A New World, A New Way Upward: Efficiency in Association

Socialism first became a reality – to a degree – in Russia in 1917. The communist system in Russia, however, faced a number of severe challenges, as the economy in Russia prior to the revolution was a wreck. Production was very low. The economy was agrarian. The newly formed USSR faced many of the same challenges as other rapidly developing countries and made some if the same mistakes. As is often the case, quality and safety were sacrificed for production.

The government of the USSR, moreover was brutally authoritarian. There were murders, mass arrests, forced relocations, secret police and harsh interrogation methods. Stalin, in particular, grew paranoid and the USSR was run as a police state. Due to foreign policy mistakes by the party leadership, the USSR found herself mired in a hellish war with Nazi Germany, destroying much of her newly built infrastructure and productive capacity.

Socialism, meanwhile, was seen as a threat by the economic elites in power throughout developed capitalist countries and these countries went out of their way to ensure the failure of the USSR. By the 1950′s, the USSR found itself in a standoff with the super-power US – whose infrastructure was intact, as the war took place in Europe – and her allies. A great deal of the country’s remaining production was funneled toward the military and the socialist system as a whole was militarized.

In the following decades, other socialist and communist countries would be shunned by the Western powers on principle – Viet Nam, for example, sought friendship with the US from its earliest inception, only to be rebuffed. As was the case with all developing countries, these were forced to align with one power or the other. To be socialist, therefore, meant to align with the USSR and soviet support came with strings attached. Aspiring socialist countries became communist and, in many cases, were integrated into the soviet economy as subject states.

Inefficiency in Socialist countries from the late 1940′s through the 1980′s, therefore, can be more accurately understood as the inefficiencies of the soviet system and their failure is linked to the unsustainable arms race between the USSR and the US. Importantly, the entire Soviet bloc was comprised of developing countries, or countries that were in the developmental stages prior to the adoption of socialism, while many of the countries in the Western alliance were quite well developed. This, in part, explains why the capitalist alliance was able to sustain despicably high military output longer than the Soviets were.

The history of Socialism and Capitalism, then is not an accurate gauge of the potential for efficiency and inefficiency in the systems. Any examination of the potential efficiency of Socialism must, therefore, be somewhat theoretical. Capitalism, on the other hand, has a longer history and a broader field of experimentation. On some level, a comparison between the two involves the comparison of the concrete and the fluid. This will be, therefore, a discussion of the potential for efficiency in the two systems.

More specifically, this paper envisions a particular political and economic reality inspired by socialist thought and capitalism. In essence, there is a single, global political and economic entity. At the highest levels, its leadership is democratically elected and these leaders serve limited terms, after which they rejoin the bureaucracy or, if they are of appropriate age, they retire. Rules for behavior are legislated in much the same way they are now and decisions on production are made according to demand. The economy is centrally planned in a loose sense, as is an individual corporation, but production is driven by demand. If red, polka dot skirts are more popular than gray slacks, more red, polka dot skirts are produced, for example. Every person in the world belongs to this entity and all capital belongs to it.  Income is measured as a proportion of total production, and there is a tiered system for resource distribution based on position, training and production. A person at the highest income level might make double that of someone on the lowest level.

There are a number of inherent inefficiencies in capitalism – especially ‘pure capitalism.’ The least contentious among economists is the potential for externalities – wherein a public good, like air, water or education is exploited and often damaged for private gain without compensation to the public.

In theory, externalities can be minimized through taxation, fines and other levies imposed on private businesses by the government – thereby redistributing a portion of the proceeds from the production to the public. In practice, however, this can be extraordinarily difficult to accomplish. It is extremely difficult to estimate the true costs of many externalities, like environmental pollution and degradation. How much, for example, is the air worth? How much does soil erosion really cost society in the long run? Moreover, many large business interests – including lobbies representing many smaller parties in the same or related industries – have a great deal of political influence through connections between powerful people, through advertisement and through the shear number of people employed in respective industries. This is especially true in democratic countries.

In this global socialist system, on the other hand, externalities are an impossibility. Environmental degradation, to be certain, is still possible and probably only slightly less likely than in a capitalist system. There is still a cost, then, to the public – but the benefits accrue to the public as well.

Something that receives less discussion, on the other hand, is the inefficiency of profit itself. Economists have long recognized economic profit – profit in excess of the customary 3-5% – as inefficient. This is one of the oft-pointed-to inefficiencies of uncompetitive markets. This 3-5% is referred to as accounting profit and is seen as the just reward for entrepreneurship and the labor invloved in running a business. Anything more, however, is seen as taking from the public. In an idealized capitalist system, all markets are competitive and there is no economic profit.

In certain capital-intensive industries, however, monopolies are able to produce goods more cheaply than a number of smaller firms in competition, even given an economic profit for the monopolist. In the most efficient real-world capitalist system possible, then, there would be a mix of monopolies, oligopolies, dupolies and truly competitive markets, as the circumstances dictated. The capitalists in the most productive and, therefore, efficient, capitalist system possible in the real world, then may well make more than 5% profit.

This profit, moreover, may be saved – and it often is by the economic elite, who control more resources than they can use personally and for whom it is prudent to have savings as well as further investment (It is important to note that financial products do not qualify as investments and, in many cases do not enhance the productivity of an economy – as recent history has shown).

In a this socialist system, however, there is no profit. Capital is jointly owned and 100% of production goes to either consumption or investment in further production. In this respect, socialism is more efficient than capitalism. Meanwhile, all capital is controlled by a single entity. The system, then, takes full advantage of the benefits of monopolistic production without the cost to the public from high profits.

Proponents of capitalism, of course, might point out that the lack of a profit motive might decrease productivity, as extra effort does not translate to greater material gain. This view is flawed in a number of ways, the product of thinkers who have known no way of life other than that based on material consumption. Humans work hard for a variety of reasons – intrinsic satisfaction, prestige, status, the greater good, etc. In our society, money equates roughly to prestige and status. This is not true of all societies and social norms would likely adjust within a generation to assign status to production, rather than income.

Moreover, in a this socialist system, one’s income would be expressed as a proportion of total production, meaning the more a society produces, the more one can consume. It would be in the individual interest to work toward the greater good. In addition, the tiered compensation system, which might or might not be phased out over time as norms change, would provide sufficient material incentive for advancement.

Another key inefficiency of capitalism, in theory and as currently practiced within the global political system, is its utter failure to take full advantage of human capital. Because goods like education, food, and health care are more expensive than many people can afford, an enormous proportion of our most talented people never see those talents developed. The vast majority of the World’s population lives in countries with poor educational systems or countries in which many children do not receive an education.

Most of the technological advance and economic production comes from the few developed countries that can afford to provide education for their citizens. Even within a rich, capitalist country like the US, moreover, rich and middle class people go to better schools and have better access to higher education – to the point that rich and middle-class people of average and below average ability receive a college education, while all but the most talented poor people go without.

Ultimately a great proportion of technological advance comes from the rich few, while their more talented poor counterparts never see their talents developed to the point that they might contribute meaningfully. This represents an enormous inefficiency, as technological advance may multiply production many times over in a generation at the current pace – one, quite literally, can only imagine the pace of advancement if all people had the opportunity to receive higher education.

In a global, socialist system, education would be centralized and available to everyone within a generation. Access to higher education would be merit-based, so that the most talented students receive the most aggressive and extensive development, greatly increasing global productivity. Eventually, greater mechanization would likely allow more people to take on challenging tasks, as more simple, menial, repetitive work would be done by machines.

Along the same lines, unemployment – currently over 6% worldwide – would be all but non-existent in this system, as everyone would be matched to a job based on their skills and preferences – and their career path would be determined by their skills, preferences and experience. Duplication of investment would cease to be a problem, as a single, centrally planned economic entity would be responsible for investment. Basic goods like housing, health care, education, food and safe water would be provided to all citizens at the expense of the broader society. This would ultimately save unfathomable resources, as the cost of upkeep, of prevention, is far less than the cost of repair and lost production.

Finally, one last inefficiency in the current system, though not a product of capitalism so much as nationalism, is the amount we spend on our military. This proportion is less than 3%, but three percent of everything made in the world is significant. Moreover, the loss of lives, destruction of capital, the destruction of minds and bodies, all are bad for production, bad for quality of life and bad for humanity in nearly every imaginable way. Needless to say, in a world controlled entirely by a single governmental and economic entity, in which every person has a tangible interest, military spending would be nonexistent. The closest thing to military spending would be spending on police, which would likely be far less than what is necessary today, as poverty is at the root of most criminal activity.

One might be skeptical of the efficiency of administering such a large bureaucracy, but what of the cost of administering so many small bureaucracies? Moreover, advancements in communications, transportation and energy technologies, coupled with experience in making a new system work, would progressively mitigate these costs. And, as development of human capital improves, one would not only see advances in technology, but also more competent administrators emerge and innovations in administration.

Overall, this system, by addressing the key inefficiencies of both the current capitalist social structure and the flaws in implementation of socialism in the past, and by noting the strengths in both systems, would be a marked improvement over the current system for the organization of society.

Immigration: An Irony Sandwich

Less than a thousand years ago the European forbears of this state came to an ‘empty’ hemisphere with 100 million people in it. These people, themselves immigrants, likely from Northern Asia, had authored thousands of individual cultures with impressive complexity and diversity of beliefs and practices. Over the centuries, Europeans sought to extinguish these ‘wrong-minded’ cultures and replace it with their own white-washed American civilization. Much damage was done to the cultural legacy of Native Peoples.

Now, and for the last 20-30 years, the progeny of these immigrants are worried – seemingly about everything. Near the top of the list for many is the fear that immigrants, mostly from Mexico and South America, threaten to extinguish the American cultural heritage. I suspect, as many do, that their fears are rooted in the same racism, now tacit, driven underground, that compelled the whitewashing of the hemisphere in the first place.

Nonetheless, the claim is that the issue is one of culture. Language has become a symbol of the threat as many conservatives fight the spread of the Spanish language – itself a legacy of our colonial past. It is believed that within the next 50 years more than half of our country will be of Hispanic extraction. The irony of the descendants of so many waves of immigration sweating the most recent is obvious.

Lost to many, however, is the deeper irony of the situation. Amidst governmental efforts to limit immigration – without which the U.S. would have a net negative population growth rate – to the educated upper classes of foreign nations, the mass of immigrants from South of the border are of poor and working-class extraction. This is doubly so of the all-too-controversial illegal immigrants.

And, there in lies the irony – for the lower economic classes in Latin America are heavily of Native and mixed origin. The blood in their veins is little different from that of the Native Peoples we slaughtered, infected, and expelled. The new demographic trend, then, is in the direction of a Native resurgence.

America is becoming more American, as the bloodlines of the Natives from whom the hemisphere was taken flows North once more and the cultures of the various colonial lineages, merged with their native counterparts and those of the slaves brought here to drive the colonial economies merge, fusing to create a bilingual, multicultural landscape truly reflective of the country’s turbulent past.

Conservatives run from their own reflection. They run from the truth of their heritage and the true complexion of the hemisphere. These ‘American patriots’ are terrified of America itself, but they can no more resist than turn back time itself as they are bred and worked into parity with the progeny of those they once conquered.

Quick hit on American Political Discourse

I’ve been thinking most of today about the sad state of political discourse and, more importantly, political action and reality. Nothing happens anymore. Nothing changes. I think it’s the nature of the beast to some extent. The 1950′s through the 1970′s were the time of big ideas. Important speeches were made. People were excited. Now, on the other hand, is the time for substantive action, for material change.

The big ideas have been out there for decades. We all know what’s wrong about the world around us, and it’s time to get moving on our goddamned to-do list. But the big speeches are gone and with it are the legs these ideas need to get moving. It’s hard to get people excited about ideas like federalization of property tax revenues or the centralization of school systems. They’re not sexy, but they’re what’s needed now. Moreover, the linkages between the structure and interactions of local, state and federal governments and problems like racism, classism and exploitation are tough to explain in a sound byte.

To make matters worse, it’s far easier to make emotional speeches in opposition to these ideas through labeling changes as socialist or fascist – these simplistic attacks on necessary policy changes are tailor-made for the sound-byte media culture in the U.S. today.

Education, Racism, Poverty and U.S. Foreign Policy

I am a university student, double majoring in History and International Studies. I’ve considered at times that my area of knowledge, between my two majors includes everything that has happened or is happening. What has been striking, as I have studied the goings-on in the world over the last couple hundred years, is that at various junctures in my study of the world as a whole, the U.S. will intersect with the history of some other country, and this intersection is almost always bad.

In Latin America, from the 1960′s to the 1980′s, movements sprung up that ousted brutal dictatorships and upended unbalanced and exploitative economic systems in favor of popular socialist regimes, only to be toppled by U.S.-led counter movements, in many cases bringing into power even more brutal and exploitative regimes than before (Pinochet, for example).

In Iran, a brutal dictatorship was toppled in the 1950′s in favor of a moderate, democratic leader named Mossadeq. The U.S. supported a coup and installed the son of the previous dictator, who proved even more brutal than his father.

In Vietnam, the U.S. supported the French and, later, a brutal dictator named Ngo Dinh Diem against what was initially a socialist resistance movement led by Ho Chi Minh that had overwhelming popular support, despite the fact that the socialist government featured a constitution modeled after the U.S.’ own and Ho Chi Minh made explicit friendly overtures to the U.S. government early and often. The U.S. involvement forced the socialist movement to turn to Maoist China for support and transformed the eventual North Vietnamese government into a communist one.

In Palestine, the U.S. has supported an Israeli state that has perpetrated human rights abuses against the Palestinians – whose land they stole – on a par with apartheid South Africa, Jim Crow in the U.S., the U.S. policy toward Native Americans in the 1800′s and, ironically, Nazi Germany before the final solution. This unconditional support continues today.

Our foreign policy failures, moreover, have had a high cost. The threat of terrorism can be traced largely to the American and European pursuit of narrow minded self-interest in the Middle East and South Asia as exemplified by support for Israel and for exploitative, violent regimes like that of Iraq (who we supported against Iran, despite knowledge of genocidal attacks and horrific torture practices against civilian populations by the Hussein regime).

The Vietnam war, likewise, cost over 60,000 American lives – mostly from the economically disadvantaged classes, of course.

The world’s policy of head burying toward Africa, as well as the colonial legacy and severe economic exploitation (agricultural subsidies, for example) is largely responsible for the piracy plaguing shipping around the Horn of Africa.

The U.S.’ bankrolling of South American right-wingers helped boost the drug trade that almost crippled American society in the 1980′s and 1990′s and whose effects we are still dealing with.

I do not personally believe in Karma, but I do believe that short-sightedness and a false sense of self interest tend to produce negative long-term outcomes and it is undeniable that selfishness has not served the U.S. well on the international stage.

Of course, in most of these situations – as with the recent economic downturn – the underclasses tend to pay for the ‘mistakes’ made by the elite.

Likewise, in studying the U.S.’ development as a nation, interactions with non-elite groups – Native Americans, African-derived peoples, and other nations – have almost always been negative. Poor whites, blacks and Native Americans are exploited at every turn by a tiny elite of white society and ever-evolving ideological tools are employed to keep these underclasses disunited, disorganized and unaware of their common exploitation.

When it appeared, moreover, that a consciousness of exploitation was developing, immigrants were targeted as scapegoats. Supplementing this strategy, moreover, has been the vilification of various states in the global community. Low wages and poor working conditions for poor whites have been perpetually blamed on competition with poor blacks, immigrants or cheap overseas labor, rather than focusing on the rich white man behind the curtains, making his millions off his supposed racial and ethnic brothers.

Currently, of course, the ideology of racism is in steep decline. Few young people feel animosity toward ethnic minorities and what animosity there is is generally suppressed by strong norms against racism. Racism is in such steep decline, moreover, that many white people, and even some deluded black and hispanic people, have become convinced that racism is no longer an issue in society.

Steep incarceration rates for people of color, however, and poor educational and economic performance provide ample evidence for anyone interested enough to do 20 minutes research that institutional racism is still a material reality, whatever peoples’ personal beliefs may be.

Of course, the hopelessly steep climb from the bottom of society faced by a large portion of ethnic minorities is also faced by millions of poor white people – with a number of important differences, including the lingering reality of negative racial stereotyping that people of color face and different challenges in assimilation amongst all the disadvantaged groups.

These disadvantages begin in infancy. Many poor children grow up with less educated parents. They are exposed to stigmatized variants of English growing up. Grammar doesn’t come naturally. Their parents are busier. When they’re home, they are more tired. They get less early education as a group. They don’t receive the same help with schoolwork that middle class and rich kids get.

Poverty itself comes into play as well. They may eat less nutritious meals. They may wear secondhand or off-brand clothes to school. They get singled out there, made fun of by students and teachers alike. They go to lower quality schools and are often instructed by less-qualified teachers. They have less access to technology at home and school. School is not a pleasant experience for a lot of poor kids.

They face different distractions and ‘opportunities’ than kids from better neighborhoods. The illegal economy lives in poor neighborhoods. Kids in these neighborhoods know people that can offer entrance into this economy, which has no minimum age and no educational requirements. For kids who grow up with nothing, participation in the elicit, informal economy offers things they could never before afford, things that confer social status on marginalized kids. For boys, this might mean more attention from girls and more respect from other boys. It is a temptation many kids find irresistible and their parents, again, are busy, often desperate economically, and unfortunately are often involved themselves.

When they manage to graduate high school, furthermore, they have to worry about how to pay for it. Grades are all-important for kids completely reliant on financial aid to pay for their schooling. The kids that make it through are often those few that were dedicated students from the outset, usually kids with the strictest parents. Kids that take even a couple years longer to see the importance of school are usually left behind.

As college graduates, they face still more obstacles. Poorer high schools leave them less prepared for college. Their status as scholarship students makes them completely reliant on grades, meaning they get fewer second-chances and it is more difficult to work while going to school. Rich and middle-class kids are better able to build a good work history early as their parents have professional connections. A vast majority of people at good jobs get them through their social network. Poor kids, though, generally know only poor people. They are forced to look for publicly listed jobs and reduced to a name on a sheet of paper in the eyes of company recruiters — often a less experienced name.

Success itself, moreover, can be daunting. For people, regardless of their ethnic identity, coming from a poor background, isolation, dislocation and alienation may accompany material success as they are forced to interact on a daily basis with people from vastly different cultural backgrounds. Expectations, attitudes, past experiences, political outlooks – all these things are often points of disagreement.

A poor person who becomes successful is very much like an immigrant within their own country.

For the most part, however, mainstream society remains blissfully ignorant of the horrible failures in U.S. foreign and domestic policy. A large enough segment of the country has been bought off with lower-middle-class status and meaningless consumption and credit that these issues are rarely talked about outside affected groups.

If both our foreign and domestic policies are so messed up, and poor people are perpetually subjugated and exploited by the economic elites, what is the solution?

The solution is to completely overhaul the educational system in this country. The gap in education in the country is largely due to the fact that they are funded with property taxes. In rich neighborhoods, higher property values result in higher revenues and more funding for schools.

At the same time, the people controlling our schools are these same rich people, as it is all but impossible for a poor person to be elected to a significant public office and as public offices offer a salary high enough to enable one to move to a better neighborhood – which most people would do, if not for themselves, than for their kids future – schools are better in the suburbs.

Despite the recent successes of charter schools, the school system in this country needs to be 100% public and 100% federally funded and controlled. If all the schools are centrally funded, equally funded, there will be less incentive for teachers to go to more expensive neighborhoods, where their salaries will not go so far.

If the elites in this country, moreover, know that their children will receive the same education as everyone else, moreover, you can bet they will figure out how to raise the bar.

At the same time, the curriculum needs to be overhauled. How can we expect progress as a country towards justice in our foreign and domestic policies when kids are still being taught that the founding fathers were heroes, that our country has been the savior of the world and that the Europeans brought civilization to the enslaved and massacred? Kids need to learn complexity if they are to solve the types of problems faced today and they need to learn it early.

This thinking is not taught solely through history classes, however. Our math programs are vital to children’s problem solving capabilities as well. In manny ways, in fact, the problem with American policy making is that leaders and/or those who elect them think of complex (algebraic) problems in simplistic (mathematic) terms. There is no reason, moreoevr, that American kids can’t learn algebra before the eighth grade, when Chinese kids are learning calculus.

There is also no reason for essential subjects like economics and composition to wait until high school. Nor is there any excuse for not teaching kids Spanish or another foreign language from the earliest ages possible. Schools should also have uniforms, provided by the school, so that kids will not be singled out so much for their economic status and, on the same note, school supplies and health care should be provided by the state.

All of these changes would serve to improve and open up kids thinking, to challenge them. They would serve, in the long term, to raise the political culture in the country, make the country more competitive, and provide something more closely resembling equal opportunities to kids from different economic and ethnic backgrounds. In the long run, they might mitigate the problems of de facto economic and ethnic segregation as well and might allow successful people from depressed backgrounds to stay in their neighborhoods, rather than funneling their dollars into already rich suburban neighborhoods.

The best way to do all of this is through national control. Schools must be the purview of the federal government and public schools must be the only option.

Materialism, Suburbanism, and the disappearance of childhood

I read a story on Yahoo! the other day that set me to thinking, reminiscing.  Apparently, the box, the stick, and the ball are in the toy hall of fame – as well they should be.  As a kid, I spent more hours enjoying those three toys (you can add rock to the list as well) than all the others put together.  I played, moreover, with my brother and sisters, with friends from the neighborhood – not alone in my room.

This story got me thinking about my childhood, and the impact it had on the person I am today.  Am I considerate because I grew up with other kids? Would I be more materialistic if I hadn’t had the most intense fun of my life doing things that cost nothing? Would I be as creative as I am had I not been forced to fill countless empty hours of every day? Would I still think for myself had I not grown up reading, watching and playing the exact same things as everyone else?

I began to reflect on a few sad developments in the world around me: The disappearance of kids playing outside in all but the poorest neighborhoods, the unfortunate conviction of many of my classmates and many of the adults I know that one must have lots of things to be happy, and the utter lack of creativity and balls and heart and generosity and manners in some of my university classmates.

My neighborhood had serious problems when I was growing up. We were poor, there was a good deal of crime, there was a drug problem – but at least we all went outside, played and had a good time. We may not have had the best toys, but we had more fun with sticks and rocks and snakes and fire than I’ve seen anyone have with a video game.

It’s funny that people talk about poor kids as having their childhood taken from them. On the one hand, I know what they mean. Poor kids have to think about things a kid shouldn’t have to. I remember wanting to ask for a piece of candy when we went to a store, but holding back because I knew we couldn’t afford these kinds of extras – this when I was five, six years old.

I remember going without food some days, collecting cans and bottles to buy bread, insisting I wasn’t cold (in Iowa, in January) because I knew we couldn’t afford a new coat for me, not telling my mom when my socks or underwear got holes in them. I had to understand, as a small child, why other kids had all the cool new toys advertised on TV and I didn’t.

So, maybe I was more practical than other kids my age. Maybe I matured faster in terms of an awareness of the world around me, maybe I lost the naiveté that people expect from children a little too early, but I had a far richer childhood than many of the kids do today.

Kids with no free time, these are the ones being robbed of their childhood.  Kids that never had time to be bored are the ones being developmentally stunted.  Kids that never learned to handle the real world without their parents hovering in the background are the ones missing out.

These poor bastards have been forced from the womb to experience the world through someone else’s eyes – adult eyes. They have known the world only as a regimented place. They are afraid to question rules, the status quo – and when they do, they feel like they are in total rebellion and exercise no moderation. I’ve heard of suburban kids with ulcers, burnt out before they get to high school.  These kids are like middle aged men, yet people talk about poor kids missing out on childhood.

A lot of the people from my neighborhood ended up with problems when they reached adulthood, mostly because of the limited opportunities we had. Some may also have simply been too comfortable with questioning the rules. A lot of them are in jail or prison, probably around half graduated high school and, to my knowledge; I am the only one who will graduate from a four-year school.  Still, we developed a creative side,understanding, empathy and social skills that are far less evident in kids who were shuttled from one organized activity to the next, that spent all their time at home with pre-packaged adventures, figments of someone else’s imagination.

If I could choose someone to take a math test for me, to memorize something, or to read a boring 400 page book, I would choose one of my classmates here at the university,  but if I needed help with any problem that required common sense, independent reasoning, creativity or the ability to think on one’s feet, I would trek to my hometown jail and find one of the kids I grew up with.

As a teenager, my friends were not good people.  My best friends sold crack.  Everyone I knew outside my family sold some kind of drugs, stole, slept around, drank too much, smoked, smoked weed, fought too much – but they were far better friends in terms of our day-to-day interactions and in terms of loyalty than the people I now know.

If one of us needed something, the others would break our necks to provide it. If one of us was in trouble, the others would help.  The ‘every man for himself’ attitude that many of the people I’ve met at university share, that my country seems to be pursuing abroad, that voters seem to hold dear, never penetrated my neighborhood.

I’m not saying we all should grow up poor, wild and lawless, but I think parents should be careful not to over-regiment their kids. Structure is important, but some moderation is needed. Send them to school, let them pick a single sport or instrument for them to practice at any one time, let them play around online for an hour, then kick them out of the house and into the real world with a stick and a box.

Archive: Fair Wages

Every so often, between stories about celebrities having sex, the media will hit on an important story.  The one characteristic these stories tend to have in common, at least on the surface, is that they are depressing.  The headline usually reads “U.S. soldiers consort with pre-pubescent sex slaves” or “September 11, can it happen again?”

Occasionally, as Americans, we’ll hear a story from Zimbabwe or Cambodia or some other place most of us can’t find on a map that just breaks our hearts.  The reporters, however, never seem to posit a solution.  There never is a light at the end of the tunnel and we never see the root cause.

Well, the cause of child hunger, child prostitution, terrorism, totalitarianism, and just about everything else is poverty.  The solution is equally simple: find people jobs and pay them a decent wage.

Rich countries like the United States know firsthand that mechanisms like a minimum wage are beneficial to an economy.  Common sense tells us that when people make more money, they buy more stuff.  Producers then make more stuff; more people get better, higher paying jobs, and those people then turn around and buy more stuff.

This process is called economic growth and any improvement in the distribution of income will give it a nice boost.  It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand that this idea applies to a global economy just as well as a national one.
The only reason big businesses fight so fiercely against wage control measures like an international minimum wage is because economic growth has the side effect of inflation.  That is, the billions or hundreds of millions not invested in growing economies will lose value.

While they would make money in the economic boom resulting from real worldwide development, individuals with generational wealth would essentially be losing money as the value of each dollar/euro/pound would be worth less in terms of purchasing power.  The struggle for fair wages, therefore, is a struggle between income and wealth.  Unfortunately, wealth is winning.

Unfortunately, a straight minimum wage may not be the answer.  If, for example, the international minimum wage was $4.00/hr., it would be next to impossible (initially) for a poor Rwandan or Cambodian to raise enough money to start a business.  This policy would also be incredibly difficult to enforce.

A better solution is for industrial powers like the U.S., U.K., Japan, (etc.) to agree on a minimum wage for companies based within their borders.  This wage would be the minimum companies could pay employees regardless of location.  This would require almost unanimous agreement among industrialized nations.  The minimum should be close to half the average minimum wage in industrialized countries so it would still be cost-effective to operate overseas.

This policy would leave multinational corporations with two choices: they could make small adjustments in the status quo – increase wages, improve working conditions, improve environmental standards – or they could move their entire operation overseas.  Either way the “third world” would win.

If company A chose to move to a country like Bangladesh, it would bring high paying jobs (R&D, advertising, attorneys, executives, etc.) to a part of the world that badly needs them.  Whether they gave the jobs to locals or imported labor, the economy and society would get a boost.

Educated labor, especially imported U.S. labor, would expect certain rights (speech, religion, and press) and amenities – clean water, air, and safe transportation to name a few.  More importantly, the people of rich countries would become more aware of conditions overseas, and would be more likely to care.

Pressure would build from within and without to build a modern economy and a liberal, democratic society.
Similarly, if company B chose simply to comply with the new requirements, wages would increase; people would pay higher taxes and would therefore expect more (public works, education, social welfare, hospitals, and medicine) from their government.

People would live longer, be happier, and expectations would rise for the next generation.  Eventually, as Joe Pakistani became more educated, the economy would begin to grow on its own.  Some of the people would begin to save money and would start their own businesses, capitalizing on the people who prefer to spend their money.

Basically, people make more, so they spend more.  Businesses then produce more, hire more people, who then spend more money.  Not only do local economies grow, the world economy grows.

The best thing about my solution, however, is that each company will act independently, adapting in their own way.  Company A will import high-paying jobs and/or educated labor and company B will pay their uneducated labor a better salary.

As the influx of money goes through the multiplier and the economy grows, labor becomes more scarce and competitive; soon company A has to pay better wages in order to staff its factories.  Furthermore, the lower and middle classes, as they grow and become more educated, will see firsthand the way the rich executives of company A live.

Social tension will build, causing greater social change and development.  Again the economy, the society, and the government would grow together.  Imagine progress as a string of dominoes; every domino that falls influences the next.

Apart from economic arguments which tend to be murky, mostly because people tend to be stupid, there is an even better reason why U.S. corporations should be required to pay their employees a decent wage.

In basic training our soldiers are told that they are representing their country, and that as representatives of the U.S. they’re expected to act, dress, and even speak in a certain way; the same can be said of politicians and Olympic athletes.

Americans are appalled when our president throws up on a world leader or mispronounces their name and we would be equally upset if one of our Olympians or a U.S. soldier were caught overseas supporting child prostitution or slavery.

Olympians and politicians, however, make up only a tiny portion of what the world sees of the U.S.; and while the barrel of a U.S. gun has become an unfortunately widespread representation of our country overseas, the U.S. military is still not nearly as widespread as the U.S. economy.

In most countries the poor and disenfranchised don’t have T.V’s; they don’t see our politicians and our Olympians when they say something stupid in front of a camera.  Despite the U.S. presence in Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and the Pacific Islands, most of the world’s people don’t see a U.S. soldier every day – let alone fifteen hours a day.

More than any other entity, the factories in which people work fifteen hour days are the face of our nation.  Unfortunately they are not representing us well.  For many poor people, the face of the U.S. people is a boss who pays $1.25 for a fifteen hour work day or a company that pays children to work in gold and silver refineries with harmful chemicals like cyanide and mercury and dangerous heavy machinery.

These irresponsible companies share as much responsibility for terrorism and anti-American sentiment as George Bush and Osama Bin-Laden combined.

There is no such thing as a quick fix when it comes to poverty, but if the proper policies were implemented tomorrow our kids’ kids might never have to deal with the side effects of poverty.

Archive: Overpopulation

The earth, as large as it is, has a fixed number of resources, most of which are renewable.  Oil, coal, ground water, and clean air, for instance, are all renewable resources; unfortunately it takes thousands of years to replenish even a small oil well or coal deposit.  Because resources take time to replenish themselves, there is a fixed amount of oil, water, coal, clean air, wood, and topsoil that can be used in a given year.

Further complicating matters is the fact that humans do not consume resources with perfect efficiency.  An engine, for instance, that is able to use eighty percent of the energy from the combustion of its fuel would be ridiculously efficient by current standards.

There also are resources we don’t currently use at all, resources we haven’t found a use for; oil is an excellent historic example.  Before the widespread popularity of the internal combustion engine oil was far less valuable; experts in that time period would likely have limited their estimates of energy resources to coal deposits.

Just as there is a limit to the amount of resources available to us, there is also a minimum amount of resources each person must consume in a given year in order to survive.  People must eat, they must have clean drinking water and shelter, and occasionally they need medical attention.

The amount of resources available per year (A) times efficiency of consumption (B), therefore, is equal to the minimum consumption (X) times the maximum sustainable population of an ecosystem (Y).  Similarly, to find average standard of living  where Y is the current population and X is the amount of resources available per person, per year.

Basically, the more efficiently we use and distribute our resources, the more there seem to be, and the fewer people sharing a pie, the more pie each person can have.

There is little we can do to change either our endowment of resources, or the minimum amount of resources needed to sustain human life.  What is vitally important, therefore, is the relationship between technological efficiency and population; as we use our resources more efficiently, our planet can support more life.

More importantly, however, is the fact that technological advancement in excess of population growth equates to people living better lives while population growth in excess of technological advance leads to a decrease in standard of living and, eventually, some combination of disease, starvation, war, or infertility – ultimately a decline in population growth – as we grow beyond our ecosystem’s ability to support us.

These declines can be easily explained.  If people have just enough to survive and population increases, people will starve.  Starvation weakens the body, aiding the spread of disease; disease, meanwhile, can lead to infertility and the absolute need for resources justifies violent means of attaining them.

Human psychology further complicates matters, as people measure their own well-being by comparing it to that of their neighbors.  Most people in modern societies have no real concept of the minimum amount of resources needed for survival.  A poor person in the United States, for example, may have plenty to eat, a decent place to live, and decent clothes, but would still feel poor because everyone else seems to have more.

This same principle can be extended to a middle class person in a rich neighborhood.  The bottom line is that regardless of how high or low a person’s standard of living is they will inevitably fight to prevent it from declining.  Furthermore, there is a surplus of people unsatisfied with their current allotment of resources, people looking to move up.

Therefore, population growth in excess of technological advance leads to catastrophe – a decline in population growth.

People from the poorest (agricultural) countries reproduce at a much higher rate than people from fully developed (urban) economies.  They have developed based on the assumption that, first, more kids will lead to better productivity, which equates to economic well-being and, second, several of those kids will die during childhood.  There is, therefore, a much greater emphasis on family and fertility.  Because the main role of women is that of child-bearer they are less likely to be educated and far less likely to be accepted in a work environment.

Normally these cultural differences would be offset by a higher death rate that would decline along with the birthrate as the country developed economically.  Despite cultural mores and the resultant high birthrates, population growth would be controlled.  The natural processes mentioned earlier would ensure ecological equilibrium.  Right now, however, industrialized countries are focused on controlling the death rate rather than helping poorer countries develop economically, resulting in the most rapid population growth in human history.

The governments of the industrialized world are seeking security, meaning re-election.  They avoid unpopular public action.  So they stop war when they can, they try to limit problems like mass starvation and widespread disease, they try to maintain stability to keep businesses and consumers happy by enabling trade, and they try to accomplish all this at a discount because the only thing businesses and consumers hate more than taxes is taxes intended to benefit someone else.

These are all good things but the long-term result of these actions could be very bad because the only way to address all these problems at a discount has been to ignore the root cause and treat the symptoms.  It is the equivalent of a patient avoiding a simple but painful surgery in favor of daily medication with dangerous long-term side effects.  Poor countries will become more populated and it will become increasingly expensive to treat the symptoms.  At some point the weight of supporting so many people at a minimum standard of living will become so great that rich countries will have to either change policies or allow their economies to collapse.

Furthermore, the longer this trend continues, the more difficult economic growth will be.  For a poor country too develop socially and economically without catastrophic damage to the environment while dealing with the problem of overpopulation is too much too ask.  A cash-strapped country cannot simultaneously finance public housing, water purification, welfare, and health care while building roads, airports, sea ports, schools, and giving loans to would-be business people.

If rich countries continue to simply focus on prolonging life and preserving stability they will be forced to choose between allowing disease, starvation, and war to take its course in the third world or allowing the world economy to collapse.  They need to act now, redirect some of their military spending to foreign development, force their businesses to pay foreign workers decent wages, invest in infrastructure and capital goods, and educate people from disadvantaged countries with the intent of returning them to their own countries.

Most importantly, however, women need to get a good education.  Educated, urban women have more options and, therefore, have fewer children.  Given a choice, some women will choose not to have kids, and those that have kids tend to have fewer when their income is less dependant on children as a source of free labor.  Therefore, educated urban women reproduce at a slower rate.

Furthermore, educated women that stay at home and raise children usually raise smarter children.
What troubles me is that world leaders either ignore or fail to understand the consequences of their actions.

Developed countries like the U.S., U.K., Japan, Australia, and most of Europe send billions of dollars in aid to underdeveloped countries to prevent people from dying of starvation or disease and spend billions more to maintain vast militaries to prevent war.  I can understand these actions; no one wants people to die and these actions prevent millions of deaths.

If we continue down this path, however, it could mean a drastic decline for our entire civilization.  I certainly am not suggesting we forget about the “third-world” or that we leave them to their own devices, but I am vehemently opposed to the idea of international welfare as a long-term solution to the problem of an unequal distribution of income between nations.  The industrialized world needs to bite the bullet, making the investment needed to fix the root problem, poverty, before the symptoms get out of control and before we decimate .

Archive: Sustainable Development

Our environment is being destroyed; our resources will not last another hundred years; our ecosystem cannot support our booming population; desertification is robbing us of arable land.  These are but a few of the claims commonly made by environmental groups and the popular media today.

The intention behind such assertions is to shock people into action and there are legitimate concerns behind many of these issues, but they are often unrealistic, based on absurd assumptions (like no technological advancement), and every one of them has been an issue since ancient Greece.

Sustainable development, possibly the most self-explanatory term in our vocabulary, refers to social and economic development that does not waste future resources and, therefore, is sustainable.  Basically it’s eco-friendly economic development.

Sustainable societies are those in which the three key forces – social, economic, and environmental – are in balance.  Satisfying all three is the most daunting challenge faced by decision makers today.  Each force seems, at times, to be in conflict with the other two; but the conflict between the three is the driving force behind almost all societal, economic, technological, and environmental progress.

The economy is generally the most useful of the three forces because it is a societal construct and can be manipulated effectively by a relatively small group of large governments and powerful corporations.  It is not only possible, but also practical to manipulate society and the environment by making economic changes.  Economic equality, for example, almost always leads to social equality and changes in hiring practices, wages, and working conditions have had a huge impact on societies.

In this country the civil rights movement, women’s movement, and the progressive movement of the early 20th century stand out as examples of economic manipulation, namely more fair hiring practices and wages and safer working conditions, ushering in extreme social change.

Economics also can be used to protect the environment.  If, for example, OPEC fixed the price of crude oil at three hundred dollars per barrel, consumption of gasoline would plummet and scientists would find a workable alternative within a couple years.  The environmental pillar would be moved drastically in the right direction by controlling the economic pillar, though not without cost.

The global economy, however, is also driven by environmental and social factors.  As environmental problems become more severe, for example, natural economic forces will facilitate a shift (however slow) to cleaner fuels and better planning.  This shift has already begun in the form of Research and Development into clean fuels, lightweight materials, and more efficient engines.  R & D is the precursor to technological advance.

Returning for a moment to the women’s movement and civil rights movement, they also are excellent examples of social changes leading to economic change.  Employers were forced to accept both women and African Americans in capacities they otherwise would not have been considered for because the enormous war effort caused a labor shortage.  Having experienced opportunities previously given only to white men, both groups refused to again take a back seat and they were able to make enough noise to convince political powers that a new solution was needed.

Similarly, as population growth slows in many developed economies, labor shortages and increasing levels of indebtedness will force businesses to underdeveloped countries in search of both a labor force and a new consumer base.

While I maintain that growth is not necessary in a capitalist economy, growth does lead to higher profits.  Businesses will, therefore, always seek growth.  If the consumer base in developed economies like the U.S., U.K., Canada, and Japan stops growing or, worse, begins to shrink, businesses will be forced to create growth elsewhere by paying better wages in factories already in place in the “third world.”

Evidence of this transition is already present, though it is admittedly difficult to see.  Levels of indebtedness have been rising in rich countries over the last twenty-or-so years while population growth has slowed drastically, together indicating that our consumer base may be nearing its limit.  Businesses also are positioning themselves overseas; knowingly or unknowingly they are preparing for the transition to greater social and economic development in the third world.

At times our economy is limited by our environment and our social growth is limited in turn by our economic means.  Some have even suggested that further economic development threatens to outstrip our resources, ruining our environment and sending society back to the Stone Age.  It is my position, however, that as long as we actively adapt to each new challenge we can sustain our level of cultural and societal complexity indefinitely.

Keys to sustainable development:

1.  Phase out fossil fuels:  Our dependence on fossil fuels goes beyond the automotive industry.  Planes, factories, and farm equipment are just a few of a bevy of dependant technologies being overlooked.  We also will need to find a replacement for the motor oil we use as a lubricant.

2.  Rethink agriculture:  We need to farm in such a way that the land remains fertile for future generations and vastly important water resources are not contaminated.  The solution may be to better control fertilizer; it may be to rotate crops such that the soil is replenished regularly and needs less fertilizer.  Once we have the solution the spread of the new technology will be crucial.

3.  Mechanization and of “third-world” agriculture:  There are three important benefits of sustainable, mechanized agriculture for sustainable development.  Countries will be able to produce more food on less land; the land will not be ruined by over-farming; people who previously were farmers will be forced to the cities and the transition to an urban, educated culture will be accelerated, resulting in slower population growth; jobs will be created as more people are needed to process, market and sell food; people will be more healthy as meat becomes more available.

4.  Rich countries need to invest overseas:  If food production industries are to be modernized, the “third world” needs roads, cars, processing plants, trains, planes, airports, ships and seaports.  Transportation and processing will be key and they do not have the capital for so many changes.

5.  International Minimum Wage:  Without it poor people will continue to have dozens of kids and the kids will work for next to nothing in dangerous factory conditions.  The U.S. and her allies need to be responsible and slave wages and child labor need to stop.

6.  The world needs more teachers:  If conditions are ever to improve, people must not only grow richer, but smarter as well.  If children are free to attend school, meaning their parents can support them alone, they will be the ones to advance society, providing there is someone to teach them.

7.  Gender Equality:  If women are working they are likely to have fewer kids.  If they work and have kids, fewer of their kids will have to, and if there kids don’t work they may go to school.  If women are recognized as equals, boys and girls will be allowed an education and the next generation of educated women will probably have fewer kids and the women that have kids will be more capable of raising educated kids.  Finally, twice as many educated people is always a good thing; technological advance will accelerate as more people contribute.  In short, gender equality is key to both education and economic development.

Archive: Drugs

Since the 1980’s, the government and media have warned the American people about the dangers of drugs like cocaine, heroine and LSD.  The Reagan administration even went so far as to call the anti-drug crusade the “War on Drugs.”

Hard drugs like crack, PCP, and methamphetamines are dangerous, not to mention morally wrong.   However, I believe that all drugs should be legal because the collateral damage from anti-drug legislation does as much or more damage than the drugs themselves.

According to the United States Department of Justice one out of every fifteen U.S. citizens will serve time in a state or federal prison at some time in their life.

The problem is even more appalling among men and minority communities.  A 2000 study by the Department of Justice estimates that 18% of all African Americans, over 11% of all men, 32% of all black men and 17% of all Hispanic men will serve prison time.  Of the 1.3 million American citizens these numbers represent, 21% of state and 57% of federal inmates are serving time for a drug offense.

There are two major flaws in the reasoning behind the war on drugs.  First, people assume that harsh penalties will deter young people from becoming involved in the drug trade – the opposite is true.  Second is the assumption that eliminating drug dealers eliminates drugs.  In actuality it simply creates a job opening.

Many drug dealers sell drugs, often on a smaller scale, for the first time as a young child.  As anyone with children will tell you deterrents are at best only partially effective on young people.  Children have no concept of time and no concept of their own limitations.  They also rarely understand the long term consequences of their decisions; that is what parents are for.

These kids may only make a couple hundred dollars a week selling drugs, but ask any thirteen year-old to choose between doing their homework or making $300 and see what they say.  While a rational adult may see that those couple hundred dollars aren’t worth sacrificing an education, for that child, especially a poor child, school takes on a less important role.

By the time many of these kids are seventeen year old crack dealers they’ve been selling drugs for the better part of a decade, have little in the way of an academic knowledge base, and still are too young to be expected to understand the consequences of their actions.

It is ludicrous for our society to expect a poor teenager, let alone a young child, to be deterred by the long-term disadvantages of dealing drugs especially with cocaine priced at between $12,000 and $35,000 per kilo, according to a study by the DEA.  It’s equally unrealistic to expect a teenager with no options to give that kind of lifestyle – one in which they may make as much money as a doctor or lawyer – up for a job at Burger King.

The idea that putting dealers behind bars will stem demand is even sillier.  Nobody stops using drugs because their favorite drug dealer has been locked away; they just go to someone else.  Drug addiction is much too powerful to be stopped by inconvenience, as are the underlying issues that lead to drug use in the first place.  The only way to rid ourselves of the problem is to study and treat drug users.

By outlawing drugs, we’ve simultaneously fueled gang violence, driven prices down, increased production and created and unregulated black market for the banned substances.  It is no coincidence that gang violence surged to unprecedented heights in the eighties and nineties as crack became king of the American underbelly, nor should this link surprise anyone.

The key to understanding why the war on drugs has failed is simple economics.  In a free market economy, which is what we’re talking about in its most pure form, competition drives price down and quality and convenience up.
That is why, according to a report by Mary Cooper, drugs are more pure, cheaper, and easier to find than ever.  It’s also why more drugs are being cut with Drain-o and rat poisoning – drug dealers need to cut costs.

Competition also causes is conflict.  People fight most ferociously when something tangible is at stake.  Pride or respect may be the focus of romanticized Hollywood movies on the subject, but money transformed the American gangbanger from neighborhood ruffian into cold-blooded killer.

The lack of regulation, however, has been equally important and has had equally tragic results.  Overdoses kill thousands of people each year.  If drugs were legal, purity could be regulated and drugs would be cut with benign substances people would have a better idea for how much they were taking and overdoses would become far less common.

Luckily, the problems caused by the war on drugs can be fixed fairly easily: by legalizing, commercializing, and regulating all drugs.  Many of the proposed changes, especially those related to marijuana, are similar to policies regarding alcohol.

I propose that marijuana use be restricted to adults aged eighteen and older and that hard drugs be restricted to those twenty-one and older.  Furthermore, it should be illegal to use marijuana outside of one’s own residence and specially-designated clubs as the smoke may cause others to become intoxicated.

While marijuana may be treated in much the same way as alcohol, it is actually less dangerous and much less addictive, hard drugs are an entirely different animal.  Drugs like crack and heroine are dangerous, overdoses often result in death, and they are very addictive.

Commission of any crime while under the influence of hard drugs should result in a significant extension of the normal sentence.  The amount of time added should be doubled in the event of a serious violent crime like murder, rape, attempted murder, or any crime involving the use of a deadly weapon.

Overdoses would be greatly reduced by rating (and restricting) the purity of drugs and this information would be clearly indicated on whatever container is used for public distribution.  Limitations as to what drugs may or may not be cut with would serve to further protect the public.

Heavy taxes and difficult-to-obtain distribution licenses (for hard drugs) would facilitate a swift takeover by large corporations or government-owned monopolies.  This would eliminate small distributors and, therefore, allow for strict government and quality control.

Our country would also reap the benefits of what Cooper estimates as a 400 billion dollar industry which, given time, could be entirely home grown.

In addition to the enormous new revenue stream provided by taxing that industry, our government could less on prisons ($20,000 per inmate per year), law enforcement – 17.8 billion per year according to Cooper’s study, and court costs – 621,000 jail inmates in 2000, according to a report from the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

With nothing tangible to fight about, gang violence should decline steadily and police would be allowed to focus on enforcing other areas of the law (Murder, Rape, Home Invasion, etc.) rather than wasting their time and our money making drug busts (job openings).

More importantly, without a field of work promising fast money with little or no education or experience, more young people could focus on school and achieve their vast potential.

Since the 1980’s the government and popular media have done everything in their power to sell us on the benefits of the “War on Drugs.”  I’ve probably heard a thousand accounts of how drugs ruined an addict’s life, or how a young child was caught in the crossfire of a local gang war.

What I have not heard, unfortunately, is how the war on drugs has aggravated and, in some cases, created peripheral problems like gang violence and drug overdoses.

The war on drugs has created a “career” requiring no experience, education, and with no age limits; where it’s possible to make tens of thousands of dollars in a matter of weeks; one that often ends in prison or worse.  By legalizing drugs, I seek only to eliminate the temptation caused by the drug trade.

Legalizing drugs will not eradicate drug use, but it will greatly reduce peripheral problems like drug overdoses, gang violence, crowded prisons, and the damage done to drug dealers.  If we cannot prevent people from using drugs (we can’t), the least we can do is limit the collateral damage.

Archive: Gun Control

In 1994, the United States saw problems such as gun violence that had been escalating for several decades reach an all time high; later that year Congress passed the Brady Bill and a ban on nineteen different types of assault rifle.  Since that time, the rates for all types of violent and property crime have decreased every year and all-time lows were achieved for both in 2003; despite rhetoric to the contrary, gun control legislation, even flawed legislation, does prevent crime.

According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1.3 million people were the victim of a firearm related violent crime in 1994.  The availability of military weapons was the major reason for the glut of gun violence our country experienced in the 1990’s.  The abolishment of those weapons, aided by the restrictions placed on handguns, nearly cut our crime rate in half in less than a decade.

Furthermore, our total rate for violent crime fell from 51.2 down to 22.3 from 1994 to 2003 (per thousand), according to the United States Department of Justice.  That’s a decrease of over 100%, more than 10% per year.  Total property crime has also decreased every year, from 310.2 in ’94 to 163.2 in ’03.

The area of crime impacted the most directly by this legislation is gun crime.  The rate for total firearm crime fell dramatically, from 2.1 in ’93 to 1.2 in ’03.  In addition, the rate for murder fell from 6.6 to 3.8 (per 100,000); this country is a safer place because of gun control.

The reason for this phenomenon is simple.  Normal home-owning hard-working middle class families don’t normally own Uzi’s or HK-53’s; they have no reason to.  Criminals, on the other hand, use the cheapest, most effective weapon available.  The availability of assault rifles gives the criminal a technological advantage and confidence.  That combination proved deadly in the early 1990’s.

Before the ban, anyone of age could purchase assault rifles legally for less than $1,000.  Under the ban, arms dealers were unlikely to risk a prison sentence by selling to just anybody. Also, these weapons were much more expensive due to scarcity and the risks involved with smuggling them into the country.

The 10-year assault rifle ban ran out last year and already AR-15’s are available for under $1,000 and AK-47’s for $450.

The winner of the debate over gun control versus gun rights is obvious: gun control wins.  The extra paper-work hunters and gun lovers had to do for the last ten years helped prevent hundreds of thousands of rapes, robberies and assaults and thousands of murders.

What Congress needs to do is reinstate the assault rifle ban, take the ban a step further by collecting the assault rifles already owned by private citizens and expand it to include all assault rifles.  Guns will be much more difficult to obtain with a longer waiting period and would be much more expensive, preventing ordinary people from committing a “crime of passion.”

Next, safety training should be a prerequisite for licensing, and operating a firearm under the influence will carry a stiff penalty and be strictly enforced.  The sooner we, as a society, learn that guns are not toys, the sooner we’ll stop hearing about kids accidentally shooting themselves and others.

This plan won’t cost us anything.  Hunters will still hunt, people will still be able to “protect their homes,” and gun nuts will just have to find something else to collect.  Furthermore, by reinstating and expanding these laws, the trend towards lower crime that began in 1994 would continue and gain momentum.  These safeguards would bring our country closer to the lower crime rates experienced by Japan, China and Europe.

In 2003 “only” 500,000 people were victims of firearm crime – down from 1.3 million in 1994 – yet in 2004 the ban on assault rifles ran out and in 2006 our conservative Congress still has made no attempt at renewing the ban.