Politics: March 2006 Archives

Nate Nelson takes issue with several points I raised in a post about the French labor riots. He uses my words as a springboard for other commentaries. Fair enough; Lord knows I've done that before, too. But the ideas that Nathan indirectly ascribes to me are not my own.

For one thing, I don't think that employers should be able to fire workers "for any reason without even providing a reason." In the U.S., employers cannot terminate someone for having black skin, for being a woman, or having other immutable characteristics. This seems perfectly fair to me.

But I do think that companies should have the flexibility to dismiss employees when they see fit. The alternative, as in France, is that a government bureaucrat will second-guess the dismissal and possibly even prevent it. The bureaucrat probably has no particular expertise in the company's industry, and no direct responsibility for the company's prosperity. Yet he may reject a cost-cutting layoff because the company did not demonstrate to his satisfaction that it was justified.

Smart companies do not fire people for trivial reasons. Layoffs are often a sign of a troubled corporation, and they devastate morale among the remaining employees. They will only undertake such a measure if they are convinced it is essential to their long-term survival. That is why smart companies survive, and stupid ones eventually die or stave off destruction by creating iPods.

The question of whether capitalist or statist economies are more effective at creating prosperity. France enjoys roughly the same standard of living as Alabama, which is a fine American state but not exactly an economic powerhouse. The countries that have adopted a free-market model are the ones on the rise -- the U.K, Australia, Ireland, India, etc. They are also the ones that offer the best hope for their poorer citizens to be gainfully employed. Merely observing those facts isn't "a glorification of laissez-faire capitalism."

Nate says that "Eric Johnson and other Catholic conservatives can feel free to correct me if I'm wrong" about us never having had a minimum wage job, or send our kids to crappy schools, etc. I'm not sure who else Nate is addressing, but as for myself, I started making minimum wage back in 1987 when it was $3.35 an hour. But like most other minimum wage earners, I soon made more, and also like most, I wasn't suppporting a family.

Productivity is the key to making the poor more prosperous. That usually means education, combined with diligence, prudence, and avoiding the social pathologies that are pandemic in poor communities (alcoholism, drug abuse, illegitimacy, crime, gangs). If someone's labor is worth more, companies can afford to pay him more.

Showing their mastery of Cartesian logic, French students and labor unions took to the streets to engage in rational dialogue with their government over changes in employment legislation.

Wait, sorry! The French are screaming and burning things to protect their sclerotic society. The main problem with France's economy is that French companies don't want to hire new workers unless they are absolutely forced to do so. That is because French workers are very costly due to the glorious Republic's "social policies," mandating strict limits on work hours and lavish benefits.

Plus, you can't fire French workers, even for gross incompetence. We're not talking about government workers, either — these are private-sector jobs. Every sentient being who has studied this problem agrees that employment laws are the reason that a quarter of young Frenchmen are unemployed. (The generous unemployment benefits play a part, too.)

So the "conservative" government of France has proposed some tiny little free-market reforms to loosen labor markets in France, and a half-million people protest and riot. Inevitably, they have torched a McDonald's. (Is there a French law requiring demonstrators to attack McDonald's? Does Ronald's funny hair make them crazy?)

And what is driving them to the streets?

The law would allow businesses to fire young workers in the first two years on a job without giving a reason, removing them from protections that restrict layoffs of regular employees.

If you're an American employed in the private sector, you're probably thinking, "Why is that remarkable?" Most U.S. workers are "at will" employees, meaning that the employer or the worker have an indefinite arrangement between them. The worker trades his labor for the company's compensation. If either party doesn't like the terms of the arrangement, they can walk away.

The worker has to make sure his labor meets the standards of his employer. But it works both ways, as the employer has to make sure that working conditions are safe and humane, and that its workers are compensated fairly. Otherwise, the workers will walk away in favor of a better employer. There are moral considerations that come into play on both sides. Employers have a responsibility not to cheat their employees, who in turn have a responsibility to work honestly and diligently for their employers.

"Let the working man and the employer make free agreements, and in particular let them agree freely as to the wages," Pope Leo XIII wrote in his 1891 encyclical Rerum Novarum. Leo took on the question of human labor at a time when the balance of power was skewed toward employers. Today, in the U.S. and other free-market economies, the balance has shifted closer to equilibrium, and in many sectors, it favors the workers over employers. The system rewards virtues, particularly diligence, severely punishes sloth, and works to suppress other personal vices, as people who can be fired are generally on their best behavior.

Plainly, the French malcontents understand none of this. They regard employment, not as an opportunity to exchange their time and skills for sustenance, but as a kind of birthright. And why wouldn't they? In the socialist scheme of things, the state makes a bargain with its populace: you give up your economic freedom, and we will provide the benefits of prosperity, without all of the messy uncertainties of life. It is a parody of "give us this day our daily bread," and a parody of Divine Providence. The younger generation is looking at their parents' generation, retiring at age 55 with full pensions, and wonders why they aren't getting a piece of that scam.

You can only maintain a socialist economy if you have a wealthy society and a high proportion of workers to retirees. Yet the primary mechanism of socialism is to transfer wealth from productive citizens to unproductive citizens. That might work for a while longer, if the French were making enough new Frenchmen, but they are not — like every other European population save little Ireland, their population is declining.

Socialism destroys wealth. Socialism weakens families and social networks, including churches. Socialism kills society, and thus it is nothing more than a slow-motion suicide pact.

(P.S. Read Rerum Novarum when you get a chance. It isn't a tough read, and the principles Leo explains are still valid today.)

The newsroom of the Washington Post is getting smaller, and I couldn't be happier.

This isn't schadenfreude (did I spell that right?) It isn't as if workers are being thrown out on the street — they're either taking early retirement, or they aren't being replaced when they switch jobs. No individuals will be harmed in the downsizing of this media property.

I grew up reading the Washington Post, starting with the comic section in 1977, graduating to Sports, then the "Style" section (as opposed to "substance," to be sure). When I was a teenager, I started devouring the front section. Although the Post approached the news with a liberal slant, it was hardly the Village Voice. Yes, they downplayed the evils of communism, and they were relentless cheerleaders for feminism, and shameless apologists for racial favoritism, but the reporting was (mostly) intellectually honest enough to mention the other side.

Not today. I have nothing but contempt for the Washington Post, and I hope I live long enough to see the company fail, or at least transformed into something less odious. My visceral dislike began almost three years ago in Al Kut, Iraq, where my Marine unit was administering one of the provinces. Post reporter Rajiv Chandrasekaran visited the city for a few hours, then went back to Baghdad to file a story about how the civilians hated us and we were afraid to mess with a local thug who took over city hall and proclaimed himself mayor.

The truth, as I wrote in June 2004, was that almost all of the civilians were friendly, except for the thug and his small number of supporters. A short time after Chandrasekaran's article appeared, the "occupation" of city hall ended with the thug slinking away without a fight.

My article made the rounds in the blogosphere, prompting dozens of people to e-mail me with encouraging messages. However, Tom Ricks, the Post's senior military correspondent, sent me a message disputing my account of the events in Al Kut in spring of 2003. Was Ricks in Al Kut back then? No. Did he have other sources disputing what I said? No. Did he raise any logical or chronological questions about my account? No.

What it came down to, for Ricks, was that Chandrasekaran was a reporter for the Washington Post, and I was not. Furthermore, Ricks thought I sounded like a "staff guy" who gave upbeat press briefings.

In real life, during the war I was a sergeant who carried a rifle 24 hours a day and went 37 days without showering. My civil affairs team were all awarded combat action ribbons, which you don't get for being a "staff guy" (unlike combat pay, you only get that ribbon if somebody is actually trying to kill you.) Tom Ricks, senior defense correspondent for the second-most-important American newspaper, didn't bother to figure that out. Nor, when I sent a polite response informing him of this, did he deign to respond.

When the Post has journalists like this on its payroll, and abject buffoons like Dana Milbank covering the White House, it is not entitled to anyone's respect or deference. Not to mention the paper's role in the various trumped-up "scandals" like "domestic spying," to name one of many.

I used to regard Post-haters with bewilderment: who could hate a left-of-center but basically responsible newspaper with such a great Food section? Now, I reluctantly count myself as a detractor. Eighty fewer people at the Post is a mighty good start, as far as I'm concerned.

According to an article in the evangelical magazine Faith Today, two groups shifted markedly in the recent federal elections: practicing Protestants across the continent swung to the Conservatives (64%, up from 51%) and practicing Catholics in Quebec abandoned the Liberals (their 56% support in 2004 fell to 29%). Andrew Grenville says that "conscience, corruption, and the Church" made the difference.