Okay, so in the states people have the right to bear arms. In Canada, we do too, but it's not as publicized and I think there are more restrictions.
One things I've never understood though is the distinction between different types of guns. Sometimes semi-automatic and automatic. So people will say "who needs an assault rifle anyway?" So they will propose banning the more powerful guns.
But I don't get this logic. I mean a small gun can kill people, perhaps many people. A semiautomatic weapon could kill many people no problem. Yes, an automatic weapon could probably kill even more people, so that would mean the logic is this:
1) killing a handful of people is bad but not that bad. people have the right to do this.
2) killing a bunch of people is really bad and the government should ban weapons which can do this
So what I don't get is the logic. "Who needs automatic weapon?" Well, maybe you need to kill a bunch of people, or you want a powerful weapon to kill an individual and that will allow you to do it more easily. I mean the point of having the right to carry a firearm is not just for hunting, it's for killing people if necessary.
So if the intent is to kill someone who is threatening your life, what difference does it make if you kill him with a handgun or an AK-47. He's still dead. An AK-47 doesn't kill him "more".
Maybe what these people are really saying is that no one should ever have a weapon to possibly kill someone else. That's another debate. If that's what they are saying, they should advocate a total gun ban, not just the more powerful ones.
Anyway, I don't think guns should be banned at all.
Sunday, August 5, 2012
Friday, August 3, 2012
Green movement has it wrong
I hate to be the garden at your skunk party, but I think the green movement has it wrong. The whole idea now is to "reduce" what we use. I know reuse and recycle are there as well, but it's really all about reduction. Reusing and recycling generally come with some reduction in quality. I'll just address those two briefly first. We are told to use crappy paper products or cheap items in general because they use "recycled" material, sometimes as little as 5%. We are expected to make this sacrifice for the good of "Mother Earth".
Reusing is a similar concept. "Sure a new product would be better and you would prefer that, but just reuse the old one to help the environment".
But most of all, it's about reduction. It's such a simple answer. Use less electricity. Get shorter showers, maybe in cold water. Wash your clothes in cold water - it will reduce the quality of cleanliness, but hey you're helping the environment. Buy a smaller car, even though it's more dangerous to drive and not as comfortable. Don't drive as much in general, instead walk or bike even though you don't want to and it takes much longer. Use public transit even though it takes much longer to get where you're going and they are probably worse on the environment anyway. Don't eat meat or eat very very little, that way you can eat all vegetables and that's better for the environment.
For the first time in hundreds of years, people are supposed to be lowering their quality of life rather than improving it. According to some environazis, we haven't gone far enough until we live naked in the wild.
My contention is, we are barking up the wrong tree. Instead of demanding that everyone lower their quality of life, we should be finding new innovative ways to increase our quality of life and levels of consumption. In fact, the free market is the best way to do this anyway. The price system guides people from rare products to abundant ones. The free market always seeks efficiency. Whenever energy or products are lost, this is lost profit. Increasing efficiency saves money.
I like the new innovations in cars, but let the market work. You don't need to use peer pressure to force people to drive hybrid cars. Once the technology improves enough and it becomes a cost-saver, people will automatically buy into it.
The ironic part is that the solution most people propose is to extract money from successful companies and just pay people through the government to operate a certain way. If a company is charged millions of dollars in taxes, that's millions they can't spend on R&D and responding to the demand for more fuel-efficient cars. The government does not innovate. It simply steals money from one group and gives it to another. If the government steals $10 million from a car company and then gives a rebate of $10,000 to 1000 drivers to buy a hybrid car, this does not provide innovation. The car company could have used that $10,000,000 to research new and better ways to produce fuel efficient cars.
Anyway, my point is that people will buy into things once they make sense economically and meet their needs better. Redistributing wealth does not create innovation. The free market loves to innovate. There is already a market demand for environmentally friendly products. It's pointless for the government to take money from the economy that could be productive and effectively kill its productivity.
Also, making cheap products artificially more expensive mostly hurts poor people. It's all fine and dandy for celebrities to talk about the benefits of hybrid cars, but poor people need cheap vehicles and once they establish themselves, they can move on to more fuel efficient models.
Let's work to increase quality of life instead of decreasing it while also pursuing our interests in the environment.
Reusing is a similar concept. "Sure a new product would be better and you would prefer that, but just reuse the old one to help the environment".
But most of all, it's about reduction. It's such a simple answer. Use less electricity. Get shorter showers, maybe in cold water. Wash your clothes in cold water - it will reduce the quality of cleanliness, but hey you're helping the environment. Buy a smaller car, even though it's more dangerous to drive and not as comfortable. Don't drive as much in general, instead walk or bike even though you don't want to and it takes much longer. Use public transit even though it takes much longer to get where you're going and they are probably worse on the environment anyway. Don't eat meat or eat very very little, that way you can eat all vegetables and that's better for the environment.
For the first time in hundreds of years, people are supposed to be lowering their quality of life rather than improving it. According to some environazis, we haven't gone far enough until we live naked in the wild.
My contention is, we are barking up the wrong tree. Instead of demanding that everyone lower their quality of life, we should be finding new innovative ways to increase our quality of life and levels of consumption. In fact, the free market is the best way to do this anyway. The price system guides people from rare products to abundant ones. The free market always seeks efficiency. Whenever energy or products are lost, this is lost profit. Increasing efficiency saves money.
I like the new innovations in cars, but let the market work. You don't need to use peer pressure to force people to drive hybrid cars. Once the technology improves enough and it becomes a cost-saver, people will automatically buy into it.
The ironic part is that the solution most people propose is to extract money from successful companies and just pay people through the government to operate a certain way. If a company is charged millions of dollars in taxes, that's millions they can't spend on R&D and responding to the demand for more fuel-efficient cars. The government does not innovate. It simply steals money from one group and gives it to another. If the government steals $10 million from a car company and then gives a rebate of $10,000 to 1000 drivers to buy a hybrid car, this does not provide innovation. The car company could have used that $10,000,000 to research new and better ways to produce fuel efficient cars.
Anyway, my point is that people will buy into things once they make sense economically and meet their needs better. Redistributing wealth does not create innovation. The free market loves to innovate. There is already a market demand for environmentally friendly products. It's pointless for the government to take money from the economy that could be productive and effectively kill its productivity.
Also, making cheap products artificially more expensive mostly hurts poor people. It's all fine and dandy for celebrities to talk about the benefits of hybrid cars, but poor people need cheap vehicles and once they establish themselves, they can move on to more fuel efficient models.
Let's work to increase quality of life instead of decreasing it while also pursuing our interests in the environment.
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
More propaganda than the USSR
The USSR had propaganda, but everyone knew it both inside and out of the country. Eventually the overlords were ousted and people reclaimed their country. But we in Canada have been indoctrinated so well that we don't even realize we are being ruled over. We've been brainwashed into believing that we are as free as the birds because of "democracy".
The government takes our money to pay for schools, and makes other schools illegal. In these schools, students are taught how the government makes everything good and that we all owe the government a lot. We are told this is "our" government and that we all have democracy which makes us free.
So we all fall for this propaganda. It's much smarter than Soviet propaganda because we feel like this is what we've chosen, it's democratic. If we don't like it, we can simply change it!
In reality though, it's only the dictatorship of the majority. 51% of people can vote against my freedom and because we're a democracy they win.
Do I get freedom of speech? Depends - does the democracy approve?
Do I get freedom of religion? Again, it depends on what everyone else decides.
But none of us is really free. Who likes paying double for their milk? Nobody. So why do we have a government-enforced monopoly on milk which keeps the prices high? Not because everyone wanted it. It's because we are forcibly taxed for thousands of things. We do not have the time, energy, or resources to fight every individual expenditure or law. But the milk producers have a huge interest in making their voices heard and having legislation passed in their favor. They then pay for advertising to convince us. They also pay off politicians to run on their platform. Everyone else barely notices.
This happens in a thousand ways. All political parties are beholden to the interests of companies and unions, not the people.
The USSR was obvious. People felt oppressed and eventually it backfired. What Canada did was much smarter. Satisfy people with the illusion of freedom then take power.
The government takes our money to pay for schools, and makes other schools illegal. In these schools, students are taught how the government makes everything good and that we all owe the government a lot. We are told this is "our" government and that we all have democracy which makes us free.
So we all fall for this propaganda. It's much smarter than Soviet propaganda because we feel like this is what we've chosen, it's democratic. If we don't like it, we can simply change it!
In reality though, it's only the dictatorship of the majority. 51% of people can vote against my freedom and because we're a democracy they win.
Do I get freedom of speech? Depends - does the democracy approve?
Do I get freedom of religion? Again, it depends on what everyone else decides.
But none of us is really free. Who likes paying double for their milk? Nobody. So why do we have a government-enforced monopoly on milk which keeps the prices high? Not because everyone wanted it. It's because we are forcibly taxed for thousands of things. We do not have the time, energy, or resources to fight every individual expenditure or law. But the milk producers have a huge interest in making their voices heard and having legislation passed in their favor. They then pay for advertising to convince us. They also pay off politicians to run on their platform. Everyone else barely notices.
This happens in a thousand ways. All political parties are beholden to the interests of companies and unions, not the people.
The USSR was obvious. People felt oppressed and eventually it backfired. What Canada did was much smarter. Satisfy people with the illusion of freedom then take power.
Monday, July 30, 2012
Anti-discrimination laws
I'm opposed to all anti-discrimination laws. I believe in personal freedom. It's easy to advocate laws which you happen to agree with, to give the government the power to enforce them. But what happens when the government turns against you and violates your rights?
No one should be forced to serve anyone of any particular characteristic if they choose not to. It is their money and they can spend it however they like. Should I also be forced to be friends with people I don't want to associate with?
What gives you the right to force me to act or associate with anyone? Who are you? Are you my overlord? Must I bow down before you?
Having said that, I think a business would probably make a bad decision by discriminating against any particular group. They would probably lose a lot of business. But that's their choice to make.
People should be free to live how they see fit, without another group of people trying to reign over them.
Also, what one person calls unjust discrimination to another person is just discrimination. Catholics only want male priests. To an atheist, this may appear nonsensical, but Catholics have the right to do as they please. What right does an atheist have to dictate to the Catholic Church who it can or cannot hire. This is an example of something which may seem just to one group but unjust to another.
You see, when we try to be dictators, everything seems fine and dandy until the laws stop working in our favor. When we become dictated to, it's less pleasant.
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Should education be free?
Some people nowadays say that education is a right and that it should be free. But I disagree with this point of view. First of all, statements like "education is extremely important" is too general and is effectively meaningless. A more meaningful statement would be something like "everyone should have free access to education up to grade 10" or whatever.
The next problem is: who pays. The primary beneficiary from an education is the educated person. So they should pay the bulk or all of the cost. This is only logical. Yes, interacting with someone with a certain level of education may also indirectly benefit me or society at large, but primarly education benefits the recipient of it.
Just because something is beneficial doesn't give "society" a carte-blanche to steal money and redistribute it for this cause. Many things have indirect benefit to society such as better nutrition or mobility. Does that mean the government should also take money to pay for cars and food for everyone?
The fact of the matter is that education has a cost. There is NO SUCH THING as free education. But when something is offered free, there is often misuse of it. If I could have any car and government would subsidize it by 80 or 90%, obviously I would pick a very expensive one because I am only paying for 10 or 20% of it. Underpricing any product or service causes exaggerated demand. I know so many people who have gone parts of degrees or done completely useless ones which they will not use. Is it even possible that instead of stealing money from citizens to pay for these misused classes, the citizens themselves could have used their own money to improve their lives? Perhaps buy better clothing, or better quality food.
There are always tradeoffs and as Milton Friedman says, no free lunch.
When it comes to accessibility, this is another interesting subject. Apparently 50% of students come from the top 25% wealthiest families while only 5% come from the bottom quarter. In provinces where tuition is higher, attendances, relative to population, is actually HIGHER than in places where tuition is lower.
The main proponents and backers of free education are people in the education system, and the unions. They are the ones who do all the promotion of low or no tuition. But the government is not Santa Claus that can grant every wish.
Let's stop making everyone else poorer to pay for people to either earn more themselves or to just fool around.
The next problem is: who pays. The primary beneficiary from an education is the educated person. So they should pay the bulk or all of the cost. This is only logical. Yes, interacting with someone with a certain level of education may also indirectly benefit me or society at large, but primarly education benefits the recipient of it.
Just because something is beneficial doesn't give "society" a carte-blanche to steal money and redistribute it for this cause. Many things have indirect benefit to society such as better nutrition or mobility. Does that mean the government should also take money to pay for cars and food for everyone?
The fact of the matter is that education has a cost. There is NO SUCH THING as free education. But when something is offered free, there is often misuse of it. If I could have any car and government would subsidize it by 80 or 90%, obviously I would pick a very expensive one because I am only paying for 10 or 20% of it. Underpricing any product or service causes exaggerated demand. I know so many people who have gone parts of degrees or done completely useless ones which they will not use. Is it even possible that instead of stealing money from citizens to pay for these misused classes, the citizens themselves could have used their own money to improve their lives? Perhaps buy better clothing, or better quality food.
There are always tradeoffs and as Milton Friedman says, no free lunch.
When it comes to accessibility, this is another interesting subject. Apparently 50% of students come from the top 25% wealthiest families while only 5% come from the bottom quarter. In provinces where tuition is higher, attendances, relative to population, is actually HIGHER than in places where tuition is lower.
The main proponents and backers of free education are people in the education system, and the unions. They are the ones who do all the promotion of low or no tuition. But the government is not Santa Claus that can grant every wish.
Let's stop making everyone else poorer to pay for people to either earn more themselves or to just fool around.
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Friday, March 16, 2012
The NL Fishery
I can't say I'm an expert in the fishery, but I see a lot of problems. Most are based on economic fallacies. First of all, there are all kinds of government regulation. One regulation ensures that the only people catching fish are so-called owner-operators. The logic is that this allows everyone to have a piece of the action and doesn't allow a large corporation to come in and get a "bigger piece of the pie". Problem is individual fishermen may not be as efficient as a large organization. Everyone pays for inefficiency, as prices go way up because of it. In a free market, what should happen is the more efficient processes ought to be used. This will increase profit, which will attract new investment. The new investment will attempt to undercut the price to share in the profit. This battle to offer the lowest price in order to gain more market share results in lower prices to consumers.
One of the big fallacies is to believe that if someone loses a job, they are permanently unemployed. But what ought to happen is that some people are laid off, but they move into other areas of the economy. So before it might have taken 1000 fisherman to meet the quotas, but now it takes only 500. Instead of seeing this as 500 people becoming unemployed, it's better to see them as transitioning into other areas of the economy. But where will they go?
Back to the consumer. Because the price of fish has dropped, consumers are saving money. Imagine it used to cost $9 a pound for fish, but now it costs $5 per pound and imagine the average Newfoundlander buys 20 pounds a year. That's a savings of $80 per year per Newfoundlander. They can now spend this money on other things. Maybe more visits to the restaurant, or on hockey games, or downtown, etc. The unemployed people will move in to fill those roles.
Why is this better? Quite simply, in the first example, with government regulation, there are 1000 people working in the fishery, and the average Newfoundlander's money has a certain value. By increasing the efficiency of the fishery, the average Newfoundlander's life improves because he can afford things he couldn't before, with the money he saves on buying fish. If nothing changes, the Newfoundlander remains the same, but if the free market is allowed to operate, the average Newfoundlander has more money in his pocket to spend and his quality of life increases.
The free market would work like this for every area. So many things we commonly buy are subject to tariffs, taxes, subsidies, price control, and quotas. This makes everyone poorer while helping out a few people here or there. Some countries dropped their heavy regulation of milk output. This resulted in milk that cost half as much for the same quality. If a person buys a carton of milk each week and the price goes from $4 to $2, that person will save $100 per year. I'm just giving individual products, but if this happened for all products and services, prices would continue to drop and people could use their productive output for better purposes.
One of the big fallacies is to believe that if someone loses a job, they are permanently unemployed. But what ought to happen is that some people are laid off, but they move into other areas of the economy. So before it might have taken 1000 fisherman to meet the quotas, but now it takes only 500. Instead of seeing this as 500 people becoming unemployed, it's better to see them as transitioning into other areas of the economy. But where will they go?
Back to the consumer. Because the price of fish has dropped, consumers are saving money. Imagine it used to cost $9 a pound for fish, but now it costs $5 per pound and imagine the average Newfoundlander buys 20 pounds a year. That's a savings of $80 per year per Newfoundlander. They can now spend this money on other things. Maybe more visits to the restaurant, or on hockey games, or downtown, etc. The unemployed people will move in to fill those roles.
Why is this better? Quite simply, in the first example, with government regulation, there are 1000 people working in the fishery, and the average Newfoundlander's money has a certain value. By increasing the efficiency of the fishery, the average Newfoundlander's life improves because he can afford things he couldn't before, with the money he saves on buying fish. If nothing changes, the Newfoundlander remains the same, but if the free market is allowed to operate, the average Newfoundlander has more money in his pocket to spend and his quality of life increases.
The free market would work like this for every area. So many things we commonly buy are subject to tariffs, taxes, subsidies, price control, and quotas. This makes everyone poorer while helping out a few people here or there. Some countries dropped their heavy regulation of milk output. This resulted in milk that cost half as much for the same quality. If a person buys a carton of milk each week and the price goes from $4 to $2, that person will save $100 per year. I'm just giving individual products, but if this happened for all products and services, prices would continue to drop and people could use their productive output for better purposes.
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