Statehood for the District of Columbia

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It is unacceptable that the 712,000 people who live in DC should have no representation in Congress.

In South Dakota ( population 892,000) the idea of DC being made a State of the Union was recently rejected because, I quote, it is “incredibly smaller than any other state in geography. The major economic activity is government” and “DC’s economy lacks basic human economic activities”.  ( Excuse me!)

The country is, as usual, split according to dominant party, the Democrat states being supportive of statehood for DC.  (Well, of course, you might think).  It looks as if legislation will pass the House in favour of statehood, but it needs 60 votes instead of 51 to pass because of the filibuster and is therefore probably dead on arrival.

This situation occurs in a country that has for decades thrust its democratic ideals ecstatically and sometimes brashly, in front of the world at large, yet disenfranchises 712,000 people in DC.  Historically it has been one party that has made the most noise about the joys of democracy, but which disenfranchises those who don’t vote for it whenever it can.

When the mob stormed and trashed the Capitol recently it was the District’s police and first responders who defended the building and a voting system in which they have no say.  And by the way, the majority of the DC population is Black and Brown: disenfranchised.

My comment:  What can possibly be the relevance of size of territory to the issue of individual votes?  What a pathetic argument!   The US is either a democracy-for-everyone or it is not –  acreage is irrelevant (or a bad joke). This is all part of a constant effort to take away the votes of people who do not vote a “certain way”.  It is happening at this very moment all over the country and should be reversed.   One man , one vote!  One woman, one vote!

Yes, I have strayed into party politics.  Mea culpa. But  this is about justice and fear of autocratic government, the very antithesis of Epicureanism.  There should be no argument about the right of every man and woman of voting age having the right to vote, and as easily and conveniently as possible.  Ban gerrymandering!   (Inspired by an article  of 2/28/21 in the Washington Post).

 

 

A decent minimum wage

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The Vice Chair of the Patriotic Millionaire,Stephen Price, has a message for lawmakers “Stop giving me all these handouts. Instead, my neighbors need that money.” 

A national 15 dollar minimum wage is the right thing to do for workers and businesses, and the Biden administration’s push to pass it right now is a welcome and necessary move. In this piece, Price

breaks down the need to raise the wage in his home state of Georgia: nearly half of all Georgians currently make less than $15 an hour, with people of color making up a large share of those workers, and 78% of workers support a higher wage. Clearly, the time has come for Democrats to seize control and pass a 15 dollar wage.   (The Patriotic Millionaire. 28 Jan 2021)

My comment:  ”If you look after your staff they will look after you”.   This was the advice given me by a very experienced person who had been on the boards of several companies.  People in general will respond well if they know you are doing your best, make it pleasant to work in your company, keep them informed of how the company is doing, and don’t cheese-pare on wages.  There are not many happy workers earning 7 or 8 dollars an hour these days.

 

Here is something termed a “moral test”. How to look at it.

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As of 18 February 130 countries had not received a single coronavirus vaccine dose.

The UN has criticised the “wildly uneven and unfair” distribution of Covid vaccines, revealing that 10 countries with the money to buy them have administered 75% of all vaccinations, while 130 countries have not received a single dose.

The UN secretary general, António Guterres, called for an urgent global vaccination plan to ensure more equitable distribution, saying: “At this critical moment, vaccine equity is the biggest moral test before the global community”.  (The Guardian 18 Feb 2021).

My comment:  I would be a total hypocrite if I uttered a bleeding heart comment on this, claiming that I supported sharing the available vaccines around the world according to percentage of needy people per nation.  I am very lucky, along with my wife, to have had our two vaccinations.  But I shall not quickly forget my own acute anxiety about vaccination (or lack of it) because of the chaotic and ill-thought-out system of our local government.  I was nervous about it for weeks. Self-interest took over.  Was that wicked?  My answer is – it is human.

Is it more moral to ship all available vaccines to, say, Africa, leaving our own population to take its chances?  Mmmmmmh.  What I do know is that America,  Britain and other “advanced” countries have developed the science, technical  education and production techniques to be able to create this miracle, and the fact is that there would be no vaccines without  our dollars and pounds  and our scientific expertise.

On this matter I don’t feel it necessary to beat my fellow citizens up at all.  Once the vulnerable populations are fully protected and production is fully ramped up, then we should ship vaccines all over the world to whoever needs them.  Use my tax dollars to subsidize this or send the stuff free, by all means.  But I think the UN secretary general is being unfair, or at least unrealistic.

 

Reassuring news, sort of.

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More than 100 prominent evangelical Christian pastors and church leaders have condemned the “perversion” of Christian nationalism and its role in the insurrection at the Capitol on 6 January.

In an open letter, the leaders said they were speaking out because they did not want to be “quiet accomplices in this ongoing sin”, and called on all members of the church to make it clear that Christianity was not compatible with “calls to violence, support of white Christian nationalism, conspiracy theories, and all religious and racial prejudice”. (The Guardian. 2/25/2021)

My comment:  Nice to see an evangelical church opposing so- called “christian” nationalism.  However today’s edition of the Washington Post carries a report on the Godspeak Calvary Chapel, north of Los Angeles, where the pastor, RobMcCoy dismisses covid 19 as an “ overblown sham” and rails against pandemic restrictions and what he considers the  “trampling of  religious liberties”.  Attendance has tripled to about a thousand every Sunday, packed in with no one wearing masks and mostly rejecting vaccination as well.

Followers of Epicurus believe in the manifold benefits of science.  Even more so, they believe that vaccination denial and refusing to abide by common sense rules against spreading the virus are selfish, imperiling others. If you want to die a horrible death so be it, but don’t kill or endanger other human beings in the process.  The rules are essential both for health and peace of mind.

 

Universal basic income

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The world’s most robust study of universal basic income has concluded that it boosts recipients’ mental and financial well-being, as well as modestly improving employment.

Finland ran a two-year universal basic income study in 2017 and 2018, during which the government gave 2000 unemployed people aged between 25 and 58 monthly payments with no strings attached.  The payments of €560 per month weren’t means tested and were unconditional, so they weren’t reduced if an individual got a job or later had a pay rise. The study was nationwide and selected recipients weren’t able to opt out, because the test was written into legislation.

The study compared the employment and well-being of basic income recipients against a control group of 173,000 people who were on unemployment benefits.

Between November 2017 and October 2018, people on basic income worked an average of 78 days, which was six days more than those on unemployment benefits. There was a greater increase in employment for people in families with children as well as those whose first language wasn’t Finnish or Swedish – but the researchers aren’t yet sure why.

When surveyed, people who received universal basic income instead of regular unemployment benefits reported better financial well-being, mental health and cognitive functioning, as well as higher levels of confidence in the future.  When asked whether basic income could help people dealing with situations such as the economic fallout of the covid 19 pandemic, Ylikännö said that it could help alleviate stress at an uncertain time.

“I think it would bring people security in very insecure situations when they don’t know whether they’re going to have an income,” she said.

The findings suggest that basic income doesn’t seem to provide a disincentive for people to work.  However, the effect of basic income was complicated by legislation known as the “activation model”, which the Finnish government introduced at the beginning of 2018. It made the conditions for accessing unemployment benefits stricter.

The timing made it difficult to separate the effects of the basic income experiment from the policy change, said Ylikännö. “We can only say that the employment effect that we observed was as a joint result of the experiment and activation model,” she said.  Preliminary findings from February last year  had previously found no difference between the two groups for the number of days worked in 2017.

“Money matters, but alone it’s not sufficient to significantly promote either labour supply or demand,” said Ylikännö.

Read more: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2242937-universal-basic-income-seems-to-improve-employment-and-well-being/#ixzz6iFQChI4B   ( New Scientist)

My comment:  If you tried to introduce this in the US or U.K. there would be uproar from the traditionalists.  Money for nothing?  Discourages work, they would say.  But it’s an interesting idea, which would help the struggling poor, the single parent and others, and would foster both social cohesion – and happiness.  We need more happiness and less worry!