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The Feminist Fib

Old Lies

By 

August 9, 2016

We expect to hear a lot of lies during an election year, and this year is certainly no exception. What is surprising is how old some of these lies are, and how often they have been shown to be lies, years ago or even decades ago.

One of the oldest of these lies is that women are paid less than men for doing the same work. Like many other politically successful lies, it contains just enough of the truth to fool the gullible.

Women as a group do get paid less than men as a group. But not for doing the same work. Women average fewer annual hours of work than men. They work continuously for fewer years than men, since only women get pregnant, and most women are not prepared to instantly dump the baby on somebody else to raise.

Being a mother is not an incidental sideline, and being a single mother can be a major restriction on how much time can be put into a job, either in a year or over the years.

People like Hillary Clinton can simply grab a statistic about male-female income differences and run with it since her purpose is not truth but votes. The real question, however, is whether, or to what extent, those income differences are due to employers paying women and men different wages for doing the very same jobs, for the very same amount of time.

We do not need to guess about such things. Many studies have been done over many years — and they repeatedly show that women and men who work the very same hours in the very same jobs at the very same levels of skill and experience do not have the pay gaps that people like Hillary Clinton loudly denounce.

As far back as 1971, single women in their thirties who had worked continuously since high school earned slightly more than men of the same description. As far back as 1969, academic women who had never married earned more than academic men who had never married.

People who are looking for grievances are not going to be stopped by facts, especially if they are in politics. But where are our media pundits and our academic scholars? Mostly silent, either out of fear of being denounced as anti-women or because they have chosen to take sides rather than convey facts.

Nevertheless, there are enough scholars, including women economists, who have done enough honest studies over the years that there is no excuse for continuing to repeat a discredited lie, based on comparing apples and oranges. A book written by two women and titled “Women’s Figures” shows the results when you compare women and men with comparable qualifications.

It is much the same story with black-white comparisons. More than 40 years ago, my own research turned up statistics on black and white professors who had Ph.D.s from equally high-ranked institutions in the same fields, and who had published the same number of articles.

When all these things were held constant, the black professors earned somewhat more than white professors. But, since all these things are not the same among black and white professors in general, there is a racial gap in pay that allows some to loudly denounce racial discrimination among academics.

Those who wish to check out my statistics can get a copy of my 1975 monograph, “Affirmative Action Reconsidered.” It has not been updated because not all the same statistics will be released now. This is not unusual. Statistics that might undermine some other popular conclusions — whether on affirmative action, global warming or whatever — have been kept under wraps when other researchers tried to get them.

Too many people in the media and in academia abandon their roles as conduits for facts and take on the role of filterers of facts to promote social and political agendas.

In all too many educational institutions, from kindergartens to postgraduate university programs, students may never hear any facts that contradict the prevailing groupthink.

How many students taught by Keynesian economists will ever learn about the 1921 recession, when the Harding administration did nothing — and unemployment dropped steeply as the economy recovered on its own?

There are many reasons why old lies, refuted long ago, are still heard every election year, and in all too many other years.

From Lewrockwell.com, here.

The CIA’s War on Your Mind

Document Surfaces Showing CIA’s Plans to Infiltrate Academia & Change University/College Curriculums

By Arjun Walia
Collective Evolution

September 4, 2017

There’s no doubt about it: three letter agencies like the NSA, FBI and CIA and the ones we don’t yet know about are full of great people who want nothing but the best for their fellow human beings. People join these agencies because they have good hearts, and want to see the world thrive in a state of peace, equality, abundance and freedom. That being said, the “disastrous rise of misplaced power” to which President Eisenhower referred when referencing the military industrial complex, has taken a hold of these agencies, which now comprise what’s known as the Deep State. The Deep State is a covert network of powerful and influential people who continue to manipulate, lie, and deceive the public for their own interests.

Oh, by the way, it’s safe to assume that the Deep State also includes, as mentioned above, the agencies we don’t yet know about. We know this from looking at history: The National Security Agency (NSA) was founded in 1952, its existence was hidden until the mid 1960s; Another great example is the National Reconnaissance Office, which was founded in 1960 but remained completely secret for three decades.

Several presidents and politicians have also referenced this secret government, which doesn’t seem to be so secret anymore. That being said, it’s still important to reference given the fact that the average Joe still might consider the secret government to be a mere conspiracy theory. It’s a shame that anything associated with secrecy seems to garner an instant conspiracy response, especially when secrecy is rampant in our world, with “National Security” constantly being used to justify it.

Continue reading…

From Lewrockwell.com, here.

Ron Paul Against Government ‘Help’

Government ‘Aid’ Makes Disasters Worse

By 

Ron Paul Institute

September 5, 2017

Texans affected by Hurricane Harvey, including my family and me, appreciate the outpouring of support from across the country. President Donald Trump has even pledged to donate one million dollars to relief efforts. These private donations will be much more valuable than the as much as 100 billion dollars the federal government is expected to spend on relief and recovery. Federal disaster assistance hinders effective recovery efforts, while federal insurance subsidies increase the damage caused by natural disasters.

Federal disaster aid has existed since the early years of the republic. In fact, it was a payment to disaster victims that inspired Davy Crockett’s “Not Yours to Give” speech. However, the early federal role was largely limited to sending checks. The federal government did not become involved in managing disaster relief and recovery until the 20th century. America did not even have a federal agency dedicated solely to disaster relief until 1979, when President Jimmy Carter created the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) by executive order. Yet, Americans somehow managed to rebuild after natural disasters before 1979. For example, the people of Galveston, Texas successfully rebuilt the city following a major hurricane that destroyed the city in 1900.

FEMA’s well-documented inefficiencies are the inevitable result of centralizing control over something as complex as disaster recovery in a federal bureaucracy. When I served in Congress, I regularly voted against federal disaster aid for my district. After the votes, I would hear from angry constituents, many of whom would later tell me that after dealing with FEMA they agreed that Texas would be better off without federal “help.”

Following natural disasters, individuals who attempt to return to their own property — much less try to repair the damage — without government permission can be arrested and thrown in jail. Federal, state, and local officials often hinder or even stop voluntary rescue and relief efforts.

FEMA is not the only counterproductive disaster assistance program. The National Flood Insurance Program was created to provide government-backed insurance for properties that could not obtain private insurance on their own. By overruling the market’s verdict that these properties should not be insured, federal flood insurance encourages construction in flood-prone areas, thus increasing the damage caused by flooding.

Just as payroll taxes are unable to fully fund Social Security and Medicare, flood insurance premiums are unable to fund the costs of flood insurance. Federal flood insurance was almost $25 billion in the red before Hurricane Harvey. Congress will no doubt appropriate funding to pay all flood insurance claims, thus increasing the national debt. This in turn will cause the Federal Reserve to print more money to monetize that debt, thus hastening the arrival of the fiscal hurricane that will devastate the US economy. Yet, there is little talk of offsetting any of the costs of hurricane relief with spending cuts!

Congress should start phasing out the federal flood insurance program by forbidding the issuance of new flood insurance policies. It should also begin reducing federal spending on disaster assistance. Instead, costs associated with disaster recovery should be made 100-percent tax-deductible. Those who suffered the worst should be completely exempted from all federal tax liability for at least two years. Tax-free savings accounts could also help individuals save money to help them bear the costs of a natural disaster.

The outpouring of private giving and volunteer relief efforts we have witnessed over the past week shows that the American people can effectively respond to natural disasters if the government would get out of their way.

From Lewrockwell.com, here.

זכות השביתה – גזלנותא דמלכותא

“זכות השביתה” – פרה קדושה שצריך להבין את שורשיה ולחסלה

יעקב

“זכות” השביתה אינה זכות בסיסית, אלא מוצר של האידאולוגיה המרקסיסטית המרושעת, שכוחה עדיין אדיר, למרות שאפסותה ונזקיה מוכחים שוב ושוב.

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קדושת “זכות השביתה”

האידיאולוגיה השלטת מייחסת קדושה מיוחדת ל”זכות השביתה”, כזכות בסיסית של האדם (העובד). טעות חמורה. “זכות” השביתה אינה זכות בסיסית, אלא מוצר של האידאולוגיה המרקסיסטית המרושעת, שכוחה עדיין אדיר, למרות שאפסותה ונזקיה מוכחים שוב ושוב.

“זכות” השביתה מבוססת על תיאוריית ערך העבודה, תיאוריה שהוצעה על ידי אדם סמית’ במאה ה- 18, פותחה על ידי דיוויד ריקארדו במאה ה- 19 ואומצה כחלק יסודי של התיאוריות של קארל מרקס. תיאוריה זו טוענת שערכו של חפץ או מוצר נובע מכמות העבודה שהושקעה בייצורו. לא אכנס לדיון מעמיק על חולשות תיאוריית הערך, אבל היום כולם מסכימים שהיא שגויה לחלוטין. במחשבה קלה אפשר לראות עד כמה התיאוריה לחלוטין לא נכונה. הנה שתי דוגמאות פשוטות: שמלה אופנתית מסוימת נמכרת, נגיד, ב- 500 ש”ח בתחילת העונה, אבל בסוף העונה מוכרים את אותה שמלה בהנחה של 50%, כלומר ב- 250 ש”ח. כמות העבודה שהושקעה בייצור השמלה (אותה שמלה!) בוודאי לא פחתה בזמן הזה – למרות זאת, ערכה נחתך לחצי. או שני סופרים הכותבים כל אחד ספר בגודל זהה. הספר הראשון מעניין ומוצלח ונמכר במיליון עותקים ומכניס לסופר מיליונים, השני נמכר בקושי במאות עותקים ומכניס לסופר אגורות – ערכם של הספרים שונה לגמרי למרות שכמות העבודה שהושקעה בהם זהה. אין שום קשר בין ערך של מוצר לכמות העבודה שהושקעה בייצורו – או, לפחות, הקשר קלוש.

קארל מרקס טען שערכו של כל מוצר נובע רק מהעבודה שהושקעה בייצורו (תיאוריית ערך העבודה); ולכן, ערכם של מוצרי תעשייה (לדוגמה) נובע מערך חומרי הגלם (העבודה שהושקעה בחומרי הגלם) בתוספת ערך העבודה של עובדי מפעל הייצור. אבל, בעל המפעל, הקפיטליסט (בעל ההון) לא משלם לעובדיו שכר שמשקף את מלוא ערך המוצר שעבודתם יוצרת אלא הרבה פחות. ההפרש בין ערך העבודה וגובה השכר הוא הערך העודף – ממנו מרוויח ומתעשר בעל המפעל (הקפיטליסט).

לפיכך (לפי התיאוריה של מרקס) בעל המפעל (הקפיטליסט) הוא, לפי הגדרה, נצלן, רמאי ופושע, כי הוא שודד מעובדיו את שמגיע להם, ומתעשר על גבם. העובד השכיר הוא, לפי הגדרה, מנוצל, דפוק וקרבן רמאות, כי אין משלמים לו את מלוא ערך עבודתו. זהו המקור התיאורטי של חוקי העבודה.

העובד השכיר הוא בהכרח (לפי התיאוריה המרקסיסטית) מקופח, הוא מסכים לעבוד בתנאי ניצול ועושק כי הוא רעב ללחם ואין לו ברירה; הוא חלש ומסכן והמדינה חייבת להירתם ולעזור לו על חשבון הקפיטליסט ה”חזירי” והרשע. זו הסיבה שהקיבוצים סירבו בעבר הרחוק להעסיק עובדים שכירים במפעליהם – הם לא רצו להיות “מנצלים” (לפי התאוריה המרקסיסטית שהייתה התנ”ך שלהם). זו הסיבה שרבים דוגלים ב”קואופרטיבים” – סוג של מפעל שבו העובדים הם גם בעליו.

המשך לקרוא…

מאתר קו ישר, כאן.