Labor Economics – Page 37 – artdiamondblog.com

Leading Computability Expert Says Humans Can Do What Computers Cannot

(p. B4) What does Turing’s research tell us?
“There is some scientific basis for the view that humans are doing something that a machine isn’t doing–and that we don’t even want our machine to do,” says S. Barry Cooper, a mathematician at Leeds and the foremost scholar of Turing’s work.
The math behind this is deep, but here’s the short version: Humans seem to be able to decide the validity of statements that should stump us, were we strictly computers as Turing described them. And since all modern computers are of the sort Turing described, well, it seems that we’ve won the race against the machines before it’s even begun.
. . .
The future of technology isn’t about replacing humans with machines, says Prof. Cooper–it’s about figuring out the most productive way for the two to collaborate. In a real and inescapable way, our machines need us just as much as we need them.

For the full commentary, see:
Mims, Christopher. “KEYWORDS; Why Humans Needn’t Fear the Machines All Around Us; Turing’s Heirs Realize a Basic Truth: The Machines We Create Are Not, Indeed Cannot Be, Replacements for Humans.” The Wall Street Journal (Tues., DEC. 1, 2014): B4.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date Nov. 30, 2014, and has the title “KEYWORDS; Why We Needn’t Fear the Machines; A Basic Truth: Computers Can’t Be Replacements for Humans.”)

One of the major books by the Turing and computability expert quoted in the passages above, is:
Cooper, S. Barry. Computability Theory, Chapman Hall/CRC Mathematics Series. Boca Raton, Florida: Chapman and Hall/CRC Mathematics, 2003.

Solution to Problems of Retirement: Don’t Retire

(p. A13) Unsurprisingly, one response to the retirement challenge is: Don’t do it. Not, at least, until you really must. As Mr. Farrell argues (with plenty of supporting evidence), there is no magic element of personal doom attached to one’s 65th birthday or whatever age is believed to separate honest labor from a twilight of idleness. If you like what you do well enough, can perform your tasks competently and could use the income, why not keep working? The satisfactions of work are too often unrecognized in the popular imagination. Without it, a lot people wouldn’t know what to do.
And the longer you work, of course, the more money you will have when you eventually do retire, a strategy that works to the good of society too, since your paychecks will be contributing to FICA and will help keep the system running.

For the full review, see:
GEOFFREY NORMAN. “BOOKSHELF; Second Acts After 65; People who could be playing golf and doting on their grandchildren are starting businesses. One senior launched a coffee house in Detroit.” The Wall Street Journal (Weds., Sept. 24, 2014): A13.
(Note: the online version of the review has the date Sept. 23, 2014, and has the title “BOOKSHELF; Book Review: ‘Unretirement’ by Chris Farrell; People who could be playing golf and doting on their grandchildren are starting businesses. One senior launched a coffee house in Detroit.”)

The book under review is:
Farrell, Chris. Unretirement: How Baby Boomers Are Changing the Way We Think About Work, Community, and the Good Life. New York: Bloomsbury Press, 2014.

Inequality Much Less If You Count Government Transfers as Part of Income

Despite the gratuitous jab contained in the “fanciful assumptions” phrase, what is notable about the passages quoted below is that Porter is mainly, though grudgingly, granting Burkhauser’s main point: including government transfers reduces allegedly high inequality.

(p. B1) Washington already redistributes income from the rich to the poor. Richard Burkhauser and Philip Armour from Cornell and Jeff Larrimore from the Joint Committee on Taxation have become heroes to the right by trying to establish that government redistribution has, in fact, erased the trend of increasing inequality.

While these claims rest on fanciful assumptions about what counts as income, their analysis of taxes and government programs does support the argument that the government does more than it has in a long time to protect lower-income Americans from the blows of the market economy.
. . .
(p. B5) “Substantial changes in tax and transfer policies during the Bush and Obama administrations have increased dramatically the resources available at the middle of the distribution and at the bottom more so,” Professor Burkhauser told me.
. . .
Research by Leslie McCall of Northwestern University finds that . . . American voters remain lukewarm about government interventions to reduce income inequality, . . .

For the full commentary, see:
Eduardo Porter. “Seeking New Tools to Address a Wage Gap.” The New York Times (Weds., NOV. 5, 2014): B1 & B5.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date NOV. 4, 2014.)

The Burkhauser co-authored paper summarized above, is:
Armour, Philip, Richard V. Burkhauser, and Jeff Larrimore. “Levels and Trends in U.S. Income and Its Distribution: A Crosswalk from Market Income Towards a Comprehensive Haig-Simons Income Approach.” Southern Economic Journal 81, no. 2 (Oct. 2014): 271-93.

I believe that the research being to referred to by McCall is in her book:
McCall, Leslie. The Undeserving Rich: American Beliefs About Inequality, Opportunity, and Redistribution. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013.

French Entrepreneurs Protest Government Crushing Them with Taxes and Regulations

“Protesting business owners in Paris brandished locks and chains to signify the constraints they said the government imposed on French businesses.” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited below.

(p. B3) PARIS — They jammed the boulevards, blowing whistles, tossing firecrackers, wearing locks and chains around their necks, and shouting into megaphones: “Enough is enough!”

In France, where protest marches are a well-practiced tradition, it is usually workers who take to the streets. But in a twist on Monday, thousands of French bosses demonstrated in Paris and Toulouse, the opening act in a weeklong revolt against government regulations and taxes that they say are straitjacketing companies, discouraging hiring and choking the economy.
“We feel like we’re being taken hostage,” said Laurence Manabre, owner of a home-maintenance business that has 28 workers — but could employ many more, she said, if not for onerous government-imposed labor rules.
Ms. Manabre marched with the throng toward the Finance Ministry, brandishing a bronze lock, a symbol that hundreds of other bosses wore to signify the constraints they said the Socialist government imposed on French businesses. “Between regulations, taxes, new laws, and razor-thin margins,” she said, “we’re being crushed little by little.”
. . .
. . . there are . . . entrenched parts of the French labor code, which employers say make it a difficult, lengthy process to lay off employees, and make bosses reluctant to take on new workers, especially with permanent contracts.
“France has high unemployment,” Ms. Manabre said. “But the French labor code is incomprehensible, and it just keeps getting more complex. How can I possibly hire more people?”
. . .
Mr. Roland has 35 employees, and his son is supposed to take over the business when he retires. But now his son is thinking of leaving the country, Mr. Roland said, because “France doesn’t seem to have a future, and the conditions for entrepreneurs are difficult.”
Mr. Roland said he did not plan to hire more workers, out of concern that coming regulations would menace his already-thin profit margins.

For the full story, see:
LIZ ALDERMAN. “In Twist on French Tradition, Bosses Take to Streets in Protest.” The New York Times (Tues., DEC. 2, 2014): B3.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date DEC. 1, 2014,)

Inequality Increased by Lack of Investment Knowledge or Discipline

Source of graph: online version of the WSJ article quoted and cited below.

(p. A2) Millions of Americans inadvertently made a classic investment mistake that contributed to today’s widening economic inequality: They bought high and sold low.
. . .
. . . the data suggest some investors simply sold at the wrong moment. “Even at the worst of the recession, most people still had jobs,” said Mr. Maki. “Certainly, some of the people who got out of the equity market were doing it because of fear rather than need.”
That’s also the finding of new research from economists Bing Chen and Frank Stafford at the University of Michigan. They plumbed the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, a survey that tracks the same households over time, to evaluate the factors behind their fluctuating incomes and wealth.
Households with the highest education and strong portfolios to begin with were likely to keep buying stocks during the decline, they found. Those with less education and smaller account balances were more likely to sell during the downturn.
When the subsequent rebound happened, the already rich got even richer.
. . .
“. . . there certainly is a widening gap there in terms of the return that higher-income people are receiving in the market,” said Mr. Akabas [an economist at the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington who works on the center’s Personal Savings Initiative]. “Lower- to middle-income people aren’t privy to those gains. That’s exacerbated by the fact that many of them have taken their money out of the stock market.”

For the full commentary, see:
JOSH ZUMBRUN. “THE OUTLOOK; Market Missteps Fuel Inequality.” The Wall Street Journal (Mon., Oct. 27, 2014): A2.
(Note: ellipses, and bracketed words, added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date Oct. 26, 2014, and has the title “THE OUTLOOK; Bad Stock-Market Timing Fueled Wealth Disparity.”)

How “the Credentials Arms-Race” Now “Defines Young Adulthood”

(p. A11) . . . “Excellent Sheep” is a cri de coeur against the credentials arms-race that now defines young adulthood–and even childhood–for many Americans. But you don’t have to take his word for it: The book features interviews and correspondence with students and recent graduates of elite institutions. Beyond their glowing transcripts and the fact that they have become “accomplished adult-wranglers,” these students are anxious, depressed and searching for some deeper meaning in their lives. “For many students, rising to the absolute top means being consumed by the system. I’ve seen my peers sacrifice health, relationships, exploration, activities that can’t be quantified and are essential for developing souls and hearts, for grades and resume building,” one Stanford student told the author. A Yalie put it more succinctly: “I might be miserable, but were I not miserable, I wouldn’t be at Yale.”

For the full review, see:
EMILY ESFAHANI SMITH. “BOOKSHELF; The Credentials Arms-Race; Students sacrifice all to grades and resume building–‘I might be miserable,’ a Yalie noted, ‘but were I not miserable, I wouldn’t be at Yale.’.” The Wall Street Journal (Thurs., Aug. 21, 2014): A11.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date Aug. 20, 2014, and has the title “BOOKSHELF; Book Review: ‘Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite’ by William Deresiewicz; Students sacrifice all to grades and resume building–‘I might be miserable,’ a Yalie noted, ‘but were I not miserable, I wouldn’t be at Yale.’.”)

The book under review is:
Deresiewicz, William. Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life. New York, NY: Free Press, 2014.

U.S. Patents and Start-Ups Fall When We Exclude Tech Immigrants

(p. A19) The process of bringing skilled immigrants to the U.S. via H-1B visas and putting them on the path to eventual citizenship has been a political football for at least a decade. It has long been bad news for those immigrants trapped in this callous process. Now the U.S. economy is beginning to suffer, too.
Every year, tens of thousands of disappointed tech workers and other professionals give up while waiting for a resident visa or green card, and go home–having learned enough to start companies that compete with their former U.S. employers. The recent historic success of China’s Alibaba IPO is a reminder that a new breed of companies is being founded, and important innovation taking place, in other parts of the world. More than a quarter of all patents filed today in the U.S. bear the name of at least one foreign national residing here.
The U.S. no longer has a monopoly on great startups. In the past, the best and brightest people would come to the U.S., but now they are staying home. In Silicon Valley, according to a 2012 survey by Duke and Stanford Universities and the University of California at Berkeley, the percentage of new companies started by foreign-born entrepreneurs has begun to slide for the first time–down to 43.9% during 2006-12, from 52.4% during 1995-2005.

For the full commentary, see:
MICHAEL S. MALONE. “OPINION; The Self-Inflicted U.S. Brain Drain; Up to 1.5 million skilled workers are stuck in immigration limbo. Many give up and go home.” The Wall Street Journal (Thurs., OCT. 16, 2014): A19.
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date OCT. 15, 2014.)

The 2012 survey is discussed further in:
Wadhwa, Vivek, AnnaLee Saxenian, and F. Daniel Siciliano. “Then and Now: America’s New Immigrant Entrepreneurs, Part VII.” Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, October 2012.

An in-depth discussion of the issues raised by Malone can be found in:
Wadhwa, Vivek. The Immigrant Exodus: Why America Is Losing the Global Race to Capture Entrepreneurial Talent. pb ed. Philadelphia, PA: Wharton Digital Press, 2012.

When Pirates Were More Enlightened than Most Governments

(p. A11) While slaves were oppressed by the social order, Mr. Rediker argues, pirates on the high seas were remaking it. An estimated 2,500 buccaneers prowled the Atlantic and the Caribbean at any given time during the first half of the 18th century. The great majority were former merchant seamen, or deserters from the Royal Navy. They were aged between 14 and 50, though most were in their 20s. Married men were not welcome for fear that they might desert and compromise an entire pirate crew.
Here, Mr. Rediker suggests, egalitarianism was being practiced at sea half a century before it became a catch-cry of the French Revolution. And, he adds, there was a striking uniformity of rules and customs on all pirate vessels. At the start of each voyage, or whenever a new captain was chosen, a wide-ranging social compact would be drawn up listing rights and responsibilities. The articles would allocate authority, deal with the distribution of plunder, and set the rules of punishment to enforce discipline. Booty was usually allocated according to skills and duties–the captain might be given two shares; gunners, boatswains, mates, carpenters and medics one and a half shares; and the rest of the crew a share each. In times of battle, the crew gave the captain unquestioned authority whether fighting, chasing or being chased. What perhaps set the pirates most apart from their former colleagues in the Merchant Navy and the Royal Navy was punishment. The lash, for example, was rarely used. Fighting was not allowed on board and disputes between crew had to be settled ashore by sword or pistol. This brought an unusual degree of harmony to the pirate ship. Incorrigible trouble makers were unceremoniously dumped and left behind on deserted islands. Vengeance was also freely taken upon captives, and woe betide any ship’s captain who had tyrannized and abused his crew.

For the full review, see:
MICHAEL FATHERS. “BOOKSHELF; Motley Crew at the Helm; Egalitarianism was being acted out at sea by pirates half a century before it became a catch-cry of the French Revolution. The Wall Street Journal (Fri., Aug. 22, 2014): A11.
(Note: ellipsis in original.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date Aug. 21, 2014, and has the title “BOOKSHELF; Book Review: ‘Outlaws of the Atlantic’ by Marcus Rediker; Egalitarianism was being acted out at sea by pirates half a century before it became a catch-cry of the French Revolution.”)

Book under review:
Rediker, Marcus. Outlaws of the Atlantic: Sailors, Pirates, and Motley Crews in the Age of Sail. Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 2014.

Robotic Milkers Are Less Costly, Easier to Manage and More Humane to Cows

(p. A1) EASTON, N.Y. — Something strange is happening at farms in upstate New York. The cows are milking themselves.
Desperate for reliable labor and buoyed by soaring prices, dairy operations across the state are charging into a brave new world of udder care: robotic milkers, which feed and milk cow after cow without the help of a single farmhand.
Scores of the machines have popped up across New York’s dairy belt and in other states in recent years, changing age-old patterns of daily farm life and reinvigorating the allure of agriculture for a younger, tech-savvy — and manure-averse — generation.
. . .
The cows seem to like it, too.
Robots allow the cows to set their own hours, lining up for automated milking five or six times a day — turning the predawn and late-afternoon sessions (p. A19) around which dairy farmers long built their lives into a thing of the past.
With transponders around their necks, the cows get individualized service. Lasers scan and map their underbellies, and a computer charts each animal’s “milking speed,” a critical factor in a 24-hour-a-day operation.
. . .
The Bordens and other farmers say a major force is cutting labor costs — health insurance, room and board, overtime, and workers’ compensation insurance — particularly when immigration reform is stalled in Washington and dependable help is hard to procure.
The machines also never complain about getting up early, working late or being kicked.
“It’s tough to find people to do it well and show up on time,” said Tim Kurtz, who installed four robotic milkers last year at his farm in Berks County, Pa. “And you don’t have to worry about that with a robot.”
The Bordens say the machines allow them to do more of what they love: caring for animals.
“I’d rather be a cow manager,” Tom Borden said, “than a people manager.”

For the full story, see:
JESSE McKINLEY. “With Farm Robotics, the Cows Decide When It’s Milking Time.” The New York Times (Weds., APRIL 23, 2014): A1 & A19.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date APRIL 22, 2014.)

Affordable Care Act Reduces GDP, Employment and Labor Income

(p. A17) Whether the Affordable Care Act lives up to its name depends on how, or whether, you consider its consequences for the wider economy.
. . .
I estimate that the ACA’s long-term impact will include about 3% less weekly employment, 3% fewer aggregate work hours, 2% less GDP and 2% less labor income. These effects will be visible and obvious by 2017, if not before. The employment and hours estimates are based on the combined amount of the law’s new taxes and disincentives and on historical research on the aggregate effects of each dollar of taxation. The GDP and income estimates reflect lower amounts of labor as well as the law’s effects on the productivity of each hour of labor.
. . .
The Affordable Care Act is weakening the economy. And for the large number of families and individuals who continue to pay for their own health care, health care is now less affordable.

For the full commentary, see:
CASEY B. MULLIGAN. “OPINION; The Myth of ObamaCare’s Affordability; The law’s perverse incentives will have the nation working fewer hours, and working those hours less productively.” The Wall Street Journal (Tues., SEPTEMBER 9, 2014): A17.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date SEPTEMBER 8, 2014.)

Mulligan’s research on the effects of Obamacare is detailed in his Kindle e-book:
Mulligan, Casey B. Side Effects: The Economic Consequences of the Health Reform. Flossmoor, IL: JMJ Economics, 2014.