think of everything in terms of good vs. evil when it comes to companies.

The reasoning goes something like this: some companies are evil and therefore mistreat employees, pay them too little, provide poor working conditions, etc. while other companies are run by morally upright owners and managers who genuinely care for their employees and treat them well. Our goal is to promote the idea of morally good managers, whether this means by protesting or by legislation.

Most Christians I talk to see this as the most effective way to improve the lot of the average worker – activism or possibly legislation. But usually the argument breaks down when specifics are introduced. In reality, the morality of the owners and managers has little, if anything, to do with working conditions.

Ultimately this goes back to the fallacy that owners have all the power: they arbitrarily decide salaries, benefits, hours, etc. and the employee is at his or her whim. The only hope the poor employee has to improve his or her situation is through unionism and government involvement.

Intuitively, Christians usually recognize the dangers of unionism and government involvement, but only in the extreme. Nearly none is willing to go so far as to advocate a truly free market. Ironically while they bash socialism, their underlying philosophy is, in fact, based on it. At the same time they barely understand free market theories, much less advocate them.

Because of this, I’ll often hear some sort of middle of the road compromise on any particular economic issue. Something like “I know that productivity is a factor in people’s salary, but I still think there should be basic laws about minimum wage, working conditions, vacation, pension, etc.”

How to Respond:

Number one: It’s very difficult to pull people away from their desire to be an authority. People tend to address problems directly, instead of setting up frameworks under which others can find their own solutions. They see the solution of leaving it to the free market as total chaos, producing uncertain results, which will potentially result in great suffering.

Number two: If the person is open to ideas, which is rare, explain that the laws of economics are in many ways the same as physical laws because people are similar in many ways and respond to stimuli and incentives. In other words, the market will set an equilibrium due to the forces of supply and demand, and personal incentives and motivation. Tampering with this can create a situation which appears better, but will inevitably have unintended consequences, which in every case yet analysed is deleterious overall.

Why the Appeal for Moral Managers is the Wrong Approach

Although tempting because of the way the human mind works, appealing to have more morally upright managers is ultimately useless. Logic and examples prove this point.

Let’s start with some examples:

1.       L.A. Clippers Basketball team owner Donald Sterling was an apparently very racist billionaire. Yet despite his racism, he paid black basketball players millions of dollars to throw around a ball. Even the most loving person on Earth wouldn’t have done more than this. The fact is Sterling had no control over how much he paid his players. Had he decided to act out his racism and pay them $5 per hour, he clearly would not have a team at all. His moral character was in fact unknown until it was exposed, meaning there was no way to derive his morality from what he paid.

2.       McDonalds pays very low wages, with a large percentage of workers making minimum wage. On the other hand, Exxon-Mobil pays really high salaries, many making 5, 10 or 20 times the minimum wage. It is also well beyond the minimum requirements for survival or even a decent life. Does anyone believe this is because McDonalds is run by immoral people while Exxon is run by exemplary and moral citizens?

3.       Even within particular organizations, salaries vary widely. To believe managers are just arbitrarily deciding who gets more and who gets less is rather silly. People obviously know salaries vary for other reasons.

What these examples prove is that a company does not arbitrarily decide wages. If this were so, every company everywhere would pay the minimum possible wage. So what determines wages? The main thing is:

Productivity

Productivity is the value an employee brings to a company. As a simple example, an employee who produces 5 shirts per hour that sell for $2 each, is producing an overall value of $10 per hour. Expenses have to be factored in. But in theory, the absolute maximum this employee could ever be paid is $10 per hour. Any more than this, the company would lose money for every hour this person worked. Demanding the employer be more moral will do nothing to raise this worker’s wage. According to recent studies, about 85% of wages are due to productivity or the value an employee brings to a company, and 15% comes from negotiation. This differs greatly from the traditional view that 90% of wages are just the whim of the employer, and the other 10% comes from the employee’s negotiation skills.

Productivity is determined by a number of factors. One is capital investment. An employee with heavy machinery can be much more productive than one with just a shovel. If a business environment is stable, with good laws, companies will want to do business there and are willing to invest. If it’s an area where equipment and other capital can be randomly confiscated, companies are not willing to invest much. Another factor in determining productivity is employee education and skills. In a low-skill, low-education area, employees are not as productive. They cannot operate equipment or perform complex operations. There is a greater supply of such workers, so they do not have a strong competitive advantage.

There are other factors as well.

Something else to keep in mind is that demand for labour is unlimited. Anybody would love to have several servants to clean their house, make the bed, walk the dog, etc. but usually people just can’t afford it. In order to gain a worker, we must pay more than they can get elsewhere. The reason I mention this is because of the false perception that in some areas, in some industries, companies are free to pay workers any amount whatsoever. This is never the case. Workers always have other options. So when spoiled American and Canadian brats protest a “sweatshop” in Asia and successfully shut it down, it’s not as though the former workers now have well-paid jobs. Instead they are forced to accept their next-best option which in many cases might be difficult physical labour in the sun for 12 hours per day, 6 days per week. If protests shut this new outdoor job down as well, the workers would seek other opportunities. Reducing opportunities is not the answer, but this is the ultimate result of minimum wages, working condition legislation, and any other law that increases the cost of labour above the equilibrium point.

In order to accept the theory I have laid out, we need accept only one thing: people pursue what they believe is their best option. Sure, maybe we can find examples of people who hurt themselves for absolutely no reason and do what they feel is worst for themselves without justification, but they are rare to say the least.

The bottom line is that employers do not determine wages. Wages are determined by market forces. Organizations can interfere in the free workings of the market, but only for an overall worse outcome. There is no free lunch and people must be suspicious when someone comes along claiming a government decree with fix a problem without consequence.

"should be free"

Is there a more useless statement than “this should be free” when referring to something which isn’t? A news article on CBC is talking about how an fireworks event taking place in a public area has an entry fee. It costs the city money to run, but for some reason people believe it should be free. But what that really means is they think someone else should pay for their entertainment. No product or service is really free. As Milton Friedman used to say: there is no free lunch. But people persist with this myth.

1)      It’s not a human right to get a free firework show.

2)      Someone is paying for this, either those taking advantage of it, or everyone else. Why shouldn’t those taking advantage pay for it?

It’s pretty open and shut. But no one protesting such things will ever say what is really happening, they want everyone else to pay for their stuff.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/parks-canada-bytown-museum-charge-to-access-public-spot-during-sound-of-light-fireworks-1.3189476

Newfoundland Loans now Grants

Now you don’t have to pay for your own education, everyone else will instead. Not by choice, but by force. The NL Gov. has declared they will no longer lend people money for education, but rather give them non-repayable grants, meaning it costs nothing for students to take courses. At least on the provincial level.

Studnets are already only paying a tiny percentage of the actual cost of their degree and everyone else is on the hook for the rest. This is even before loans. I don’t have the exact figures on me, but it’s something like students in NL pay about 20% of the cost of university overall. That apparently wasn’t good enough. The loans students used to take out to cover this 20% will now be paid by the government, or at least a large chunk of it.

This is fundamentally a terrible policy for a number of reasons.

1)      It removes the incentive to complete a degree in a timely manner. Not having to pay for one’s education perversely incentives studnets to take forever to complete a degree. Already there are tons of 7^th and 8^th year students. Many do a few years, don’t completely anything then leave. We are all on the hook to pay for them.

2)      People who are hard at work, whether it’s as a minimum wage worker or a high-skilled person, everyone is paying for these kids. When I made minimum wage, huge parts of my check were confiscated by the provincial government. That means minimum wage workers are paying for people to do poetry courses.

3)      This is a transfer or money from poor to rich. The vast majority of students come from rich families. The lower classes of society generally do not attend university. This is not because of the price, but rather because of culture. It’s not part of their culture. Statistics bear this out. So they work hard to pay for rich kids to attend university. Who thinks that’s fair?

4)      If the university has a tuition freeze, plus the tiny part of tuition students actually pay is now reduced even further, this will simply incentivize the university to expand and increase costs. The government is essentially saying, no matter what your expenses are University, we will subsidize it so that students only have to pay a low fee to attend. This creates a perverse incentive to increase spending. Some question my assertion here, but it’s indisputable. Look at all the expansion that has already happened in recent history at MUN. Now they are building a brand new building for science. Ask any department if they have enough equipment, technology, teaching tools, etc, and they will undoubtedly say no. there are always demands and desires in every department. Giving the university a blank check will only make these dreams come true and cost us all.

There is no such thing as free education! Plus, the people benefitting from the education should pay for it. IF someone does engineering, then graduates and gets a lucrative career under this scheme, shouldn’t I get some return on my investment? If I paid for his education, what do I get from it? I think we should get part of their salary. But we don’t. We pay for their education and they benefit.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/provincial-student-loans-now-replaced-with-grants-in-n-l-1.3177298

NL Man Found Dead After 4 Months: Sister Blames Gov instead of Self

A veteran of the Canadian Forces, former corporal Shawn Brumsey, 50, who lived in Conception Bay South died in January but was not discovered until police entered his home in mid-May. Now his sister is speaking up. Not because she didn’t bother to check on her own brother for 4 months. Nor is she telling people they should try to keep in touch with family members especially if that family member is experiencing mental illness. No, she is (of course) blaming a government department for not discovering her brother earlier. That’s right, it’s the government’s fault. How far gone is she, and I suspect many people, where they will blame the government for pretty much anything? Have we completely and utterly surrendered our independence and become mere children constantly looking to Mommy Government to take care of us? It seems so in many cases.

Perhaps what we are seeing is someone who does not want acknowledge her own guilt in this situation. I don’t think she’s necessarily to blame for this. Often people don’t talk to family members for long periods of time. This doesn’t make them a bad person. What makes this whole situation so ridiculous is the nerve she has blaming the government. I don’t usually care for the government and I’m not defending it here. I’m just noting how utterly dependent and childlike people have become on the government. It’s really sad. The government should at best be considered a necessary evil, not the be-all and end-all of everything we do.

Article: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/veteran-died-and-lay-undiscovered-in-his-house-for-4-months-says-sister-1.3149665

 

Not Hiring a Pregnant Person is a Human Rights Violation!

Apparently not getting a job while pregnant = not getting a job BECAUSE you’re pregnant.

That’s what we’re meant to get from a story plastered all over CBC News online as well as CBC Radio. From Corner brook, a woman wasn’t rehired for some lawn mowing and picking up garbage. A real big deal this job. She is 5 months pregnant. The “job” only goes from May to September and she’s having her baby in November.

Lot of issues with this whole story.

1)      She has 0 proof she wasn’t hired because she’s pregnant. She doesn’t know who in fact got hired. We have no idea of her employment history, maybe she’s a terrible employee.

2)      It implies if someone is not hired and they are pregnant, there is a causal link

3)      She isn’t even giving birth until November, but the job only lasts till September. There doesn’t seem to be any clear motive from the company to not hire her. It’s not like they’ll have to pay benefits.

4)      No one should be forced to hire anyone they don’t want to. It’s their money they can do whatever they want with it.

Here’s the story of the century: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/corner-brook-woman-says-she-was-denied-work-because-she-s-pregnant-1.3150377

 

Net Neutrality vs. Freedom

A lot of people jumped on the Net Neutrality bandwagon when it was introduced a few years ago. It is currently the law in the US, Europe, and to some degree in Canada. But this sets a scary precedent and is based on unfounded fears and a misunderstanding of how the market works.

Net neutrality is a law that says internet service providers cannot offer faster access to certain websites for a fee to businesses. For example, Verizon could not charge Yahoo $1 million per year to give customers faster access to their content. The theory behind the law is that if ISPs can charge more for faster speeds, there will be a segregated internet and it will no longer be “fair and democratic”. Proponents believe you should have access to Google and Bob’s website at the same speed, and this is a right.

People are looking at this issue in a very illogical way, but it’s a normal way of thinking when it comes to the market. People will bring up hypothetical situation which have never happened, but because they believe it’s “possible”, they fear it will happen and the government needs to step in to make sure it doesn’t. This is essentially the case for every kind of regulation.

But look at the situation. Before net neutrality laws existed, ISPs did not charge companies huge fees to access the fast part of the internet. They could have but didn’t. In most regions, there is competition. Customers want an internet with equal speeds for all websites. If customers find out that Rogers makes a handful of sites fast and slows down all the others, they will switch to Bell or another service provider. Also, look at the heavy competition. Rogers constantly advertises that they are the “fastest”. Bell offers Fiber Optic which is incredibly fast. Speeds of the internet have consistently gone up to the point where you can download entire movies in a matter of minutes. Does anyone ask why companies are doing this? Legally speaking, they could just keep offering dial-up. In fact, they are not even required to offer anything, yet they do.

Do people not realize the reason speeds are constantly going up, computers are getting better, and more and more content is being offered on the internet is a result of capitalism and the market? Yet people take this for granted and fail to recognize how competition works in their favour. It’s hard to believe the cognitive dissonance that occurs here. On the one hand people are benefitting daily from companies providing continually-improving products and services, and on the other hand, they vilify businesses and believe they do nothing but bad things.

But one of the things I fear is less freedom, not more. My fear is that as people give more and more power to the government over the internet, eventually it will gain unwanted control over it. With too much power, what will stop the government from declaring certain points of view illegal or hate speech. People in Canada are routinely fined and imprisoned for having unpopular viewpoints. What makes anyone think this won’t extend to the internet once the government is in complete control? I can imagine this extending to many areas. Blocking unpopular political commentators like Alex Jones, blocking unpopular moral commentators including the Catholic Church if it condemns homosexual acts, etc. The list goes on. Can no one else see this danger?

Some of the effects of net neutrality have proven extremely stupid. For example, it was ruled that zero-rating was illegal. Zero-rating is when an ISP offers a free streaming or other service without making customers use their bandwidth allowance. For example, if a mobile user has a 1 gigabyte data package, a company might say watching Netflix doesn’t count toward that total. But this was deemed illegal. I guess charging customers is preferable to giving them certain free services. Who is this benefitting?

Why do people think the government, which generally raises prices substantially, is large, ungainly, unresponsive, and often oppressive is our best option for providing good internet service? Why can’t people see that internet quality and speed has improved considerably because of the market and competition? Why do people fear a scenario which could have happened for well over a decade but hasn’t?

The answer to these questions might be that people misjudge policies based on perceived motivation rather than on actual results. They see companies as greedy, only seeking to improve the bottom line and thus cannot be trusted to protect our best interests. Although the first part can be taken for granted, the second is false because of the power of the market. People need to ask the follow-up question of “then what”. A company could increase prices or reduce quality, but then what? What will happen in real life? Well, if it’s a free market, a better alternative will come about.

The second part of this mentality comes from the false belief that government does not have self-interested parties but rather is a selfless safeguard against greedy entities. But the government is a much worse ally than businesses because government operates military-enforced monopolies. It has very little accountability by its very structure. Some say voting is a check on government power. But voting is infinitely less powerful than the market. A government will enact hundreds of pieces of legislation, which few people can even keep track of. Then we are presented with one or two alternatives every 4 years at voting time. Good luck influencing one particular law. Then we get one vote out of a million or 30 million. Our individual power is like a drop of water in the ocean. But with a business, if I don’t like the service or quality, I immediately take my business elsewhere. This has immediate effect. I’ve often issued a complaint to a company and received immediate satisfaction. Imagine complaining to the government. If they answer months later, the response is usually unsatisfactory and has little effect.

To demand more government to solve a problem of service quality is nonsensical and ultimately doomed to failure, and Net Neutrality is no different.

Migrant Workers Abused - Not Surprising

It’s no surprise that according to a new article, many migrant workers are abused here, both sexually and otherwise. The reason is pretty obvious. According to the laws in our country, many workers with temporary foreign worker status can only work for a sponsor and cannot shop around for a job elsewhere. The employer holds all the strings and can expel the worker at will. Hmm, let me think if this would create a bad situation for employees! They can only work in one place! If they don’t like it their only option is to go back to the terrible place they fled! It’s surprising no one could foresee this!

The whole economic theory about improvements in the workplace essentially hinge on the ability and legality of employees leaving and going elsewhere. Without this ability, workers power is dramatically reduced. C’mon Canada, fix this stupid problem! (By the way, the solution is more freedom).

Canadian Taxpayers Federation Goes After Small Potatoes Once Again!

I’m starting to think the so called Canadian “Taxpayers” Federation is being paid off by politicians or told to keep a low profile. They keep coming out with reports which basically amount to rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

So today their BIG REPORT is about Gerry Byrne running for the provincial election while still an MP in Ottawa. So there’s a little bit of overlap somehow. I guess the theory is that if he’s running for politics here, he can’t do as much work as an MP as he normally would. *yawn* Big deal, politicians don’t do anything anyway. Here we are throwing billions of dollars at boondoggles and all the Taxpayers Federation notices is something this minor and insignificant?

In another article, they attacked NDP severance packages worth almost $700k *gasp*. What’s that? 0.01% of the budget?

C’mon Taxpayers Federation, find something of substance!

WHAT? The Liquor Corporation has unfair advantage??

This is news? The Liquor Corporation in Newfoundland and Labrador has an unfair advantage? Well, you don’t say! That’s according to this news report by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business. But everyone knows this. The NLC has monopolized the market, they are the only ones allowed to sell many types of alcohol. Not only that, prices are exorbitant, often double or triple the market value. If you ever go to the states, just compare the prices, they are WAY higher here in Canada. And the benefits of this system as very dubious at best. For the most part, the higher prices just go to pay inflated salaries and a huge unnecessary bureaucracy. Free market pricing is the only thing that will do!

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/nlc-has-unfair-advantage-over-small-business-cfib-1.3131641

 

CBC Victim-Blaming!

In our ultra-feminist world, telling a woman to be careful at night, go out with a partner, not to dress inappropriately, and other forms of sage advice in order to avoid being sexually assaulted is called blaming the victim. They say “don’t tell women not to do certain things, tell men not to r@pe!” (I use the @ to avoid having it picked up by the wrong system). But what if we applied this logic to other scenarios, where any advice is perceived as “blame” when we tell a potential victim how to stay safe. To bring this way of thinking to its logical conclusion, where telling anybody who could be victimized advice to avoid being a victim is considered victim-blaming let look at blatant examples of CBC Victim-Blaming:

 

Don’t tell people to watch out for car dealership scams, tell dealerships to stop scamming!

 

Don’t tell pedestrians to be careful around cars, tell drivers to stop hitting them!

 

Don’t tell people to be careful of high-risk offender, tell offender to stop being high-risk!

 

Don’t tell drivers to be careful when driving, tell roads not to be slippery!

Climate Change will affect EVERYTHING!

 

So apparently now climate change is a MEDICAL EMERGENCY! Cue the music of doom and gloom! The whole climate change industry reminds me some kind of infomercial for a new innovative product. “This product can do ANYTHING!”

 

“But that’s not all! Order now, and climate change can also be a national security threat and create terrorism!

 

 

I don’t think there are any articles too absurd about climate change that CBC won’t post. What’s next?

Climate change responsible for New York Yankees winning another World Series!

Climate change causing bald men to enjoy hockey well into June!!

 

People accuse “right-wing nut jobs” of coming up with crazy conspiracy theories, but somehow the wacky left-wing theories are considered normal and respectable. Both of these articles are from CBC and the Climate Change – Terrorism link was from Obama. It seems no theory is left unspoken when it comes to Climate Change.

 

 

Government needs to tell us how to eat

So according to Communist Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), the government should tell people how to eat. Not only that, cooking and sewing classes should be mandatory for kids from grades 5-12, because that’s what Japan does. And apparently that’s why Japanese people are skinny! Is there anything people don’t think the government should do???

 

Councillor wants to waste everyone's money on "free" WIFI

Socialist Councillor at Large in St. John’s Dave Lane who unfortunately has coercive power over many residents wants to use his power to force everyone to pay for downtown internet. Of course, he’s branding it as “free” internet, but as everyone knows, there is nothing free about another government boondoggle. Think about it. When the government, even the municipal one, wants to provide a “free” service, they have to raise the money through increased taxation. You can’t choose not to pay this tax. If you don’t pay it, you will either go to jail or receive a bad credit rating. You’ll be endlessly harassed and your life will be made more difficult.

With this kind of choice, the service you are forced to pay for should at the very least be essential. But it’s not, it’s internet. Why should I pay for someone else’s internet? If a business wants to provide this service, feel free. If customers want to pay roaming charges, again, feel free. But in a “free” society, we should not be forced to pay for someone else’s internet. At the very least someone needs a phone or laptop to use the internet. They had to pay for these, therefore they’re probably not starving. Plus, according to Lane, he wants this for travelers, especially business travelers. So someone can buy an airline ticket to come here, buy a computer or smart phone, and be here on business and therefore must pay for hotel accommodations, meals, etc. but somehow they can’t afford the $5 or $10 per day for internet charges in outside areas charged by Rogers, Telus, Bell or other providers. Also, most hotels offer free internet to begin with.

What about the argument that free internet will make St. John’s a “friendlier place” to do business? First of all, whether or not there is free internet will have zero impact on business travel to the province. What an absurd scenario: A businessperson is deciding on whether to come here. He does a bit of research on hotels, transportation, meals, various business costs, and it works out to $3500 for a week. But somehow the extra $50 (at most) makes the whole thing prohibitively expensive and he decides not to come? Does anyone really believe this?

This is just another stupid “program” to make the councillor look good, like he’s giving everyone something free. Most people won’t bother looking into the cost and will probably just say who cares. Most people will applaud this and say how advanced it makes us. Also, this is like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. St. John’s isn’t really a serious place for business. Buildings can only be a few storeys high, everything is government run, and people drive about half the speed limit. Given the downtown area free internet won’t change anything except our municipal taxes.

Article here: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/dave-lane-wants-free-wireless-internet-in-downtown-st-john-s-1.3125497

 

 

 

Potato Farmers Can't Run Their Own Businesses Apparently

So PEI potato farmers found some potatoes with metal or other objects within. Obviously a big problem. They believe the dangerous potatoes can be traced back to a single farm, but somehow they don’t know who did it and they are offering $100k to anyone who gives them proof of who it is.

 

Anyway, now the farmers want metal detectors to make sure there is nothing harmful in their potatoes, which will cost around $2 million. So this is a business expense. But unlike real businesses with real businesspeople, farmers want everyone else to pay for their stuff. Whether or not you eat potatoes, money will be forcibly stolen from you by the government and given to these people.

 

Should any company looking to make a safer product just appeal to the government? If a car company wants to test out new airbags, should the government pay for the testing? If a circular saw company wants to make one that’s safer, should the government pay for the innovation and quality control? Most people would say no. Yet farmers have some kind of special status. They get special privileges that other businesses don’t enjoy and we are all forced to pay.

 

Potatoes are already extremely cheap and tens of millions are sold annually. PEI produces around 2.6 billion pounds of potatoes per year. If the average potato weighs 0.25 pounds, they produce around 10 billion potatoes. Spreading the $2 million price tag for the metal detectors to over 10 billion potatoes would increase the price per potato by just 0.02 cents!

 

Potato farmers need to stop being whiny babies and start paying their own expenses!

Neil Macdonald - No Understanding of Gun Control

Neil Macdonald added his name to a large and growing list of people speaking out in favour of gun control. Somehow he believes his simple, linear thinking will solve the problem. I’m writing this from work where I don’t have access to the internet at large or many resources, so if you want specifics, ask me later. However the conventional liberal logic on guns goes like this:

1.       Guns are bad and guns kill people

2.       Make laws to stop people from using guns

3.       Fewer people will die.

Call the Nobel Peace Prize Committee, we have a serious contender!

Somehow this simplistic logic seems like a reasonable catch-all to the problem for liberals. An infallible solution to the issue. So much so, the proponents don’t even bother to explain how or why it would work. They don’t bother to show examples of their philosophy reducing gun violence or anything of the sort. It’s as if they are firmly convinced that by making stricter laws on guns, guns will evaporate and violence will disappear. I guess similar to how making drugs illegal makes them vanish and solves all problems related to drug addiction and the drug trade. Rarely is a specific policy suggestion even made. We just keep hearing a generic “we need more gun laws” mantra.

This “analysis” by Neil MacDonald has an incredibly patronizing tone. Anyone who disagrees with his evidence-free faith in gun control is a low-brow mouth-breathing Republ… I mean Neanderthal.

First the mischaracterizations. Neil MacDonald claims that anyone who doesn’t believe in gun control love guns more than protecting innocents. From the get-go Macdonald repeats the tired canard that people who believe in the right to keep and bear arms really don’t give a crap about people being killed. They’re far more interested in slamming down beer, playing country music, and buying the biggest baddest guns they can get their hands on, or whatever other stereotyping these “reporters” engage in.

Neil Macdonald doesn’t say specifically the types of laws he would want enacted. A total firearm ban including hunting rifles? A handgun ban only? The specifics don’t matter apparently, he’s just against guns in general.

I would advise people to look at the data themselves. Bill Clinton did a study back in the 1990s to find which gun laws would reduce crime. He asked the Centers for Disease Control to study over 100 studies done on the subject and not a single one showed more gun laws prevented gun crime. Perhaps counterintuitive, but worth a look for anyone who is actually serious about stopping gun violence. Also, three of the cities in the US with the highest gun violence rates – Washington DC, Los Angeles, and New York City – all have the strictest laws on guns. To those who say this is a mere coincidence, the rates of gun murder in these states increased at a faster rate than the national average AFTER gun laws were enacted. A similar occurrence seems to take place anywhere gun laws are introduced – crime goes up, not down.

Bottom line: All evidence on the subject shows that gun control laws in fact do not work. You may not like that, you may not understand that, but if you are serious about reducing gun murders, it’s worth looking into. But what liberals believe is not fact, but faith in this case. Government and reduced freedom is always the solution according to them. But back to the article.

One thing Neil Macdonald goes after several times is concealed carry laws, which is ironic since he admits himself that concealed carry is illegal in South Carolina. So his point doesn’t really make sense. It boils down to: this was a great tragedy, we need stricter laws such as banning concealed carry, even though in this state that’s already illegal…

Obama said this was a tragedy and then something along the lines that once again someone was able to get a gun too easily – implying the need for more (unspecified) gun control. Macdonald called the president’s response “civilized”. Perhaps it was, but it was also pointless.

According to Macdonald pretty much everyone wants gun control, but then the evil NRA steps in and spends millions of dollars convincing people that’s a bad idea. But this is clearly not the case. People just want the right to defend themselves and their families against violent criminals.

Macdonald mocks the idea that arming good people can stop bad people with guns. I would like to know his alternative suggestion. Make guns disappear? Guns are here to stay, whether legal or illegal. The only question is do you want only criminals to have them or for ordinary citizens to have that right also? The FBI has statistics on the huge number of crimes prevented because a good person had a gun. Again, I apologize for not having them here, I will try to provide them later.

The writer also implies that the governor of South Carolina, Nikki Haley’s, tears are not genuine. He says “As for Haley, sobbing at a news conference, she announced that South Carolina's "heart and soul is broken." But she still evidently thinks Roof had a natural right to carry his gun around.” What a stupid comment. In Canada, a country for which I have data, there are more stabbing murders on average than gun murders even though guns are widely available here. Imagine substituting “gun” with “knife” in Macdonald’s silly assertion:

As for Haley, sobbing a news conference, she announced that South Carolina's "heart and soul is broken." But she still evidently thinks Roof had a natural right to have a knife.

Out of Canada’s murders in 2013, 131 were with a firearm, but 102 were by beatings. To bring the quote to an even greater level of absurdity, you could say: “As for Haley, sobbing a news conference, she announced that South Carolina's "heart and soul is broken." But she still evidently thinks Roof had a natural right to arms and legs.”

Sounds kind of stupid doesn’t it? Roof had a natural right to a weapon just as all people do. He does not, however, have a right to kill someone. Liberals like Macdonald seem to conflate gun ownership with killing people.

Just a couple of weeks ago, Pamela Geller and Geert Wilders, both anti-Islamists and free speech advocates were participating in a free speech event called “Draw Mohammed Contest”. It was lucky there were armed people there because 2 jihadists came to the event to kill as many people as they could with several high-powered weapons. Fortunately there were several armed security officers and off-duty police officers ready to protect them with guns. The two gunmen were themselves gunned down – good guys with guns stopping bad guys with guns.  According to Macdonlad they would have been better off being sitting ducks. I suppose after the evil villains had perpetrated their crime, the cops could show up to possibly arrest them and ID the bodies of their victims.

I also notice Macdonald doesn’t recommend everyone be disarmed, just ordinary citizens. He still thinks cops should have guns. But if guns only cause murder, why should anyone be allowed to have them? Believing cops should be allowed to carry guns implies they can be beneficial.

Neil Macdonald has been a journalist for CBC for almost 30 years. Clearly he knows how to do a little bit of research, something completely lacking from his piece. Even though it’s called an “analysis”, that doesn’t mean it should be devoid of any data to support his claims. Macdonald knows this. But the problem is there in fact is no data to support his claims.

We want to do something whenever a tragedy occurs. It’s natural, it’s human. We feel sadness and compassion for the victims. But as John Lott, an expert in gun control laws, says, we can’t just operate on a gut-level without verifying if our hypotheses against reality. People should not be in favor of gun control, but rather in a reduction in gun violence. If that involves restricting guns less, as the evidence suggests, then honest liberals should pursue this.

Police Brutality in the US

So I watched a video yesterday online about a guy riding a horse in a desert-like area and the cop is chasing after him. Eventually he gets off the horse, gets on the ground, lies flat on his face, and puts his hands on his head. He is in a completely vulnerable position. Then the cop, and several other cops who join soon after, start kicking him repeatedly in the head, groin and other areas. Oh, this was after tasering him several times.

 

This is just one of dozens or hundreds of examples of police brutality that happen daily in the States. Absolutely unnecessary brutality. I then found a stat which said American cops killed more people in one month than British cops killed in the entire century so far! In fact, it was more than double. The actual stat was British cops killed around 50 people in the past 15 years, while American cops killed 111 in one month! In Canada, the number of people killed by cops is around 11 per year, which apparently is around 74 times less than the US per capita.

 

It’s important to keep all of this in mind when people are cheerleaders for police and the militarization of them!

Mandatory Voting?

So Justin Trudeau, the former part-time drama teacher, who feels it’s his obligation to be our ruler and is thus running in the election to be Prime Minister has recently announced that he is considering making voting mandatory if he becomes PM. He also wants to change the entire voting system. As it is right now, there are a little over 300 jurisdictions for the federal elections. Each district votes and whoever gets the most votes wins that district. Then whichever party wins the most districts forms the governing party.

 

But Trudeau wants to change it. They say the Conservatives only got 40% of the vote, why should they rule! I’m not sure the precise system he wants, but it’s something about representative vote. So if 40% of people vote for conservatives, 40% of seats will be held by them. Probably a stupid system because then the national vote is a general vote, and does not represent local areas very well.

 

Anyway, the craziest thing is forced voting. How exactly would this work? Would you be fined for not voting? I’m assuming this is the course of action they would take. We are already bombarded by fees and penalties all the time anyway. No one should be forced to vote against their will. Politicians shouldn’t have nearly as much power as they do, if they are even required at all. This is absolutely outrageous if this goes through!

Inquiry Costs 23.8 Times More Than Expenses Being Investigated

In a scenario so absurd it would require the government to do it, an investigation into $991,917 cost the auditor general $23.6 million to conduct! LOL, that’s 23.8 times the actual expenses being investigated.

 

Maybe we need an investigation into the inquiry and why it cost $24 million.

 

Also, according to the auditor general, they spend about 1000 hours PER senator on investigations. This sounds ridiculous to me! 1000 hours is more than the average number of work hours in a year. So basically there is more time spent investigating a senator than the actual amount of time he or she works in a year. How is this even possible??? Essentially you could have someone shadow each senator for every working hour analyzing everything the senator is doing to make sure it’s valid. Does this sound reasonable to anyone, even the most ardent statist?

 

Imagine an accounting company operating like this. Companies have expenses, and unlike the government it really matters if they are wasteful. Someone pays for that – someone could be fired. So imagine a company consults an accounting firm and asks how much it would cost to be audited. The company has 10 employees, and the accounting firm says it will cost $700,000 per year to audit the 10 employees. Obviously the owner will reject this offer.

 

But for argument’s sake, let’s say he accepts the offer. The company does its audit and finds $29,412 being improperly spent. So the owner looks at this and realizes he spent $700,000 to find out they misspent less than $30,000. Let’s just say they wouldn’t hire this organization in the future.

 

But we’re dealing with government here, not business. We all just pay taxes and except for a general sense of dissatisfaction, very few people do much about it. So we get hundreds of government departments spending money left, right and center. Then every so often, the auditor general comes out and tells us some money was misspent and we’re reassured they’re doing something about it. But this is all just meant to placate us. Nothing ever changes. Billions are spent as headlines are made about a couple thousand misspent. It’s all just meant to keep us from doing much.

Stupid Unions - Local 5795 United Steelworkers

If a book was ever published called “Unions Shooting Themselves in the Foot”, it would probably be bigger than the Encyclopedia Britannica, and that would only cover Canada from 2014-2015. So in this particular case it’s Local 5795 United Steelworkers which operates in Labrador City working for the Iron Ore Company of Canada.

Basically the price of ore fell and the IOC asked for a small concession from workers. What do I mean by small? They asked workers to give up a 4% wage increase! Lol, they didn’t even ask for a reduction in wages.

So anyway, reading the articles about the issue, the president of the union basically said he thought the company could save money other ways. How he knew this is a mystery to me. Is he more highly trained than the CEO or other senior managers at the company whose main job is to increase revenue and decrease cost? Call me skeptical, but I highly doubt it.

So out of spite, the union voted 91% to reject maintaining the same wages. The result: 150 workers will lose their jobs. That’s good though, because they need to “Stop the Union Busting”, “Stand With Lab West”, because “Solidarity is a Weapon.” A weapon for what? Stupidity and job loss?

When daddy goes home and his little daughter asks why he’s sad he’ll say “cuz I lost my job.”

Little girl: but why daddy?

Daddy: Because they didn’t want to give me a raise.

Little girl: Now what happens?
Daddy: We go on welfare and suffer. But, my girl, I stood up for Lab West and stopped union busting.

Little girl: Will we have enough to eat and a place to live?

Daddy: We’ll have to eat mayonnaise sandwiches and live with Aunt Bertha in her tiny apartment. But you wanna know the good news?

Little girl *through tears*: yes daddy?

Daddy: Solidarity is a weapon…

Some people are now blaming the company for being “greedy”. Guess what – it’s the same company as before. The same company that was paying gigantic salaries to workers which they then used to overspend on unnecessary frivolities. The company is just as greedy as before, but greed has absolutely nothing to do with business operations, salaries, contracts, etc. The price of iron ore is not determined by the Iron Ore Company, it’s determined by the laws of supply and demand. Companies constantly try to be more efficient and save money. The salaries they were paying were necessary to get the workers they needed.

And as we see, no matter how many protests you hold, no matter how often you appear on Open Line, no matter how much you belly-ache to the government for help, none of this can change market conditions. Those workers who are “fighting for their rights” have lost or will lose their jobs. You want to call the company greedy? Go ahead, it changes nothing.

But also look at what people were doing in times or prosperity. Were they saving money in case of a rainy day? Every article on the subject talks about the huge salaries people were earning, but along with that people were spending money like it was going out of style. Huge houses, huge trucks, skidoos, quads, trips, everything you could think of. Somehow they thought their jobs were permanent. Now we hear all the sap stories about people who have “no hope”. Get over it, people lose jobs every day. You aren’t guaranteed anything and half the people working in Lab West didn’t even have much education – unskilled labour. Go find yourself a new job like everyone else has to.

But what makes this whole story even worse is that Lab West which once bragged about its unending stream of money now finds itself broke, and because it was financially irresponsible, everyone else in the province has to bail them out. The provincial government has already given this town of 9000 $3.8 million. That comes from everyone else in the province and the taxes we pay. What’s next, a millionaire loses his job but because he was wasteful and didn’t save anything, we have to bail him out? And who is bailing these people out? Other six-figure earners? Yes, but also everyday people who earn far less than this. It includes people with meager salaries who work hard to save whatever they can. Now they have to lose money to support once-rich people who squandered what they had.

Lessons to be learned:

-          Your job is not permanent. Very few people remain in the same job. Don’t spend 110% of your huge salary on “goodies” and go in to debt.

-          If you are in a union (which is probably stupid), try to be reasonable. Companies are greedy, so are union members. The members in this story were clearly greedy. Instead of accepting the same wage as the previous year, they were stubborn and lost their jobs. Greed, or self-interest, must be balanced with reality. That’s what the market teaches us, but unions think they are immune from the laws of economics. They think economics are determined by protests and squeaky wheels. Well, we all see the result.

-          It’s not everyone else’s responsibility to bail out six-figure earners or a town when people lose their jobs. Maybe the company could give the laid-off workers a flight to St. John’s to see if there are any jobs available. Don’t get me involved.

-          Companies have no obligation to take care of your every need and desire. Being hired is an agreement between employee and employer. They are not your stand-in parent or guardian. You are responsible for yourself. If you don’t like the contract, then renegotiate or leave. You have no “claim” on the money of a private company.

In a perfect world, these unions would learn from their mistake, but they probably won’t. They’re based on a flawed philosophy and I don’t see that changing anytime soon.

 

Retarded St. John's Development

The development of the city of St. John’s is retarded. No, not mentally retarded, but as in the actual definition of “slowed”. There are several issues and it’s hard to know where to begin. Two of the main issues facing development are two Hs: Heritage and Height.

 

Heritage

Many, many buildings and homes in St. John’s are subject, arbitrarily of course, to heritage rules. These rules are designed to keep St. John’s looking like it’s from 100 years ago. It seems like every time someone wants to make a change to a house or building, a municipal committee has to approve it. But it goes from absurd to ridiculous when the heritage standards are applied to buildings which aren’t even built yet.

 

I was working for a company in Mt. Pearl that had ambitious plans to build a large structure downtown. They would first bulldoze a vacant, crumbling building which was styled like an 80s department store that was full of vermin. They would replace it with a state of the art edifice which would have been a great improvement. But first they had to be approved by a committee. First the committee demanded they build more than enough parking underground for its own employees. There had to be enough for probably double the number of people in the building in order to increase parking availability downtown. Secondly the building had to have a “heritage” look. What that meant no one really knew. The modern glass and steal design was unacceptable. It had to look like a small group of fishermen got together to build it. Maybe it had to be made of wood? Anyway, it had to be revised several times. Ultimately it was denied for pretty much arbitrary reasons.

 

Height

Height is another consideration that often comes up when building in St. John’s. Although there  is probably some rule somewhere about how tall a building can be, depending on area, it’s again applied arbitrarily. So back to the story I was just recounting. One of the problems with this building, as it was originally designed, was that it was too tall. I forget exactly the issue, but I think it was originally 7 storeys but the city said it had to be 5. So they changed the design to be 5 storeys, and it was of course still rejected. For anyone who doubts the process is arbitrary, I ask you one question: why is there so much debate every time a new building is proposed? Why are there community meetings? These would not be necessary if there was a clear law.

 

Higher is Better

So whenever a new building is proposed inevitably someone or some group will complain that it will block their view. They might spice up their argument by adding references to “democracy” or “livable communities” or some other vague unspecific argument. The thing about vague arguments is they are hard to argue against. But maybe not that hard. Most of the argument that happens between people is about how high buildings should be allowed to be. One group says they should be very low, others say they should be moderate, etc. I have a different approach that has more to do with property rights, but in the end I think it would work out much better.

 

Developers should be allowed to build as high as they want. This is a shocking proposal to most. But here’s why:

1)      Property rights. When someone buys land, from a moral perspective they own the land. Can we say someone really owns the land if another entity can dictate how the land can be used? This line of reasoning can sometimes be objected to on the basis that we cannot allow anyone to do literally anything with their land because it would create complete chaos in society with people building pig farms next to skyscrapers. I will talk later why this is absurd. But even with zoning, why should the height be restricted? Is there an upward limit on your property rights?

2)      From a practical point of view, allowing taller high rises would actually create MORE views of the harbour, not fewer. Skyscrapers would create hundreds of offices, rooms, and restaurants with a harbour view. If you don’t want someone blocking your view, your only guaranteed way of doing this is to buy a property right next on the waterfront.

 

I think it’s rather presumptuous for people to think they are “owed” a view to the harbour just because at the time they bought their house they could see it. If I build my house next to a vacant lot, do I have the right to complain when someone builds on it because before I had a nicer view before? Of course I don’t. You are only entitled to your own view, on your own property. I can understand people complaining about new buildings going up, especially if they have lucked into an awesome view, but what about the rights of property owners. Who has more rights to a parcel of land: the land owner, or the non-land owner who has a view? The answer is obvious.

 

St. John’s is holding itself back by disallowing taller buildings. We are listening to the complaints of people who want something for nothing. It’s easy to have an opinion on how a city “should” look when you are not paying the price for it. The major price we are paying is that of progress. Some people say the quaint, old fashioned look of St. John’s attracts a lot of people, but I’m very skeptical of this claim. People might like the old fashioned look if they happened to be here for some reason, but businesses will locate here if it makes business sense, not because of some vague concept of heritage. As for tourism, sure Newfoundland gets a few tourists, but what place doesn’t? If you were to rank St. John’s on the list of most visited Canadian cities, it would probably rank below the top ten.

 

Another ironic thing people will bring up is the so-called urban sprawl of the city. They complain that St. John’s is becoming too spread out and something needs to be done about it. I guess they don’t realize that strict zoning codes and urban sprawl go hand in hand. Although there are a couple of small condos near the harbourfront, I think a lot more people would live there if larger residential areas could be built. Plus, with these large buildings, the developer would probably be incentivized to build promenades along the harbour as well as that would increase the value of the property dramatically. Plus, we have to consider whether urban sprawl is as bad as people say it is. It’s usually a matter of people seeing a city as a Sim City game where it is up to them, through the democratic process, to decide how everyone should live, rather than seeing it as people making choices in their own best interest. If someone wants to live far away from the center of the city, why should we care about that? That’s their choice, not mine.

 

Note on Zoning:

Much of the fear of not having zoning laws comes from the idea that if we allow people to build whatever wherever, we will in fact create a sort of dystopian city where there is a slaughterhouse next to a swanky vegan restaurant or a factory smokestack in the downtown area. For many reasons this is an absurd fear. For one, factories would never locate on the super expensive land of a downtown capital city. They would never be able to compete with other factories that operate on the outskirts or completely outside the city. The same goes for slaughterhouses. The only properties that make sense in a downtown area are high-end retailers and high-density residential areas. Also, housing areas can form legal arrangements where new buildings must conform to certain standards. One way to do this is for a developer to buy a large area and any new housing development must abide by the rules. In any event, the fear of issues arising from lack of zoning laws is largely unfounded. Houston is a major city which does not have zoning laws. They are also one of the few places that has not experienced skyrocketing housing prices, even before the housing market crash. Prices have remained stable for several decades while in other places, prices shot up. The city is very large, but again, who is complaining? Probably not the people who are voluntarily choosing to live there!

 

 

 

Get Your Own Stupid Road CONCHE!

First of all, where / what is Conche? Answer: Nobody knows or cares except for the couple dozen people who live there. Why do I bring them up? Because they have their hat in hand telling everyone in Newfoundland that we have to pay for their stupid road going to the middle of nowhere. In that entire community lives 160 people. No, not 160,000, not even 16,000, not even 1600! Just a measly 160 people.

I say if you want to live there, feel free! Maybe you like being excluded from civilization, I don’t blame you with the way things are going, but don’t you dare ask me to shell out thousands of dollars for you to do so. I don’t have all the numbers here, but what we do know is that despite receiving $6 MILLION dollars from the provincial coffers, this place in the sticks still hasn’t completed the construction of its road. They still require significantly more money. By the time all is said and done, it could cost $10 MILLION!!!

Think about this for a second - $10 million for a village of 160 people. If the average family has 3 people in that community, that’s 54 families, so the cost per family is $185,000. But no, they won’t pay that themselves (I’m sure they can’t afford it anyway), they will demand everyone else pay for them.

Compare this to living in St. John’s. If St. John’s even spends $100 million per year on roads (which it doesn’t), the cost per person would be around $500-$1000.

This is why since time immemorial people have congregated in large, densely populated areas. This phenomenon has nothing to do with an increase in population as people have done this since Ancient Egypt and before. The reason is simple: when you live in a more densely populated area, there are economies of scale. A cell phone tower providing service to 100,000 people is much cheaper per person than one providing service for 160 people. A road driven on by 100,000 people costs FAR less per person than a road driven on by 160 people.

But because these people have decided to live out in the boondocks, we all of a sudden have to support them? Are they crazy?? At what point does this arrangement become absurd? What if a family of 5 decided to move to the northern-most tip of Labrador? Would we be forced to build a road connecting them to the rest of the province? Do we have to build a school for the 2 kids? Where does this nonsense end?? 160 is just as absurd. No slippery slope argument required.

And this is just the road. There are probably dozens of other things everyone is forced to pay for such as clinics, schools, police, etc. Who knows how many millions we are sinking into this place. Plus, is it fair that the government will probably spend $300,000-$400,000 per person in this community, but the average expenditure for everyone else is a small fraction of that?

Overall it probably costs $100,000 per person per year to support this crowd. It would be cheaper to pay them to live in St. John’s with personal servants at their fancy estate complete with an expensive car and a chauffeur. And they wouldn’t even have to work, and we would still save money.

To the people of Conche – leave me alone. I don’t want to give you my money, nor does anyone else. Live in a city if you want roads. I would like to live in a multi-million dollar house with all the amenities. Can you pay for it please? Didn’t think so. You know the saying do unto others – well abide by it!

A lot of people will still not be convinced by my arguments. They’ll say some socialist feel-good thing like “we deserve to be all taken care of by our government” or “it is the government’s responsibility to build roads”.

First of all, what is “the government”. Well, really it’s a handful of authoritarians who do things considered illegal for everyone else such as theft and expropriation. But really the government has no money of its own. They must steal it from everyone else. So when some self-righteous do-gooder proclaims that a road “must be built”, they are really telling the military to make sure that everyone pays up against their will to build a road to the middle of nowhere. Is this really any way to organize society? Again, there are many things many people want. I want a helicopter to pick me up and bring me to work every day. That doesn’t mean I should get it. But that would probably still cost way less than this Conche road.

The only moral way to live is on a voluntary basis, not using government to force people to do your whims.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alberta Goes Socialist

People are starting to give up entirely on this country after Alberta has decided to go full socialist on us. We used to think of Alberta as our conservative sister in the country, but now they’ve turned orange, which is really just a shade of commie red. That’s because deep down people aren’t really conservative in that province. It’s just that when things were going well they didn’t have to live at anyone else’s expense and they were afraid of having their money taken away so then they were “independent”. But now that things are a little shakier, they feel it’s okay to live at others’ expenses.

I would say a lot of people bought expensive things like cars and big houses, went to fancy restaurants, etc. and would spend all their money. Now that things aren’t looking so hopeful, they’re afraid and they are running to their government overlords for help like little children.

This is a sad day for Canada.

Uncompetitive Hotel Cowards Looking for Mommy-Government to Come to Rescue in Newfoundland

In an all-out assault on our accommodation freedom, Hospitality Newfoundland and Labrador is appealing to government to make many voluntary lodging arrangements illegal. Authoritarian Rex Avery, the head of HNL, believes he is more of an adult than everyone else and that he needs to treat everyone as children. He doesn’t believe free people should be allowed to make voluntary choices as to where they stay on vacation, but rather he and his government goons should force people to stay where they decide. “Avery says the Newfoundland and Labrador government should follow Quebec's footsteps by making moves to fine anyone who attempts to rent out their homes as hotels.” But we live in a free country right?

Because Mr. Avery cannot actually compete and loathes the idea of a free market where he is forced to offer a compelling sales proposition, he instead relies on the force and coercion of the government to do his bidding. It’s just an old ploy that uncompetitive businesses and industries are fond of using. It goes like this:

1.       Establish a business, make some money

2.       Competition enters which is more competitive, offering either higher quality or lower prices or both

3.       Run to the government to demand protectionism to make competition illegal and refuse to innovate

4.       Claim you are just a really caring person who cares about the “health and safety” of people and you are really just a consumer advocate! Balk at any suggestion that you are pursuing selfish interests.

This is just a textbook example of businesses seeking special protections against competition. The only people better off for this arrangement is the businesses receiving this protection, never the consumer. Usually it’s the big guy trying to trample the little guy which is why governments often side with the big bully. The bully can provide campaign contributions and they are an organized and unified voting block – something very attractive to politicians.

The canard that is nearly always used is that the competition is “unsafe” or “dangerous” in some way. At least Rex Avery was somewhat honest by admitting that he is concerned about “his” industry and his revenue potential.

Let’s translate some of the stuff Mr. Avery is saying:

 

What Mr. Avery he says:	Analysis
“Airbnb is a business where it's unlicensed, they don't collect taxes, they don't pay taxes, they don't support the economy.”	I really have no idea what this even means. So unless a business is “licensed” or “pay taxes”, it doesn’t support the economy?? What is the economy in Mr. Avery’s opinion – tax collection? But Airbnb does in fact pay taxes. And what does being licensed have to do with supporting the economy? Absolutely nothing. This sentence is completely nonsensical. The “economy” is all financial interactions of people in a given area. It’s not paying taxes and being licensed.
“You may pay more but you're protected, your experience is what you'd expect and there's no hidden surprises.”	No surprises? Has Mr. Avery ever even been in a hotel? Hotels are full of surprises! Dirty bed sheets, dirty towels, bugs, poor service, overbooked rooms. What kind of dream world does Rex Avery live in to believe there are never any hidden surprises with hotels. Again, just a form of verbal advertising for the hotel industry that has no reflection on reality.   Another interesting question is how many people have had negative experiences with airbnb. They have had thousands of tenants and exchanges, yet when something bad happens like the incident recently in Calgary, the media goes berserk. Plus, even in that incident no one was actually physically hurt.
Avery said it also creates an unfair situation in which legitimate hoteliers and bed and breakfast owners, who pay taxes and help stimulate the economy, are up against tough competition.	“Legitimate” in this sense means cartelized. Paying taxes does not stimulate the economy. At most, it stimulates the government. Often it destroys the economy.
"A lot of these [hosts] that are renting these places don't understand the liability and risk they take by trying to make a quick dollar," Avery said.	They don’t understand the risk, so it should be illegal? You mean it’s impossible for someone to start a hotel without knowing the risk? That’s like saying “Some drivers don’t know the risk with driving, let’s make driving illegal!”   The “risk” is simply a matter of insurance. If someone doesn’t have sufficient insurance, then too bad, so sad, they lose their property if something happens. I don’t see why this would automatically make the industry illegal.
“by trying to make a quick dollar”	This statement is extremely patronizing and it’s really a pet peeve of mine. They act as though no one should be allowed to make any money except them and that if someone other than them tries to they are somehow sleazy lowlifes. “making a quick dollar” is also referred to as making a living. How dare Mr. Avery act as though there is something wrong with this!

Also, notice how CBC is acting like this incident in Calgary is the end of the world. It’s not just a one-off event, it’s the scary, demonized, terrifying “unregulated” market again! Take your children inside quick! An overpaid under-motivated government worker didn’t waltz in one day to have a quick glance around the place and another one didn’t charge a huge tax amount. So I mean obviously these places must be unimaginably horrible, practical torture chambers filled with the most disgusting and dangerous surroundings! Give me a break!

Frederick Bastiat, the famous French economist from a couple of hundred years ago once wrote a satirical essay about a fictional new law in France forcing people to never open their window shutters, especially during the day, requiring people to stay indoors during daylight hours, and other absurd measures because candle-makers couldn’t compete with the sunlight. Mr. Rex Avery and his ilk are no less absurd in what they are demanding.