Gender Wage Gap

Steven Horowitz has a Freeman article out debunking the gender wage gap. As it is argued, when human capital and preferences are taken into account, the 25% wage disparity between men and women largely disappears. He concludes:

When economists hold all these factors constant, they find that the gender wage gap largely disappears. Imagine two employees who are equal regarding human capital and preferences and who differ only by gender – what, if any, pay gap is present? In a study of people 27 to 33 who had never been married and who had no kids, the gap was only 2 cents. The strong implication is that if women want to earn as much as men, they need to adjust their human capital and preferences accordingly.

Seven Sins of Our System of Forced Education

Some great points by Peter Davis. I wonder how much longer our institutional systems will take to adjust to the obvious -- if it can occur at all without some sort of systemic collapse/reorganization. (Emphasis added)

Denial of liberty on the basis of age.

In my system of values, and in that long endorsed by democratic thinkers, it is wrong to deny anyone liberty without just cause. To incarcerate an adult we must prove, in a court of law, that the person has committed a crime or is a serious threat to herself or others. Yet we incarcerate children and teenagers in school just because of their age. This is the most blatant of the sins of forced education.

Infantilization of Young People

It's always cool when your abstract thoughts are echoed by someone else, especially a "man of science." This interview of psychologist Robert Epstein has some great points, which would probably be more or less common sense if we lived in a more sane society.

We have completely isolated young people from adults and created a peer culture. We stick them in school and keep them from working in any meaningful way, and if they do something wrong we put them in a pen with other "children." In most nonindustrialized societies, young people are integrated into adult society as soon as they are capable, and there is no sign of teen turmoil. Many cultures do not even have a term for adolescence. But we not only created this stage of life: We declared it inevitable. In 1904, American psychologist G. Stanley Hall said it was programmed by evolution. He was wrong.

Beautifully Macabre

This animated short is incredibly touching. Why, in the face of imminent death, do you do anything? Because that's the only way to feel alive.

Just when I begin to have my doubts about libertarianism...

... I'm again reminded of the insanity and utter stupidity by which I'm surrounded.

Massive, record-breaking natural disaster in Japan that results in hundreds, probably thousands dead with many more injured, not to mention billions of dollars of structural damage. Terrible. No qualification necessary, right? Not so fast:

“If you look, this is clearly going to add complexity to Japan’s challenge of economic recovery,” [Larry Summers, president emeritus of Harvard University and former director of the White House National Economic Council,] said. “It may lead to some temporary increments, ironically, to GDP, as a process of rebuilding takes place.”

More Truth?

Another great one from SMBC:


If I hold any knowledge with certainty, it's this... Though I don't think this is specific to politics.

Is Piracy Really Killing The Music Industry?

From Torrent Freak.

With the growing popularity of the Internet, computers and most importantly MP3-players, music fans have started to trade in their CDs for MP3s and other digital files. Initially, the public had to convert CDs themselves, but in 2003 the iTunes store opened, selling over a million tracks in the first week.

With this shift from physical to digital, another important change hit the industry, one that may in part explain why the labels’ revenues in the U.S. continued to decline. With the introduction of paid downloads, consumers no longer had to buy a full album if they were only interested in two or three songs. This new freedom for consumers has dramatically changed the music sales landscape.

Quick, arrest whoever took this picture

He's giving away our tactics to the enemy! That endangers the troops (y'know, unlike war). String him up like Bradley Manning.

How to make work-life balance work

Lecture by Nigel Marsh. Follows my Getting the Least Out of Life nicely.

Can Unions Be Voluntary?

I've been having an extended debate about unions. Specifically, have they been or can they be voluntary? Might they exist in a free market? Must they engage in rent seeking? Do they hurt the unemployed?

Can they be voluntary?

Unions are simply a form of organization. They can be large or small, hierarchical or flat, tyrannical or liberating. Must they use the state? Kevin Carson provides six tactics in which they wouldn't:

The Truth?

From SMBC:

Thomas Friedman Should Give Himself More Credit

I found this parody of Thomas Friedman via Jesse Walker at Reason. Pretty hilarious.

Here's Friedman:

We know the big causes [of the Egyptian revolt] — tyranny, rising food prices, youth unemployment and social media. But since being in Egypt, I’ve been putting together my own back-of-the-envelope guess list of what I’d call the “not-so-obvious forces” that fed this mass revolt. Here it is: