1. You catch wild pigs by finding a suitable place in the woods and putting corn on the ground. The pigs find it and begin to come everyday to eat the free corn.A lot of people could come up with a lot of political commentary here, and they are certainly welcome to do so. I'm thinking that a trillion dollar stimulus package will buy a lot of corn and fencing ...
2. When they are used to coming every day, you put a fence down one side of the place where they are used to coming. When they get used to the fence, they begin to eat the corn again.
3. Put up another side of the fence. They get used to that and start to eat again.
4. You continue until you have all four sides of the fence up with a gate in the last side. The pigs, which are used to the free corn, start to come through the gate to eat that free corn again.
5. You then slam the gate on them and catch the whole herd. Suddenly the wild pigs have lost their freedom. They run around and around inside the fence, but they are caught. Soon they go back to eating the free corn. They are so used to it that they have forgotten how to forage in the woods for themselves, so they accept their captivity.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Catching Wild Pigs
It is my suspicion that a lot of you have already read this. I'm sure it has circulated by email before it got to me. Nonetheless, I also suspect that it's timely ... a good time to review:
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21 comments:
Not a bad point at all. And it was true when we're talking about a trillion dollar defense budget, too. That kind of money buys all kinds of corn and fencing...
Fortunately, our faith (as believers) is in God, not in a nearly trillion dollar defense system. Still, it can be tempting to want to rely upon that huge budget to provide our defense, not God.
And yet, I believe reasonable believers can think that some money towards defense or towards helping an ailing economy might be appropriate. Where to draw the line is always the tricky part.
Tell you what, though, I won't think less of you as a Christian or fellow citizen if you'd draw the line for defense spending WAY differently than I would if you won't hold it against me if I draw that line on economic spending way differently than you, how about it?
Well, of course I'm happy to not think less of you for where you draw the line. This topic is certainly no measure of one's relationship with Christ.
There is a difference between paying for national defense and spreading money to the populace, though. One may provide "corn and fences" for the military while it pays for the defense of a country, but the other will provide "corn and fences" for a country. I see one as a defense of our freedom and the other as a threat to our freedom.
Me, too. I think an obscenely large military is a threat to our nation and to the world. I agree with G. Washington:
"Over grown military establishments are under any form of government inauspicious to liberty, and are to be regarded as particularly hostile to republican liberty."
AND a trillion dollar stimulus package MAY be a threat to our republic as well, just to make my position clear. That is a HUGE amount to spend and I am opposed to deficit living (again, see Reagan/Bush/Bush years for other examples of this). IF it is a one time thing AND we turn around and begin to spend down the debt, though, it might make some sense.
Our infrastructure IS in horrible shape, we HAVE let many investments in our society go for a while that might ought to be spent on and an influx of money may well help. It will certainly create jobs in the short term and deal with existing problems (crumbling bridges, roads, pipework, etc) that need to be dealt with one way or the other.
The question is, it seems to me, what happens AFTER this massive spending?
Once the one side of the fence went up, I knew where we were going. And you know at moments like that I realize how blessed I am to have a father who taught us so much about our US Constitution, our founding fathers, and protecting our precious freedom. The older I get the more I realize what a treasure I have in my parents!
Why is it that every time I start thinking about politics I feel nauseous? I had to call Senator Feinstein just two days ago and request that she refuse to confirm Ogden for Justice. I explained my concerns with his stand on porno and our children. I did not get to go into all the other issues I have with the man such as his belief we already need to honor the UN Conventions on the Rights of a Child.
The problem is for conservative leaning Christians...that this is like having all four sides of the fence going up around us at once. Which way do we run to escape or fight? So many things around us happening at once, since this last election.
I hear what Dan is saying here and I don't completely disagree, but I have concerns. Such as when I look at Iceland and see how stimulus did NOT work, it finished them off.
And the job creation could take a very long time with the approval times to start a project, things get held up forever. It usually takes 10+ years to approve any highway or bridge at minimum, before the first work can even start.
And then the comments by Reich about not hiring qualified "white male construction workers" for the jobs just smacks with racism. White men have to provide for their families too. Race should have NOTHING to do with it, simply the most qualified with the best proven work ethic histories should be hired for the positions.
Reich video on NO WHITE MALE CONSTRUCTION WORKERS
Reich's Blog Post on Stimulus
Stepping off my soapbox.
And the job creation could take a very long time with the approval times to start a project, things get held up forever. It usually takes 10+ years to approve any highway or bridge at minimum, before the first work can even start.
I believe some good percentage of these dollars are targeted towards projects that are "shovel-ready," that is, ready to begin in the next few weeks (projects where all the approvals are already in place).
The problem, from my perspective, is not originally an economic one, so throwing money at it won't help it ... "shovel-ready" or not.
It's like the whole Big-3 automaker bailout. Are they struggling to stay afloat because they don't have enough money, or are they struggling because they don't have enough customers? They're struggling because fewer people want to buy their cars than the foreign ones. Giving them more "overhead money" isn't going to change the market. It's a temporary fix that fixes nothing.
Just so with this "stimulus plan". But it serves to exacerbate the problem because everyone wants to know "Where's my cut?"
I disagreed with the Big 3 bailout, for what it's worth. That seemed to be a wrongheaded attempt to deal with economic troubles.
But, from where I sit, we have a problem with not having enough good jobs out there. We need more.
AND, we have a serious infrastructure problem. That needs to be dealt with.
And so, it seems entirely wise to me to put some money into infrastructure. It solves (temporarily, at least) the jobs problem and it deals with needed infrastructure issues. We simply have not been paying in to infrastructure the way we ought to.
What is unknown (and I'm not convinced it's know-able) is what happens next? We can't keep spending trillions of dollars to keep jobs rolling. Some folk who look into this kind of thing say that the jobs problem is a temporary one and that this stimulus deals with the short term shortage, but that the market will take care of it longterm.
I'm not sure they're right, but I'm not sure that those who disagree are correct, either. Regardless, we do have a real infrastructure problem that needs to be dealt with and so I lean towards agreeing with this package.
Yes, yes, yes, there are big problems rolling around out there. My question is are these problems of money or are they from deeper causes? I would contend that they are caused by bigger problems than money. They're caused by "corporate greed" (a euphemism, since a "corporation" is not a being and cannot be greedy), self-centered people, uncaring management, power-hungry individuals, and so on. Feeding money into the system won't have the slightest effect on these bigger problems. It will, more likely, serve to make them worse.
Another problem is that lining the money up to spend and spending it are two different things. I read an analogy. Since the money they want to spend is ours, it's like taking money out of your left pocket to fill your right pocket. However, that's not the real problem. Government spending never goes from Point A to Point B. It gets siphoned off by everyone who touches it. So it's more like you have a tub of water on one side of your yard and an empty tub on the other and you want to fill the empty with water from the full. So you use what you have available ... a soup spoon. Now, the task will certainly take awhile, but how much of the water extracted from the full tub will actually make it to the empty?
The plan is not efficient. The plan does not address the real problem -- human greed. So it inefficiently puts some funds where it might help out and the real problem remains, sucking the life out of the money solution.
Well, setting aside the jobs creation side of things for a moment, there are, it seems to me, fiscal responsibility issues at hand.
IF we're going to make use of roads and bridges, IF we're going to have water, wastewater, electric, etc systems, THEN we need to properly pay for them. That's a societal responsibility we have to one another in our social contract. We have not been properly funding these projects and that just means it costs in other ways (by putting costs off on the environment, on future generations, on the poor and sick, etc).
So, one issue is, it seems to me, how are we going to fund these things or are we going to disband them and quit using them? That, in and of itself, is not a greed issue, but a societal responsibility issue, right?
The truth is that I don't get the connection between "stimulus bill" and maintaining infrastructure. What has one to do with the other? I mean, it's not like "Well, if the economy is good, we have no need to maintain the infrastructure", is it?
The infrastructure part of that process is, to me, a red herring. It's like, "In order to keep working at your job, Stan, you need to continue breathing." "Sigh, okay, I will. I don't want to, but I will. Out of the goodness of my heart in order to do the best job for you I know how, I'll continue to breathe."
The connection is that, in the process of updating our infrastructure - which I think we can agree we need to do - we will be creating jobs. Many, many jobs.
People with jobs can, in turn, go out and buy homes, or bikes, or trains, or solar panels, etc, etc, which puts more people to work (work which is not being funded by the taxpayer). All these people working pay taxes into the system and pay other people's salaries. It's a cycle.
Now, ideally, we will encourage a sustainable, non-greedy climate in which we as people begin investing in bikes instead of cars, in solar panels instead of coal furnaces, all of which leads to a more sustainable economy, it seems to me. One that goes on past this temporary infusion of taxpayer dollars.
It seems reasonable in theory to me. We might disagree on the size (is $100 billion right or $800 billion???), but it seems pretty reasonable to me that, 1. We need to fix our infrastructure regardless and, 2. This will create jobs.
I have no idea how much of the trillion dollars that we are going to spend on this "stimulus package" is earmarked for infrastructure. The final numbers have just changed, but an idea of what is being paid for what is here. Frankly, it doesn't look like 1) lot of money toward infrastructure or 2) a lot of money now. (This spending plan is spread out over 10 years.)
My real question: Is "jobs for the government" going to create economic stability? Currently the government employs some 30 million people. In my part of the world (Arizona), the government is the biggest employer in the state. Then there is folks like healthcare and WalMart. Sure, we need these folks (like we need infrastructure), but this is not producing anything. Not producing anything will not create growth. Their income is maintained by others who produce. If we don't encourage production, but rather encourage government and service jobs, then we are going to move our country out of the production world and into the non-production world in which there is no growth.
They produce roads, bridges and railroads, which industry needs to ship stuff.
They oversee bridges and waterways, which needs to happen in order to ship stuff.
They provide oversight for environmental problems which is necessary for all of our health's sake.
They provide education for our children so that they can be employable and join the workforce.
They provide jails so that our criminals are off the streets.
They provide case workers so our unemployed can become gainfully employed.
etc, etc, etc.
All of this is necessary in some form or the other for a society to function, right? Can we have society without roads? With crap and toxins floating down our streams? With toxic water and air? With mentally ill wandering the streets?
Now, I'm very much a local solutions and private enterprise solutions kind of guy. I want Kentucky to make decisions about our pollution levels and infrastructure, etc. I want Louisvillians to decide about our infrastructure within Kentucky. I would love for private churches, community groups, synagogues, etc to provide solutions for homelessness or mental illness.
But when private world doesn't handle all the problems (and they don't, they just don't, not even close), then someone has to stop in and it makes sense for gov't to be that someone. We, the people, in other words, stepping up to deal with problems that aren't getting dealt with in other ways. That's just societal responsibility.
And sometimes local solutions are not sufficient to protect people. If the wind is blowing away from my state, we might be fine with factories producing pollution, but the next state up might not. And so, there, too, is a place for we the people (ie, gov't) to step in and take action.
And this all seems appropriate and good, to me. Just plain fiscal and societal responsibility.
I'm with you. Private would be better.
They don't produce. You can't market that roads to China. You can't sell that bridges to India. You can't export it. You can't market it. When I say they don't produce, I don't mean they don't do anything. I mean they don't make something that will bring income.
But they DO do something. They build roads on which your TVs and Food travels to your stores. Without the infrastructure, there is no (or much less) private commerce.
Tell you what, let's just remove all the roads and railroads, bridges and waterlines, etc, etc and then we can see how well a market can cope. With the roads gone and no clean water, how does the farmer get food to the city? By horse? Okay, that will slow things down some, but we can do that.
How will you get to work? Bike? Walk? Both are excellent options! When you get to work, where will you go to the bathroom? What will you drink? Soda? Soda created from what? Stormwater? Wastewater? Who will certify that the soda is not toxic itself?
Anarchy is not a fun place. We need infrastructure and I don't think you're really arguing otherwise, but I'm not sure of your point. Those people who are working to build roads ARE working, they ARE producing something that contributes to society. Those people who are making sure you have clean water going into your house and that the dirty wastewater is leaving your house ARE contributing to society and to the market.
I'm not seeing how you think this is not contributing to the market or to job creation?
I'm with you. Private would be better.
Then we agree. But what about when private doesn't come through? What about thousands of homeless veterans or the ~million or so homeless children? If private sources don't come through, then what? Leave them to the streets? Sell them off to China as slaves (at least that would be producing income for a product...)?
[and, be assured, I'm not suggesting that you think this is what should be done.]
What of the mentally ill, the mentally challenged, the ill grandmothers, the disabled mill workers who have no family?
When private enterprise fails, then what? I'm curious as to what you think should be done.
I suppose I've failed to express myself properly. I don't remember suggesting, "WE DON'T NEED NO STINKIN' INFRASTRUCTURE!" What I DID say was that infrastructure should be separate from stimulus. The suggestion is "If the economy is good, we don't need infrastructure."
Yes, they'll be employed. And they'll be providing something we need. I guess that's it, right? Kind of like giving a guy a fish ...
Your questions about what to do when private support fails are beyond my pay grade. (Hey, if he can use it, so can I, right?) But we're talking stimulus bill again. Again I would suggest that the idea is "If the economy is good, we don't expect the government (or anyone else, I suppose) to take care of the mentally ill (etc.)." I don't get the tie in.
Well, it seems to me that assisting the homeless, mentally ill, etc, and infrastructure work is killing two birds with one stone. It's bringing jobs to people who need it right now, and it's providing a needed service. What's to argue with?
You think I'm arguing with something, as if I'm opposed to taking care of the things that need to be taken care of. I'm not.
Here's the thing. This is a "rescue bill". It isn't supposed to take care of things that need to be taken care of. Those things are not part of any rescue. They need to be taken care of. This is being touted as a way to solve our economic crisis. "Take care of the things that need to be taken care of" is not "solve our economic crisis". If it was, then we'd have no crisis, right?
We need to take care of things. Given. That will employ people. Given. We're in agreement. Great! Except ... if the problem is the economy and something is wrong with the economy, then taking care of what needs to be taken care of will take care of those things, but it won't rescue the economy.
It is exactly the old proverb: "Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he'll eat for life." You seem to think that I'm against giving him a fish. No. Not the point. Take care of what needs to be taken care of. But none of this will provide fish for tomorrow. For the economy to improve, we need to produce goods that will be sold at a profit that will then produce income for people so that we can produce more goods to be sold at more profit ... well, you get the idea. Give a man a job and he'll eat for a day. Teach a man to produce and he'll provide food for himself and his family. Well, something like that.
The package might give some infrastructure jobs. And then? What income will sustain that level of spending? How long can we continue to maintain infrastructure without producing goods? How does this spending package encourage future economic growth?
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