Promoting Job Cuts, 20 Cents at a Time

Posted on by Caitlin Hartsell

This week, the federal minimum wage will rise to $7.25, which is 70 cents higher than the previous national minimum and 20 cents higher than the current minimum in Missouri. Advocates of the minimum wage hike ostensibly intend to create a “living wage” for the poor, but there are some significant unintended consequences: Minimum wage policy raises costs for businesses and creates economic pressure for them to hire less low-skilled labor.

As the Show-Me Institute has cited in several studies and articles about the effects of minimum wage on the labor market, most people in minimum wage jobs are not in the poorest brackets — many are teenagers who live with their parents, or are people with wealthier spouses.

Those in the poorest brackets and at minimum wage level tend to be predominantly low-skilled workers. When the minimum wage is increased and employers are forced to scale back their hiring, the poorest low-skilled workers tend to lose their jobs as employers choose between them and teenagers from mostly middle-income backgrounds. Minimum wage increases also raise the cost of goods, which harms poorer families disproportionately. Essentially, minimum wage function as an additional tax on the poor.

Any time that the minimum wage is raised, but especially during a recession, the people hurt the most are the lowest-skilled workers — the very same people these raises are supposed to help. If Missouri wants to help its poorest workers, lowering mandated minimum wage levels (or eliminating them entirely) would help tremendously.

Should There Be an Age Restriction for Hunting?

Posted on by David Stokes

The urbanites that run MSNBC are apparently shocked that young people in America are allowed to hunt all by themselves. Can you believe this? Kids are actually allowed to use guns and hunt animals without a parent or guardian around in many states. (In Missouri, which is covered in the story, you only have to be 11 years old to be able to hunt on your own.) How terrible.

Of course, they found a tragedy that they’ve used as the basis for an argument that kids should hit a certain age before they are allowed to do something that kids in America’s rural areas have been doing for hundreds of years. From the story:

On the national level, Guzzo’s comments won support from Jim Kessler, policy director and co-founder of the progressive think-tank Third Way who previously spent four years at Americans for Gun Safety. Both groups seek tighter gun laws but are not opposed to hunting.

“I find it shocking actually that there aren’t laws that prohibit unsupervised hunting by minors,” said Kessler. “For a lot of families, hunting is passing on values from fathers to sons and it’s about responsibility and there are a lot of good lessons there, but it is far too much responsibility to give to a child or a minor teen, far too much responsibility. You need an adult there.”

There are tragic accidents in every aspect of life. The young man who committed the manslaughter prompting the article will pay a price for it. It seems most people see a tragedy and try to make laws to restrict the rights of others in order to prevent another tragedy, no matter how small the odds may be that the law will actually prevent a similar future tragedy. Maybe I am a jerk, but I get offended when people try to use a tragedy to limit the freedoms of others.

And I don’t mean to make fun of MSNBC. The story is interesting and the survey informative. I just don’t see a need for Missouri to increase its age limit because of one terrible incident.

Be Nice to Those Telemarketers

Posted on by Sarah Brodsky

I feel bad for this guy, who is being held as a terrorist after he threatened a telemarketer. While I agree with the commenters on my texting-while-driving post, who explain why actions that have a high risk of leading to crimes should be outlawed, I don’t understand why the irate consumer in this case isn’t just liable for a misdemeanor. Is it because he threatened to harm more than 10 people? (Who came up with that magic number?) Or because they wanted to evacuate the building?

Not everyone who gets angry on the phone is a terrorist.

Thoughts on Liberating Learning: The Need for Achievement

Posted on by Sarah Brodsky

The second chapter of Liberating Learning is “The Need for Achievement.” The authors present data from NAEP and international tests that show a large achievement gap between white and minority students, and an achievement gap between U.S. students and students in other countries. The latter gap persists even when you compare students from similar socioeconomic backgrounds.

This chapter could serve as a concise, clear introduction to achievement studies of the past 20 years. Readers who are already following education reform debates probably won’t find anything new here. It’s the same story we’ve heard time and again: U.S. test scores are poor, therefore U.S. economic power is at risk.

One thing that strikes me when I look at test score comparisons like the ones presented in this chapter is the decline in achievement as students get older. U.S. 4th-graders do okay by international standards. Students fall behind in middle school and high school, so by the time they take the tests as 12th-graders, their international peers outperform them.

If U.S. students started out far behind others, it would be understandable if their relative performance declined in the higher grades. One might conclude that the disadvantage was too great for U.S. public schools to overcome, and that they would have to push kids harder and harder at each grade level — an increasingly difficult challenge. But, in fact, U.S. students do OK in elementary school. We don’t see the big gaps between the United States and other developed countries until students have been in school for several years. U.S. schools are not helping students reach their potential.

A Private Solution for CAFO Nuisances

Posted on by Dave Roland

As I have repeatedly said, civil lawsuits — not zoning ordinances — are the best solution to nuisances caused by a property owner’s use of land. It just so happens that events in the western part of the state provide a handy case study in how this is supposed to work.

In 1998, a concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO) began operations in Cedar County near property owned by Ed and Ruth McEowen. The odors from the hog farm’s operations dramatically impacted the McEowens’ ability to enjoy their home, and the farm also polluted a creek that ran across their property. In 2005, the couple sued several entities responsible for the CAFO, and last week the suit was settled for $1.1 million dollars. That payment only addresses the problems caused from 1998 to the date of the settlement, so if the CAFO continues to operate in such a way that it disturbs the McEowens, they retain the right to file a new lawsuit. The Kansas City Star reports that there are currently about 400 similar nuisance lawsuits pending all over Missouri.

When the government imposes restrictions on property use, they are usually painted with broad strokes, prohibiting a variety of uses that might not result in any harm. The potential uses that are permitted are frequently governed by a set of standards that impose strict limits on what must be done in order for that use to be permissible. Such stringent, one-size-fits-all prescriptions inhibit innovation, and they make the mistake of assuming that non-compliance will be detrimental, whether or not this is actually the case. Furthermore, if a private property owner, such as a CAFO, violates this sort of governmental regulation, the government is strictly responsible for its enforcement, and if there is to be any financial punishment for such a violation, the government will usually be the beneficiary. Any citizens that have been negatively affected by another’s use of their property are not likely to be compensated for the inconvenience they have suffered.

A policy that relies upon civil lawsuits to address private nuisances, however, has several advantages. It results in a system in which property owners have tremendous freedom to pursue their business — perhaps in innovative ways — while still holding them accountable for any harm that their actions might cause to their neighbors. The neighbors, on the other hand, would have a way to defend the quiet enjoyment of their own property by demanding financial compensation for any harm they might suffer. (For anyone concerned about a neighbor’s ability to afford legal representation, let me assure you that many attorneys would leap at the chance to take a case like this on a contingency basis — 30 percent of $1.1 million is a lot of money.)

The ultimate result is that property owners would have a very powerful incentive to cooperate with their neighbors and to avoid disturbing their neighbors’ enjoyment of their property, while still retaining the freedom to make beneficial use of their own.

Jefferson County Development Update

Posted on by Sarah Brodsky

Here’s a Post-Dispatch article about the proposed Hindu temple in Jefferson County, which I’ve blogged about in the past. The project will be reconsidered this month, because the developers scaled down their plans. The latest proposal calls for fewer than half the number of houses that were first envisioned.

It’s outrageous that resources are allowed to sit idle while neighbors hold developments hostage — especially in a weak economy. The zoning process results in a lot of waste, probably outweighing the decreases in property values it’s supposed to prevent.

Traffic Studies and the New I-64

Posted on by David Stokes

Freakonomics has some links to interesting studies of traffic congestion. The studies indicate that, paradoxically, sometimes a reduction in road options may decrease congestion. I think many St. Louisans would have thought this idea to be insane before the 2008 closing of I-64, when everybody saw the amazing lack of traffic problems that resulted. Now, granted, 2009 has not been quite as easy for traffic in St. Louis as it was the previous year, but it is still far better than anyone could have predicted.

Bingo and Bicycles

Posted on by Sarah Brodsky

A couple months ago, the General Assembly approved a bill that would end taxation of bingo cards, allow organizations to hold more frequent bingo games and to spend more on advertising them, and make other minor changes to state bingo regulations.

Now, Gov. Jay Nixon has vetoed the bill, invoking education as his reason:

“In light of current fiscal conditions, this reduction to education funding cannot be absorbed,” Mr. Nixon wrote

This comes just after the news that the state-subsidized bicycle race will proceed as originally planned, with the usual funding.

The state could have ended funding for the race, spent the money saved on education, and decreased the bingo tax accordingly. The bicycle race costs $1.5 million and the bingo tax brings in $2.2 million, so funds from the race wouldn’t completely cover the lost revenue if the tax were eliminated. But it would allow for a reduction, and the bingo bill’s other measures would increase revenue because more bingo games could be played. If a reduction in the tax is unacceptable, that’s no reason to maintain the restrictions on frequency of games and advertising expenses, which don’t affect education one way or another.

“Education” is a poor excuse for choosing bicycles over bingo. It doesn’t explain why the state doesn’t tax bicycles to pay for education and subsidize bingo games, which would be just as reasonable as the current arrangement.

Kidney Swapping and Selling

Posted on by Caitlin Hartsell

The Atlantic recently published an interesting piece about possible solutions for the kidney shortage, by former Reason editor Virginia Postrel. There are more than 80,000 people on the donor waiting list in the United States, undergoing dialysis while they wait 10 years (or much longer) for a kidney transplant. About 1,335 of these potential kidney candidates live in Missouri. Dialysis, a time-consuming four-hour process that is repeated three times a week, fatigues patients — 90 percent of them are unable to work even part-time. Because dialysis treatment is guaranteed by the government (and can potentially go on for decades) it is extremely expensive from a fiscal standpoint.

Postrel’s article lists suggestions for ways both to decrease the transplant wait time and to increase the supply of kidneys, which currently stands at approximately 16,000 per year. One of her suggestions, “donor chains,” would essentially allow a patient’s friends or family, who may be willing to donate a kidney but are not a match, to trade places with other willing donors who do match. The longer these chains of donor-recipients are allowed to grow, the more kidneys can be closely matched to existing biological needs. For people with lots of relatives and friends who are willing and able to donate, this would be a boon.

There are plenty of people who cannot take part in such a chain, though, and for them another interesting solution presented is to purchase healthy kidneys. Donating a kidney is not without cost, and there are very few people who would be willing to donate one to a complete stranger. Any major surgery comes with the risk of potential complications. While a person can live a very healthy life with only one kidney, this lifestyle has additional risks: A single kidney expands to compensate for its missing counterpart, making it more vulnerable to collisions or contact sports, for example. Offering compensation for a kidney donor is a way of taking into account and making up for the risks that the donor decides to undertake. (Also, as Andrew Sullivan’s blog notes, a kidney donor is thereafter limited to one alcoholic beverage per day, which might affect some people’s quality of life.)

The Atlantic article suggests that if Medicare paid donors even $25,000 or $50,000 for a kidney, the resulting equilibrium would cost less than than the current expense incurred by the government-guaranteed dialysis treatments — not to mention the immeasurable quality-of-life benefit for patients who would otherwise waste years of their lives on dialysis.

Some question the morality of “selling” organs like kidneys. They voice legitimate concerns that unscrupulous people would take advantage of the poor, or that debtors or drug addicts would rashly sell their kidneys. Internationally, the kidney market is not benevolent, because some kidneys for sale are taken from unwilling donors in prison.

However, if such a plan were implemented in the United States, each donor would first be required to undergo both a psychological and medical evaluation to ensure that he or she could undertake the ordeal. Waiting periods or payment plans could also be instituted that would prevent people from making snap decisions about becoming a compensated donor. A legitimate American market would also discourage coercive international practices, which mostly arise from transplant tourism. If kidneys are more readily available at home, gray-market transplants abroad would no longer fill a significant economic niche.

If morality is to enter the equation of whether to allow kidney sales in the United States, however, a better question to pose might be whether it is moral to let people die or linger for decades on a waiting list when there are already plenty of healthy kidneys available from willing donors.

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