One argument against the Trump administration's moves of BLM and the USDA agencies out of DC was the need to work closely with the rest of the administration and Congress.
There's a hint in this discussion of CDC director Walensky (the HQ is in Atlanta but she seems to be working from MA?) that CDC is being hurt by the location.
Apparently the recent elections authorized something called "participatory budgeting" in Boston (the link seems to say it's more of an exploration than a cut and dried deal). First I'd heard of it, although there's an organization devoted to promoting it.
Without knowing anything about it I don't like it. I don't get many comments on this blog, but the longest exchange I had with anyone was on this issue, although neither the proponent nor I called it that. I think my resistance is based on inheriting some "Progressive" or "goo-goo" ideas--the concept that professionals in management know better than mere citizens about what is needed and how to do it. (I wrote the preceding sentence with tongue-in-cheek, and am only half serious.)
I may look at it more seriously now, or I may get lazy and pass.
Since McAuliffe lost in VA on Tuesday, attention turns to the victor; Mr. Youngkin. He's youngish (56) and obviously ambitious, so where does he go. Virginia governors are term-limited, so in 2025 he'll be looking for a new job. Senator Kaine presumably will run for reelection in 2024, so one possibility is to run for that seat.
Youngkin seems to combine some assets: a pleasing persona, enough political ability to thread the needle between Trump and Virginia moderates, a resume combining achievements in finance and in religion, plus the requisite family (four children).
There's discussion today of whether his campaign sets a pattern for the Republicans in the future. The attack on CRT and support of charter schools is a tie to the right, while otherwise he seems to have a more conventional Republican platform. So I think the test will be whether he can navigate the politics of the next two years, and lead the Republicans to a takeover of the Senate and increased margin in the House of Delegates in 2023. If that happens, he'd make a good dark horse candidate.
Children believe in essentialism. So did ancient Greeks, apparently, according to the wikipedia article. I don't.
Is "America" essentially a racist country, a white-dominated country, a city on the hill, a light unto the world, an imperial hegemon, a pillar of human rights? My answer is some of all of the above, more so at different times in history and less so at other times, in some places and at some times.
In other words, it's complicated.
This Politico piece traces the history of the pension program for Civil War veterans (Union army) from very limited coverage to close to universal, ending with its last payment in 2020 to a widow. It argues that because the vets developed an effective lobby organization (Grand Army of the Republic) they were able to expand the program over the years. It goes on to cite the 20th century's Social Security and Medicare programs as similar cases where a program limited initially was expanded subsequently. All of this is in service to an argument that possibly the programs included in Biden's "Build Back Better" might have a similar destiny.
I don't quarrel with the writer's logic and hope for the expansion of BBB programs. I do offer the instance of USDA farm programs as another instance of the expansion of government programs, an instance which is even more noteworthy than his examples.
In the years since the Agricultural Adjustment Act was passed, programs have expanded to cover not only seven or eight field crops, but oilseeds, fruits and vegetables, specialty crops, aquaculture, apiculture, etc. The only crops whose programs have been reduced as of now are tobacco, peanuts, and naval stores.
I read this the other day:
A university is a place where minds should be opened, not closed; where perspectives should be broadened, not narrowed; where biases should be challenged, not confirmed. It would appear that many of our universities are failing at this critically important role.It started me thinking. When I went to college that was true. But then I was coming from a mostly rural area and background, living in a time when my knowledge of the world was mostly limited to reading magazines and the Binghamton Press newspaper, short news broadcasts on NBC, and the books available at home and in the school library.. So encountering the variety of people and courses at college was definitely broadening, particularly socially, since I was already leaning liberal and agnostic. College opened a world of choices to me, or at least made more real the choices I had vague glimpses of when in high school.
GAO has a report on the problems FCC faces in providing national broadband.There's a new law:
To identify areas that need broadband access, the Universal Service Fund relies on maps of internet accessibility based on data collected from broadband providers. However, this data is not always accurate. For example, some rural areas with low populations are lumped together, and may appear to have access when they do not. This is because providers may report the entire area as having broadband even if only one location has service. The result of this mapping error is that resources to improve internet access do not always match the need.
To get more precise assessments, Congress approved the Broadband DATA Act in 2020. This required FCC to create a better map starting with getting more granular data on the precise locations of homes, businesses, and other places that could make use of broadband. Once this location map is complete, FCC will overlay broadband providers’ service area data to show which locations are served and which are not.
GAO notes the problems in combining available databases, like USPS, Census, and DOT address data. Many of the problems mentioned were familiar from back in the day when we were trying to achieve consistency across counties and across agencies.
What struck me was the lack of any mention of USGS. So I went to their site, I'd not been in 10 or more years, and found the National Map. It's more impressive than it used to be, but obviously doesn't serve as the base for governmental action. Took a look at Rural Utilities, which GAO also discussed, but they don't seem to have used GIS in their broadband efforts.
I wonder whether other countries have been more successful in coordinating the rollout of broadband to their rural areas.
Interesting paper via Marginal Revolution--a scholar found that inefficiencies and delay in states still using COBOL to run their unemployment insurance systems hurt GDP.
I calculate that the failure to invest in updating UI benefit systems in COBOL states caused U.S. real GDP to fall by an extra $181 billion (in 2012 dollars) during this time period. Three primary mechanisms account for the effect I find: COBOL states could be characterized by (1) longer delays in processing claims, (2) longer delays in filing claims, or (3) a larger share of discouraged filers: individuals who do not file because they do not believe that they will be successful in receiving benefits if they file or individuals that believe that the cost to file is too high.
I've good memories of COBOL; for one thing that's how I met my wife, in a COBOL class.
While I understand why states haven't redone their unemployment insurance systems, I won't lose the chance to ponticate on the subject. In an ideal world we'd have a national unemployment insurance program, not 50+ individual state ones. In an ideal world we'd find the resources to redo software systems more often than every 50 years. In an ideal world we wouldn't leave money (GDP) growth on the table.
Anthony Downs died recently--he was an economist who argued that people assess their choices rationally, particularly their political choices, which often leads to them not voting.
A recent paper here argues for the importance of personal experience in shaping choices. A recent article on inflation in the Post got a number of comments--I was struck by the number who recounted their history, or their parents history, with high mortgage rates back in the 1980s. As for myself, when I bought in 1976, I ended up buying from Gulf Reston, choosing a new townhouse, although one of the last remaining in a 220 unit townhouse development. Part of the factor for my choice was the 8 percent rate for the mortgage, as Gulf still had access to financing at that rate, although the going rate was IIRC closer to 9. Rates cited in the comments on the Post piece were double digits.
That personal history makes me more sensitive to the dangers of inflation returning than most of my fellow liberals, who seem these days to believe it can't happen again.
This isn't inconsistent with Downs theory, but it does fit the NBER paper.
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Two of the more idiosyncratic bloggers I follow are University Diaries, written by Margaret Sotan, a GWU English professor, and The Daily Howler, written by Bob Somerby, a retired schoolteacher and Harvard grad. Both have, as my mother might have said, bees in their bonnet. I say Prof. Soltan's are guns, corruption in colleges, and Haridim. Mr. Somerby's are liberal media (particularly on education and statistics) and philosophy.
Soltan has a post on an article from Mosaic, an online Jewish magazine, describing education in the Haridim schools in New York City. There seems not to be much education occurring within the schools. She calls it a cult, and questions its acceptance within American culture.
Somerby has posts yesterday and today on a NYTimes Magazine piece on Rebecca Hall and an upcoming movie. He questions whether an individual belongs to a race, and the nature of the linkage. Is it the one-blood rule, is it the context within which the person grows up, or something else? Is there any reality to race?
Seems to me both bloggers are dealing with issues of belonging and identity. If you view, as I do, the bonds between individual and nation as rather rubbery, stretching and contracting depending on the individual and the circumstances, under what circumstances do the links break. I've no problem with the Amish Americans, even though they end education early and get some special treatment. But Haridi Americans (is that a term) stretch the bonds more, perhaps simply because they have the history here than the Amish do. But for both the Amish and the Haridi the bond between individual and group are voluntary, though as long as one is a member you're subject to group pressure.
Somerby's subject relates to involuntary bonds--you can't choose your grandparents or the cultural context you grow up in. At least, they used to be involuntary, entirely determined by the community. It turns out there is choice: first for those whose color is ambiguous, they can "pass", and now for many who can choose which parts of their history they accept. (Somerby has some fun with the words "Allen whose great great grandfather...", pointing out she had several great grandfathers (16 to be specific).
