Regulations, Parkinson’s Law Mail 20110819

 

Mail 688 Thursday, August 18, 2011

What else might we do?

Dear Dr. Pournelle,

I would like to add one caveat to your regulatory reform: if a regulation is so important that we must have it and we must borrow to pay for it, certainly it is important enough to be debated and voted on in Congress. Perhaps that is implied in your suggestions.

You are free to use my name; please do not use my email address.

Respectfully,

A.S. Clifton

Apologies if I was not clear: that is precisely what I intended. Regulations are suspended until reinstated, each at a time on a separate vote after debate, by Congress. Until that time no public money may be spent enforcing them. And the House ought to write that instruction in every money bill from now on.

I Asked Question On My Favorite Message Board:

"Calling All Fiscal Conservatives: Suppose you get what you really want: the repeal of the New Deal and the Great Society programs.

What then? Millions, unfortunately, depend on payments (AKA entitlements) from Social Security (e.g. my mom). Is my family now solely responsible to care for her?

Just want to know so we can plan. Thanks."

Responses varied, but no one actually answered the question directly.

Robert Peters

The answer to your question is no.

Conservatives are not radicals. Those who paid into Social Security have both legal and moral rights to what they were promised in return. That does not mean that we should not adjust the age of entitlement to benefits in future, but no one I know wants or thinks we need to end benefits being paid to those who paid into the plan. Yes, I would examine some of the benefits paid under Social Security to the disabled who never paid into the program: perhaps they deserve some sort of public pension, but I do not see why it should be paid for by those who worked and paid into the program (or benefitted by reason of relationship to someone who did pay into the program). Note that Social Security has plenty of money – or at least Treasury Bills, which are almost as good as money. True we need to borrow money to continue expanding government as we are doing, but if we froze expenditures then we would have to sort through what we pay and what we defer, and there is enough income to continue to pay Social Security and Veteran benefits.

I know of no conservative who wants to repeal Social Security and I would argue that those who would simply end it are not conservative at all: that’s a very radical thing to do, and part of no conservative program I know of. Not all of those who cry Burke, Burke or Kirk, Kirk are followers. I would dismantle much of the Great Society, but I would not do it suddenly; it took years to build this dependency on government and it will take years to dismantle it. But we have added entitlement after entitlement, and I think we have gone too far in that direction. As to the New Deal, we have pretty well assimilated much of that; I would defederalize much of the New Deal, but I expect the States would take up much of that. We do need to give the States the power to control their own affairs.

There are entitlements and entitlements. Social Security is not only an old one, but it is one that many of its recipients bought and paid for. Why should they not be entitled? There are others who apparently are to be paid for their existence; why should those entitlements not be questioned?

As to why you received no answer, I have no idea how many conservatives read your bulletin board, or how many like me do not know of its existence. With apologies. I don’t have a lot of time lately.

Parkinson’s Law and the U.S. Public Debt

On a lark, I did an analysis of the U.S. public debt from 1950 through

2010, fitting it to an exponential growth curve:

http://www.fourmilab.ch/fourmilog/archives/2011-08/001328.html

Guess what? The per annum growth rate is 6.8%, almost precisely what

Parkinson observed in terms of headcount.

John Walker

Note that Parkinson’s Law was first formulated in 1955, and the book published in 1958. Parkinson was an historian, and over time his observations went from satire to something a great deal more serious. The basic formulation was that “work expands to fill the time available for its completion” but it soon became a good deal more than that. Parkinson published a series of books based on his observations, including the finance law – “expenditures rise to exceed income” – which applies to all governments and most organizations. He is also author of Evolution of Political Thought which I used as a text book in Senior Political Theory back when I was a professor of political science; it is now unjustly neglected, and apparently there is no Kindle edition. I wish there were one. The book deserves a continuing readership, but the copyright laws prevent that. I do wish the Parkinson Estate would allow the electronic publication of Evolution of Political Thought; it probably has no great commercial value, but it is a work that deserves preservation. His other works would seem to me to be naturals for electronic publication, and might well make his heirs some money.

About those federal regulations

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/581555/201108151901/Regulatory-Agencies-Staffing-Up.htm

Steve Chu

==

UK A Levels Posted

Perhaps American schools facing No Child Left Behind can learn something from the British. Or perhaps not. The UK A level scores are ‘adjusted’ after the exam papers are marked. http://tinyurl.com/3w3c7aq http://tinyurl.com/3oj3ftx http://tinyurl.com/3qzml2y http://tinyurl.com/3zfp23r

—

"If they do that with marks and grades, should they be trusted with experimental data?"

Harry Erwin, PhD

==

Ruby Red Tape

Jerry,

You posted an email the other day challenging you to enumerate some of the "Job-Killing Regulations" that conservatives and libertarians have been complaining about. I ran across an article at the The Wall Street Journal that describes the effects of many such regulations very eloquently:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904140604576498503171054430.html?mod=WSJ_article_MoreIn_Opinion

I doubt that this will convince your emailer since his mind seemed quite firmly made up that all government regulation is important and needed.

To me it appears that the left’s quest to right all wrongs by government fiat has gone disastrously wrong, but it seems nearly impossible to change the opinions or policies of those who have bought into that worldview.

Tom Durrant

==

Job-killing regulations

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/581555/201108151901/Regulatory-Agencies-Staffing-Up.htm

A.S. Clifton

There are of course dozens of listings of regulations; and of course I recommend to you Edith Efrom The Apocalyptics, Cancer and the Big Lie (How environmental politics controls what we know about cancer). It is not really difficult to amass more data than you can read about the effects of regulation and regulatory science. Regulatory science is to science as rabbit hunters are to rabbits.

What creates jobs?

Dr Pournelle

Mr Bruce wrote "Consumers create jobs." https://jerrypournelle.com/chaosmanor/?p=1448

This takes the form of a convenient sound bite. It is as seductively appealing as it is false.

Adam Smith, _The Wealth of Nations_, taught me that capital creates jobs. My experience has taught me that government hinders that creation. An example.

Under Bush I, the fed instituted a new tax on yacht production. Seemed the thing to do. I mean, who buys yachts? The wealthy (or so they thought). So the wealthy could and would pay.

The trouble is that they didn’t. They cancelled orders for American boats and bought from Swan (Finland) and Beneteau (France). American boat builders laid off employees. You know. Regular working class joes.

I shall be grateful to you and count it a favor if you address the noxious notion that ‘Consumers create jobs.’ I am confident that you can articulate the argument better than I.

Thank you.

Live long and prosper

h lynn keith

The problem is that it would take a longer essay than I have time for, at least tonight. Another time, perhaps. But it should be obvious that demand alone creates little; it requires capital and intelligence to make for efficient production.

The Paradoxes

Jerry

Subj: Hanson: The Paradoxes

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/274706/obama-s-paradoxes-victor-davis-hanson#

Victor Hanson is always worth paying attention to. Thanks.

Jetman !!!

Fantastic, but OMG!!!! And, he’s no spring chicken!!!!!

I guess the Grand Canyon was selected for the flight due to the great

scenery. Seems risky though if he had any real problems. Great to watch.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=D&q=http://www.youtube.com/v/WgdIE2t8QkM%3F <http://www.google.com/url?sa=D&q=http://www.youtube.com/v/WgdIE2t8QkM? >