Re: Sowell and the big lie.
David B. Shemano wrote: Melvin P. writes: On affirmative action he would be run out of the podium and forced to understand the real meaning of traditional American justice. The poor would most certainly string him up and I would not object. As Godwin's Law approaches, I am done with the thread. a long time ago on usenet, someone proposed a sort of self-referential corollary to goodwin's law: any attempt to avoid a response, through the invocation of godwin's law, in itself satisfies the antecedent of the law, and the consequent applies. ;-) --ravi
Re: Sowell
Shane Mage writes:Under rigorous neoclassical analysis it is easily demonstrated of course, rigorous neoclassical analysis is not the same as the Chicago-school neoclassical analysis embraced by Sowell. For the latter, rigorous refers to free market. jd
Re: Sowell
Correction: I said 30 years ago referring to Buckley's no-contest contest with the SEC. Actually it was 23 years ago and here are some details: In 1979, the SEC charged Buckley, the Rex Reed of American conservatism, with violating federal securities laws while attempting to forestall personal bankruptcy while he was an officer of Starr Broadcasting Group, Inc. According to the SEC, Buckley and the Starr brothers, Peter and Michael, formed a separate partnership which purchased a number of drive-in theater properties prior to 1975. [Note: Only a real entrepreneur would purchase drive-in theaters when the price of gasoline was doubling.] The market, however, failed to reward Mr. Buckley's faith in the future of American adolescent sexual encounter. By the summer of 1974 the partnership was deeply in debt and staggering under its interest payments. Mr. Buckley and the Starrs then induced Starr Broadcasting to purchase the properties and assume all debts and liabilities of their separate partnership. Eighteen months after Starr Broadcasting INc. purchase the properties, the theaters entered bankruptcy proceedings. Three dollar Bill settled the charges in the best tradition of American entrepreneurship, paying up without admitting to guilt or proclaiming innocence (see OED-- amoral). Buckley made restitution of 1.4 million dollars, withdrew his claim for reimbursement of legal fees by Starr Broadcasting (see Evie's Dictionary of the Yiddish language-- chutzpah), and agree to an order barring him from holding a position as an officer or directer of a publicly owned company for 5 years, and from any future violation of the SEC's anti-fraud, reporting, and proxy laws. The SEC agreed that Buckley could apply to court to have the restrictions modified as to holding corporate office, provided he could show the court that he was capable of obeying the law. Mr. Buckley stated he would not apply. But Buckley, having pleaded no contest, wasn't about to go quietly. Outside of court that is. He charged the SEC with refusing to distinguish between technical and substantive guilt [Note: does this not sound like Sowell's distinction in types of justice?]. To a Wall Street Journal reporter, Mr. Buckley attributed his problems that he doesn't have a head for figures. I am not making this up.
Re: Sowell
Melvin said: So how is incompatible with Marxism that raising wages above market levels can reduce employment? He just decided that the living conditions of sugar workers were less important than the needs of the economy. Like some present-day socialists, he seems to thinks that using capitalist market forces to increase employment is a worthwhile objective. In my estimate raising wages will eventually cause unemployment if one is only looking at and understanding the economy from one category and not the details of reproduction. When the workers win a wage increase - which has not happened as real wages in decades, this increases consumption and or by one way or another drives the expansion of production and in theory - and practice in history, leads to hiring more workers. The owners or those charged with administering production on the basis of private ownership and private accumulation of capital, begin a frenzy of increased production to take advantage of selling to a broadening consumer market. Is this not the bottom line to Keyes and government spending? The government has to be the hiring agent or provider of last resort . . . period. --- Sure. There have also been rare, contrary occasions when wage rises have been won in the face of a generally static or contracting capitalist economy, usually due to a historically unusual degree of organisation and/or bargaining power on the part of labour in those cases. However, I think that history has shown that unless this success is followed up by revolutionary political action, such gains in the long run tend to result in an even bigger reversal for the workers concerned. Whatever the levels of employment, wages and conditions, labour market segmentation (along the lines of race/nationality/gender/etc), and/or sudden mass influxes into or out of the general workforce, cause --- albeit for different reasons --- what the Marxist historian Tom Brass has called deproletarianisation. Needless to say, if one has a genuinely revolutionary agenda, one will need much more than a sudden mathematical change in employment figures, wages and/or conditions. regards, Grant.
Re: Sowell
David Shemano: The argument is about the effect of minimum wage laws, and if you can't figure out the difference between minimum wage laws and rising wages, Yes, indeed the argument is about the effect of minimum wage laws and it is based on a fallacy -- actually several fallacies -- including the shape of the theoretical labour supply curve, the relationship between low-wage labour and investment, the confusion of labour rates and labour costs, the competitiveness of labour markets and probably several others that other Pen-lers could name. No doubt there is SOME level of minimum wage that may cause a decline in employment but even then it's possible that the higher wage more than compensates for the loss of employment both collectively and individually. For example, someone would possibly be better off working 9 months of the year at $10 an hour than working 12 months at $7 an hour. They might even be better off with a lower total income earned during a shorter time period. The minimum wage/unemployment argument is a defiant throwback to archaic wages-fund doctrine. I would have every sympathy with Sowell's observation of the bureaucratic response to his suggestion about empirical validation provided he also noticed that the incentives for conservative economists are equally incompatible with the economic laws they purport to uphold and investigate. These folks are neither entrepreneurs nor scientists. They're an ecclesiatical order entrusted with an infallible, ineffable doctrine. Is it an accident that their conclusions invariably exalt the rationality of privilege? Or does that just happen to be true? It may have been painfully clear to Sowell that as they pushed up minimum wage levels... employment levels were falling, but such painful clarity doesn't constitute empirical validation. Nor, despite the shocked looks on the bureaucrats' faces, would his data on sugar cane have definitively answered the question. Considering the theoretical slimness of Sowell's moment of truth, his painful clarity takes on a fascinating rhetorical function. Does it ground his reasoning in a moment of *passion* arising out of some kind of vicarious suffering in identication with the poor? Or is it his annoyance at the obtuseness of the bureaucrats who are unable to see what he so clearly (he thinks) sees? Or is there perhaps some kind of fusion there where Sowell's suffering the bureaucratic fools in itself redeems the suffering of the poor, regardless of any policy consequences? I only pray that if I ever see the light, it not be the glow of such thread-bare doctrinal kaka. Tom Walker 604 255 4812
Sowell
Sowell paints a picture of himself as having a rather shallow grasp of Marxism, if the narrow experience he describes really changed his mind. I'm pretty sure that there is no principle in Marxism that says that capitalists won't lay people off in response to minimum wage hikes, if only as a way to retaliate against the minimum wage hike. On analogy to something Marx says in _Value,Price and Proift_, Marxists might say there is no _natural_ law that says things must be that way, that rather than laying people off , the capitalists' profits could be reduced. Assuming that Sowell is smarter than the way he portrays himself, the inference would be that he had another motive than reasoning based on the empirical study he mentions to change from left to right. In other words, it's a bit idiotic or slick to conclude that the ideas Marx sets out in his many works are false because in Puerto Rico at a certain time ,with capitalism in place, a minimum wage hike was followed by a rise in unemployment. I say it might be slick if Sowell is wanting to move to the right for opportunist reasons as discussed earlier on this thread. He seems to be casting the federal ,wage-and-hour, regulatory agents and unions as practitioners of Marxism. How ridiculous is that ? And then having set up these straw Marxists, knocks them down and moves on to the right. Pleeeassse. At this point , I guess I would have to question what kind and whether Sowell was a Marxist. He sounds more like a Marxist. He seems to equate liberals and Marxists. When Sowell and the interviewer have the following exchange: What's it like for you on the right? I certainly have met racist Republicans. I ask this question for the Salon readership, many of whom are probably convinced that the Republican party is made up entirely of racists. Sowell: That's not true, of course. It's amazing, for example, how many people on the right have for years been up in Harlem spending their money and their time trying to help the kids, including one whose name would be very familiar to you. But he hasn't chosen to say it publicly, so I won't either. CB: One wonders whether that Republican's generosity will cause a rise in the unemployment rate , since back at the company where the Rep got the ducets to give to poor in Harlem, they might have to layoff some people to pay for the gifts being distributed to those Black ( no doubt) recipients of loving, non-racist charity. Charles -- From:David B. Shemano The wonders of the internet. Here is Sowell explaining his shift away from Marxism: http://www.salon.com/books/int/1999/11/10/sowell/index1.html David Shemano Interviewer: So you were a lefty once. Sowell: Through the decade of my 20s, I was a Marxist. What made you turn around? Sowell: What began to change my mind was working in the summer of 1960 as an intern in the federal government, studying minimum-wage laws in Puerto Rico. It was painfully clear that as they pushed up minimum wage levels, which they did at that time industry by industry, the employment levels were falling. I was studying the sugar industry. There were two explanations of what was happening. One was the conventional economic explanation: that as you pushed up the minimum-wage level, you were pricing people out of their jobs. The other one was that there were a series of hurricanes that had come through Puerto Rico, destroying sugar cane in the field, and therefore employment was lower. The unions preferred that explanation, and some of the liberals did, too. Did you discover something that surprised you? I spent the summer trying to figure out how to tell empirically which explanation was true. And one day I figured it out. I came to the office and announced that what we needed was data on the amount of sugar cane standing in the field before the hurricane moved through. I expected to be congratulated. And I saw these looks of shock on people's faces. As if, This idiot has stumbled on something that's going to blow the whole game! To me the question was: Is this law making poor people better off or worse off? That was the not the question the labor department was looking at. About one-third of their budget at that time came from administering the wages and hours laws. They may have chosen to believe that the law was benign, but they certainly weren't going to engage in any scrutiny of the law. What that said to me was that the incentives of government agencies are different than what the laws they were set up to administer were intended to accomplish. That may not sound very original in the James Buchanan era, when we know about Public Choice theory. But it was a revelation for me. You start thinking in those terms, and you no longer ask, what is the goal of that law, and do I agree with that goal? You start to ask instead: What are the incentives, what are the consequences of those incentives, and do I agree with those?
Sowell
From: David B. Shemano Some times you guys are just insufferable -- must you always resort to caricature? Read the entire exchange!! The relevant factor wasn't that minimum wage laws (not raising wages) reduce employment. It was the reaction of the government bureaucrats to his suggestion of an empirical test to determine why employment was falling, which led him to philosophically shift from the importance of goals to incentives. ^ CB: Well, sufferin' suckatash, is he saying the government bureaucrats were Marxists ?
Re: Sowell
CB: Well, sufferin' suckatash, is he saying the government bureaucrats were Marxists ? Many of them are. (present tense) If you get to know them, of course. But, Charles... don't tell him that. Next thing you know, David Shemano might be against unions. (It is rumored that organized labor might have Marx-ish thinker therein.) Ken. -- Religion is a belief in a Supreme Being; Science is a belief in a Supreme Generalization. -- Charles H. Fort Wild Talents
Re: Sowell
Mr. Sartesian writes: I am very careful before calling someone a hack. Somebody who makes purely ethereal distinctions in order to obscure the ugly reality in order to justify the continuation of that reality is a hack. Obviously nothing. This is not about simple common sense, as if there exists such a thing, price theories, or the democracy of free markets. It's about class. What makes a hack is someone denying, obscuring his or her class service, by proclaiming rationality, utility, objectivity. Would it shock you if I said J. S. Mill was a hack, and a big one? Friedman is a hack, and never hackier than when he criticized the IMF for its role in the Asian and post-Asian financial collapse of 97-98. Now I understand. Anybody who disagrees with your view of the world is a hack. Mill, Friedman, Sowell and Shemano -- all hacks. I can live with that. David Shemano
Re: Sowell
Charles Brown writes: Sowell paints a picture of himself as having a rather shallow grasp of Marxism, if the narrow experience he describes really changed his mind. I'm pretty sure that there is no principle in Marxism that says that capitalists won't lay people off in response to minimum wage hikes, if only as a way to retaliate against the minimum wage hike. On analogy to something Marx says in _Value,Price and Proift_, Marxists might say there is no _natural_ law that says things must be that way, that rather than laying people off , the capitalists' profits could be reduced. I am going to say this one more time. Sowell does not say that he started to change his mind because he discovered that minimum wage laws cause unemployment. The whole discussion of minimum wage laws is irrelevant to the point. The point is that when Sowell suggested an empirical test to answer the question, he discovered that the bureaucrats were entirely uninterested in why, as a matter of fact, unemployment was rising, because the bureacracy had an institutional interest in assuming the usefullness of wage and price controls. At that point, it clicked in his mind that incentives, as opposed to goals, are critical in understanding the way the world works. David Shemano
Re: Sowell
As long as we understand each other. Anybody who obscures the real source of poverty and immiseration and then argues that better is worse is a hack. Don't know if that describes you personally. -Original Message- From: David B. Shemano [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Jul 2, 2004 1:19 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Sowell Mr. Sartesian writes: I am very careful before calling someone a hack. Somebody who makes purely ethereal distinctions in order to obscure the ugly reality in order to justify the continuation of that reality is a hack. Obviously nothing. This is not about simple common sense, as if there exists such a thing, price theories, or the democracy of free markets. It's about class. What makes a hack is someone denying, obscuring his or her class service, by proclaiming rationality, utility, objectivity. Would it shock you if I said J. S. Mill was a hack, and a big one? Friedman is a hack, and never hackier than when he criticized the IMF for its role in the Asian and post-Asian financial collapse of 97-98. Now I understand. Anybody who disagrees with your view of the world is a hack. Mill, Friedman, Sowell and Shemano -- all hacks. I can live with that. David Shemano
Re: Sowell
Mr. Sartesian writes: As long as we understand each other. Anybody who obscures the real source of poverty and immiseration and then argues that better is worse is a hack. Don't know if that describes you personally. It probably does. Do you mind if I use it for my epitaph? Here lays Shemano the hack, who obscured the real source of poverty and immiseration and then argued that the better is worse. I would insist on being buried next to Herbert Spencer and make Marx stare at it all day. David Shemano
Re: Sowell
Be my guest, if you like it, if it fits, and it's how you want to be remembered. Don't much care for epitaphs myself, although I wouldn't mind being remembered as a skirt-chasing bastard. -Original Message- From: David B. Shemano [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Jul 2, 2004 3:31 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Sowell Mr. Sartesian writes: As long as we understand each other. Anybody who obscures the real source of poverty and immiseration and then argues that better is worse is a hack. Don't know if that describes you personally. It probably does. Do you mind if I use it for my epitaph? Here lays Shemano the hack, who obscured the real source of poverty and immiseration and then argued that the better is worse. I would insist on being buried next to Herbert Spencer and make Marx stare at it all day. David Shemano
Re: Sowell
But what one earth has deciding that incentives rather than goals are more important in determining the way the world works got anything to do with rejecting Marxism or showing that there is something lacking in Marxism.? Also, why is what Sowell notices inconsistent with considering goals to be more significant than incentives in understanding the world? If the goal of the bureaucracy is to promote its own power and influence, this goal would explain why there is an incentive to promote price and wage controls as these will advance the power and influence of the bureaucracy. Not only do his observations have zilch to do with Marxism, they do not show anything to support his thesis that incentives rather than goals are important in determining how things work. Cheers Ken Hanly David B. Shemano [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, July 02, 2004 1:23 PM Subject: Re: Sowell retaliate against the minimum wage hike. On analogy to I am going to say this one more time. Sowell does not say that he started to change his mind because he discovered that minimum wage laws cause unemployment. The whole discussion of minimum wage laws is irrelevant to the point. The point is that when Sowell suggested an empirical test to answer the question, he discovered that the bureaucrats were entirely uninterested in why, as a matter of fact, unemployment was rising, because the bureacracy had an institutional interest in assuming the usefullness of wage and price controls. At that point, it clicked in his mind that incentives, as opposed to goals, are critical in understanding the way the world works. David Shemano
Re: Sowell
What Marxist would deny that incentives affect behavior? Didn't Old Whiskers say somewhere that an 800% return would draw forth capital from the moon? Doug
Imaginary Sowell Dialogue
Sowell..I came to reject Marxism when I was studying affirmative action programmes for black entrepreneurs. Commentator: HOw is that?? Sowell..Well this black business owner benefitted from special loan rates and other govt. incentives. However, he still had to pay a minimum wage. He complained that these minimum wages were causing his profit to decline to where he would soon be bankrupt and that he needed an increase in loan rebates and other incentives.. Competitors claimed that the decline in his business was the result of his products being inferior. Commentator: Well what has this to do with Marx? Sowell. Well when I suggested that we do an empirical study to find out that if it was the inferiority of his proudcts that actually was causing the decline in his business profts or the minimum wage requirements he rejected this outright. He insisted that it was the level of incentives and government subsidies combined with the minimum wage requirements. Commentator : So how does this relate to Marx? Sowell. Well isnt it obvious. This guy has an incentive to explain things as lack of govt subsidies since he is dependent upon these affirmative action programme and the complaint about minimum wages is an excuse for more subsidies.. He wasnt interested in empirical truth or in finding which explanation was correct. Now Marx thought that it was the goal that was important but I now understood that Marx was wrong it is the incentives that are most important in understanding this black businessman's answer not his goal. Commentator. But wouldnt Marx say that the goal is maximising profit and since this man's profits are dependent upon govt. subsidies then this goal provides him with the incentive to explain his lack of profits a priori by suggesting that they are not large enough in the light of his being required to pay minimum wages? Sowell..Sorry. Im out of time. I have some hack wrirting to do for some guy named Shemano.
Re: Sowell
Who is Old Whiskers? I thought it was Uncle Whiskers. I've always suspected that Doug was a revisionist. At 04:50 PM 7/2/2004 -0400, you wrote: What Marxist would deny that incentives affect behavior? Didn't Old Whiskers say somewhere that an 800% return would draw forth capital from the moon? Doug -- Robert Naiman Senior Policy Analyst Venezuela Information Office 733 15th Street, NW Suite 932 Washington, DC 20005 t. 202-347-8081 x. 605 f. 202-347-8091 (*Please note new suite number and telephone*) ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: The Venezuela Information Office is dedicated to informing the American public about contemporary Venezuela. More information is available from the FARA office of the Department of Justice in Washington, DC.
Re: Sowell
Regarding Sowell's transformation, the problem here is one of email communication confusion and I have contributed. In the Salon interview, the question to Sowell was So you were a Lefty once. Sowell responded Through the decade of my 20s, I was a Marxist. The interviewer then asked What made you turn around? Sowell then gave the Puerto Rico story. Therefore, in context, Sowell is responding why he is no longer a Leftist, not why he is no longer a Marxist. This makes much more sense, because Sowell has written two books, The Vision of the Annointed and The Quest for Cosmic Justice, on the differences between Left and Right world views, and by Left he is not talking about Marxism as an analytical tool. A flavor of this is in the Salon interview: You make a provocative distinction in your new book between cosmic justice and traditional justice. Would you explain that distinction? Traditional justice, at least in the American tradition, involves treating people the same, holding them to the same standards and having them play by the same rules. Cosmic justice tries to make their prospects equal. One example: this brouhaha about people in the third world making clothing and running shoes -- Kathie Lee and all that. What's being said is: Isn't it awful that these people have to work for such little rewards, while those back here who are selling the shoes are making such fabulous amounts of money? And that's certainly true. But the question becomes, are you going to have everyone play by the same rules, or are you going to try to rectify the shortcomings, errors and failures of the entire cosmos? Because those things are wholly incompatible. If you're going to have people play by the same rules, that can be enforced with a minimum amount of interference with people's freedom. But if you're going to try to make the entire cosmos right and just, somebody has got to have an awful lot of power to impose what they think is right on an awful lot of other people. What we've seen, particularly in the 20th century, is that putting that much power in anyone's hands is enormously dangerous. It doesn't inevitably lead to terrible things. But there certainly is that danger. Later in the interview, there is this exchange: I notice that in New York liberal circles, people generally prefer arguing over ideals to discussing what might work. Being on the side of the angels. Being for affordable housing, for instance. But I don't know of anybody who wants housing to be unaffordable. Liberals tend to describe what they want in terms of goals rather than processes, and not to be overly concerned with the observable consequences. The observable consequences in New York are just scary. Regarding when Sowell turned away from Marxism as an analytical tool, I don't know. I do have his Marxism book and the conclusion of the book contains a criticism, but there is no discussion of when or why he shifted. David Shemano
Re: Sowell
I really thank you for this piece, David. It was more articulate than that which had come in quotes before. But Mr Sowell does still seem quite... you know... stupid. You actually quote this: Liberals tend to describe what they want in terms of goals rather than processes, and not to be overly concerned with the observable consequences. The observable consequences in New York are just scary. The man seems a bit thick. scary ... jesus. Regarding when Sowell turned away from Marxism as an analytical tool, I don't know. I do have his Marxism book and the conclusion of the book contains a criticism, but there is no discussion of when or why he shifted. I doubt he shifted. Ken. -- Capitalism is the extraordinary belief that the nastiest of men, for the nastiest of reasons, will somehow work for the benefit of us all. -- John Maynard Keynes
Re: Sowell
David, I mentioned before that Card and Krueger found just the opposite: that journals would not consider articles that suggested that min. wage laws do not cause unemployment. On Fri, Jul 02, 2004 at 11:23:44AM -0700, David B. Shemano wrote: Charles Brown writes: Sowell paints a picture of himself as having a rather shallow grasp of Marxism, if the narrow experience he describes really changed his mind. I'm pretty sure that there is no principle in Marxism that says that capitalists won't lay people off in response to minimum wage hikes, if only as a way to retaliate against the minimum wage hike. On analogy to something Marx says in _Value,Price and Proift_, Marxists might say there is no _natural_ law that says things must be that way, that rather than laying people off , the capitalists' profits could be reduced. I am going to say this one more time. Sowell does not say that he started to change his mind because he discovered that minimum wage laws cause unemployment. The whole discussion of minimum wage laws is irrelevant to the point. The point is that when Sowell suggested an empirical test to answer the question, he discovered that the bureaucrats were entirely uninterested in why, as a matter of fact, unemployment was rising, because the bureacracy had an institutional interest in assuming the usefullness of wage and price controls. At that point, it clicked in his mind that incentives, as opposed to goals, are critical in understanding the way the world works. David Shemano -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Re: Sowell and the big lie.
In a message dated 7/2/2004 5:22:00 PM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Traditional justice, at least in the American tradition, involves treating people the same, holding them to the same standards and having them play by the same rules. Cosmic justice tries to make their prospects equal. One example: this brouhaha about people in the third world making clothing and running shoes -- Kathie Lee and all that. What's being said is: Isn't it awful that these people have to work for such little rewards, while those back here who are selling the shoes are making such fabulous amounts of money? And that's certainly true. Comment This entire discussion concerning Mr. Sowell has an unreal quality that originates in his biases and dishonest assessment with the actual life of American society. Traditional justice in America have never involved treating everyone the same because America was more than less a Southern country in its genesis and this involved slavery and before that the genocidal extermination of the Indian. Slavery distorted everything that America - since 1776, professed it believed in. "Traditional Justice" dates from when and what is the empirical data concerning incarceration rates for the same crimes amongst different population groups? There is a point at which intellectual discourse becomes meaningless if one is not willing to confront the truth of our history and current reality. Enough of Mr. Sowell . . . and his obvious lies. Traditional American justice has never been treating everyone the same . . . and this includes in the ideological realm. Enough of this nonsense concerning Mr. Sowell. I would of course challenge him to debate amongst working class citizens and the lowest economic stratum of society and union members and give him the spanking he deserves . . . especially on issues like gun control and education. On affirmative action he would be run out of the podium and forced to understand the real meaning of traditional American justice. The poor would most certainly string him up and I would not object. Melvin P.
Re: Sowell
THIS WE MUST PARSE... -Original Message- From: David B. Shemano [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Jul 2, 2004 6:19 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Sowell Traditional justice, at least in the American tradition, involves treating people the same, holding them to the same standards and having them play by the same rules. ___ Here Shemano proves that Sowell is indeed a hack. Taking an advertising slogan, i.e. American tradition, fair play, equal standards, which in the real history of the US has had exactly nothing to do with the development of its capitalist economy, and designating it as the real history, the real freedom, the real economy. That's what hacks do. I always find Hegel's definition of liberalism A philosopy of the abstract that capitulates before the world of the concrete so appropriate for dealing with hack theories, although I might change it to read ...that covers up for the world of the concrete. Can anyone looking at the real history of capitalist economic development find an American tradition that coincides with Sowell's hackery? Where is the fair play? In Slavery? In theeExtermination of the indigenous peoples? The NYC anti-draft riots? In the fraud and brutal exploitation accompanying the development of the railroads. How about Plessy v. Ferguson? How about in the assaults upon workers, organized privately and through the state against workers trying to organize for better wages? Where is the equal treatment? In the discrimination in employment. In strike-breaking? . Cosmic justice tries to make their prospects equal. One example: this brouhaha about people in the third world making clothing and running shoes -- Kathie Lee and all that. What's being said is: Isn't it awful that these people have to work for such little rewards, while those back here who are selling the shoes are making such fabulous amounts of money? And that's certainly true. But the question becomes, are you going to have everyone play by the same rules, or are you going to try to rectify the shortcomings, errors and failures of the entire cosmos? Because those things are wholly incompatible. If you're going to have people play by the same rules, that can be enforced with a minimum amount of interference with people's freedom. But if you're going to try to make the entire cosmos right and just, somebody has got to have an awful lot of power to impose what they think is right on an awful lot of other people. What we've seen, particularly in the 20th century, is that putting that much power in anyone's hands is enormously dangerous. It doesn't inevitably lead to terrible things. But there certainly is that danger. ___ Once again Shemano shows that Sowell is a hack, obscuring reality by pretending to apply simple rational analysis and then inflating the simplistic analysis as profound historical insight. Everybody play by the same rules vs. enormous power? Exactly what and how would you get any and everyone to play by the same rules when the rules themselves are a function of enormous power. Has Sowell ever seen a maquilladora? Or a clothing factory? Has he ever seen workers in food processing plants, slaughtering, preparing chickens? You cannot get the owners of these plants to abide by even a minimum set of rules regarding health or safety, or even fire codes, much less rules that might be fair. And putting that much power in anyone's hands is enormously dangerous? We are not talking about one person here, again Sowell distorts, and I would say deliberately, the social organization of classes, with individual corruption, arbitrariness, etc. as if those qualities were innate dangers of the human being and not historical expressions of the needs of property and class. __ Later in the interview, there is this exchange: I notice that in New York liberal circles, people generally prefer arguing over ideals to discussing what might work. Being on the side of the angels. Being for affordable housing, for instance. But I don't know of anybody who wants housing to be unaffordable. Liberals tend to describe what they want in terms of goals rather than processes, and not to be overly concerned with the observable consequences. The observable consequences in New York are just scary. _ More hackery. Creating the mythical New York liberal circle, (he left out Jewish) as the well-meaning but ultimately destructive engine of anti-freedom. What a load. What liberals? Doing what? How does this account for the social changes in housing stock, the real deterioration in living standards after 1973; the explosion in single parent working women families below the poverty line after 1979. This faux erudition pretending to be pithy insight is nothing but the William F. Buckley short course in pseudo analysis. And for those of you
Re: Sowell and the big lie.
Melvin P. writes: On affirmative action he would be run out of the podium and forced to understand the real meaning of traditional American justice. The poor would most certainly string him up and I would not object. As Godwin's Law approaches, I am done with the thread. David Shemano
Re: Sowell and the big lie.
In a message dated 7/2/2004 6:42:37 PM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: As Godwin's Law approaches, I am done with the thread. David Shemano Comment I understand . . . but there are times I speak as an insurgent partisan. I would debate Mr. Sowell in front of the people who actually have elected me to offices . . . offices . . . on things like the military budget. I am not a liberal or leftist. I am a communist worker who is not ashamed of the path I traveled from Christ communism to modern communism. And more than capable of presenting coherent arguments to masses. I do not advocate dividing one fish amongst 40 people. I do believe and can convince the diverse peoples of American that the billions of dollars cycling through the circuit of speculation could be better spend on real things like health care, hot dogsand child care for the majority of the workers who happen to be women. If you cannot spend a billion dollars then I am not advocating taking anything from you but an abstraction that is wealth that means nothing to the multitude. I am not interested in expropriating ones rather large mansion . . . because I refuse to be responsible for the administrative task of a mansion. You hire a cook and have to feed him to cook the food that feeds you. And then the cook have to feed his or her family and the cycle deepens. You slowly discover that the people you have hired are actually making you work to pay them. OK! There is some deeper logic and morality to society that does not always match our noble aspirations and ideological proclamations. I'll eat Mr. Sowell alive and my brother would bury him for sure. Peace Melvin P.
Re: Sowell and the big lie.
I'll eat Mr. Sowell alive and my brother would bury him for sure. Peace Melvin __ Cue the brother: Brother Melvin puts somefire to the feet of theideological tapdancers of capital, and the dancershead towards the emergency exits, protesting the harsh language. Meanwhile, fire or no fire, their, the tap dancers', feet stink. But the facts ofmatters are that my brother Melvin isteaching a lesson-- that rhetoric obscures reality, and the reality is class struggle. The purveyors of the rhetoric of free markets, greed and god,have not themselves shied away fromapologizing, excusing, thephysical attacks upon the poorer members of society by the agents of the wealthier-- agents such as the police, the military, thesecret and not so secret night-riders. "It's unfortunate," is offered,which means, aswith everything else offered by the ideological soft shoe/hard bootmen, "It's really the fault of those uncouth, unwashed,demanding poor, who just won't accept that this is all for their own benefit. But we must preserve order." You tell me if you haven't heard that, or its equivalent, coming out of the mouths of Gilderites, Randists, Friedmaniacs, Von Miserabilists. What is the reality of capitalat its critical moments? -- Attacks on the workers. Thatcher dismantling British Steel; shuttering the coal mines.The dirty war in Argentina, withDaimler Benz auto plants used asghost prisons; with Fordpointing out "troublemakers." But no, some would ratherdiscuss hypothetical revenue sharing in Simon and Garfunkel concerts without realizing that the expropriation begins not in the work of the roadies, but the very production of the amps, the guitars, the costumes, the lights, that make the social, commerical, presentation of such aconcert possible. Give me Brother Melvin and his fire in the belly every time. And I'll bring the shovel. - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, July 02, 2004 5:32 PM Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Sowell and the big lie. In a message dated 7/2/2004 6:42:37 PM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: As Godwin's Law approaches, I am done with the thread. David Shemano Comment I understand . . . but there are times I speak as an insurgent partisan. I would debate Mr. Sowell in front of the people who actually have elected me to offices . . . offices . . . on things like the military budget. I am not a liberal or leftist. I am a communist worker who is not ashamed of the path I traveled from Christ communism to modern communism. And more than capable of presenting coherent arguments to masses. I do not advocate dividing one fish amongst 40 people. I do believe and can convince the diverse peoples of American that the billions of dollars cycling through the circuit of speculation could be better spend on real things like health care, hot dogsand child care for the majority of the workers who happen to be women. If you cannot spend a billion dollars then I am not advocating taking anything from you but an abstraction that is wealth that means nothing to the multitude. I am not interested in expropriating ones rather large mansion . . . because I refuse to be responsible for the administrative task of a mansion. You hire a cook and have to feed him to cook the food that feeds you. And then the cook have to feed his or her family and the cycle deepens. You slowly discover that the people you have hired are actually making you work to pay them. OK! There is some deeper logic and morality to society that does not always match our noble aspirations and ideological proclamations. I'll eat Mr. Sowell alive and my brother would bury him for sure. Peace Melvin P.
Re: Sowell
The wonders of the internet. Here is Sowell explaining his shift away from Marxism: http://www.salon.com/books/int/1999/11/10/sowell/index1.html David Shemano
Re: Sowell
David Shemano said: The wonders of the internet. Here is Sowell explaining his shift away from Marxism: http://www.salon.com/books/int/1999/11/10/sowell/index1.html David Shemano From that interview: So you were a lefty once. Through the decade of my 20s, I was a Marxist. What made you turn around? What began to change my mind was working in the summer of 1960 as an intern in the federal government, studying minimum-wage laws in Puerto Rico. It was painfully clear that as they pushed up minimum wage levels, which they did at that time industry by industry, the employment levels were falling. I was studying the sugar industry. There were two explanations of what was happening. One was the conventional economic explanation: that as you pushed up the minimum-wage level, you were pricing people out of their jobs. The other one was that there were a series of hurricanes that had come through Puerto Rico, destroying sugar cane in the field, and therefore employment was lower. The unions preferred that explanation, and some of the liberals did, too. I never thought that by posting that original article (Low Taxes Do What?!), I would stir up a lengthy debate on Sowell! But I've learnt a lot. Whatever his strengths or weaknesses as an economist, it seems he is under the impression that there is not much difference between the _political_ viewpoints and objectives of Marxists, Puerto Rican union officials and some of the liberals. Sowell can hardly be blamed for this, considering that so much of what has passed for Marxism --- at least since the late 1960s --- would more accurately be described as varieties of radical liberalism, labourism, (Bernsteinian) social democracy, etc. This is shown in his emphasis on the objective of preserving jobs in the sugar industry --- on objective which is both modest in terms of political change, and (IMHO) damn nigh impossible in terms of either a local/national capitalist economy, or an overarching global capitalist economy. regards, Grant.
Re: Sowell
The wonders of the Internet. Here is Sowell explaining his shift away from Marxism: http://www.salon.com/books/int/1999/11/10/sowell/index1.htmlDavid Shemano Comment Mr. Sowell is of course no one fool or "boy" . . . and most certainly not an Uncle Tom . . . a characterization that can mean virtually anything depending on usage. In Michigan one of the very first African Americans and Marxist to declare themselves for the Republican Party was a gentlemen named William Brown Jr. Bill and I were leaders in the "student movement" and member of the old League of Revolutionary Black Workers and later the Communist League. There was always "something conservative" about Bill and here is the dilemma. There was always "something conservative" about African Americans and a very large segment of them. What was trying to be conserved was the right to enter American society as equal and "have my own thing" or to "make my way in life" using all that is available in society. Bill's political evolution amazed none of us because we lived the polarization and shifting economic relations amongst the African American people as they sought to take their place in American society as equals to their respective counterparts. I became a union leader, whichis an economic category several steps above the most poverty stricken. This reality of the African American as a people has not been properly understood . . . or rather, interpreted very different. If one suspends the color factor and their subjective understanding of color for a moment the path of theAfrican American has not been unlike that of variousethnic groups in theireconomic and political strivings. The force that has held the African American people together as a people was not language, religion or other "ethnic" factors present as the quest of the Italian or Irish or Slavic workers in American history, but rather the violence of the whites, legal and extra legal measures and pressures in the context of about 90 years of segregation. Mr. Sowell understands this dynamic but he apparently understands as an outsider or one who has not studied the issue in its concreteness. For instance, in the interview pointed out above that is a radically incorrect notion of the meaning and origins of Jim Crow and segregation. For instance, segregation and what would become the Jim Crow laws have their origins in the North and not the South. There is a reason that Detroit exploded violently in 1967 . . . and the catalyst was in fact a crap game. The source material for this specific evolution is "The Strange Career of Jim Crow" by C. Vann Woodward. Dr. Claude Anderson - formerly of the Carter administration, traces the peculiar evolution of what became the black community in the North in his "Black Labor/White Wealth," and he uses as a line of delineation the freeing of 30,000 black slaves in the North in 1790 and their subsequent social and economic evolution. Mr. Sowell's evolution out of Marxism is neither surprising and questionable as an assertion. There are as many different brands of Marxism as their are Republicans, Democrats and General Motors divisions and make of automobiles. One can argue the meaning of "Marxism" and end up with a definition that proceeds from ones "brand identity." I most certainly did not and do not espouse what has been "brand Marxism" between the period of the 1960s and 1990s. Mr. Sowell is correct in my opinion concerning vouchers and most blacks I have lived with and represented in various organizations and the Union would immediately opt for the chance to send their children to better schools. This would not of course alleviate or radically alter the intractable social position of the most poverty stricken and destitute in our society and I refer to this segment of society as the "real proletariat" - the bottom stratum of society. I do not question the sincerity of Mr. Sowell's vision but rather all the assumptions about American society implicit in his vision. Blacks or rather African Americans or the descendants of slaves of the old plantation system manifest the intractable social position of not being slaves but rather being on the bottom of the social ladder. This is a different conceptual framework from Mr. Sowell. The bottom of the social ladder means the bottom of all the classes and class fragments that correspond with their counterpart amongst the Anglo American people . . . although cities like Atlanta Georgia continue to amaze me. The rebellion in Detroit - 1967, and why the catalyst was literally a crap game or "blind pig" or what we simply call "an after-hours joint" is not understood. This is actually an economic question and involves money. Who has money to frequent an after hours
Re: Thomas Sowell
This excerpt provided by Waistline echoes the crap William F. Buckley routinely put out in the past. I recall Buckley once pointing out that minorities chose to go into song and dance as a career path, rather than, say, medicine. He applauded the freedom of choice. Simple lying economics. Gene Coyle [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Thomas Sowell June 29, 2004 /10 Tamuz, 5764 Excerpt "Just as an artificially high price for wheat set by the government leads to a chronic surplus of wheat, so an artificially high price for labor set by the government leads to a surplus of labor better known as unemployment. "Since all workers are not the same, this unemployment is concentrated among the less skilled and less experienced workers. Many of them are simply priced out of a job. "In the United States, for example, the highest unemployment rates are almost invariably among black teenagers. But this was not always the case. "Although the federal minimum wage law was passed in 1938, wartime inflation during the Second World War meant that the minimum wage law had no major effect until a new round of increases in the minimum wage level began in 1950. Unemployment rates among black teenagers before then were a fraction of what they are today and no higher than among white teenagers. The time is long overdue for schools of journalism to start teaching economics. It would eliminate much of the nonsense and hysteria in the media, and with it perhaps some of the demagoguery in politics. http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell1.asp Without question Mr. Sowell is a highly educated and talented man .. . and also an outstanding propagandist. Many simply disagree with his point of view and the implied economic concepts and frameworks his exposition are based upon. There is absolutely nothing wrong with a popular form of exposition that takes into account how the diverse people of America actually think things out. This art requires awareness of how people actually interact with one another and the real history of their ideas. I tend to steer clear of broad ideological categories called "left" and "right" . . . liberal and conservative, because in my personal experience these are not categories that express how people think out social questions and the issues of the day. For instance, ones attitude concerning abortion does not necessarily dictate or correspond to a fixed and predicable political pattern concerning how one might respond to economic issues or losing ones pension for instance . . . or having the company renege on its pledge to pay ones medical benefits during retirement. Although, I generally and specifically disagree with Mr. Sowell's inner logic about America - including gun control, and I am against gun control as the issue is currently framed in the public, what he does understand is the mood of the country and how people think things out. At any rate, he understands the mood of the audience he is writing to and for. Mr. Sowell is an outstanding leader . . . as is Colin Powell . . . and they carry the tag "black leaders" for reasons of our history. They exist and operate on a political continuum and I generally have nothing in common with these men. One can nevertheless learn an important lesson from Mr. Sowell's form of exposition, whose inner logic I radically disagree with. Melvin P.
Re: Sowell - follow up
In a message dated 7/1/2004 8:28:43 AM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Mr. Sowell is of course no one fool or "boy" . . . and most certainly not an Uncle Tom . . . a characterization that can mean virtually anything depending on usage. Comment - Follow up There is a tendency to reframe from characterizing a leader such as Thomas Sowell because no one wants to be accused of "color blindness" or "insensitivity." I believe other more profound factors about American society are involved that has generally escaped the logic of the radicals and liberals . . . socialists and many communists. Perhaps a year or maybe 18 months ago I wrote a couple articles called the "Peculiar Phenomena called the Black Leader" or something to thataffect on Marxmail. If this articles was written today it would be different in exposition but not its underlying internal components. Mr. Sowell is not a black leader but a leader who happens to be black. On the other hadReverend Al Sharpton is a black leader being reinvented as a leader that happens to be black. Al Sharpton was literally won over and recruited by a politically and economically important segment of the African American intelligenica that persuaded him to take off his "jump suits" and get a hair cut. The Minister Louis Farrakhan is a black leader, while Julian Bond is a leader than happens to be black, although he began as a black leader in the Civil Rights Movement. The distinction is not an ideological category but the face of the shifting economic and political relations in the American Union. The "Peculiar Phenomena called the Black Leader" arose on the basis of the defeat of Reconstruction and its political aftermath. The first set of political leaders from the slave class after Emancipation were not black leaders but leaders who were black. One must read and understand the demands of that time for reform of the system. The broad institution of Jim Crow and segregation is the context for the emergence of the"Peculiar Phenomena called the Black Leader." The destruction of Jim Crow and segregation is removing the social framework of the "Peculiar Phenomena called the Black Leader." There will always be leaders that are black. My brother's story might illustrate why one needs a concrete understanding of the evolution of American society to understand the modern world of politics instead of ideological proclamations. My brother Maurice is an International Representative of the UAW - the autoworkers union. He is not a black leader but most certainly African American. He is perhaps the most knowledgeable and militant leader the UAW currently possesses and more than less "conservative," having taken part in negotiating contracts since 1984. Maurice began his unioncareer at the Detroit Universal Division of Chrysler in Dearborn Michigan - the home of Ford Rouge, and a city where blacks could not pass through unless they had a factory badge indicating what plant they workedat.Her won his first union position as Chief Steward around 1976 andat that time much of our battle was liberally against Ku Klux Klan type groups in the plant.He had been earlier fired - discharged, for fighting a white co worker and the union returned the other guy back to work but not Maurice. We had to go to the Civil Rights Commission to get his job back. Detroit Universal made drive shafts and when Chrysler failed to meet its obligation in the bond market - 1979, and was threatening to go belly up the plant was closed. I was tossed in the streets for four years - 1980-1984, and Maurice went to Sterling Stamping, the largest stamping facility in North America with a little over 5,000 workers. I was called back to work in January 1984, zoomed in from Chicagoand moved in with my brother. He decided to run for the office of Committeeman in the upcoming May election and we analyzed the political forces and determined he had a long shot and if we ran a well organized intense campaign he could take the office two years later. The district he was running in was composed of roughly 1700 people with a workforce 30% black. Two political caucuses controlled the Local Union 1264 and the Shop floor, not unlike the Republican and Democratic Party. Maurice worked the midnight shift and had a reputation for being knowledge about contract matters, fiercely loyal to his coworkers, a lover of overtime work and took crap from on one - black or white. As a young man he actually enjoyed fisticuffs and considers himself a capitalist minded worker. Working midnight's means one has an opportunity to mingle with the workers on days and afternoons because shifts overlap so everyone knew him and the black workers loved him deeply for his iron will and ability to get things done. Real leaders get things done. As preparation
Re: Sowell
Grant Lee wrote: The wonders of the internet. Here is Sowell explaining his shift away from Marxism: http://www.salon.com/books/int/1999/11/10/sowell/index1.html David Shemano From that interview: So you were a lefty once. Through the decade of my 20s, I was a Marxist. What made you turn around? What began to change my mind was working in the summer of 1960 as an intern in the federal government, studying minimum-wage laws in Puerto Rico. It was painfully clear that as they pushed up minimum wage levels, which they did at that time industry by industry, the employment levels were falling. I was studying the sugar industry. There were two explanations of what was happening. One was the conventional economic explanation: that as you pushed up the minimum-wage level, you were pricing people out of their jobs. The other one was that there were a series of hurricanes that had come through Puerto Rico, destroying sugar cane in the field, and therefore employment was lower. The unions preferred that explanation, and some of the liberals did, too. So how is incompatible with Marxism that raising wages above market levels can reduce employment? He just decided that the living conditions of sugar workers were less important than the needs of the economy. Doug
Re: Sowell
Doug asked: So how is incompatible with Marxism that raising wages above market levels can reduce employment? He just decided that the living conditions of sugar workers were less important than the needs of the economy. Like some present-day socialists, he seems to thinks that using capitalist market forces to increase employment is a worthwhile objective. Grant.
Re: Sowell
Exactly! One wonders how anyone with even a minimal understanding of Marxism would think this somehow showed its shortcomings. At the same time the conclusion that minimum wages necessarily lead to greater unemployment is surely not that evident nor does this example show that to be the case. Are those countries or states with minimum wages those with higher unemployment rates than those with minimum wage rates? Anyway even if the conclusion were correct, the conventional economic explanation assumes some sort of idealised capitalist economic system. Why would a Marxist not conceive of ways to counteract these effects rather than just accepting them. For example by nationalising industries and subsidising them to ensure at lest a living wage etc. by putting controls on capital flight etc.etc. Passages such as this just confirm that Sowell hasnt a clue about Marxism . Prima facie even for a Marxist if wages go up then capital will tend to flow to a lower wage regime other things being equal and would thus reduce employment. Capitalists want to maximise their return after all. But then there may be no lower wage regime with equal labor skills or equal productivity, costs of moving might outweigh benefits and so and so on and on. Why is such a bright light seemingly blind to the obvious. Cheers, Ken Hanly - Original Message - From: Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, July 01, 2004 11:16 AM Subject: Re: Sowell Grant Lee wrote: The wonders of the internet. Here is Sowell explaining his shift away from Marxism: http://www.salon.com/books/int/1999/11/10/sowell/index1.html David Shemano From that interview: So you were a lefty once. Through the decade of my 20s, I was a Marxist. What made you turn around? What began to change my mind was working in the summer of 1960 as an intern in the federal government, studying minimum-wage laws in Puerto Rico. It was painfully clear that as they pushed up minimum wage levels, which they did at that time industry by industry, the employment levels were falling. I was studying the sugar industry. There were two explanations of what was happening. One was the conventional economic explanation: that as you pushed up the minimum-wage level, you were pricing people out of their jobs. The other one was that there were a series of hurricanes that had come through Puerto Rico, destroying sugar cane in the field, and therefore employment was lower. The unions preferred that explanation, and some of the liberals did, too. So how is incompatible with Marxism that raising wages above market levels can reduce employment? He just decided that the living conditions of sugar workers were less important than the needs of the economy. Doug
Re: Sowell
In a message dated 7/1/2004 11:30:37 AM Central Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: So how is incompatible with Marxism that raising wages above market levels can reduce employment? He just decided that the living conditions of sugar workers were less important than the needs of "the economy."Like some present-day "socialists", he seems to thinks that using capitalist market forces to increase employment is a worthwhile objective. Comment In my estimate raising wages will eventually cause unemployment if one is only looking at and understanding "the economy" from one category and not the details of reproduction. When the workers win a wage increase - which has not happened as real wages in decades, this increases consumption and or by one way or another drives the expansion of production and in theory - and practice in history, leads tohiring more workers. Theowners or those charged with administering production on the basis of private ownership and private accumulation of capital, begin a frenzy of increased production to take advantage of selling to a broadening consumer market. Is this not the bottom line to Keyes and government spending? The government has to be the hiring agent or provider of last resort . . . period. This new buying impacts other sections of industry like needing new and more modern machinery, more managersand everything is wonderful until the market barrier is hit. The market barrier is the ability of consumers to buy things and finance continued consumption. The barrier is hit - generally speaking, and a segment of society, usually the less skilled are thrown into unemployment. Even during a boom the unskilled face a tenuous future became the boom has followed a downturn and many companies tend to buy new equipment on the way to the bottom of the curve and coming out of the curve to lower labor cost and fully exploit the boom. During several upticks of the market in my life time the auto industry became cash cows. This is followed by the inevitable dog fight for market shares. On the other hand lowering labor cost can impact the market as a part of a boom if say the cost of production in agriculture continues to fall faster than the labor cost in other segments of the market, but the general effect is the lowering of labor cost across the board and rendering every large segment of labor superfluous to active/continueous employment. If the labor cost of cell phones, televisions, DVD's fall faster that the labor cost of whatever sector of the economy you are employed in you are going to see a ghost that does not express the totality of the process. Low labor cost in China - on the basis of its expanding bourgeois property relations, further drag down world labor cost. Wal-Mart is a good buy for now. Mr. Sowell tends to take partial expressions of the economy and generalize, while it would be more useful to . . . say . . . trace the development of labor in the auto industry from the time of Henry Fords "Five Dollar A Day" wage scam to yesterday. How many "hands" produce how many vehicles is a simple equation. What portion of direct labor is cost? What portion indirect labor and capital expenditures? Or the ratios in what is the organic composition of capital? What is the trend or direction of this process? In a few words the general curve is that greater consumption broadens the market. Greater consumption is not the product of either cutting wages or lowering them but a combination of both under the impact of changes in the organic composition of capital - the technological revolution. Broadening the market means fiercer competition for that market. This brings about the rationalization of labor and the rationalization - improvement of the technical basis, of the material power of the productive forces. This end up creating the basis for the constriction of the market as fewer and fewer workers are needed and replaced by technological innovation. Directly suppressing the wages in a sector of the economy can increase consumption from that sector. I advocate the expansion of welfare as a practical program not just to expand the agricultural sector but to feed people, because it is morally and ethically correct to do so, but this will not stop the revolution in agriculture. Why should we not have our monthly government allocated beer ration and compel Coca Cola and Pepsi to implement massive water purification programs in every market they operate in? There is nothing wrong with Section 8 housing for right now . . . today. I do not support a program of free Coca Cola and a Coke monthly allotment for the masses. Mr. Sowell has it all wrong even from the stand point of bourgeois economic theory. He falls on the side that says funding private corporation capital accumulation and tax cuts - to the people, is the key to expan
Sowell
Doug Henwood writes (and others agree) What made you turn around? What began to change my mind was working in the summer of 1960 as an intern in the federal government, studying minimum-wage laws in Puerto Rico. It was painfully clear that as they pushed up minimum wage levels, which they did at that time industry by industry, the employment levels were falling. I was studying the sugar industry. There were two explanations of what was happening. One was the conventional economic explanation: that as you pushed up the minimum-wage level, you were pricing people out of their jobs. The other one was that there were a series of hurricanes that had come through Puerto Rico, destroying sugar cane in the field, and therefore employment was lower. The unions preferred that explanation, and some of the liberals did, too. So how is incompatible with Marxism that raising wages above market levels can reduce employment? He just decided that the living conditions of sugar workers were less important than the needs of the economy. Doug Some times you guys are just insufferable -- must you always resort to caricature? Read the entire exchange!! The relevant factor wasn't that minimum wage laws (not raising wages) reduce employment. It was the reaction of the government bureaucrats to his suggestion of an empirical test to determine why employment was falling, which led him to philosophically shift from the importance of goals to incentives: I spent the summer trying to figure out how to tell empirically which explanation was true. And one day I figured it out. I came to the office and announced that what we needed was data on the amount of sugar cane standing in the field before the hurricane moved through. I expected to be congratulated. And I saw these looks of shock on people's faces. As if, This idiot has stumbled on something that's going to blow the whole game! To me the question was: Is this law making poor people better off or worse off? That was the not the question the labor department was looking at. About one-third of their budget at that time came from administering the wages and hours laws. They may have chosen to believe that the law was benign, but they certainly weren't going to engage in any scrutiny of the law. What that said to me was that the incentives of government agencies are different than what the laws they were set up to administer were intended to accomplish. That may not sound very original in the James Buchanan era, when we know about Public Choice theory. But it was a revelation for me. You start thinking in those terms, and you no longer ask, what is the goal of that law, and do I agree with that goal? You start to ask instead: What are the incentives, what are the consequences of those incentives, and do I agree with those? BTW, the Reason review of Doug Henwood's book is now online: http://www.reason.com/0406/cr.co.that.shtml David Shemano
Re: Sowell
David wrote: The relevant factor wasn't that minimum wage laws (not raising wages) reduce employment. It was the reaction of the government bureaucrats to his suggestion of an empirical test to determine why employment was falling, which led him to philosophically shift from the importance of goals to incentives David may not know about the economics literature about the minimum wage. David Card and Alan Krueger showed that the minimum wage did not reduce employment. They compared employment into adjacent states where one increased the minimum wage. Soon thereafter, the fast food industry hired two economists to refute the study. They were not very successful. The refutation did not stand up to scrutiny. The other study did. I have to leave now even though this explanation is inadequate. Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University michael at ecst.csuchico.edu Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
Re: Sowell
From: David B. Shemano [EMAIL PROTECTED] BTW, the Reason review of Doug Henwood's book is now online: http://www.reason.com/0406/cr.co.that.shtml Well that was two minutes wasted. I'd suggest that Reason critic Charles Oliver hold onto his day job, in which he covers local government for The Daily Citizen in Dalton, Georgia. Carl _ FREE pop-up blocking with the new MSN Toolbar get it now! http://toolbar.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200415ave/direct/01/
Sowell
Apropos of the discussion on SOwell, I add the following from Greg Mahoney at GWU David Barkin MEXICO -- Forwarded Message --- From: gmahoney [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thu, 1 Jul 2004 14:00:56 -0400 Subject: RE: more on s. Have you ever seen Sowells book, Marxism: Philosophy and Economics (1985)? Its an awful book. Does it sound strange then to say that I would have loved to have reviewed it? My own work recently is a direct critique of Friedman, a piece titled Friedman and Freedom: Text or Antitext? given his popularity in Asia, where I've done most of my research (econo-ethnographies in rural and urban China). It's convenient that Sowell is a Chicago Schooler and Friedman Fellow at Hoover, and that his work doesn't really deviate from the Friedman mantra. Plus, he really exposes himself when he bowlderizes WEB Dubois and others in his continued assault on blacks in the book you're having sent, Applied Economics. He and Walter Williams, the other black libertarian laissez faire apologist, are such hypocrites. It's similar to Friedman's vehement arguments against various government regulations and support programs, and yet, admits that he has benefited greatly from them. And similarly, Friedman's immediate acceptance of tenure when it was first offered at Chicago despite being on the record as being opposed to tenure... Really, I don't have the training or caste to pyschoanalyze them, but Social Darwinists really seem to have a lot of self hate... See, for example, Friedman's 1972 presidential address to the Mont Pelerin Society titled Capitalism and the Jews: Confronting a Paradox where, among other things, he has the gall to cite Hannah Arendt's Origins of Totalitarianism in support of his attack on Jews for a negative attitude towards capitalism despite owing it an enormous debt. Friedman must have missed the passages in Arendt's Origins when she excoriates liberalism. Perhaps he was misled by Arendt's intimacy with and apologies for Heidegger. Speaking of Williams in tandem with Sowell, here are a couple of columns from both: It's time for journalists to study a little economics Thomas Sowell June 29, 2004 A recent front-page story in the Wall Street Journal told of rising hunger and malnutrition amid chronic agricultural surpluses in India. India is now exporting wheat, and even donating some to Afghanistan, while malnutrition is a growing problem within India itself. This situation is both paradoxical and tragic, but what is also remarkable is that the long article about it omits the one key word that explains such a painful paradox: Price. There can be a surplus of any given thing at any given time. But a chronic surplus of the same thing, year after year, means that somebody is preventing the price from falling. Otherwise the excess supply would drive down the price, leading producers to produce less -- and consumers to consume more -- until the surplus was gone. What is happening in India is that the government is keeping the price of wheat and some other agricultural produce from falling. That is exactly what the government of the United States has been doing for more than half a century, leading to chronic agricultural surpluses here. Nor are India and the United States the only countries with such policies, leading to such results. Although Americans are wrestling with obesity while Indians are suffering malnutrition, the economic principle is the same -- and that principle is totally ignored by the reporters writing this story for the Wall Street Journal. There is no special need to single out the Wall Street Journal for this criticism, except that when economic illiteracy shows up in one of the highest quality publications in the country that shows one of the great deficiencies of journalists in general. One of the many jobs offered to me over the years, to my wife's astonishment, was a job as dean of a school of journalism. While I was not about to give up my own research and writing, in order to get tangled up in campus politics, the offer made me think about what a school of journalism ought to be teaching people whose jobs will be to inform the public. They first and foremost ought to know what they are talking about, which requires a solid grounding in history, statistics, science -- and economics. Since journalists are reporting on so many things with economic implications, they should have at least a year of introductory economics. People with a basic knowledge of economics would understand that words like surplus and shortage imply another word that may not be mentioned explicitly: Price. And chronic surpluses or chronic shortages imply price controls. Conversely, price controls imply chronic surpluses or shortages -- depending on whether price controls keep prices from falling to the level they would reach under supply and demand or keep them from rising to that level. Controls that keep prices from falling to the level
Re: Sowell
from his column on why journalists should study economics, one thing that strikes me as defining Sowell as a hack is that his approach is so _a priori_. He doesn't have to study _why_ black youth unemployment was so low during World War II. Instead, he _knows_ that it was because the inflation-corrected minimum wage was so low. It's a _fact_ that arises because the word surplus implies a high price and the _fact_ that only relative prices explain how the economy works. An empirically-oriented economist would look at whether or not other workers' unemployment rates (especially those for whom the minimum wage is irrelevant) were low at the same time. Indeed they were. It has something to do with high aggregate demand, something that Sowell didn't study in school, it seems. People like Sowell need to have some experience with the real world, so I think it would be good to make him take a job as a cub reporter in Compton, California. Then, he needs to study economics again. Maybe he'd learn something this time. jd
Re: Sowell
k hanly wrote: ... the conclusion that minimum wages necessarily lead to greater unemployment is surely not that evident... Indeed. Under rigorous neoclassical analysis it is easily demonstrated that under monopsonistic or monopsonistically competitive labor market conditions (ie., where the hiring of a marginal unit of labor-power increases total labor cost by more than the cost of that marginal unit) imposition of a minimum wage can, and a marginal increase in an existing minimum wage will, increase total employment. Shane Mage When we read on a printed page the doctrine of Pythagoras that all things are made of numbers, it seems mystical, mystifying, even downright silly. When we read on a computer screen the doctrine of Pythagoras that all things are made of numbers, it seems self-evidently true. (N. Weiner)
Re: Sowell
It, the rise in wages, is not incompatible with increasing unemployment, but neither is it incompatible with rising employment. Sowell, or whoever wants to argue this point from the right, makes a superficial cause and effect between wage rates and employment levels, where there is none. And by the way, its is the creation of such superficial cause and effect links, and the propagation of them as profound economic insights that defines a hack. - Original Message - From: Doug Henwood [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, July 01, 2004 9:16 AM Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Sowell Grant Lee wrote: The wonders of the internet. Here is Sowell explaining his shift away from Marxism: http://www.salon.com/books/int/1999/11/10/sowell/index1.html David Shemano From that interview: So you were a lefty once. Through the decade of my 20s, I was a Marxist. What made you turn around? What began to change my mind was working in the summer of 1960 as an intern in the federal government, studying minimum-wage laws in Puerto Rico. It was painfully clear that as they pushed up minimum wage levels, which they did at that time industry by industry, the employment levels were falling. I was studying the sugar industry. There were two explanations of what was happening. One was the conventional economic explanation: that as you pushed up the minimum-wage level, you were pricing people out of their jobs. The other one was that there were a series of hurricanes that had come through Puerto Rico, destroying sugar cane in the field, and therefore employment was lower. The unions preferred that explanation, and some of the liberals did, too. So how is incompatible with Marxism that raising wages above market levels can reduce employment? He just decided that the living conditions of sugar workers were less important than the needs of the economy. Doug
Re: Sowell
Mr. Sartesian writes: It, the rise in wages, is not incompatible with increasing unemployment, but neither is it incompatible with rising employment. Sowell, or whoever wants to argue this point from the right, makes a superficial cause and effect between wage rates and employment levels, where there is none. And by the way, its is the creation of such superficial cause and effect links, and the propagation of them as profound economic insights that defines a hack. For the third time, neither Sowell, nor any other neoclassical economist I know of, has ever argued that rising wages causes unemployment. Obviously, if wages are rising, people who might otherwise be at the beach will be drawn into the workforce. The argument is about the effect of minimum wage laws, and if you can't figure out the difference between minimum wage laws and rising wages, be a little more careful before you call somebody a hack. Now that I got that off my chest, I am off to see Simon and Garfunkel at the Hollywood Bowl. When I get back, how about a discussion of explaining the price of concert tickets from a Marxist perspective? David Shemano
Re: Sowell
I appreciate the distinction between rising wages and minimum wages, David. Thanks. Now that I got that off my chest, I am off to see Simon and Garfunkel at the Hollywood Bowl. When I get back, how about a discussion of explaining the price of concert tickets from a Marxist perspective? People elevate the demand for music from a moment in their past to a Frank Sinatra sorta retro act? I prefer the original recordings (Frank and SG and the rest). The Marxist perspective might be that this is a false consciousness and wishing for the days of old ideologies (Santa Claus etc)... and people pay money for it because it eases their feelings of being less than they had thought they were (socially speaking). ? Ya think? Ken. -- Call this war by whatever name you may, only call it not an American rebellion; it is nothing more or less than a Scotch Irish Presbyterian rebellion. -- Anonymous Hessian officer, 1778
Re: Sowell
Mr. Shemano asks: how about a discussion of explaining the price of concert tickets from a Marxist perspective? individual prices can't be explained or predicted using Marx's labor theory of value (more accurately, the law of value). Regular micro will do (though not the Chicago variant). It's a monopoly situation, where the sellers try to get as much of the consumer surplus as possible. That is, if they find someone who's willing to pay $200 to see Simon Garfunkel, they'll try to figure out how to get him or her to pay that much (using price discrimination). The sellers who benefit the most these days are usually Ticketmaster and ClearChannel rather than the performers. (The scalpers sometimes make a lot, but they also can lose a lot. It's not like Ticketmaster or ClearChannel, who have relatively stable incomes and relatively risk-free lives.) Now why anyone would want to listen to Simon Garfunkel is beyond me. jd
Re: Sowell
Kenneth Campbell wrote: The Marxist perspective might be that this is a false consciousness and wishing for the days of old ideologies (Santa Claus etc)... and people pay money for it because it eases their feelings of being less than they had thought they were (socially speaking). ? Ya think? Once in a while the obvious needs to be restated. Marxism is not a TOE (Theory of Everything)nor did any serious Marxist ever pretend that it was. Engels goes out of his way several times to deny it. In particular he denies interest in explaining cultural minutiae. _The_ Marxist perspective obscures the multiplicity of marxist views even on those topics which marxists _do_ claim to be able to explain. Carrol
Re: Sowell
That, the distinction between minimum wage laws, and a rising minimum wage, is sophistry, not analysis. If you can't see the identity between the two, it's only because your analysis is completely pedantic and lacks the critical, social, element, that places Marx head and shoulders above, and flat out against, every bourgeois political economist. That's what I mean when I say hack. - Original Message - From: David B. Shemano [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, July 01, 2004 5:49 PM Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Sowell Mr. Sartesian writes: It, the rise in wages, is not incompatible with increasing unemployment, but neither is it incompatible with rising employment. Sowell, or whoever wants to argue this point from the right, makes a superficial cause and effect between wage rates and employment levels, where there is none. And by the way, its is the creation of such superficial cause and effect links, and the propagation of them as profound economic insights that defines a hack. For the third time, neither Sowell, nor any other neoclassical economist I know of, has ever argued that rising wages causes unemployment. Obviously, if wages are rising, people who might otherwise be at the beach will be drawn into the workforce. The argument is about the effect of minimum wage laws, and if you can't figure out the difference between minimum wage laws and rising wages, be a little more careful before you call somebody a hack. Now that I got that off my chest, I am off to see Simon and Garfunkel at the Hollywood Bowl. When I get back, how about a discussion of explaining the price of concert tickets from a Marxist perspective? David Shemano
Re: Sowell
And one more time: The argument that is made and couched in pseudo-economic terms, is not an argument, but an ideology where any mandatory increase in benefits to the dispossessed is blamed for the eventual increase in social misery. It is nothing but the argument for laissez-faire increases in exploitation against any remedial action by, pick one or all, government, trade unions, social democrats. The argument then takes the critical element in the reproduction of capital, extraction of profit, and turns it, identifies it as the universal greatest good. That much is explicit in the argument as the practice, i.e. Chile, the US in the 70s and 80s, has shown. I am very careful before calling someone a hack. Somebody who makes purely ethereal distinctions in order to obscure the ugly reality in order to justify the continuation of that reality is a hack. Obviously nothing. This is not about simple common sense, as if there exists such a thing, price theories, or the democracy of free markets. It's about class. What makes a hack is someone denying, obscuring his or her class service, by proclaiming rationality, utility, objectivity. Would it shock you if I said J. S. Mill was a hack, and a big one? Friedman is a hack, and never hackier than when he criticized the IMF for its role in the Asian and post-Asian financial collapse of 97-98. PS. BOSTON FANS: NEW YORK THANKS YOU FOR YOUR VISIT AND WISHES YOU A SAFE TRIP HOME.
Re: Thomas Sowell
David, I cannot help noticing that you have written close to 1000 words about what a fantastic chap Thomas Sowell is, and not a single word about the actual (IMO lousy) boilerplate free trade hackwork that was forwarded to the list. This also, is a form of argumentum ad hominem. dd -Original Message- From: PEN-L list [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of David B. Shemano Sent: 30 June 2004 02:26 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Thomas Sowell Laurence Shute writes: I agree with both: Jim's analysis of Sowell's article was great. And some of Sowell's early stuff was quite good. For example, Marx's 'Increasing Misery' Doctrine, American Economic Review, March 1960, pp. 111-120. I think I recall that Sowell had trouble finding a job. Wasn't he teaching at Cornell for a while, then out of work? It looks like he made his right turn around then. Are you implying that Sowell does not believe what he writes? Do you have any evidence for this? Charles Brown writes: That the Left has not the same is not a matter of luck. The bourgeoisie do not pay people to be revolutionary propagandists and agitators or public intellectuals, unsurprisingly. Nonsense. The bourgeoise would sell the rope to a revolutionary if it would make a profit, would they not? What is the No. 1 movie in America? Who financed it? Why do the bourgeoise fund universities which employ Profs. Perelman and Devine? The answer must lay elsewhere. Jim Devine writes: Once or twice, I've jokingly told my department chair (who's African-American) that he could have made Big Money if he'd gone right-wing. There's truth there, though it's very rare that someone actually chooses their political orientation as one would choose a dessert. The conservatives _love_ affirmative action if it fits their needs. Clarence Thomas and Thomas Sowell have benefited mightily by being right-wing _and_ Black. The conservatives can say look -- we're good-hearted too. We've got a Black man (or woman) on our side! There's no way we're racist. Of course, appointing Thomas was one of George Bush Senior's few Karl Rove moments, choosing an ultra-con who would get support from some African-Americans simply because he's Black (and making it hard for guilt-laden liberals to oppose him). At least Prof. Devine does not think Sowell is a careerist. It is unavoidably true that part of Sowell's success is that he is black. It is also true that conservatives like putting foward minorities to advocate policies that raise allegations of racism. However, that does not mean that the conservatives are wrong, i.e., that the conservative love (and I mean love) for Sowell and Thomas does in fact demonstrate that conservatives truly believe their own rhetoric, which is simply old liberal rhetoric (treat everybody as individuals, do not judge by the color of skin, etc.). Michael Perelman writes: I think that Sowell, like Powell, has Caribbean roots. Sometimes, they look down on those whose ancestors were slaves here. I am sure someone here knows more about this than I do. To the extent this has any relevancy, I do not think this applies to Sowell and certainly does not apply to Thomas. Again, this highlights the very point repeatedly raised by Sowell and Thomas -- the refusal of Lefties to treat them as real people with their own mind who believe what they say based upon honest reflection. David Shemano Larry Shute Economics Cal Poly Pomona
Re: Thomas Sowell
David Shemano writes: Why do the bourgeoise fund universities which employ Profs. Perelman and Devine? The answer must lay elsewhere. I work for a branch of the Catholic Church, the Jesuits. In general, academia is not simply capitalist (i.e., funded by rich Catholic folk). There's a big admixture of feudalism and workers' control (control by the professors themselves, not the staff). The mix depends on the college. It's interesting that those that are the most capitalist (i.e., profit-seeking) in their principles are also the worst. Also, I don't know if Sowell is a careerist or not. I also wasn't saying that conservatives are wrong, though that's true. (Thanks for bringing that issue up!) They often don't believe in their own rhetoric. The leaders, such as Karl Rove, are quite cynical. On the other hand, many of the rank and file _do_ believe the rhetoric. A lot of it is so abstract that almost anyone can believe it. As with most ideologies, there are contradictory elements (i.e., the combination of lip-service both to libertarianism and traditionalism). Of course, then there's the issue of what a _true_ conservative is. I'll let David define that. jd
Re: Thomas Sowell
David makes a good point, but with so much money and so many resources flowing to amenable conservatives, careerism is a legitimate suspicion. To raise such a suspicion is not to deny that conservatives are real people. I do not mean to imply that careerism is a part of most conservatives mindset, but the suspicion does seem legitimate for the movement conservatives, such as Sowell. On Tue, Jun 29, 2004 at 06:26:09PM -0700, David B. Shemano wrote: To the extent this has any relevancy, I do not think this applies to Sowell and certainly does not apply to Thomas. Again, this highlights the very point repeatedly raised by Sowell and Thomas -- the refusal of Lefties to treat them as real people with their own mind who believe what they say based upon honest reflection. David Shemano Larry Shute Economics Cal Poly Pomona -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Thomas Sowell
by David B. Shemano That the Left has not the same is not a matter of luck. The bourgeoisie do not pay people to be revolutionary propagandists and agitators or public intellectuals, unsurprisingly. Nonsense. The bourgeoise would sell the rope to a revolutionary if it would make a profit, would they not? What is the No. 1 movie in America? Who financed it? Why do the bourgeoise fund universities which employ Profs. Perelman and Devine? The answer must lay elsewhere. CB: But they aren't going to make any profit off of a radical newspaper columnist, so... Michael Perelman and Jim Devine are not given the public prominence that Sowell is. Michael Moore did creep up on them, as a sort of clown. I don't know all the specifics of his financing. He comes out of the alternative newspapers ( small business) in Michigan. He is not in the monopoly/mainstream media like Sowell. The answer , in general, is right where it seems to be. With very rare exceptions (if Moore is really one), the right , not the left will get gigs like Sowell's because of the right has money and the left doesn't, natch, obviously. Why do you think Sowell switched ? Hey , on an old thread, I haven't seen you since Enron. What to you think about bookcooking on Wall Street,now ?
Thomas Sowell
As a Lefty myself, I have never really thought very much about whether Sowell and Thomas really believe what they say or not. My criticism of them is not based on their insincerety , but on the atrocious content of their political positions in general and on racism in particular. As a Black person, for me there is an added factor that they are anti-Black racists, which adds an element of their being a type of traitor. When I say racists , I mean objectively speaking. Their subjective mindset that conservative policies are good for Black people (and their sincerety or lack thereof) is a minor issue. It doesn't much matter that they really believe something that is false. The objective impact of their actions is to bolster and preserve racism. Charles ^^^ by Michael Perelman David makes a good point, but with so much money and so many resources flowing to amenable conservatives, careerism is a legitimate suspicion. To raise such a suspicion is not to deny that conservatives are real people. I do not mean to imply that careerism is a part of most conservatives mindset, but the suspicion does seem legitimate for the movement conservatives, such as Sowell. On Tue, Jun 29, 2004 at 06:26:09PM -0700, David B. Shemano wrote: To the extent this has any relevancy, I do not think this applies to Sowell and certainly does not apply to Thomas. Again, this highlights the very point repeatedly raised by Sowell and Thomas -- the refusal of Lefties to treat them as real people with their own mind who believe what they say based upon honest reflection. David Shemano
Re: Thomas Sowell
Daniel Davies writes: David, I cannot help noticing that you have written close to 1000 words about what a fantastic chap Thomas Sowell is, and not a single word about the actual (IMO lousy) boilerplate free trade hackwork that was forwarded to the list. This also, is a form of argumentum ad hominem. The article cited was straightforward op-ed defense of free trade written for a general audience. To detemine that Sowell is a hack based upon an op-ed column for a general audience is silly. Furthermore, looking back at Devine's criticism, he agrees with 2 of the points and takes issue with 6 others in short declarative sentences that are unsupported by any evidence and fail to address easy rebuttals or even the complexities of the issue. Therefore, since Sowell is a hack because of the superficial nature of his op-ed, then Devine is a hack because of the superficial nature of his criticsm. David Shemano
Re: Thomas Sowell
Jim Devine writes: Also, I don't know if Sowell is a careerist or not. I also wasn't saying that conservatives are wrong, though that's true. (Thanks for bringing that issue up!) They often don't believe in their own rhetoric. The leaders, such as Karl Rove, are quite cynical. On the other hand, many of the rank and file _do_ believe the rhetoric. A lot of it is so abstract that almost anyone can believe it. As with most ideologies, there are contradictory elements (i.e., the combination of lip-service both to libertarianism and traditionalism). Of course, then there's the issue of what a _true_ conservative is. I'll let David define that. A true conservative is somebody who agrees with me. That was easy. David Shemano
Re: Thomas Sowell
I'm always glad to be a hack from your perspective, David. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine -Original Message- From: PEN-L list [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of David B. Shemano Sent: Wednesday, June 30, 2004 2:49 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Thomas Sowell Daniel Davies writes: David, I cannot help noticing that you have written close to 1000 words about what a fantastic chap Thomas Sowell is, and not a single word about the actual (IMO lousy) boilerplate free trade hackwork that was forwarded to the list. This also, is a form of argumentum ad hominem. The article cited was straightforward op-ed defense of free trade written for a general audience. To detemine that Sowell is a hack based upon an op-ed column for a general audience is silly. Furthermore, looking back at Devine's criticism, he agrees with 2 of the points and takes issue with 6 others in short declarative sentences that are unsupported by any evidence and fail to address easy rebuttals or even the complexities of the issue. Therefore, since Sowell is a hack because of the superficial nature of his op-ed, then Devine is a hack because of the superficial nature of his criticsm. David Shemano
Re: Thomas Sowell
I wrote: I'll let David define [conservative]. David Shemano answers: A true conservative is somebody who agrees with me. That was easy. the Wikipedia has an interesting article on conservatism at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative. Here's the introduction: Conservatism or political conservatism can refer to any of several historically related political philosophies or political ideologies. There are also a number of Conservative political parties in various countries. All of these are primarily (though not necessarily exclusively) identified with the political right. Among the significant usages of the term conservatism are: 1. Institutional conservatism or conservatism proper - Opposition to rapid change in governmental and societal institutions. Some might criticize this kind of conservatism by saying that it is anti-ideological for emphasizing tradition over ideology. 2. Social conservatism or values conservatism - A defense of traditional values, especially religious and nationalistic values and traditional social norms. See also communitarianism. 3. Fiscal conservatism - Opposition to, or at least strong scepticism about, government debt, excessive government spending, and taxation. See classic liberalism. ... 4. Business conservatism - Support for business and corporate interests (or, as those on the left would typically say, the capitalist class). See also neoliberalism, laissez-faire, trickle-down economics. 5. Conservative as a mere synonym for right-wing. 6. Compassionate conservatism - George W. Bush's self-declared governing philosophy. jd
Re: Thomas Sowell
Charles Brown writes: The answer , in general, is right where it seems to be. With very rare exceptions (if Moore is really one), the right , not the left will get gigs like Sowell's because of the right has money and the left doesn't, natch, obviously. Why do you think Sowell switched ? Sowell wrote an autobiography entitled A Personal Odyssey. Give it a read. It's been several years since I read it and don't remember the specifics. What I do remember, and it is hugely relevant, is that Sowell is am admittedly very ornery guy who never gave a flying fig to what other people thought, which is why I respect him so much. My guess is he thought Marxism was true, and then he decided that it wasn't true. David Shemano
Re: Thomas Sowell
I think that someone's move from left to right on the political spectrum varies a lot among individuals. Sometimes, a conservative is a liberal who's been mugged (to quote the cliché). On a larger scale, a lot of people have shifted right simply because the leftist mass movement has atomized due to political disappointment, government subversion (e.g., Cointelpro against the new left of the 1960s), and sometimes superficial victories (e.g., Nixon's (temporary) abolition of the draft). Sometimes leftist sectarianism, itself a sign of the movement's decline, contributes to the process (as when some jerk criticizes a doubter as being a class traitor or whatever). Economic incentives help the rightward move, since most of capitalism rewards obedience to the system and the like. Those who publicly break with their old views and espouse establishmentarian ones (e.g., the god that failed crowd) often get big rewards (e.g., CIA subsidies for their journals). These, of course, make it hard to go back. (As usual, the words right and left are not used rigorously.) Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine - From: Michael Perelman Sent: Wednesday, June 30, 2004 8:11 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Thomas Sowell David makes a good point, but with so much money and so many resources flowing to amenable conservatives, careerism is a legitimate suspicion. To raise such a suspicion is not to deny that conservatives are real people. I do not mean to imply that careerism is a part of most conservatives mindset, but the suspicion does seem legitimate for the movement conservatives, such as Sowell. On Tue, Jun 29, 2004 at 06:26:09PM -0700, David B. Shemano wrote: To the extent this has any relevancy, I do not think this applies to Sowell and certainly does not apply to Thomas. Again, this highlights the very point repeatedly raised by Sowell and Thomas -- the refusal of Lefties to treat them as real people with their own mind who believe what they say based upon honest reflection. David Shemano Larry Shute Economics Cal Poly Pomona -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Re: Thomas Sowell
Thomas Sowell June 29, 2004 /10 Tamuz, 5764 Excerpt "Just as an artificially high price for wheat set by the government leads to a chronic surplus of wheat, so an artificially high price for labor set by the government leads to a surplus of labor better known as unemployment. "Since all workers are not the same, this unemployment is concentrated among the less skilled and less experienced workers. Many of them are simply priced out of a job. "In the United States, for example, the highest unemployment rates are almost invariably among black teenagers. But this was not always the case. "Although the federal minimum wage law was passed in 1938, wartime inflation during the Second World War meant that the minimum wage law had no major effect until a new round of increases in the minimum wage level began in 1950. Unemployment rates among black teenagers before then were a fraction of what they are today and no higher than among white teenagers. The time is long overdue for schools of journalism to start teaching economics. It would eliminate much of the nonsense and hysteria in the media, and with it perhaps some of the demagoguery in politics. http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell1.asp Without question Mr. Sowell is a highly educated and talented man .. . and also an outstanding propagandist. Many simply disagree with his point of view and the implied economic concepts and frameworks his expositionarebased upon. There is absolutely nothing wrong with a popular form of exposition that takes into accounthow the diverse people of America actually think things out. This art requires awareness of how people actually interact with one another and the real history of their ideas. I tend to steer clear of broad ideological categories called "left" and "right" . . . liberal and conservative, because in my personal experience these are not categories that express how people think out social questions and the issues of the day. For instance, ones attitude concerning abortion does not necessarily dictate or correspond to a fixed and predicable political pattern concerninghow one might respond to economic issues or losing ones pension for instance . . . or having the company renege on its pledge to pay ones medical benefits during retirement. Although, I generally and specifically disagree withMr. Sowell's inner logic about America - including gun control, and I am against gun control as the issue is currently framed in the public, what he does understand is the mood of the country and how people think things out. At any rate, he understands the mood of the audience he is writing to and for. Mr. Sowell is an outstanding leader . . . as is Colin Powell . . . and they carry the tag "black leaders" for reasons of our history. They exist and operate on a political continuum and I generally have nothing in common with these men. One can nevertheless learn an important lesson from Mr. Sowell's form of exposition, whose inner logic I radically disagree with. Melvin P.
Re: Thomas Sowell
Michael Perelman wrote: Some of Sowell's early stuff on Say's law was pretty good. Then he became more of a right wing hack. Reagan tried to get him to be Sec. of Education. Now his most appears as a syndicated right wing ideologue. Jim's critique was excellent. I agree with both: Jim's analysis of Sowell's article was great. And some of Sowell's early stuff was quite good. For example, Marx's 'Increasing Misery' Doctrine, American Economic Review, March 1960, pp. 111-120. I think I recall that Sowell had trouble finding a job. Wasn't he teaching at Cornell for a while, then out of work? It looks like he made his right turn around then. Larry Shute Economics Cal Poly Pomona
Re: Thomas Sowell
Once or twice, I've jokingly told my department chair (who's African-American) that he could have made Big Money if he'd gone right-wing. There's truth there, though it's very rare that someone actually chooses their political orientation as one would choose a dessert. The conservatives _love_ affirmative action if it fits their needs. Clarence Thomas and Thomas Sowell have benefited mightily by being right-wing _and_ Black. The conservatives can say look -- we're good-hearted too. We've got a Black man (or woman) on our side! There's no way we're racist. Of course, appointing Thomas was one of George Bush Senior's few Karl Rove moments, choosing an ultra-con who would get support from some African-Americans simply because he's Black (and making it hard for guilt-laden liberals to oppose him). jd -Original Message- From: PEN-L list on behalf of Laurence Shute Sent: Tue 6/29/2004 4:20 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: Subject: Re: [PEN-L] Thomas Sowell Michael Perelman wrote: Some of Sowell's early stuff on Say's law was pretty good. Then he became more of a right wing hack. Reagan tried to get him to be Sec. of Education. Now his most appears as a syndicated right wing ideologue. Jim's critique was excellent. I agree with both: Jim's analysis of Sowell's article was great. And some of Sowell's early stuff was quite good. For example, Marx's 'Increasing Misery' Doctrine, American Economic Review, March 1960, pp. 111-120. I think I recall that Sowell had trouble finding a job. Wasn't he teaching at Cornell for a while, then out of work? It looks like he made his right turn around then. Larry Shute Economics Cal Poly Pomona
Re: Thomas Sowell
I think that Sowell, like Powell, has Caribbean roots. Sometimes, they look down on those whose ancestors were slaves here. I am sure someone here knows more about this than I do. Glen Lowry could not maintain his right wing discipline. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
Re: Thomas Sowell
Laurence Shute wrote: It looks like he made his right turn around then. An interesting ambiguity. Right turn means turn to the right or the right turn to make. :-) Carrol
Re: Thomas Sowell
Laurence Shute writes: "I agree with both: Jim's analysis of Sowell's article was great. And some of Sowell's early stuff was quite good. For example, "Marx's 'Increasing Misery' Doctrine," American Economic Review, March 1960, pp. 111-120. I think I recall that Sowell had trouble finding a job. Wasn't he teaching at Cornell for a while, then out of work? It looks like he made his right turn around then." Are you implying that Sowell does not believe what he writes? Do you have any evidence for this? Charles Brown writes: "That the Left has not the same is not a matter of luck. The bourgeoisie donot pay people to be revolutionary propagandists and agitators or publicintellectuals, unsurprisingly." Nonsense. The bourgeoise would sell the rope to a revolutionary if it would make a profit, would they not? What is the No. 1 movie in America? Who financed it? Why do the bourgeoise fund universities which employProfs. Perelman and Devine? The answer must lay elsewhere. Jim Devine writes: "Once or twice, I've jokingly told my department chair (who's African-American) that he could have made Big Money if he'd gone right-wing. There's truth there, though it's very rare that someone actually chooses their political orientation as one would choose a dessert. The conservatives _love_ affirmative action if it fits their needs. Clarence Thomas and Thomas Sowell have benefited mightily by being right-wing _and_ Black. The conservatives can say "look -- we're good-hearted too. We've got a Black man (or woman) on our side! There's no way we're racist." Of course, appointing Thomas was one of George Bush Senior's few Karl Rove moments, choosing an ultra-con who would get support from some African-Americans simply because he's Black (and making it hard for guilt-laden liberals to oppose him). " At leastProf. Devine does not think Sowell is a careerist. It is unavoidably true that part of Sowell's success is that he is black. It is also true that conservatives like putting foward minorities to advocate policies that raise allegations of racism. However, that does not mean that the conservatives are wrong, i.e., that the conservative love (and I mean love) for Sowell and Thomas does in fact demonstrate that conservatives truly believe their own rhetoric, which is simply old liberal rhetoric (treat everybody as individuals, do not judge by the color of skin, etc.). Michael Perelman writes: "I think that Sowell, like Powell, has Caribbean roots. Sometimes, they look down onthose whose ancestors were slaves here. I am sure someone here knows more about thisthan I do." To the extent this has any relevancy, I do not think this applies to Sowell and certainly does not apply to Thomas. Again, this highlights the very point repeatedly raised by Sowell and Thomas -- the refusal of Lefties to treat them as real people with their own mind who believe what they say based upon honest reflection. David Shemano Larry ShuteEconomicsCal Poly Pomona
