What Doomed Federalism in the United States June 21, 2009
Posted by federalist in Government.add a comment
Paul Starobin’s intriguing essay, “Divided We Stand,” covered the history of federalism and the prospects for “devolution,” or secession and geopolitical right-sizing of the United States. Several letters follow up on the subject in this weekend’s WSJ.
The Civil War was probably the single most critical event in the destruction of states’ rights. However Bob Jamieson suggests that the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Amendments to the Constitution really doomed federalism:
The Founding Fathers were no fools. They understood that those who are inclined to power are also tenacious defenders of that power once they have achieved it. That is why they insisted that the Senate be elected by the state legislatures rather than by popular vote. This was one of the checks and balances in the Constitution and it served us well for more than a century. By making the Senate answerable directly to the state legislatures, they were counting on human nature to prevent federal encroachment on the powers of the states. Before 1913, when the 16th Amendment ushered in the popular election of Senators, the states had a powerful political presence in Washington. Today they have virtually none.
A second check on the power of Washington was eliminated when the 17th Amendment was ratified, also in 1913. This egregious amendment authorized the federal government to subject the American people to a direct income tax, providing Congress with what it seems to regard as a bottomless purse to finance its ever more expensive Utopian fantasies.
If we are finally getting serious about devolving power from Washington back to the states, we must seriously consider the repeal of these two amendments.
Teacher Unions Imitate Anthem World Council June 18, 2009
Posted by federalist in Education, Unions.1 comment so far
We find echoes of Ayn Rand’s Anthem in a WSJ review of Moe & Chubb’s Liberating Learning:
Teachers unions, of course, are appalled. They know that “the new computer-based approaches to learning simply require far fewer teachers per student — perhaps half as many, and possibly fewer than that,” Messrs. Moe and Chubb write. … Technology also disperses teachers geographically (making them elusive for union organizers); lets in private-sector players who aren’t members of the guild; and enables outsourcing to foreign countries. For unions, technology is poison.
Grammar: “Different from,” almost never “different than” June 10, 2009
Posted by federalist in Language.Tags: different from, different than, different to
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Different is an adjective form of the verb to differ.
If one thing differs from another then we can say “One thing is different from another.”
We cannot say “One thing is different than another” any more than “One thing differs than another.”
Generally different from is correct and different than is not.
But of course one thing can differ more than another, in which case we can say, “One thing is more different than another.” It is correct to use different than when different is part of a comparative adjective.
The strange exception to the general rule: Use different than when different modifies an elliptical clause (i.e., a clause in which words have been omitted). For example, “The path follows a different route than the map shows.”
According to this page, the Collins Cobuild Bank of English shows that Americans have developed a tendency to butcher these rules in normal speech. Meanwhile, the British are prone to use the absolutely incorrect formulation different to.
Why Did CAFE Regulations Hurt American Automakers? June 3, 2009
Posted by federalist in Government Regulation, Transportation.add a comment
The Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) regulations were enacted decades ago to improve the fuel efficiency of cars sold in the U.S. Conventional wisdom is that U.S.-headquartered automakers reacted by turning out fleets of small, weak cars that they had to sell at a loss to boost their average fuel economy. Meanwhile, foreign nameplates essentially ignored the CAFE standards.
I had always wondered why, and now I’m even more bewildered: It turns out that the civil penalties allowed under the law are a one-time fine of $50 per mpg below the target per vehicle sold.
For example, this year the CAFE standard is 27.5mpg for passenger cars (”light trucks,” a.k.a., SUVs, get their own category and lower standard). Suppose a car maker ignored the standard and only sold enormous gas-guzzling sedans that on average get 20mpg. At the end of the year they would owe a fine of $375 per car sold. Is it worth building fleets of small cars nobody wants in order to avoid a fine of this magnitude? This is no more than a few percent of the cost of a car!
Obviously the foreign companies got it right by essentially ignoring the disregarding the law, factoring the fine into the price they charge, and selling only what people want to buy at that price: Year after year BMW, Mercedes, Volkswagen, Porsche, et. al. simply coughed up a few million dollars in fines and went about their business. (One suspects that American car makers easily spent more just lobbying for more loopholes to squeeze through to avoid fines.)
Why Focus on Ethanol Instead of Biomass Incineration? June 2, 2009
Posted by federalist in Energy, Transportation.add a comment
Government has been paying domestic companies to turn food into vehicle fuel, even during food supply shortages and even though more ethanol is being produced than the current vehicle fleet can consume. Government is also funding efforts to build plants that can convert non-edible biomass into ethanol.
At the same time, government is funding initiatives to make vehicles more dependent on electricity and less dependent on liquid fuels.
If the goal is to increase the domestic supply of liquid fuel for the transportation sector, there is no question that coal liquification is the most cost effective and realistic solution: We have vast coal reserves, and liquified coal produces heavier fuels that can support existing kerosene, diesel, and gasoline engines. (Ethanol is a light, hygroscopic fuel that can only run efficiently in modified gasoline engines.)
If the goal is to effect a shift from fossil to biomass fuels then simply burning biomass to generate electricity is far more efficient at recovering energy than first trying to distill it into ethanol. Even if we do develop effective cellulosic ethanol technology, WSJ reports:
An acre of crops can generate enough electricity for a battery-powered SUV to travel 15,000 miles, nearly twice the distance that would be covered if the crops were turned into cellulosic ethanol….
And unlike all these other tentative technologies biomass power plants have been in existence for decades.
Why Government Must Be Small: The Unseen May 30, 2009
Posted by federalist in Government, Judiciary.Tags: Frederic Bastiat, minarchy
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John Hasnas illuminates Frederic Bastiat’s 1850 essay, “That Which is Seen, and That What is Not Seen.” An essential point of these essays is that when government acts to pass or enforce a law it (hopefully) does so to achieve some positive result. However, it is difficult if not impossible to foresee all of the secondary and collateral consequences of an action, which may be detrimental to others. These “unseen” victims of action or inaction deserve as much consideration as the proximate beneficiaries of an action.
Big government and its advocates tend to tout the positive primary effects of acts. They downplay negative side effects, and they tend not to temper their enthusiasm for action to effect positive change with the unpredictable and unknowable secondary effects. This Knightian uncertainty is a fundamental argument for minimalist government.
Hasnas gives some excellent examples that should give the current government pause:
One can have compassion for workers who lose their jobs when a plant closes. They can be seen. One cannot have compassion for unknown persons in other industries who do not receive job offers when a compassionate government subsidizes an unprofitable plant. The potential employees not hired are unseen.
One can empathize with innocent children born with birth defects. Such children and the adversity they face can be seen. One cannot empathize with as-yet-unborn children in rural communities who may not have access to pediatricians if a judicial decision based on compassion raises the cost of medical malpractice insurance. These children are unseen.
One can feel for unfortunate homeowners about to lose their homes through foreclosure. One cannot feel for unknown individuals who may not be able to afford a home in the future if the compassionate and empathetic protection of current homeowners increases the cost of a mortgage.
In general, one can feel compassion for and empathize with individual plaintiffs in a lawsuit who are facing hardship. They are visible. One cannot feel compassion for or empathize with impersonal corporate defendants, who, should they incur liability, will pass the costs on to consumers, reduce their output, or cut employment. Those who must pay more for products, or are unable to obtain needed goods or services, or cannot find a job are invisible.
Congress Imitates Homer Simpson — II May 24, 2009
Posted by federalist in Energy, Healthcare, Taxation.1 comment so far
Some federal legislators have decided that all of that government-subsidized sugar we’ve been adding to soft drinks all these years might not be so good for us. Since government has assumed responsibility for the health of American citizens our representatives are ready to take action. Naturally, they’ve decided to reduce those crop subsidies.
Oh wait, no, they’ve actually decided that the way to fix this problem is to impose an excise tax on sweetened drinks. I.e., they’ll continue to pay farmers to grow more corn and sugar than the market wants, but they’ll discourage Americans from drinking it with a “soda tax.”
Because of course the best way to correct the unintended consequences of government is with more government.
Reminds me of Homer Simpson’s solution to overdosing on stimulants:
Clerk: Hey, you can’t take that many pep pills at once.
Homer: No problem, I’ll balance it out with a bottle of sleeping pills.
QOTD: The Climate-Industrial Complex May 21, 2009
Posted by federalist in Economic Policy, Energy, Markets.1 comment so far
The always incisive Bjorn Lomborg describes the emergence of a “climate-industrial complex” of politicians, special-interest groups, and for-profit corporations.
Spending a fortune on global carbon regulations will benefit a few, but dearly cost everybody else.
Government Can’t Order Results May 19, 2009
Posted by federalist in Government Regulation, Taxation, Transportation.add a comment
Well gosh, if the government can just order automobiles to be more efficient, why stop there? Wouldn’t 50mpg be even better? Indeed, it is not clear how the government intends to effect this order. If it’s anything like past enforcement of CAFE mandates then:
- Domestic companies will try to comply by building fleets of efficient cars nobody wants and selling them at a loss.
- Foreign companies will generally try to make a profit, either by seeking subsidies or by paying government fines for noncompliance and passing them on to their customers.
- All companies will game the regulations — e.g., redefining “automobile” to exclude SUVs, or substituting diesel engines for gasoline (thereby achieving the nominal goal, but probably not in the way proponents wanted.)
Two years ago I noted that any bad regulation is just a disguised tax, and it is usually helpful to rephrase regulation in terms of taxation. In this case, there is a simple tax that would achieve the government’s stated goal:
“If gasoline is cheap, there’s going to be a huge disconnect” between the vehicles available and what consumers will want, argues AutoNation Inc. Chief Executive Mike Jackson. He has long advocated a higher federal gasoline tax to ensure that gas prices stay above $4 a gallon, the level that drove demand for small cars last summer.
I.e., if the government really thinks it’s important to increase the distance an average car travels on a gallon of gasoline, it can avoid all gamesmanship and politics in achieving that goal simply by raising the existing gasoline tax.
But apparently The People don’t think it’s worth paying more at the pump to get more efficient cars on the road. So instead the government pursues its agenda through supply-side regulation, disguising the costs to such a degree that nobody can hope to quantify them. Of course, in the process all sorts of special interests crowd into smoke-filled rooms with bureaucrats and politicians to trade favors. If the objective is met, it is at a much higher economic cost than the transparent and straightforward tax would have accumulated.
Grammar: Against Backward Compound Nouns May 19, 2009
Posted by federalist in Language.add a comment
English has acquired a small number of compound nouns that violate rules of grammar by putting an adjective after the noun. Because these are not used frequently enough to form canonical exceptions they result in errors and confusion when people try to form their plural. Examples (followed by the correct plural form) include:
- Attorney general (attorneys general)
- Court martial (courts martial)
- Notary public (notaries public)
- Mother-in-law (mothers-in-law)
These exceptions also make plural possessives downright unwieldy — e.g., the attorneys general’s conference.
There is no good reason to preserve these exceptions. Putting the adjective first always makes the compound more wieldy:
- General attorney / general attorneys / general attorneys’ conference
- Martial court / martial courts / martial courts’ guidelines
- Public notary / public notaries / public notaries’ council
- In-law mother / in-law mothers / in-law mothers’ meeting
Grammar: Don’t Use “Woman” as an Adjective May 18, 2009
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Is it grammatically correct to speak of “woman doctors?”
“Woman” is not an adjective, but that fact does not mean it cannot modify a noun. Nouns that properly modify other nouns are referred to as “noun adjuncts” or “attributive nouns.” For example, “chicken soup” or “arms race.”
However, the use of “woman” as a noun adjunct is grating because there is an adjective (”female”) that almost always serves the same purpose. One should never use a noun adjunct when a bona-fide adjective will do.
The only time “female” might not suitably substitute for “woman” is when one needs to qualify the noun not only as female, but also as adult and human. I.e., one may prefer “woman friends” to “adult human female friends” (as distinct from, say prepubescent human male friends, or monotreme friends).
It is never correct to use “women” as a noun adjunct. Hence, “women doctors” is as ungrammatical as “chickens dinners.”
Sodium, Salt, and High Blood Pressure May 11, 2009
Posted by federalist in Government Regulation, Healthcare.add a comment
Excessive consumption of sodium can raise blood pressure. High blood pressure causes all sorts of expensive and deadly diseases.
Leave it to Bloomberg’s New York City to jump in at this point and conclude that we need government action to reduce sodium in everyone’s diet.
Of course, it’s not that simple. But it is interesting. I contacted the CDC, FDA, and NYC Health Department to compile and confirm the following information.
First of all, extreme imbalances of any electrolyte — high or low — can cause health problems, including permanent organ damage and death. There is no question that on average Americans consume more sodium than is nutritionally necessary. It is also medically proper for people with hypertension to reduce their intake of sodium as a first step to lower their blood pressure. But if you don’t have high blood pressure there is no reason to specifically worry about your sodium intake. (Although you may notice that if you stick to a healthy diet you are avoiding a lot of junk foods with elevated sodium content.)
Health officials seem to warn interchangeably about excess “sodium” and “salt.” But it’s the sodium that matters, and there are salts in your diet that do not contain sodium. Yes, table salt is conventionally sodium chloride, and sodium chloride does happen to be the primary source of sodium in human diets. But it’s not the only one: you probably also regularly consume sodium bicarbonate and sodium nitrate. When you look at the FDA nutrition label for a food, the “sodium” line is supposed to list the entire mass of elemental sodium regardless of what molecules it is bound up in.
Tax Competition: Swiss Update May 6, 2009
Posted by federalist in Taxation.1 comment so far
I’m a huge fan of tax competition. Bloomberg reports that the combination of increasing British income taxes (a 50% marginal rate was promised last month) and EU efforts to increase the regulatory burden on alternative investment funds are driving fund managers from London to Switzerland. There:
Personal taxes for wealthy foreigners can frequently be negotiated with the local authorities in Switzerland, depending on the canton … and may be based on projected expenditures, not income….
Grammar: Symmetric vs Symmetrical May 5, 2009
Posted by federalist in Language.1 comment so far
Unless you’re paid by the syllable or intentionally bombastic you should never use symmetrical instead of symmetric, or asymmetrical instead of asymmetric. The only reason to add -al is to convert the adjective to an adverb, as in symmetrically.
Dictionaries seem to have given a pass to adding the extra syllable to these two adjectives. But that is no more correct than turning basic into basical, or ironic into ironical (unless, perhaps, you’re speaking sarcastically).
These examples illustrate that you should only add -al as part of -ally to convert a -ic adjective to an adverb.
Why Run Ships on Oil? April 29, 2009
Posted by federalist in Energy, Open Questions, Transportation.3 comments
Vote for Dave asks an excellent question: Massive container ships burn low-grade “bunker” fuel for power. Wouldn’t it be more cost effective to run them on nuclear power, as our navy has done without incident for decades on submarines and large warships? Shouldn’t global warmists be thrilled at such low-hanging fruit in the fight against carbon dioxide emissions?
[Addendum: Four nuclear-powered cargo ships were built, but the technology is simply not cost-competitive with fossil fuels. The United States Navy has abandoned nuclear power for all vessels but submarines and aircraft carriers, where nuclear power confers unique tactical benefits.]
Federalism Update April 27, 2009
Posted by federalist in Government, Taxation.3 comments
The first assertions of state sovereignty occurred early in the history of the United States: Jefferson authored the Kentucky Resolutions and Madison wrote the Virginia Resolution. One generation later was the notable South Carolina “nullification crisis.” In February I noted the resurgence of state sovereignty movements. Christian Science Monitor had a good update last month. This week Randy Barnett proposes a Constitutional “Federalism Amendment” to reign in the federal government, though I much prefer his simpler fix, which is to repeal the 16th amendment:
What sort of language would restore a healthy balance between federal and state power while protecting the liberties of the people?
One simple proposal would be to repeal the 16th Amendment enacted in 1913 that authorized a federal income tax. This single change would strike at the heart of unlimited federal power and end the costly and intrusive tax code. Congress could then replace the income tax with a “uniform” national sales or “excise” tax (as stated in Article I, section 8) that would be paid by everyone residing in the country as they consumed, and would automatically render savings and capital appreciation free of tax.
The Problem With Wind Power April 25, 2009
Posted by federalist in Energy.add a comment
Ross McCracken via William Tucker:
As wind provides neither baseload nor peaking plant it has no impact on reserve capacity. . . [I]t increases redundancy in peaking plants and reduces the profits of baseload generation; potentially good for consumers but bad for investment in non-intermittent sources of power, and presenting the risk of a decline in reserve capacity. . . . [P]eaking plants would be used much less and baseload plant would see sustained period of potential below cost prices – a particular nightmare for the nuclear industry.
The Vicious Cycle of Regulation April 22, 2009
Posted by federalist in Government Regulation, Markets.add a comment
Fraud can occur in both regulated and unregulated markets, due to failures of both regulators and participants. Chidem Kurdas analyzes the failure of Manhattan Capital and argues that regulatory responses can produce a vicious cycle.
The conventional response of boosting government watchdogs magnifies the impact of their mistakes while reducing both the watchdogs’ and the public’s incentive to learn. It creates a vicious spiral of more regulation, regulatory failure, and even more regulation.
In contrast, non-regulatory responses to a market failure are patently virtuous in comparison. As Carl Close summarizes:
[T]here’s often a big difference in the consequences of their respective mistakes, Kurdas argues. When investors fail, everyone tends to learn from their mistakes; but when regulators fail, new regulations are proposed, and investors are not given stronger incentives to learn.
QOTD: The Public Pension Shakedown April 20, 2009
Posted by federalist in Pensions.add a comment
The pension fund scandal exposes the myth of the superior virtue of the public and nonprofit worlds. Greed is universal. And the opportunity for corruption is enormous when political discretion is tied to vast sums of public money.
That’s today’s WSJ editorial page. I’ve railed against the inherent hazards of public pensions frequently. Another highlight from the WSJ’s piece:
It has also become routine for politicians to inject their pension funds into partisan debates that have nothing to do with the sound management of retiree money.
