Jonathan V. Last's Blog, page 54

Contra Froma Harrop

In the course of talking about how great our low-fertility future is, Froma Harrop argues:

Scaremongering over demographics is a divide-and-conquer strategy: Convince younger workers that they are paying for plush programs sure to collapse by the time they get old, and they’ll bring them down. And as a double-scoop, say that these programs make the “demographic winter” worse by having government replace the children who traditionally supported their elders. For example:

“The most insidious effect of the Social Security and Medicare regimes is that they actually shift economic incentives away from having children,” Jonathan V. Last, a writer for the conservative Weekly Standard, says in his book, “What to Expect When No One’s Expecting: America’s Coming Demographic Disaster.”

Here’s a counter-argument: These programs reassure parents bearing the considerable expense of raising children that they won’t be destitute if they can’t save enough for their old age.

In general, I find that arguing opinions over these sorts of matters isn’t particularly productive–people usually wind up suggesting that their preferred policies will produce the best outcomes. Funnily enough. That’s why What to Expect is heavily data-driven, and relies almost entirely on research. (For example, I wish that abortion was illegal–and I think there are compelling moral and philosophical reasons to ban it. But the data suggests that abortion does not today play a significant role in depressing fertility rates in the United States.)

Anyway, the reason I suggest in What to Expect that Social Security may be crowding out incentives for having kids is that there are two recent studies that have looked at the question closely and tried to isolate the effects. Both teams came to the conclusion that Social Security depresses the American fertility rate by about 0.5 children. (You can read them here and here.) These studies are, of course, referenced in the notes. If Harrop had read What to Expect a little more closely, she would have seen them.

Mind you, this isn’t to say that these two studies are the final word on the subject. I’d go further and suggest that we shouldn’t delude ourselves about the power of social science to provide definitive answers to such big, complicated questions. As I say in the book, the limits of social science are even nearer than we think.

All of that said, however, it strikes me that starting the discussion from a base of data is probably more fruitful than beginning with your ideological preferences and just riffing from there. I like Policy A, therefore Policy A must create better outcomes.

I don’t mean to cast aspersions on Harrop here. Maybe she’s made intensive study of entitlement policy and the fertility rate and is basing her counter-argument on research. And certainly, like in the case of abortion, there are moral cases to be made for Social Security and the entitlement state–it may be that such programs are worth having despite whatever costs they incur in terms of fertility. That’s certainly a defensible position; one that I probably agree with, actually.

But in that case, it would be more helpful for Harrop to simply make that moral case without trying to delude people into believing that the good she is selling comes for free (in terms of fertility). Whatever your preferences on entitlements are, the evidence suggests that it does not.

“Most Hated College Player of All-Time”

For whatever it’s worth, is Christian Laettner, Danny Ainge, Marcus Camby, and Tyler Hansbrough.

With Laettner over Hansbrough in the finals.

Anyone who doesn’t have Laettner as the eventual champ has a dark, dark soul.

The Pope, God, and the Decline of the West

The reason I missed the Veronica Mars stuff yesterday was, obviously, the election of Jorge Mario Bergoglio as Pope Francis. I don’t have any especially keen observations or thoughts about Francis–for that you should be following George Weigel.

But I do have a thought about part of the world Pope Francis is inheriting, and that is this: You cannot understand the real philosophical problems of the West–which have been mounting for 40 years–without reading Mary Eberstadt’s new book How the West Really Lost God.

Mary Eberstadt is one of the brightest minds in Washington. (By happy coincidence, she’s also one of the nicest people in D.C.) She’s been writing great stuff for as long as I’ve been in journalism, but this book is pretty clearly her masterwork. I got the galleys a couple weeks ago and what it does is basically take the demographic data and do really smart metaphysics with it. This is a many-splendored book, but the general thesis is that the decline of the family and the decline of religion aren’t just linked–the former is actually powering the latter.

You can read the introduction online now, but I’d highly recommend ordering a copy now. This is one of those seminal books which should change the entire discussion of demographics, religion, and the decline of the West.

Veronica Mars: The Movie, Is Happening

I was going to post on the Veronica Mars Kickstarter campaign yesterday afternoon, but then all that other stuff happened. And this morning the campaign already blew through its goal. So the movie is happening.

I’m a pretty big Ronnie Mars fan. (Big enough that this is on the wall in my office, surrounded by my other bits of geekery.)

So a Veronica Mars movie was the second best bit of news from yesterday.

Paul Bearer, RIP

I missed the passing of Paul Bearer last week, Bill Moody was one of the great gimmick managers of my day. In discussing the loss on his morning show, the Czabe asked where Paul Bearer ranks in the annals of wrestling valets/managers. My guess is that he’s solidly second tier. Not quite in the first rank, with Bobby Heenan, Freddie Blassie, and Jim Cornette. But in the class just behind them.

Trailer City

Joss Whedon’s Much Ado About Nothing has a trailer and it looks, well, kind of awesome. Maybe the best weekend film project ever made?

 

 

Now, if only some people could get over their hangups about modern-setting Shakespeare. Ahem.

Dept. of Too Easy

BBC headline asks: “When will we learn to trust robots?”

Obvious answer: The day before they rebel and take over the world.

A Publisher’s Weekly Contest

Most of the negative reviews What to Expect has gotten so far have come from people who pretty clearly haven’t read the book. But Publisher’s Weekly has the most critical review to date–and the reviewer pretty clearly did read it. But for the life of me I can’t quite understand how the reviewer came away with these views:

* PW says that I use “garbled statistics” and muddle causation with correlation. (I write on page 10 that unless I say otherwise, I’m never arguing that correlation equals causation.)

* PW says that I blame abortion for America’s fertility collapse. (I say, on pages 61 and 172, that the evidence suggests that abortion does not play a significant role in fertility decline.)

* PW says that I call for “pro-creation as self-actualization, period.” (On page 63 I point out that Second Demographic Transition Theory posits procreation has become an act of self-actualization, and then I suggest that such motives will probably not be sufficient to get societies to a sustainable replacement rate.)

* PW says that I make a “borderline racist” claim in noting that the US fertility rate has been artificially bolstered by mass immigration over the last 30 years. Yup, that’s me. A big ol’ racist who says that we’re “lucky to have [immigration] as long as it lasts.” (That’s on page 116.)

I’m not angry or anything–just kind of confused. If PW didn’t like the book for whatever reason, then so be it. And at least they read it! It just seems like a weird, bizarro series of complaints.

In any case I’d love to hear theories on how PW had all of that as their take-away. There’s a signed copy of What to Expect for the best explanation.

(As judged by Galley Friend X. Employees and family not eligible for contest. Contest not valid in Hawaii. Purchase not required for entry. Rules and restrictions apply.)

“But I powered it with pollution.”

This Sim-City ad, featuring a Bro-ski version of Kenny Powers (in Adidas CEO mode) is all kinds of awesome. (Via The Transom.)

 

Best TED Talk . . . Ever?

“Peak child”? That’s awesome.

In related news, the Catholic League’s Bill Donohue has some very nice things to say about What to Expect.