Monday, January 21, 2013
We must show our children the ugliness of the world so that they may see it as it is and fear it not. As we hide our children from what we see as ugly in the world, we only seek to hide ourselves. We must say this is what it is and this is why. If you think this is wrong, you have to help change it. On that note, what have YOU done to help the world lately?
Global Integration
Countries like the US and (collectively) the EU must choose between greater global integration or segregation. In the US, this debate is manifest in the dispute surrounding the border with Mexico.
As the US has prospered over the past few decades, moving poor folks out of the fields and into the cities, agricultural (as well as many service jobs such as restaurant cooks) have become available to foreign labor. The workers have typically been immigrants from Latin America, who travel from or through Mexico, cross the southern border of the US and take up residency or employment somewhere in the states. They sometimes have permission to work and sometimes not. They sometimes have permission to stay, but sometimes not.
Overall, however, the influx of Latin labor to the US is a positive thing...when the economy is booming. Cheap labor flows in to prevent backlogs in production or harvesting. US producers can maintain inexpensive production of goods. The American workforce has stepped into higher paying jobs. And wealth flows from a surplus country to many with deficits. Reward is reaped by everyone, with the most stress going to those individuals who leave their countries to come to the US to do backbreaking work so they can send money home to their families.
The real problem, of course, comes when the economy slows, and we are unable to shift labor down into the agricultural or service jobs occupied by foreign labor. A variety of factors contribute to this inadequacy. First, people who have grown comfortable with a particular quality of life have a very difficult time, socially and financially, transitioning to work that is more physically demanding and pays less. Second, businesses have an incentive to maintain employment of experienced foreign labor rather than transition to inexperienced domestic labor. They know domestic labor will not generally be satisfied with the demands and compensation of the job. A training investment in these individuals would yield little return as they would seek different employment (i.e. office job) as soon as possible (when the economy improves). Next, foreign workers who have overstayed their visa and are now "illegal immigrants" have an incentive to maintain employment and avoid crossing the border again. This last part gets a bit fuzzy as I am not super familiar with immigration laws and foreign worker permits and statistics on the incentives of people crossing the border illegally.
Suffice it to say that we already have a modest system where labor moves around the globe, in some places more than others. The question remains, do we seek further integration of that system, or further isolation of individual countries. I feel there can be no doubt that we must favor further integration. A global community. We can do this only if we transition from a nationalist sentiment to a global consciousness. We must begin the tremendously burdensome step of global planning and integration now. Because it will take decades to work out. Who will do what, where, and how. Why we will do things. We have six billion examples of how people are fundamentally the same. Everyone must have a part in the world. A purpose. And everyone must feel loved.
As the US has prospered over the past few decades, moving poor folks out of the fields and into the cities, agricultural (as well as many service jobs such as restaurant cooks) have become available to foreign labor. The workers have typically been immigrants from Latin America, who travel from or through Mexico, cross the southern border of the US and take up residency or employment somewhere in the states. They sometimes have permission to work and sometimes not. They sometimes have permission to stay, but sometimes not.
Overall, however, the influx of Latin labor to the US is a positive thing...when the economy is booming. Cheap labor flows in to prevent backlogs in production or harvesting. US producers can maintain inexpensive production of goods. The American workforce has stepped into higher paying jobs. And wealth flows from a surplus country to many with deficits. Reward is reaped by everyone, with the most stress going to those individuals who leave their countries to come to the US to do backbreaking work so they can send money home to their families.
The real problem, of course, comes when the economy slows, and we are unable to shift labor down into the agricultural or service jobs occupied by foreign labor. A variety of factors contribute to this inadequacy. First, people who have grown comfortable with a particular quality of life have a very difficult time, socially and financially, transitioning to work that is more physically demanding and pays less. Second, businesses have an incentive to maintain employment of experienced foreign labor rather than transition to inexperienced domestic labor. They know domestic labor will not generally be satisfied with the demands and compensation of the job. A training investment in these individuals would yield little return as they would seek different employment (i.e. office job) as soon as possible (when the economy improves). Next, foreign workers who have overstayed their visa and are now "illegal immigrants" have an incentive to maintain employment and avoid crossing the border again. This last part gets a bit fuzzy as I am not super familiar with immigration laws and foreign worker permits and statistics on the incentives of people crossing the border illegally.
Suffice it to say that we already have a modest system where labor moves around the globe, in some places more than others. The question remains, do we seek further integration of that system, or further isolation of individual countries. I feel there can be no doubt that we must favor further integration. A global community. We can do this only if we transition from a nationalist sentiment to a global consciousness. We must begin the tremendously burdensome step of global planning and integration now. Because it will take decades to work out. Who will do what, where, and how. Why we will do things. We have six billion examples of how people are fundamentally the same. Everyone must have a part in the world. A purpose. And everyone must feel loved.
Sunday, October 28, 2012
Looking forward
Living in a better world means considering our planet as a global community. We are becoming increasingly dependent on people on the other side of the planet. Concurrently, our ability to communicate world-wide has reached a degree unprecedented in history. We can video chat with our friends around the globe in real time. Email is received instantly. And in small villages, where there may not be running water, there are cell phones.
Human knowledge has allowed us to invade most of the world in search of resources. While we have not yet exploited all of the worlds natural resources, we are coming to a point where we no longer need to focus on expansion in terms of the geographical area that we, as people, occupy, but on expanding the ingenuity which will allow us to make better use of the resources we are aware of, and find more resources beneath our feet. As a global community, and with this in mind, we must look at population growth, which is no longer a tool to allow us to invade regions rich with fresh resources, but as a burden. "More with less" should be the motto, instead of "more with more."
To develop a population of sustainable size, we must look to education. Educating the masses will allow people to make smart decisions about raising families. It will increase ingenuity in developing countries, allowing them to responsibly develop their natural resources.
Educating women may be one of the most effective means of population control. First, educating women about their bodies will help prevent unwanted pregnancy. This issue gets bigger when we thing about many religious values (particularly the Catholic Church doctrine of "wasted seed.") Most importantly, educating women will allow them to pursue careers of their own, lending invaluably to increased economic ingenuity, but also to the desire for a more manageable family size.
Human knowledge has allowed us to invade most of the world in search of resources. While we have not yet exploited all of the worlds natural resources, we are coming to a point where we no longer need to focus on expansion in terms of the geographical area that we, as people, occupy, but on expanding the ingenuity which will allow us to make better use of the resources we are aware of, and find more resources beneath our feet. As a global community, and with this in mind, we must look at population growth, which is no longer a tool to allow us to invade regions rich with fresh resources, but as a burden. "More with less" should be the motto, instead of "more with more."
To develop a population of sustainable size, we must look to education. Educating the masses will allow people to make smart decisions about raising families. It will increase ingenuity in developing countries, allowing them to responsibly develop their natural resources.
Educating women may be one of the most effective means of population control. First, educating women about their bodies will help prevent unwanted pregnancy. This issue gets bigger when we thing about many religious values (particularly the Catholic Church doctrine of "wasted seed.") Most importantly, educating women will allow them to pursue careers of their own, lending invaluably to increased economic ingenuity, but also to the desire for a more manageable family size.
Saturday, October 13, 2012
HS education
Looking back on my high school education, I remember that it was mandatory to take a government class your senior year. That class taught me about the structure of the government, mostly the basics, and some of the fundamental laws of the country. That was it.
Were were the classes that teach you how to get involved in the political process? Where are the classes that teach you what the laws are in your town/state/country so you know how to stay out of trouble? I would rather sacrifice some of the other courses we have in school and teach our future minds some of the basics on how to get along. We do this with sex/drug education, but not with a lot of the other basics.
We train our young people in math and science, literature and art, but not in the basics of starting a business, how to do your taxes, managing personal finance, how to invest money in the stock market or your own business. If we want to unleash the growth of our economy, we need to empower each person to develop their ideas. If people feel overwhelmed by the basics of the system, because nobody taught them, then they will have to spend their time figuring out those things instead of developing their ideas.
Knowledge has been and will only more so continue to be the determinant in economic prosperity.
But it has to be the right knowledge. A college graduate with a fine education in science and literature may not be as economically profitable as a post high school grad with a few years of real-world experience, simply because he does not have the context, the knowledge of the system, in which to apply his knowledge and come up with ideas. I am not saying that everybody needs to be an entrepreneur, only that every individual is a more effective part of the machine if they understand their place in that machine.
If every individual has a better understanding of how the system works, because many aspects of it are becoming more and more standardized, than they can make the personal decision about where they fit in that system. As the last mandated education, high school students should be exposed to a barrage of real world information AND they should have access to that information for reference after they graduate.
Were were the classes that teach you how to get involved in the political process? Where are the classes that teach you what the laws are in your town/state/country so you know how to stay out of trouble? I would rather sacrifice some of the other courses we have in school and teach our future minds some of the basics on how to get along. We do this with sex/drug education, but not with a lot of the other basics.
We train our young people in math and science, literature and art, but not in the basics of starting a business, how to do your taxes, managing personal finance, how to invest money in the stock market or your own business. If we want to unleash the growth of our economy, we need to empower each person to develop their ideas. If people feel overwhelmed by the basics of the system, because nobody taught them, then they will have to spend their time figuring out those things instead of developing their ideas.
Knowledge has been and will only more so continue to be the determinant in economic prosperity.
But it has to be the right knowledge. A college graduate with a fine education in science and literature may not be as economically profitable as a post high school grad with a few years of real-world experience, simply because he does not have the context, the knowledge of the system, in which to apply his knowledge and come up with ideas. I am not saying that everybody needs to be an entrepreneur, only that every individual is a more effective part of the machine if they understand their place in that machine.
If every individual has a better understanding of how the system works, because many aspects of it are becoming more and more standardized, than they can make the personal decision about where they fit in that system. As the last mandated education, high school students should be exposed to a barrage of real world information AND they should have access to that information for reference after they graduate.
Intro
I am a first year medical student who needs to be focusing more on my studies, but can't help but have his mind invaded by thoughts on how we might improve things, solve problems, and create a better world. I am looking forward to having a forum to post some of my ideas so I can get them out of my head, making room for the all the science I should be packing in.
I think the best ideas are those that have been criticized, scrutinized, and tried. We all have great ideas every day, but usually don't know enough information or have the perspective to make them practical. I will try and be selective and thoughtful with all my posts, but I have never made or read a blog, so this is truly a rough draft. Cheers!
I think the best ideas are those that have been criticized, scrutinized, and tried. We all have great ideas every day, but usually don't know enough information or have the perspective to make them practical. I will try and be selective and thoughtful with all my posts, but I have never made or read a blog, so this is truly a rough draft. Cheers!
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