- LeBron's failure warms Cleveland's heart - NBA - Yahoo! Sports
- A Tale of Two Decisions | WaitingForNextYear
Elsewhere:
- James Taranto on the Monster Mohel cartoons which led to the circumcision ban's primary backer dropping it.
- James Bovard discusses his summer working for government, which shows perfectly why government operations are so ineffective: There's simply no incentive to work properly.
- Kol HaRav has R' Bigman's piece on Coercing a Divorce, about how the process ultimately gives power to uncooperative husbands. As we have seen a couple friends pay small fortunes to get their get, this one hit home.
- On a related note, Kefirot questions, after watching a friend be forced to give up her own get rights to get hers, whether we have lost our belief in God that we allow so many people to act so horribly.
I was going to let this whole get thing slide because I know I'm a broken record, but you have the chutzpah to ask (in someone else's name) whether it's because OJs have lost their belief in God??
ReplyDeleteBelieving in God is half the problem here! The God you believe in set it up so that men could refuse to divorce their wives, like they own them. You still, in 2011, when the whole Western world has moved on, live in a society where you don't let women be rabbis or read from the Torah or daven from the amud, where exchanging rings under the chupah is still not acceptable because it wouldn't be clear enough that the man is acquiring the woman and not vice-versa, where the ketubah still says that she's a virgin like she's worth more that way, who still carries that primitive disgust of a woman's natural cycle that you refuse to touch her for a week and then have her bathe ritually before she's "clean" again.
Don't blame this on not believing in God. We who don't believe in God are not the problem here. The problem is those who do, especially those who believe in YOUR God.
/rant
a) You are a broken record.
ReplyDeleteb) This is an Orthodox blog, period. Get over it.
c) That's ridiculous. The whole thrust of how it's supposed to work is to protect a woman, and the point is that an individual can twist it in specific ways if they know how to "game" the system a bit/if there are corrupt individuals helping. Kefirot is wondering how a person could self-justify such an action if they believe in God in the first place - don't they realize that behaving in such a manner is horrible and bound to hurt them in the long run? If the person (and particularly a Rav) is truly a believer in God (and following the Jewish divorce process would imply as much), then it is incredulous that they would act/help corruption.
Also, nice job on completely misrepresenting Judaism. If I did that to your stuff you'd lose it.
ReplyDeletereligion is poison
ReplyDeleteHow does the fact that a woman needs a get to move on with her life protect her?
ReplyDeleteIf I did that to your stuff you'd lose it.
ReplyDeleteAnd what do you mean "If?" Your whole point was that believing in God should make people less likely to do this stuff. My whole point is that you're slandering nonbelievers, who in fact do not have many of the problems that I see resulting from fundamentalist religions like OJ. To make your point in the context of sex equality (e.g. about divorces) is especially ludicrous.
>live in a society where you don't let women be rabbis or read from the Torah or daven from the amud
ReplyDelete*gasp*
Either Bovard's piece is kind of dumb or your conclusion is off-base.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that employees of the Virginia Highway Department in 1973 did bad work is only tangentially relevant to the question of whether government operations are ineffective.
Your position reveals two assumptions that anti-government types make that I do not understand. One is that, at their heart, all government agencies operate more or less like the DMV, or in this case, the Va. Highway Department of 1973. Clearly this isn't true. Government is more than just the DMV. I hope you think that the military, the FBI, the CIA or the Supreme Court sport more impressively managed outfits.
The fact is that the quality of work you get from a government agency is closely related to the quality of the government worker. Why would we expect the clerk at the DMV to be better than a clerk in some insurance agency? It's not a scholarship position, nor can we assume that the people who hold them dreamed of attaining these positions since childhood. On the other hand, federal judges, FBI agents, district attorneys - these guys represent the cream of the crop. Openings for these positions are very competitive (often more so than their private sector counterparts), and they are consequently staffed by very effective workers. Do you know the workload of a federal judge? Do you think the Manhattan DA spends more time prosecuting insider traders than the the fancy white shoe law firm spends defending them?
And it's not as if the private sector is full of efficient go-getters. Again, the position and qualifications possessed by the worker is very influential here. Anybody whose spent time on the phone with their cable provider can attest to the fact that they're not all geniuses. Additionally, private sector firms are not always motivated to perform at peak efficiency. A lot of waste goes on in fancy law firms, for example, because they bill by the hour.
Second, there seems to be an assumption that because government does not operate in a for-profit capacity, therefore the people who work for it have no incentive to work hard or operate efficiently. This is absurd. First, even in the DMV, they have promotions. In many government agencies, promotions are very competitive, and very lucrative. Second, not everyone plans on working at the same place forever. Government experience is very valuable to private sector employers. Being a lazy screw-up is not conducive to one's future employment. Third, it overlooks that many people are in government because they want to be in government. Believe it or not, a lot of people think monitoring our nation's fisheries is very cool. Fortunately, most of those people are with Fish and Wildlife Services. These people love what they do, and do it much better than some private sector firm could reasonably be expected to.
I actually did think his piece was kind of dumb, particularly since it was from 1973. But I thought some of the concepts were interesting.
ReplyDeleteI don't think all branches of government are the same, and I've long said that military is best served by the government, particularly as it's served by dedicated people who choose to be there. The same is usually (though not always) true of the DOJ - these are people dedicated to being at the top of their profession and/or doing right.
But those are all situations where government is doing what it's actually supposed to do and where private can't do the same. As an example, I don't understand why more road work isn't outsourced to private companies - there's no incentive for gov't road employees to work hard, their jobs simply are not in danger and - as they are not scholarship positions - there's no real upside to doing a great job. I recently noted the city in GA that outsources ALL of its work, and it is doing fantastic at a much lower cost.
Many people in government DO want to be there - but a lot of that is because of the great benefits they get vs. what they are required to do. I just spent the weekend in Baltimore, where many people work for and/or have dealt with government, and even those (particularly those?) who work for gov't find that it's laughable how things are done. There's no sense of or even a desire for efficiency - it's far more about protection of their own jobs and benefits. They have cushy jobs relative to their skill levels, and they will fight to protect that.
Most government jobs are NOT scholarship positions, and yet we cough up tax money as if they are - and don't get rewarded with better results, and often get worse. That's really the point.
All branches of government are not the same, true. State governments, in particular, can suck. Part of this I suspect is self-fulfilling prophecy, in that political factions that don't care about government, or that think government should do less, tend to focus less on actually improving the governments we have, as opposed to just cutting programs and funding. This plays havoc with agency efforts to either reform methods or bureaucracy, and hire and/or retain highly skilled and dedicated workers.
ReplyDeleteRegarding the military, I generally agree that it's comprised of dedicated public servants, but there's a lot going on there. I believe the demographics of the modern military skew towards inductees from lower socio-economic strata, in part because the military can offer tremendous benefits to those without a bevy of realistic opportunities for economic advancement. Again, this reinforces the idea, that in evaluating the quality of government work, you get what you pay for, and also what you look for.
Regarding road work, my understanding is that most road work is probably performed by private companies paid by governments. I would agree that if the private sector can handle something more efficiently, and there isn't some important public policy consideration militating otherwise, then by all means, have them do it. Definitely I would not consider "keeping incompetent road workers employed" as an important public policy goal. Although it is often the case that it is not profitable for private companies to do certain tasks - like bury raccoons on some deserted patch of Maine Hwy. 14 - I imagine the Highway Dept of Va. in 1973 had some sort of political patronage.
>I just spent the weekend in Baltimore, where many people work for and/or have dealt with government, and even those (particularly those?) who work for gov't find that it's laughable how things are done. There's no sense of or even a desire for efficiency - it's far more about protection of their own jobs and benefits. They have cushy jobs relative to their skill levels, and they will fight to protect that.
Again, I wonder how true this all really is. Obviously, it depends on what government, agency and work is being done. I have no doubt that the Maryland DMV has its share of lazy good-for-nothings. I also suspect that most people think that everyone they work with is stupid and incompetent. It's just that someone who works for or with Verizon has no readily available ideology to explain it. Again, lots of this stuff is self-fulfilling prophecy.
Also, it may be a good idea to take a wider view of what government's goals are. Government is not meant to be profitable (in the sense of creating a surplus of monetary value that will not be reinvested), and to a certain degree it's incongruous to measure its effectiveness like you would a business. Government has larger, public policy-oriented concerns than does even a very large business. In certain situations, government may be willing to put up with waste or market failure in one area of operations if it can help serve a more nebulous purpose elsewhere. It moves in mysterious ways.
My point is that government is perfectly capable of performing efficiently, so long as the circumstances are right. My problem with the article (and your gloss) was that it implied there's some fundamental contradiction in terms with the concept of government effectiveness, which there of course isn't.
hence the expression,"good enough for government work"
ReplyDeleteI think there have always been people who look as though they are Yerai ShamYim and will even try and use Yiddishkeit to put others on "guilt trips" and it does not have to anything to do with the length of the Galus (as we see in the prophecies in Navi)
ReplyDeleteIt is realy hard when the poeple who are not acting right claim to be part of the Orthodox community - but that I think is part of the Nisayon we have and we must try and still continue living our lives trying to do what is right!!!
(As my cousin EZ once told me - I prefer to be bullied and not to be the bully - EZ do you know who I am ? NY)
anon: yes :) though NY means something different here!
ReplyDeletethat's a great line, i should use it more!
VP - Sorry, your comment was in spam for some reason.
ReplyDeleteI believe the demographics of the modern military skew towards inductees from lower socio-economic strata, in part because the military can offer tremendous benefits to those without a bevy of realistic opportunities for economic advancement. Again, this reinforces the idea, that in evaluating the quality of government work, you get what you pay for, and also what you look for.
That's actually (surprisingly) untrue - a study a couple years back found that it was about evenly spread among economic groups, with the highest group actually being overrepresented if I'm recalling correctly (which was linked to families of soldiers over generations and fierce patriotism among many old wealth families, I believe).
I would agree that if the private sector can handle something more efficiently, and there isn't some important public policy consideration militating otherwise, then by all means, have them do it.
That's the main point. I don't believe that many people on the left agree, and/or they don't believe for various reasons that government will be any less efficient, which I have yet to find a good explanation for outside of military. (Or major national projects, which do not come to mind.)
The frustrations expressed by people in Baltimore were definitely specific to government in most cases, though a couple were simply to unions (which just happened to be government in this case).
Also, it may be a good idea to take a wider view of what government's goals are. Government is not meant to be profitable (in the sense of creating a surplus of monetary value that will not be reinvested), and to a certain degree it's incongruous to measure its effectiveness like you would a business. Government has larger, public policy-oriented concerns than does even a very large business.
Certainly, except it's still usually easier, cheaper, and more efficient to find private companies to meet those concerns. I don't think people are typically upset that the government doesn't make money, but that it wastes it.
In certain situations, government may be willing to put up with waste or market failure in one area of operations if it can help serve a more nebulous purpose elsewhere. It moves in mysterious ways.
I'm not sure what that means. If the waste has other purposes, then it's not waste. "Mysterious ways" is silly, though - government should be working in very clear, transparent ways. (The one major policy of Obama's that almost everyone agreed was on the money was transparency... though he hasn't held to it.)
My point is that government is perfectly capable of performing efficiently, so long as the circumstances are right.
In theory yes, in practice no, and the right circumstances rarely exist regardless.
Are you not aware that they pay contractors 2-4 times (off the top of my head) the amount as they pay government employees to do the same job? Even if contractors work harder than government employees (not necessarily true by any means) they'd have to work 2-4 times more efficiently for it to be worth it. That's pretty crazy.
ReplyDelete(I'm only talking about certain domains, obviously, especially tech ones.)
ReplyDeleteIt's not just efficiency, it's quality. And I'd love to see where you got that.
ReplyDeleteCertainly that city in GA (for example) which outsources noted clearly that it paid approximately half vs. doing it themselves.
And specifically to your point, a friend in Baltimore noted simply that when government wishes to get something, and a purchaser finds an appropriate product/service, they often still have to play the game of getting a bid. So they write up the bid in a way so that only one contractor will truly match... and that contractor now knows (if it didn't already) that it can bid rather high and still win. So it does.
It's stupidly anti-competitive precisely where it needs to be competitive.
Or rather, competitive when it shouldn't be.*
ReplyDeleteRe the military -
ReplyDeleteInteresting.
>That's the main point. I don't believe that many people on the left agree, and/or they don't believe for various reasons that government will be any less efficient, which I have yet to find a good explanation for outside of military. (Or major national projects, which do not come to mind.)
Well, aside from the fact that I'm not sure when I came to represent the left, let's unpack that. People in the mainstream left, in the United States, of course generally accept the theory that the private sector can handle many things more efficiently than government. Just like it's silly to say that government cannot be effective, its silly to say that the private sector can't be effective. Moreover, it's the United States, and there mainstream acceptance of, and enthusiasm for, capitalism. Liberals believe in the free market too. Keep in mind that the vast majority of services provided in the United States are provided by the private sector. We have a comparatively small government, despite long periods of Democratic control.
Second, there are two separate things that I don't want to get confused - there's believing that government should do something, and then there's believing that government should pay a private company to do something. Obamacare, road work, etc. represent the latter.
Also, it's important to note the role that ideological fellow-travelling plays here. For many reasons, liberals are politically allied with unions, especially public sector unions. It's not surprising that liberals will fight against cuts to the postal service, even if there's no per se liberal ideological reason to.
And on the other side, the people most likely to attack specific instances of government waste are the people most likely to believe that the treasury department should be abolished. There's lots of lines drawn in the sand that don't need to be.
>Certainly, except it's still usually easier, cheaper, and more efficient to find private companies to meet those concerns. I don't think people are typically upset that the government doesn't make money, but that it wastes it.
Not so sure about this. I don't mean public concerns like giving out band-aids, which anybody can do. I mean keeping an eye on the big picture. The government stepping in and making sure there are no monopolies, while this may be considered an imposition on the free market, it has public policy benefits to people who are not forming the monopoly. So, something like individual construction projects paid for in the stimulus package may not be extraordinarily necessary in and of themselves, and thus may constitute waste of a sort, the government has a compelling interest in getting people working and getting paid, and buying things during a recession. A private civic planner, or construction agency would not have these concerns.
>I'm not sure what that means. If the waste has other purposes, then it's not waste. "Mysterious ways" is silly, though - government should be working in very clear, transparent ways.
Part of this was a joke, but I meant in the sense that the big picture is not always available by looking at a particular program and saying, "well X corp, could do this for cheaper." I don't think the government is obfuscating things, but in a sense you have to be a public policy baki on many issues to understand what the government is doing, why it's doing it, and what would happen if it didn't.
>In theory yes, in practice no, and the right circumstances rarely exist regardless.
I don't know. What, in particular, do you think they do so incompetently, that could be better handled by paying someone to do it? We've mentioned numerous things they do very well.
Well, aside from the fact that I'm not sure when I came to represent the left, let's unpack that.
ReplyDeleteJust to clarify, I view you as middle, perhaps slightly left-leaning. I'm referring to people on the left who believe those things, I didn't believe you necessarily do.
People in the mainstream left, in the United States, of course generally accept the theory that the private sector can handle many things more efficiently than government.
Agreed - I think that for the most part (just to make up numbers) about 70% of the country has mostly conservative economic policy views and 70% have socially liberal policy views.
Second, there are two separate things that I don't want to get confused - there's believing that government should do something, and then there's believing that government should pay a private company to do something. Obamacare, road work, etc. represent the latter.
I think an important point here is that while there's a reasonable debate over whether the government *should* help people when it comes to healthcare (other than extreme cases), the objectionable aspect of ObamaCare is that it tried to sidestep the much more agreed upon issue, which is that it's economically unfeasible for government to do so. It tried to present ObamaCare as cost-efficient when it clearly is not, and the estimates on it keep rising.
Also, it's important to note the role that ideological fellow-travelling plays here. For many reasons, liberals are politically allied with unions, especially public sector unions. It's not surprising that liberals will fight against cuts to the postal service, even if there's no per se liberal ideological reason to.
Of course, but it's still wrong.
And on the other side, the people most likely to attack specific instances of government waste are the people most likely to believe that the treasury department should be abolished. There's lots of lines drawn in the sand that don't need to be.
Also true, though I'd say this is much more rare. I think to oversimplify, the GOP would rather err on the side of not wasting money - so don't promote a government project unless it is clearly shown to be cost-effective. The Dems would rather err on the side of social assistance - better to help a few people even at a huge cost and we'll try to make it more efficient later.
Not so sure about this. I don't mean public concerns like giving out band-aids, which anybody can do. I mean keeping an eye on the big picture. The government stepping in and making sure there are no monopolies, while this may be considered an imposition on the free market, it has public policy benefits to people who are not forming the monopoly. So, something like individual construction projects paid for in the stimulus package may not be extraordinarily necessary in and of themselves, and thus may constitute waste of a sort, the government has a compelling interest in getting people working and getting paid, and buying things during a recession. A private civic planner, or construction agency would not have these concerns.
ReplyDeleteNo, but if the jobs aren't "real", then they're just creating new bubbles. It's like the old analogy of finding people to dig and fill holes - sure, it employs them, but for what? If there's no productive gain, it's ultimately just transferring wealth for nothing. (Which I believe immoral [it's legitimizing government theft, essentially], but there are those on the left who disagree.) If there's true need for various jobs/projects, then by definition someone in the private sector will do it. The only real debate I could see in those situations is if there's a potential upside, but a reasonable risk, and the government helps subsidize slightly to mitigate the risk. For example, I think SBA loans are extremely wise for the most part (conceptually, I have no idea how successful they are in practice though I understand reasonably so).
Part of this was a joke, but I meant in the sense that the big picture is not always available by looking at a particular program and saying, "well X corp, could do this for cheaper." I don't think the government is obfuscating things, but in a sense you have to be a public policy baki on many issues to understand what the government is doing, why it's doing it, and what would happen if it didn't.
I know :) and understood, but if they can't clearly explain and/or defend it then that's usually a bad sign.
I don't know. What, in particular, do you think they do so incompetently, that could be better handled by paying someone to do it? We've mentioned numerous things they do very well.
Have we? I think they do a great job with the military, but those are dedicated volunteers. I think the DOJ isn't bad, but again, dedicated volunteers (and also a stepping stone often toward positions of great power/fame), and they have their poor moments as well. I know from experience the SEC is horrible, the Fed is usually horrible, the IRS is okay, Social Security and Medicare horrible - and those are some of the most important governmental organizations.
I think that another important point is that even if a department is reasonably efficient, it still doesn't mean it's worthwhile - because by definition they've added layers on top of what needs to be done, since they still don't do a lot of the work themselves.
>I think an important point here is that while there's a reasonable debate over whether the government *should* help people when it comes to healthcare (other than extreme cases), the objectionable aspect of ObamaCare is that it tried to sidestep the much more agreed upon issue, which is that it's economically unfeasible for government to do so.
ReplyDeleteCould you elaborate on this point? Do you mean that even if one agrees that it is a good idea for government to help out its citizens re healthcare, it's still widely agreed that such an effort would be economically unfeasible? If so, why? If anything, the experience of ther countries is that it is very feasible. Just to take our neighbor to the north for an easy example, Canada spends considerably less per person on its version of Medicare than we do, while providing it to vastly more people. Ditto the UK, and I think every other industrialized liberal democracy. Government is in a unique position to keep costs down in a number of ways.
>No, but if the jobs aren't "real", then they're just creating new bubbles. It's like the old analogy of finding people to dig and fill holes - sure, it employs them, but for what? If there's no productive gain, it's ultimately just transferring wealth for nothing.
First, I think the distinction between real and fake jobs is a lot more illusory than you allow. Is fighting WWII a real job, or just something we decided to do? Sure, it seems pretty necessary, but it would be hard for FDR to have made a profit-centric argument for committing every man, woman and child in the country to manufacturing bullets to kill Germans. If Donald Trump builds a vanity hotel project for which there is really no demand, he's still built a hotel. He's still (I hope) paid the construction workers, architects, taxes, etc. That's redistribution of wealth, but it still counts as work.
Second, as a Moderate Liberal, I don't believe the democratically mandated redistribution of wealth is per se immoral. As in all things, context is king. In this case, it might make more sense for the government to spend less money killing Afghans and more money employing American workers to build bridges to nowhere.
Third, if we're in a recession, which can be made worse by high unemployment, then it can be a perfectly legitimate use of goverment borrowing and taxing power to say let's spend some money now, so that we can have prosperity in the near to long future, so we can better pay off our debt at a later date. Considering that the American government has an unparallelled ability to borrow and print money, perhaps we might as well.
>If there's true need for various jobs/projects, then by definition someone in the private sector will do it. The only real debate I could see in those situations is if there's a potential upside, but a reasonable risk, and the government helps subsidize slightly to mitigate the risk. For example, I think SBA loans are extremely wise for the most part (conceptually, I have no idea how successful they are in practice though I understand reasonably so).
ReplyDeleteWell, more than this. For example, there are many situations where something may provide great benefits to everyone (disparate benefits), but is expensive for one entity to undertake by itself (concentrated risk or cost). For instance, the construction of roads, bridges, the military, etc. It's in Trump's interest to have roads, but it's not worth if for him to build the Interstate Highway System. In an ideal world, everyone could get together and contract around this, but that seems like a logistical and economic nightmare (and unlikely to happen), so government effectively fills this role.
I'm curious that you think the SBA makes sense. Why should the government be subsidizing the risk of loans? If some guy with an idea but no credit couldn't get a loan from a bank (because it's too risky), why do you think we should lend the money at risk to ourselves? From my perspective, I get it, because I believe there's a value in helping small businesspeople have access to credit, even if it costs me money somewhere down the line. But for you, the securing of credit seems to be an area that is particularly well served by the market.
>but if they can't clearly explain and/or defend it then that's usually a bad sign.
Well, you have to ask them. And by them, I don't mean the guy behind the counter at the DMV, or even your average elected official.
>I know from experience the SEC is horrible, the Fed is usually horrible, the IRS is okay, Social Security and Medicare horrible - and those are some of the most important governmental organizations.
Granted the SEC has some pretty high profile failures, but I don't see how not having the SEC makes that better. The lesson we should learn from people breaing the law and not getting caught, is that perhaps we're not doing enough to catch people breaking the law. In the SEC's case, there are private SROs of course, but FINRA hasn't exactly covered itself in glory these last few years either. It's a hard job to do, and FINRA can only be as capable as the SEC lets it (although there is plenty of room for plain old incompetence and agency capture), and the SEC in turn is only as capable as Congress lets it be (although there is plenty of room for incompetence and agency capture) and Congress is comprised of people who don't necessarily believe in the mission of the SEC in the first place.
Why do you say that the SSA and Medicare are horrible? They cost a lot of money and we'll have to spend more money on them as time goes on but that's not the problem of either agency per se. As efficiency goes, everyone gets their checks on time, and just try advocating for the abolition of Medicare in today's political climate. As to whether you think government should be doing this at all, well, nobody wants it privatized, so I guess some value is perceived there, to put it lightly.
Vox - great handle!
ReplyDeletewhat's not to understand, I desire for him to experience an anguished existence of Jobian proportions.
ReplyDeletewhere's the confusion?