The Curmudgeon Speaks

Twitter is experimenting with a new feature (Android only) that would ask users to read articles before posting a link. I like the idea and I have offered a similar recommendation for Facebook. With Facebook, I would like to see a feature that requires a personal statement to accompany any post rather than just sharing or adding a meme link.

I am mostly an Apple user so I won’t be able to try the new Twitter feature, but this isn’t the way I use Twitter anyway. I tend to share a link from the source to Twitter. When you share from the source, you have the document open in the first place. The Twitter idea of a request to read is a useful reminder, but there is unlikely a way to actually verify that a posted resource has been read.

The recent jobs report brought a ray of hope. In the midst of a global pandemic, a pandemic-related economic collapse, and then the police killing of George Floyd spurring national and international righteous protests of injustice, it just appeared that employment was improving rather than decreasing. The stock market responded to the jobs report with an 800+ point improvement (DJA). Lost in the enthusiasm was the caution that the improvement failed to include the number of workers on furlough meaning they were not actually drawing an income, but that is not central to the point I want to make.

What is it we look to as variables indicating greatness? Trump seems to have focused on the stock market and now this upturn in the employment data. Even if we limit our focus to economics and not other areas nations might value are we assessing greatness appropriately. For example, employment numbers do not reflect that amount of money earned and whether this income offers a level allowing for adequate food, housing, and health care. For example, we have recently had much attention focused on a $15/hr minimum wage. Reich notes that 40% of working Americans make less than $15. Note that a 5 day, 8 hour week, for 50 weeks results in an annual income of $30,000. 

I have tried to fact check the Reich statement and find the position is fairly close to what I can find elsewhere. Slate reports that 42% make 15 or less so there is additional evidence for this position.

What about the rising stock market as an indicator of greatness? Yes, the stock market has improved since the financial crisis of 2008. However, there is an important issue of how many actually benefit from the market and hence how well the level of the market is a useful indicator of the general situation in the country.

A couple of sources for insight into stock holdings as a useful variable. It appears that a focus on the market ignores the economic plight of many Americans.

… “despite the fact that almost half of all households owned stock shares either directly or indirectly through mutual funds, trusts, or various pension accounts, the richest 10 percent of households controlled 84 percent of the total value of these stocks in 2016.” [https://www.nber.org/papers/w24085]

Gallup reports that 54% own stocks [https://news.gallup.com/poll/211052/stock-ownership-down-among-older-higher-income.aspx]

Finally, there is this reflection on what might seem a disconnect between the present statement of the market and the economy. 

Jim Cramer (Mad Money raises an issue that had occurred to me. The businesses facing the greatest hardships right now are small businesses. Many of them may be unable to survive an extended period of no or very limited income. The long-term consequences may be to shift greater advantages to larger businesses. These businesses are more likely to offer stocks and will benefit from a lower level of competition. Large businesses also use downturns to “right size” using the stress of a downturn to reduce the number of employees. 

Perhaps a useful indicator could be fashioned from a combination of annual wage and employment. What proportion of those over 21 wanting to work are presently employed at an annual income of $45,000.

Don’t ask your black friends about racism, but listen carefully when they share how their experiences differ from your own.

I admit that I might think asking my black friends about racism was a logical thing to do. I admit to doing this when much younger. I had very little, actually no, exposure to black people growing up. This changed in college and in the military. The military changed my life experiences more in this regard than going to college as the people in the military were different from me on more dimensions than the people in an Iowa University. For example, my roommate in AIT (the training for specialization that follows basic training) could not read. I had never met an adult who seemed like a person of functional intelligence who could not read. I read his letters from relatives to him. My drill Sargeant in basic training liked me and made me platoon leader. This was not my experience with other drill sergeants with one inviting me to a fight in the woods. My tendency to smile at people who challenge me in this way is not particularly adaptive, but it is a reaction I cannot seem to control.

Anyway, the Sargeant I was assigned to was fascinated with my university experiences because he wanted to go to college when he left the military. He had already been to Vietnam and was riding out his time and he knew he would now have support he could use to go to college. We talked some about his background, but not racism. Thinking back, I don’t think I thought to bring it up. Later, I became more aware of issues of the time and became more aware of the issues brought to public attention because of inequities in military service and who ended doing what in the military. I remember one particular night on guard duty of some type riding around with a black guy who played football for a small Iowa college. So, we had some commonality in being connected to Iowa at least for the college years. I did ask about his experiences and he was quite open. Now, this was many years ago (50 years or so) and so much has changed since then. I was far more naive at the time and don’t apologize for what was then understandable ignorance.

I don’t ask black friends about racism now. Somehow, I have figured out that there are some things I should know. Still, our conversations do touch on our own day to day lives and despite the commonality in our education and work, there are glimpses of a reality I do not face. I guess the insight for me here has been that the differences are not simply a matter of economic inequities. I tend to think that education and the greater opportunities as a result will solve most problems. I guess not completely.

This brings me to one concrete suggestion. There are things anyone can read or watch that increase awareness. I regularly watch technology-oriented online video content. A panelist on one of these podcasts (Baratunde Thurstone) I have listened to enough that I feel some sense of knowing him. I eventually learned that he wrote about his own experiences and more recently that he had given a TED talk on the same topic.

Baratunde is funny and this may make his reality more approachable for many. I suggest the TED talk (no cost) and then maybe the book.

P.S. – a more recent video from the tech channel with Baratunde.

Robert Reich – Saving capitalism: For the many not the few.

[My one-paragraph summary] Our nation is not engaged in a fight between democracy and socialism, it is engaged in a fight between democracy and oligarchy. There are important differences in the positions of the political parties, but both bear some responsibility for allowing the rules to be manipulated by those with the greatest wealth. Little will change until politicians shape the rules of the economy to benefit all and not the ultra-wealthy. 

I have read several critiques and the negative take on Reich is that he keeps promoting the same old arguments and lacks concrete recommendations for remedies. Not how I read his books at all. Yes, his complaints are consistent across the several books I have read. However, he is quite concrete in explaining what has to change. He explains that it is the rules of the game that are established by politicians to shape the economy and the control of politicians through pressure from the wealthy that is allowed by some of these rules. For example, rules which control political contributions and who are allowed as lobbyists. His suggestions for laws focused on the leadership of publicly held companies, worker unionization, wealth inheritance, the finance of political campaigns, monopolistic practices and related oversight, and several other areas under the control of the rule-makers are quite specific.

Solutions

• Limit inheritance
• Prevent ex-office holders from lobbying
• Get rid of large corporations as source of funding for elections (Citizens United)
• Modify board makeup of board of directors for publicly held companies so that employees of that company are included. Boards reward company execs to limit the focus to profit margin to engorge stock values limiting returns to those who do the work. 
• Limit salaries of company executives so they are not rewarded for focusing on stock buy-packs as a mechanism for raising stock values 

Since, I have already generated a post based on an earlier book, I thought I would focus this effort on some enlightening statistics. For those wanting to check my source for any given claim, I would suggest you purchase the Reich book as all claims are carefully referenced. These statistics focus on the concentration of wealth and the role of great wealth in political influence.

The total wealth of the richest .1% of American households (160,000 people) rose from less than <10% to more than 20% of the total wealth of the country since 1980. The bottom half owns 1.3% of the wealth.

Since 1980, the wealth of the richest 1% has doubled while the earnings of the bottom 90% remained roughly stagnant. CEO pay increased by 940% while worker pay increased 12%. 

So much has been made of setting the minimum wage to $15 an hour. Forty percent of American workers made less than this amount. 

Sixty % of household wealth is inherited rather than earned.

CEOs are increasingly pressured to maximize stock valuations at the expense of funds spent on employees. Pressure can be brought by hostile takeovers. In the 1970s there were 13 takeovers of companies valued at a billion or more. During the decade of the 1980s entrepreneurs attempted more than 2000 leveraged buyouts. Who benefits from the pressure to maximize stock valuations. The top 10% of citizens by wealth own 80% of the stock.

The richest .01% (about 25,000) of the population made 40% of contributions to campaigns. In 1980, this same percentage of the rich made 15% of contributions. 

In 1970, approximately 3% of politicians became lobbyists when leaving office. This figure is now about 40%.

About 6.4% of American  workers are unionized. The values for other countries are 25% United Kingdom, 26% Canada, 37% Italy, and 67% Sweden.

Educators sometimes use an instructional tactic they describe as think, pair, share. The idea is to get everyone to think about a topic, describe it to a partner, and after discussion share the combination of insights with everyone. The benefits of this approach are individual engagement and processing and eventually global awareness.

Collect, gather, share is my disease-based model of these same core elements. This is also what schools enable. Each student goes into the community and collects germs, viruses, etc and then returns to a school to share what they have collected with everyone else. Like the model for assuring everyone is involved and influenced in terms of learning it works the same way with illness. Collect and share with each other and then back to the environment outside of school.

I think we have to think very carefully about opening up schools and what the consequences will likely be. We can’t delay education indefinitely as students begin to lose what they have learned making students advancing more difficult. What students learn in school is essential and serves multiple functions in society – shared culture and values, lifelong skills (reading, writing, basic math, information location, self-guided learning, etc.) and vocational exploration. Realistically, education also involves caring for children. In many cases, this care and supervision allows parents to be employed. In some cases, this care provides things some children don’t always receive at home – nutrition, safety, supervision.

We are expecting the educational system to do a lot and I hope our expectations are not unrealistic. Schools everywhere are cutting back in personnel and resources at a time when demands for attention, supervision, and safety are increasing. All of this on top of the educational expectations. At some point doing more with less is just not realistic. Simple observation should indicate that students struggle with the expectations of personal safety. I walk though a local park daily and I see adolescents playing basketball and hanging out around the courts. Taking the requirements for safe interaction seriously simply does not work for those who believe they are impervious to risk and who are too impulsive to maintain what simply isn’t cool under peer pressure. Do we also assume that your average second-grader understands disease transmission and related safety protocols? What will they touch in the lunch room and the rest room? Will they also remain in their assigned desk and not touch other things in the room?

I don’t see a model yet for face to face instruction. What I can imagine would require a reduction in how frequently students spend time in school to allow space in classrooms, buses, and lunchrooms. Those rotating through face to face experiences would also be required to interact with educators and with each other online at other times. This might work, but it would require more educators. I would assume additional personal would be required to clean surfaces more frequently – I mean constantly in lunch rooms, classrooms, and other settings that students inhabit. This is what restaurants must do and it would seem this would be even more important with younger children. What I imagine seems impractical without additional and not fewer resources.

I started thinking about this yesterday after listening to Rand Paul’s frustration with Anthony Fauci’s go slow position on opening the economy and schools. Paul’s concerns with the lagging economy and the multiple roles face to face education play seems a simple matter of stating the obvious. What is not obvious is how the real challenges will be addressed.

I am not particularly interested in history and I don’t read many books on the history of much of anything but the history of digital technology. I am a fan of Jon Meachum and I follow what he has to say.

Meachum has generated a 5 part podcast series called Hope, through history. It is offered to bolster Americans in this time of threat. It is well worth your time as Meachum is a great storyteller and the content is embellished with sound from the people and events described.

Episode one tells the story of Franklin Roosevelt and the Great Depression. Roosevelt grew up wealthy. Meachum suggests his ability to convey compassion and his tenacity were a function of his struggle with polio and continued efforts to find a way to walk. Roosevelt was a strong leader and unlike his predecessor (Hoover), he was able to instill hope in people through his capacity for empathy.

I must say I am glad I am retired given the present situation in higher education. There seems a perfect storm of factors converging to make the future for the kind of institution I worked at quite bleak. I see this as unfortunate for the role of higher education in society and particularly the value of higher education for less affluent families. I am concerned that higher education has always been an easy target for local politicians due to the lack of understanding of the general public as to how universities work and assumptions that the short-term thinking that might work in businesses would work at state institutions of higher as well.

Higher education in North Dakota was struggling before the pandemic. Budgets had been slashed for several years because of poor economic conditions in the state. Higher education has little to do with fracking or crop commodity prices, but the contributions from the state budget are an easy target. Understand that state government can influence both the contributions from taxpayers and also influence the tuition charged to students. People were encouraged to retire early, more individuals were hired into nontenure track positions which is not the best way to attract the highest quality candidates, supported graduate student positions were cut again with consequences for the quality of candidates and reducing the opportunities to obtain grants and produce research, and administrative positions were increased in number (this seems a trend with no logical explanation). The increase in administrative positions is puzzling. Perhaps it relates to the need for more planning or more controls and oversight. Now the pandemic.

Some things most citizens wouldn’t consider.

Certain research fields are based on access to human subjects. Some might survive by trying to do “online” forms of research and questionnaires, but this limits the type of research that can be accomplished. This creates some internal challenges when evaluating faculty members and program contributions.

Graduate students trying to finish thesis and dissertations often have not been able to complete their projects. Committees might be forgiving, but if quality research is not completed publications are unlikely and job opportunities in a constricting market become even more unapproachable.

Faculty members are in the same situations in some programs. There are implications for tenure and promotion and again even if local committees are understanding publication are necessary for successful grant applications and a productive research program is necessary to attract graduate students.

The competitive gap between well endowed programs and state supported institutions with declining support will widen. Funding agencies want to be able to trust that the resources they provide will be used productively. This is not charity.  Money and successes attract money and successes and students.

Don’t be put off by the mention of multiple research issues. Research is a component of what academics do and students at all levels are involved in this research. This is the way students develop skills. Think of the connection between research and teaching as one of apprenticeship.

The uncertainty of the type of instruction institutions will be able to provide creates a dilemma for potential students. Do they wait a year to see if campus-based programs will return? What kind of revenue will be possible through online instruction? Many students at present want their money back? I see online instruction if done well as being more labor intensive. This means that the revenue generated declines relative to the resources invested. Will institutions begin to compete on price creating a downward spiral in tuition income? With common course agreements within statements guaranteeing that credits earned at any institution will transfer to any other institution, how will a survival mentality at smaller institutions affect the budgets at universities who must offset the high cost of graduate and upperclass specialized courses with revenues from entry level courses?

I was interested in income inequality before the pandemic. It made little sense that with what was supposed to be the best of times, at least as judged by the stock market, a booming economy seemed to offer little benefit to those at the bottom of the ladder and even to those in the middle. This is a basic mathematical reality that can be displayed in many different ways – charts, the proportion of the income captured by the top 400 people versus everyone else, etc. I had long understood that trickle down economics was a fiction and had I constructed a personal understanding of why things worked this way. Why this was a fascination is hard to explain, but I think it had to do with my life as an educator and the assumptions educators often make about All having opportunities if they worked hard and improved their personal capabilities. It just didn’t seem to actually work the way it was supposed to work.

The pandemic has only increased my concern. Those making the least are the same folks forced into the most dangerous work if they can find work at all. No online opportunities for those who work in packing plants and hair salons. 

My reaction to problems is to try to understand why things work the way they do as a starting point to see if anything can be changed. So, I have been reading a variety of sources looking for explanations that make sense. I have just completed Robert Reich’s Saving Capitalism: For the many not the few. While not exactly pleasure reading, the issues explained are approachable and the type of thing more folks need to consider.

I would describe Reich’s starting point as disputing the popular position that the U.S. is divided over the argument for free markets (Conservative) versus an activist government (Liberal) as an approach to the economy. Reich argues this is a convenient fiction used to distract citizens from the actual issue which is who makes the rules by which the economy operates. When it comes to the economy, politics is about the increasing influence of large corporations and wealthy individuals. Who is able to get elected as a politician or appointed as judges and what influences the decisions made by those in these positions The book is then divided into two main goals; why do large corporations and the very wealthy have increasing influence in political decision making and what political decisions have been made that increasingly advantage large corporations and the very wealthy. The interaction between these two sources explain the widening gap between the have and the have nots.

Issues involved in influence (a sample):

• Failure of campaign finance reform

• Citizen’s United decision and the increased influence of corporations versus individual citizens

• Politicians becoming lobbyists

• Cost of running for office

Political decisions influencing wealth (a sample):

• Patent and copyright durations and ease of renewel

• Monopolization of many sectors of the economy 

• Immense salaries to CEOs based on stock valuations which encourage a focus on profit margins returned to stockholders, stock buybacks, etc.

• Limited government commitment to enforcement of corporate violations of responsibilities and minimal penalties when violations are identified

• Low estate tax allowing massive fortunes to be passed on to those who did not in any way earn them.

These are examples from the two areas of emphasis. Reich’s point is that decisions made to address the second group of issues are influenced by the issues identified in the first group of issues. 

Reich argues that this system will eventually fail as capitalism requires consumption by all and as more and more of the population are limited in their ability to make more than minimal purposes the system will fall apart. 

It is Earth Day. The environmental message of this day and the significance of observing this day for 50 years has been lost because of the pandemic. However, as any of us shelter at home, I have noticed that several of my acquaintances have decided this is the year to garden. Several have posted pictures of the seedlings they are starting in their basements.

I have an interesting personal history with gardening. I grew up on a farm working the large family garden with my siblings. I was actually more interested in the chores of weeding, hoeing, and picking than my brothers and sisters because I saw myself eventually teaching biology. This led to some personal projects that resulted in little food for the family, but were still tolerated by my parents. I remember taking a corner of the garden and trying to grow bentgrass for a putting green. Starting grass is not easy because you have to control weeds and like many of my “projects” that green never reached the stage at which it was useable.

My gardening interests also have an interesting tech connection. In the late 1990s, I became interested in the educational outreach of North Dakota Game and Fish. I implemented several projects for them (clipart collection) that explored technology for what at the time was an organization with no efforts in this area. Game and Fish purchased my first server to support an effort to encourage collaboration among schools that had been funded to create OWLS (Outdoor Wildlife Learning Sites). These sites were not vegetable gardens by gardens focused on native grasses, forbs, and trees as a way to encourage student awareness and appreciation of the outdoors.

School gardens are a thing particularly as a way to acquaint city kids with the origins of the food they eat and as a focus on healthy food. While often encouraged for this purpose, even those kids who now grow up on farms probably are not familiar with the cultivation of many of the fruits and vegetables they consume.

Back to gardens. I have kept some type of garden most of my adult life. I have not started my own plants the past few years, but I decided this year with time to kill I would get back into growing rather than purchasing plants. I now grow vegetables in raised beds and I have 10 beds that surround my back yard. We are still probably three weeks away from putting much in the ground.

TED talk from Margrethe Vestager explains the efforts of the European Commission for Competition. She explains the concept of competition on the merits and how it has been applied to big tech. There are insights here for capitalists who resist the role of government oversight. Who else can assure competition on the merits?