Seek First to Understand

Having debates with other people can be a very dangerous business. Generally, people are only so open to other viewpoints, and I think everyone has a point at which they're emotions take over.

I thought of a question today for pro-choice abortion people. This story sparked it.

The question: Is gender selection a legitimate reason to have an abortion?

Possible answers: Yes or No.

If the respondent says yes, then they're morally suspect, but consistent.

If the respondent says no, then they've admitted that abortions are not just a choice someone can make. Many pro-choicers say it's not the government's business what a woman does with her body, implying that the woman can have an abortion for any reason she wants.  This takes that stance off the table.

Democrats Against Science

I often hear liberals talk about how Republicans or Conservatives are anti-science, that they ignore what academia learns and publishes.  Here is Paul Krugman talking about Rick Perry and Mitt Romney, for example.

Now it seems, President Obama is smarter than the scientists! (Though probably many liberals believe he is one of the smartest men to walk the Earth.)

Obviously, the President just continues to eschew the truth so that he can politicize it, fundraise off it, and use it to build up votes.

How unpresidential.

Do As I Say Not As I Do

So, the US has imposed tariffs on Chinese-produced solar panels.

Why? Because China is subsidizing their production so much, that they can afford to sell their panels in the US for a lower price than US firms can sell them.  Therefore everyone buys the Chinese panels and the US firms suffer.  It's called dumping.

What's bizarre is that the US subsidizes its own production (has anyone heard of Solyndra?)  I guess this means we're not subsidizing as much as China.  However, I wanted to point out that if the purpose of the US subsidies is to promote the use of solar panels by lowering the price, how does it make sense to punish other countries from also subsidizing, further reducing the price?

Propaganda!

The ACA has mandated that insurance companies that spend more than 15% of their budgets on non-health spending have to refund the difference to their beneficiaries.

It also requires them to explain when it sends the money that it's because of the ACA.  I hope the insurance companies and Republicans make sure that when something negative happens (premiums going up or coverage being dropped) because of the ACA, the public knows exactly why.

The Argument for Regulation

Liberals have a clear plan for increasing government's control over our lives.

Step 1: Choose an industry
Step 2: Claim the industry is special.
Step 3: Regulate the industry
Step 4: Repeat

Claiming the industry is special was first used in the health care debate, and now is used by Paul Krugman to persuade us that banking needs to be regulated.  Are there any industries that can't be described as special?

Note: I do not mean to argue here that regulation is always and everywhere unnecessary, but only want to put people on the lookout.

Also: in Krugman's op-ed, he implies that there were almost no regulations on banks in the Gilded Age, which isn't exactly true.  As I recall, banks were regulated by states instead of Congress.  Most states did not allow banks to open branches to serve multiple locations.  The inability of banks to diversify their accounts geographically did a lot to destabilize the system.

Not a Slippery Slope

In Sunday's New York Times, Richard Thaler argued that the conservative argument against the individual mandate is nothing more than a slippery slope arguments.  Since slippery slope arguments are fallacious so is the conservative argument against the individual mandate.

However, the argument against the mandate is not quite a slippery slope.  A slippery slope argument states that if we do X, then we'll do Y, then Z, then eventually we'll do something crazy, but if we don't do X then that series of events won't happen.  The argument against the individual mandate isn't saying that if we allow this power to Congress, then Congress will eventually force us all to eat broccoli. 

Instead it's an argument that if Congress has the power to mandate insurance, then Congress has the power to mandate anything, even broccoli.  Conservatives argue that permitting the mandate means Congress has the power to mandate anything they want, not that they necessarily will do so.

Net Neutrality?

I'm still not sure I understand the net neutrality debate.  From what I can surmise it's a battle between content providers (Amazon, Netflix, Google, etc.) and data providers (Comcast, AT&T, Time Warner, etc.).  Data providers want to charge content providers more for premium services (maybe faster transmission of their content, for example) while content providers want everyone treated equally, no premium services offered.

You can probably figure out each side's motivations, but it's not obvious which would be better for consumers.  The data providers argue that by charging more for special services, they can invest more in higher-speed lines and it will help slow the increase in congestion.

Eduardo Porter wrote an op-ed about net neutrality.  I wonder if you can determine which side he's on.

Anyway, in his opening paragraph he suggests an analogy of automobiles on a highway.  He argues that certain automobile makes would cut deals with the highway operators so that they could use "special" lanes, while all other cars were stuck in the slow, free lanes. 

Though it's a good way to visualize what's going on, the details confuse some of the issues.  First, this analogy suggests that the data providers, if they could offer premium service, would ignore the non-premium data streams, leading to content building until the bandwidth was exhausted.  That isn't necessarily true.  It will still be in the data providers' interest to ensure that their customers have reasonably fast access to the content they want.

Second, he argues that if one company cuts a deal to use the premium lane, then they'll then charge customers more for usage.  I don't see what's wrong with that.  It happens all the time.  Each cable channel has to cut a deal with cable providers, all of commercial business depends on contracts between businesses.  This doesn't necessarily make things more expensive.  If they make their product too expensive we won't buy it.  Mr. Porter seems to forget the ability of customers to decline to buy their product.  This is the pressure that will keep their prices low.

They're could be a problem if the data provider IS the content provider and gives itself a discount.  That I'll discuss in a future post.