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How to Avoid Depressions? Foster Saving and Investment | Mises Wire

Posted by M. C. on December 31, 2021

Contrary to the popular thinking, economic depressions are not caused by a strong decline in the money stock, but are rather the result of the depleted pool of savings. This depletion emerges because of the previous loose monetary policies. A tighter monetary stance arrests the depletion of the pool of savings, thereby laying the foundation for an economic recovery.

https://mises.org/wire/how-avoid-depressions-foster-saving-and-investment

Frank Shostak

In his writings, the leader of the monetarist school of thinking, Milton Friedman, blamed central bank policies for causing the Great Depression of 1930s. According to Friedman, the Federal Reserve failed to pump enough reserves into the banking system to prevent a collapse of the money stock. Because of this, Friedman held, the M1 money stock, which stood at $26.34 billion on March 1930, fell to $19 billion by April 1933—a decline of 27.9 percent.1

fs1

According to Friedman, as a result of the collapse in the money stock, economic growth also dropped off. By July 1932, industrial production had fallen by over 31 percent year on year (see chart). Also, year on year the Consumer Price Index (CPI) had plunged. By October 1932, the CPI had declined by 10.7 percent (see chart).

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A closer examination of the historical data shows that the Fed was actually pursuing very easy monetary policy in its attempt to revive the economy.2

The Fed’s holdings of US government securities depict the extent of monetary injections. In October 1929, holdings of US government securities stood at $165 million. By December 1932, these holdings had surged to $2.432 billion—an increase of 1,374 percent (see chart).

fs

Also, the three-month Treasury bill rate fell from almost 1.50 percent on April 1931 to 0.4 percent by July 1931 (see chart).

Another indication of the Fed’s loose monetary stance was the widening differential between the yield rates on the ten-year Treasury bond and the three-month Treasury bill. The differential increased from 0.04 percent in January 1930 to 2.80 percent by September 1931 (see chart; an upward-sloping yield curve indicates a loose monetary stance).

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The sharp fall in the money stock during 1930–33 does not indicate that the Federal Reserve did not try to pump money. Instead, the decline in the money stock came because of the shrinking pool of savings brought about by the previous loose monetary policies of the Fed.

The yield curve between 1920 and 1924 reveals this easy stance by the Fed: the yield spread increased from –0.67 percent in October 1920 to 2 percent by August 1924.

The reversal of this stance by the Fed, which saw the yield spread decline from 2 percent in August 1924 to –1.45 percent by May 1929, finally burst the monetary bubble (see chart).

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In addition to this, at some periods the monetary injections were nothing short of massive, contradicting Friedman’s claim. For instance, the yearly growth rate of M1 increased from –12.6 percent in September 1921 to 11 percent by January 1923, and then from –0.4 percent in February 1924 the yearly growth rate accelerated to 9.8 percent by February 1925. Such large monetary pumping amounted to a massive exchange of nothing for something.

See the rest here

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The New York Times Explains That Mask Wearing Helps To ‘Rewire’ Children – LewRockwell LewRockwell.com

Posted by M. C. on December 31, 2021

No one should be wearing a mask. Face mask wearing is simply harmful to you and those around you. It is bad for you. It is especially bad for the sick. It is especially bad for the elderly. It is especially bad for children. That is what the best science of the last two years shows, and that is the direction that we must push the narrative around masks — the direction of the truth. Masks harm you. The harm may even be irreversible. So, stop feeding into the lie by wearing one or by allowing one to be worn around you.

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2021/12/allan-stevo/the-new-york-times-explains-that-mask-wearing-helps-to-rewire-children/

By Allan Stevo

Pro tip: Google and The New York Times have a business arrangement that makes subscription-free reading easier. If you don’t want to prop up this once great newspaper by buying a New York Times subscription, then do this: Whenever you hit a New York Times paywall, you can just copy and paste the URL into a Google search and click on the top return in order to view that New York Times article for free. 

Shouldn’t I Feel Bad Doing That? 

You should feel no shame in doing this. The New York Times has spent years in total decline into mere propaganda rag for the uniparty establishment and deserves no propping up. May the Gray Lady die a swift and quiet death so that she can at least go back, even if only in  the memory of man, to be known for the generally noble efforts that once took place within those pages, pages that once great men and women wrote for.

Though the institution has doubtlessly been fraught with foibles and scandals over its history, this exemplary list of writers includes the brilliant free market mind Henry Hazlitt. Hazlitt was once an editor for The New York Times and frequent writer of the unsigned editorials that represented the official opinions of the Times editorial board. Though efforts to reform and prevent this decline of The New York Times have taken place, the paper has moved so far away from truthful coverage and honest debate that Hazlitt would no longer be allowed past security in that building today.

Though some New Yorkers are renown for the provincial style of blindness that allows one to look around a rat infested city covered in grime, garbage, and now desolation, and uncritically call everything in New York “the best,” I write this praise of the once great New York Times as a Midwesterner who was once an avid reader of the Sunday pages of this once excellent publication, and recognize what a loss it is for American society that it has descended so far into the abyss.

Please Forgive The Delay, But The Egregious Nature Of This Piece Still Deserves Addressing 

I’ve been working on my next book (Face Masks Hurt Kids is due for release soon) since August, which means I have failed to comment on some of the more egregious topics of the face mask debate since that time. The New York Times opinion piece “Actually, Wearing a Mask Can Help Your Child Learn,” by Judith Danovitch would be one of them. Danovitch’s piece was published in mid-August 2021 as courageous parents near and far were increasingly standing up for their children at school board meetings in droves. The article deserves far more criticism than it has, to date, received.

Greater than 50% of the 757-word article belittles the wise and natural concerns of parents that masks are harmful and perhaps even dangerous for their children. That is unfortunate, for we already live in an era that seeks to be so discouraging of good parental behavior that additional discouragement is unheeded and redundant. A good aspect of the article is that Danovitch speaks a great deal of truth in the article, she just twists it in such an unethical and manipulative way that it is very difficult to recognize that truth. In the next few minutes, I am going to try to twist her words back into shape here so that the truth is clearer, and it is easier to read between the lines.

To give you a sense of who the writer is, let us begin by pointing to the ethics of a mother who eagerly plays mad scientist with her child.

This Biography From A Professional May Shock You 

In what I will admit is an ad hominem intended to illustrate this writer’s poor ethics around boundaries, Dr. Danovitch considers her child to be “her favorite research subject,” as stated in her biography below.

“Judith Danovitch, Ph.D. grew up in New York speaking English, Spanish, and Hebrew. After earning degrees from Harvard and Yale, she became a psychology professor. She teaches child development courses and studies how children think and learn. Her favorite research subject is her own child, who is bilingual in English and Hebrew.”

Children are awesome to observe and learn from. Children are not appropriate to do research on. When research must be conducted, it must be done with the most significant ethical considerations. Children cannot give their informed consent. Parents must. To make a parent both lead researcher and unconflicted provider of informed consent is nearly impossible. One must be placed before the other. In the case of Danovitch, as one can see from the biography, the role of researcher appears to be the role she places in first position.

See the rest here

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Biden’s Staring into the Abyss—and So Are We – LewRockwell LewRockwell.com

Posted by M. C. on December 31, 2021

Still, it is hard to believe Putin is bluffing when he says that if Ukraine is invited to become a full member of NATO, Russia will see to it that the consummation never comes to pass.

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2021/12/patrick-j-buchanan/bidens-staring-into-the-abyss-and-so-are-we/

By Patrick J. Buchanan

“‘Hope’ is the thing with feathers / That perches in the soul,” wrote Emily Dickinson. “And sore must be the storm / That could abash the little Bird / That kept so many warm.”

Staring ahead on New Year’s Eve, at what appear to be the coming storms of 2022, this once-hopeful country is going to have to fall back on its reserves.

What storms?

Suddenly, the omicron variant of the coronavirus is sweeping the nation, shutting schools, shops, restaurants and bars that were only lately reopened. In this last week of 2021, new infections twice set records.

Is a fifth wave of the pandemic arriving, just two years after the first wave hit in March 2020?

What is hopeful here?

While the numbers of infected are exploding and deaths are rising anew, the omicron variant appears to be less severe and less lethal than the delta variant — and possibly less enduring.

From the medical community one hears the hope that the omicron variant could displace the delta and, as has happened in South Africa, burn itself out.

Still, if the present rate of infections and deaths continues, we could have a virus-related million American deaths by spring.

A second storm is economic, with inflation now running at 6.8%, the highest rate since the last days of Jimmy Carter and first days of Ronald Reagan.

See the rest here

Patrick J. Buchanan is co-founder and editor of The American Conservative. He is also the author of Where the Right Went Wrong, and Churchill, Hitler, and the Unnecessary War. His latest book is Nixon’s White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever See his website.

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WATCH: Dozens of NYPD Remove Child Without Vaccine Passport from Restaurant | The Libertarian Institute

Posted by M. C. on December 30, 2021

https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/watch-dozens-of-nypd-remove-child-without-vaccine-passport-from-restaurant/

by Matt Agorist

As TFTP reported, earlier this month, New York mayor Bill de Blasio expanded the already-tyrannical “Key to NYC” program which imposed a vaccination mandate for workers and customers at indoor dining, fitness, entertainment and performance venues. Anyone who wished to enter a public place would first be required to give that place a glimpse into their personal medical records by providing proof that they had taken a covid-19 vaccination.

Beginning last week, this discriminatory and unscientific practice was expanded to include children, ages 5-11, who are now also forced to show proof of vaccination to enter public places. Now, as the video below shows, that chicken has come home to roost.

“New York City will not give a single inch in the fight against COVID-19. Vaccination is the way out of this pandemic, and these are bold, first-in-the-nation measures to encourage New Yorkers to keep themselves and their communities safe,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio. “From workplace mandates, to $100 incentives, to mobile and at-home vaccination offerings, no place in the nation has done more to end the COVID era. And if you have not taken this step yet: there’s no better day than today to stand up for your city.”

Apparently, Bill hasn’t been looking at the data and reading the headlines from across the planet showing that places even with 100% vaccination rates are experiencing massive surges in COVID-19—including New York City which currently accounts for 10% of all reported cases in the entire country—despite their construction of a covid police state.

Nevertheless, the government is carrying out the tyrannical mandate and now cops are going after children. In the video below, a little boy is traumatized as cops swarm him and his mother in a New York restaurant for trying to eat dinner without showing papers.

It wasn’t just one or two cops who responded to the scene. Over a dozen cops were dispatched to deal with an innocent little boy and his mother who dared to grab a bite to eat without publicly displaying their personal medical history.

Just two years ago, a scene like this would have shocked the world. If a mother and child were swarmed by a dozen armed agents of the state and kicked out of a restaurant for failure to make public their medical history, news agencies worldwide would have run this story.

Now, however, this is common place in the land of covid dystopia. As you watch the video below, pay attention to the woman filming. She continuously asks the cops if this is what they signed up for.

“Is this what you signed up for? Is this what justice looks like to you? Is this what you dreamed of when you wanted to be a cop?”

Obviously, these officers couldn’t care less about what actual justice looks like. They are merely “doing their jobs,” and blindly carrying out the orders handed down from the tyrant class.

If you support treating people this way for their personal medical choices, you deserve the hellish police state that will inevitably ensue. The pro-vaccine passport camp thinks they are safe right now because police are enforcing what they want.

Sadly, however, their ignorance of history leaves them oblivious to the fact that government never relinquishes power and freedoms are never returned once surrendered. It is only a matter of time before the ones who advocate such authoritarian segregation fall victim to the very policies they cheered for when it benefitted them. You’ve been warned.

What a lovely new world we are living in when you go out for a meal and a squad of police barge in, persecute a little boy then demand to see everyone else’s papers. This is the vax passport world so many are begging for. #NotAboutAVirus #NOVAXPASSPORTS pic.twitter.com/ZQFnybs4ly

— Cyn Clagar (@cynclagar) December 27, 2021

This article was originally featured at The Free Thought Project

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NDAA Includes Provisions Blocking Biden From Closing Gitmo – News From Antiwar.com

Posted by M. C. on December 30, 2021

https://news.antiwar.com/2021/12/29/ndaa-includes-provisions-blocking-biden-from-closing-gitmo/

by Dave DeCamp

The 2022 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that President Biden signed on Monday includes amendments that block him from taking steps to close the notorious prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

The bill extends amendments that were in previous NDAA’s that block the White House from using funds to transfer or release Gitmo detainees into the US or other countries. The bill also blocks the use of funds to close the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay altogether.

After signing the bill, Biden released a statement denouncing the restrictions. “Unfortunately, section 1032 of the Act continues to bar the use of funds to transfer Guantánamo Bay detainees to the custody or effective control of certain foreign countries, and section 1033 of the Act bars the use of funds to transfer Guantánamo Bay detainees into the United States unless certain conditions are met,” the statement said.

Biden said the provisions “unduly impair the ability of the executive branch to determine when and where to prosecute Guantánamo Bay detainees and where to send them upon release.” Despite his objections, Biden still signed the massive $777.7 billion NDAA that authorized about $25 billion more than he requested from Congress.

Biden has pledged to close Gitmo, but the same promise was also made by President Obama. There are currently 39 detainees in the prison, and only 11 have been formally charged with crimes. Gitmo costs about $540 million to operate each year, meaning the US government spends over $13 million for each prisoner.

In July, Biden transferred former detainee Abdul Latif Nasser to his home country of Morrocco. Nasser was held since 2002 on no charges and was cleared for release five years ago. Like other Gitmo inmates, Nasser faced torture and other abuses during his time at the US military prison.

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Refusing To Oppose US Tyranny Is Siding With It: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

Posted by M. C. on December 30, 2021

The world is burning and psychopaths are brandishing armageddon weapons in the name of global domination. If you are going to spend any of your remaining time on this planet fighting, it would probably be wise to spend it fighting for something that truly matters.

https://caitlinjohnstone.substack.com/p/refusing-to-oppose-us-tyranny-is

Caitlin Johnstone

The US and its allies are pushing the world toward nuclear armageddon. The US and its allies armed Al Qaeda in Syria. The US and its allies are carrying out a literal genocide in Yemen. The US and its allies are deliberately starving children by the thousands. Shut up about Russia and China.

Desmond Tutu said “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” This is especially true of the unjust situation in which the largest power structure on earth oppresses and tyrannizes populations around the world to force their obedience. Refusing to take a clear stance against that power structure is siding with it.

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William Van Wagenen has a new article out with The Libertarian Institute documenting the mountains of evidence that the US and its allies were supporting Al Qaeda-tied militias in Syria from the beginning of the war, in direct contradiction of the mainstream narrative that that started later. 

This is what happened in Syria, it’s what happened in Libya, and it’s what was on track to happen in Xinjiang before Beijing said “nah” and launched its crackdown. The west isn’t mad at Beijing for committing a “genocide”, it’s mad at Beijing for preventing one.

Like so many other western propaganda operations these days, this one is predominantly about China’s Belt and Road Initiative which it plans to use to help rise above US hegemony and create a multipolar world. The actual interest in Xinjiang has been about the fact that it is a key geostrategic region that the western empire would greatly benefit from balkanizing away from China so it can’t fulfill the crucial role planned for it in the BRI.Benjamin Norton @BenjaminNortonThis map says more than any article you’ll ever see in corporate media about why Western imperialist countries (that have spent decades killing Muslims) suddenly pretend to care about Uyghurs in Xinjiang, China. They want to break China up and stop its Belt and Road Initiative. July 25th 20201,087 Retweets2,278 Likes

Criticize Beijing’s crackdown in Xinjiang all you want, but it is indisputably orders of magnitude less draconian than the US “war on terror” approach which has killed millions and displaced tens of millions since 9/11.

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Yes, China’s government is more authoritarian than yours in some ways. Also, you’re being deceived by a massive, sweeping propaganda campaign about the things China’s government does and the threat it poses to you. Both of these things are true. They do not contradict each other.

❖See the rest here

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Russia Is the Last Remaining Christian Country – PaulCraigRoberts.org

Posted by M. C. on December 30, 2021

And thus under attack by the forces of Satan

https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2021/12/29/russia-is-the-last-remaining-christian-country/

Paul Craig Roberts

At his year-end press conference, Russian President Putin said that “a woman is a woman and a man is a man,” and he expressed his confidence that the religious denominations of the Russian Federation would have the moral fiber to resist the intrusion of the corrupted and degenerate values of the Western world.
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2021/12/tyler-durden/a-woman-is-a-woman-man-is-a-man-putin-vows-to-protect-russia-from-wests-gender-obscurantism/

Alas, the Western World has no such moral fiber. The West has cut itself off from its past and is tottering on the premise that it can survive by acculturating its youth to disbelieve in the West. The purpose of Western education is the deracination of Western youth and their alienation from Western culture. That is what insouciant families pay taxes and tuition for.

Every year in my Christmas column I point out that the voices that connect us to the past have been demonized and cut off, leaving us in a country without a foundation. Moreover, Hollywood, TV, media, Internet, and educational systems at every level in every state are working openly or surreptitiously to rewrite the history of Western culture as a white racist enterprise that must be overthrown. The purpose of public schools has been converted to brainwashing children into a guilt complex due to the color of their skin and to installing a sense of entitlement into the minds of BIPOC children. Parents protest but ideological anti-white school boards pay no attention.

In other words, what education does in the Western world is to deracinate the white ethnicities and elevate the immigrant-invaders.

Western education has already produced a generation or more of people who have no idea who they are. “Western Civ Has To Go” was a student chant in US universities as long ago as the 1960s. For decades few graduating classes have ever read a word of Shakespeare. Indeed, their proficiency in the English language is so poor they are incapable of reading him. The literary and artistic metaphors used to convey meaning are unknown to them. The classic literature of Western civilization in which the real challenges of life are revealed are replaced by Woke and minority whining. Essentially, the educational systems produce illiterate barbarians. The smartest ones are the dumbest of all. They are the unthinking geeks who produce the police state control devices and robotics that are inherent in the digital revolution. The purpose of the digital revolution is to remove independence, purpose, and meaning from human life. We are not even going to be permitted to drive cars. Privacy is not only a disappearing value, it is becoming a non-word, a word whose meaning is incomprehensible to all but the very old.

George Santayana said that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” It did not occur to him that soon there would be people, indeed entire countries, without a past.

European cities that survived the mass bombing of civilian cities by the British and Americans during WW II have ancient buildings, cathedrals, and narrow streets that remind people that there was a past. But not Americans. In the US everything is constantly remade. Neighborhoods are torn down and reappear as something else. I live in what was until a few years ago an old Florida community, a charming, quiet place of beauty. Today almost every house has been knocked down and the lots divided and subdivided. Everywhere massive commercial rentals have gone up that sleep 20 to 30 people despite zoning that prohibits it. A live community with a history fell victim to outside real estate speculators and developers and is now populated with holiday makers numbering 20 or more times the former population. If a person who lived here 10 years ago returned, he would not recognize the place. His house no longer exists. His neighbors’ homes no longer exist. Nothing that he remembers exists.

This happens to entire cities. I grew up in Atlanta, Georgia, but today I cannot find my way in the city. All landmarks are gone.

Now cities are removing monuments that represented memory, street names that represented memory, school names that represented memory in order to cleanse themselves of what they have been indoctrinated to believe is a racist past.

When a governor of the state of Virginia ordered the removal and destruction of a statue of Robert E. Lee, we see not only the success of critical race theory in brainwashing a weak-minded governor of Virginia, the Virginia state legislature, and the Virginia media, but also the acquiescence to the erasure of memory. Americans have become a people without a past.

All of the Western nations no longer exist. Nations are reduced to countries without borders as there is scant limit to influx by peoples of alien languages, cultures, and behaviors. All Western nations are Towers of Babel. In Europe religious life is found only among Islamist immigrant-invaders. They are building mosques (churches) everywhere. As I often ask, how long has it been since a Christian church was built in Europe or the UK.

Even the most famous Christian cathedral of Europe–Notre Dame–is being refashioned as a multicultural shrine with street art and modern art murals creating with mood lighting “emotional spaces” in place of confessional boxes and medieval integrity of the Christian cathedral. In effect, Notre Dame, and thereby Christianity, is being vandalized and adulterated, and the Pope apparently signed off on it. https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2021/11/27/notre-dame-to-become-a-woke-disneyland-under-leaked-renovation-plans/

So what is the West when the West is without nations, without Christianity, and without a past?

It is a nothing. And this is what the Russians and Chinese are beginning to see.

Every great family and every great civilization has some roots in sin and crimes. What the Western world has forgotten is that they also have roots in accomplishments, moral, artistic, cultural, economic, political. We should not forget that man is fallen. There are good and evil that contend for his soul. It was Christianity that gave the powerless a voice capable of challenging the voice of raw power. It was this voice, together with material interests, that produced accountable government, itself subject to a rule of law.

Today the rule of law is disappearing. The US Constitution is in tatters. Everyone has become a tyrannical dictator. Not only presidents, chancellors, and prime ministers, but also employers, school boards, university administrators, mayors, governors, airlines, restaurants, sports organizations, issue mandates that are violations of the Nuremberg Laws laid down by the United States at the WW II war crime tribunals. Now the government in Washington refuses to obey its own creation, finding that Big Pharma profits, control over citizens, and perhaps darker agendas are more important than the rule of law.

The “watchdog media” are silent on the transgression but are shrill in propagandizing the criminal agenda. In other words, there is no honest media to hold government accountable, so government does what it desires. This is the definition of tyranny.

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Mandatory Holidays Mean Less Freedom and Flexibility for Workers | Mises Wire

Posted by M. C. on December 30, 2021

If we really want to help workers, then, statutory holidays should be repealed. Said differently, workers should have the freedom to take their time off when they need it most.

https://mises.org/wire/mandatory-holidays-mean-less-freedom-and-flexibility-workers

Patrick Carroll

One of the things people tend to appreciate throughout the year, and especially during the Christmas season, is statutory holidays. These days off are taken for granted by many, and few people stop to think about whether they have any drawbacks. But as any good economist will tell you, everything comes with tradeoffs, and holidays are no exception. The trick, then, is to figure out where the cost lies, and who, ultimately, is paying it.

The True Cost of Statutory Holidays

At first blush, it may be tempting to assume that our employers are the ones taking the hit. After all, they are losing productive work hours from their employees. And if all else were equal, that would certainly be correct. Shareholders, ultimately, would bear the cost of this lost productivity.

In most cases, however, things are not that simple. Consider, for example, a world in which there are no statutory holidays. Let’s say there’s a worker in this world who gets twenty paid holidays per year as part of their compensation. Now, let’s say the government introduces ten new statutory holidays, so every employer is now mandated to give their employees a minimum of ten days off per year. What happens?

Clearly, the employer is not going to give their worker ten additional holidays. After all, the government didn’t say it had to be ten more than what the worker was given in the past. They just said it had to be at least ten. The most likely scenario, then, is that the employer will give their worker the ten statutory holidays and ten additional holidays, so that they break even at twenty days per year.

The reason the employer will gravitate toward the same number as before is because of market forces. Time off, like salary, is part of the “price” of labor, and as such, it is determined by supply and demand. Thus, days off tend toward an equilibrium point determined by the market, just as salaries do.

The introduction of statutory holidays can therefore be likened to the introduction of a minimum wage. To the extent that the market “rate” is already higher than the mandated minimum, the new law has no effect on the level of compensation. And since almost all employers give more days off than they are required to by law, it seems clear that market forces, not statutes, are determining the total number of holidays most workers get.

The implication, then, is that the total number of holidays will gravitate toward the market “rate” regardless of whether some of those holidays are mandated or not. Thus, more statutory holidays just means fewer regular holidays. So really, the hidden cost falls entirely on the worker.

The Value of Flexibility

“Fair enough,” you might say. “But if they still break even, what’s the big deal? Isn’t the worker just as well off in either case?” The answer here is no, because while they may get the same total number of days off, their flexibility regarding when they can take those days is significantly curtailed.

Going back to the salary analogy, we’ve already established that if a worker gets paid, say, $20 per hour, a minimum wage of $10 per hour will not make any difference to their total pay. But imagine that instead of simply mandating a minimum of $10 per hour, the government also mandated how that $10 would be spent.

Clearly, this is harmful for the worker. Whereas before they could choose how they spent their entire salary, now they can only choose how they spend part of it, and the part that they can’t control will invariably be spent on things they consider less important than what they would have spent it on themselves. The same logic applies to holidays. If there are ten statutory holidays per year, that’s ten days that can no longer be allocated by the worker.

The reason that flexibility is so important is because the value of time off largely depends on when it’s taken. Imagine your kid gets sick or there is a death in the family. Those are times when days off are more important. But if half of your holidays are fixed by legislative fiat, you lose the ability to use that time when you actually need it. You are forced to “spend” those days on time that is less valuable, which means you can’t spend them when you really need them.

Vacations are also curtailed because of statutory holidays. Since the timing of the mandatory days is rigid and spread out, it’s impossible to use that time off for longer trips that take multiple consecutive days, even though that may be preferable to a series of long weekends.

Of course, if people want to take certain special days off like Thanksgiving or Christmas, they can still choose to do that. But forcing people to take certain days off against their will only pushes them away from their optimal holiday allocation, just like forcing people to spend money on certain things pushes them away from their optimal capital allocation.

If we really want to help workers, then, statutory holidays should be repealed. Said differently, workers should have the freedom to take their time off when they need it most.

Author:

Patrick Carroll

Patrick Carroll has a degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Waterloo and is an Editorial Fellow at the Foundation for Economic Education.

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Fauci Lied and Thousands Died… RPI Year-End Update

Posted by M. C. on December 30, 2021

https://mailchi.mp/ronpaulinstitute/yearend?e=ff526b933a

Everybody is talking about this Ron Paul Liberty Report!
Liberty Report In the News: Fighting for You! Dear Friends:

As 2021 winds down to its last couple of days, I am writing to toot our horn a bit. You see, the Ron Paul Liberty Report has spent this year – and the previous year – in the trenches fighting what can only be described as the greatest assault on Americans’ civil liberties since slavery.

All of a sudden we saw that our house of liberty was built on sand – that the elites made billions with their boots on our necks while the rest of us suffered. Never again!

You have probably received many solicitations for end-of-year support from organizations that put their finger to the wind to see when it’s safe to come out in favor of liberty and freedom. As you know, Ron Paul has never played that game. Please make your year-end, tax-deductible donation
to the Ron Paul Institute!
From the very first moment they started ramping up an authoritarian response to a virus, Ron Paul was calling their bluff. He published “The Coronavirus Hoax” on the Ron Paul Institute website in March, 2020, just as President Trump was following his malevolent covid advisors toward lockdowns and tyranny.

It certainly was not the “cautious” thing to say – and we received some nasty notes from a few supporters – but Ron Paul always speaks the truth regardless of whether it is popular at the time.

In this prescient March 2020 article he wrote: Governments love crises because when the people are fearful they are more willing to give up freedoms for promises that the government will take care of them. Did he call this whole thing or what? Governments use “crises” to frighten the people into submitting their liberties to the “authorities” in exchange for protections that governments never deliver. And how well did the government protect us from illness and death from this coronavirus? About as well as it protected us against a terror attack on 9/11. Help RPI Continue to Grow! Senator Rand Paul said it best as a guest on a recent episode of the Ron Paul Institute’s Ron Paul Liberty Report: I would venture to say that thousands of people die in our country every month now because [Fauci] has deemphasized the idea that there are therapeutics. The mainstream media is doing a great job amplifying Sen. Paul’s Liberty Report statements – of course with the intention of ridiculing the Senator.

But we’re past that. Their game is up.

We’ve travelled down this road together these past two years. Dr. Paul and I scouring the media every morning to try and bring the latest bit of truth to our growing viewership. As the mainstream media loses viewers by the millions, the Ron Paul Liberty Report GAINS viewers by the millions!

Our influence is growing thanks to your generous support. But we cannot continue to produce a top-quality news and analysis program every day without you. Behind the camera there are so many expenses that we must meet if we are to continue.

And we are not just the Ron Paul Liberty Report! This year the Ron Paul Institute held two sold-out conferences, in Houston and Washington, DC, including speakers like Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Rep. Thomas Massie! We also held our second Ron Paul Scholars Seminar – a foreign policy boot camp for a terrific group of upper division undergrads and grad students! And don’t forget the thousand-plus articles we publish each year!

Without the Ron Paul Institute and the Liberty Report who would be left to tell the unvarnished truth? 

Time is running out to get all the tax credit for your donation to the Ron Paul Institute –  501(c)3 Charity – for 2021! Please act NOW before midnight on December 31st to keep the Ron Paul Institute and Liberty Report alive and growing in 2022.

The bad guys are not giving in. They are not giving up. We can stop them in 2022…but we need your help!

Please take a moment and make a stand for peace and liberty NOW!

Hope to see all of you at a future Ron Paul Institute event in 2022!
Sincerely yours,

Daniel McAdams
Executive Director
Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity

Be seeing you

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Oh No! Biden Checks His To-Do List And Realizes He Totally Forgot To Shut Down The Virus

Posted by M. C. on December 30, 2021

WASHINGTON, D.C.—According to sources, Biden is just kicking himself after looking at his to-do list for 2021 and realizing he forgot to shut down the virus. 

“Ah, dadgummit!” Biden exclaimed to a nearby potted plant while slapping his forehead. “I knew I was forgetting something! That’s too bad because it was otherwise a flawless year for me!” 

Health experts say COVID deaths surged all through 2021 and cases are currently skyrocketing because Biden misplaced his small spiral-bound notebook where he keeps track of all the items on his to-do list. “We all forget—It happens to the best of us,” said Dr. Fauci. “I’m sure he’ll put this item at the top of his list for next year.”

White House insiders say that instead Biden decided there is no federal government solution to the virus and happily crossed the item off his list in time for the new year. 


RED ALERT: this is not a joke. Elon Musk sat down with Babylon Bee CEO Seth Dillon, EIC Kyle Mann, and Creative Director Ethan Nicolle for an in-depth interview on wokeness, Elizabeth Warren, the Metaverse, and how the left is killing comedy.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/jvGnw1sHh9M

Bee seeing you

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