Map of life expectancy at birth from Global Education Project.

Sunday, March 17, 2024

Sunday Sermonette: Moar Anachronism

Psalms 79 and 80 are attributed to Asaph. As you will recall, Asaph was purportedly one of David's chief musicians, but the setting of these psalms is evidently the fall of Judah to Babylon, so that makes no sense. These must have been written during the exile, after Nebuchadnezzar sacked Jerusalem and kidnapped the elites. It's also possible, though less likely, that the setting is the sack of Jerusalem by the Egyptian Pharaoh Shishak in the 10th Century BCE, in the reign of Rehoboam, but Asaph, if he ever existed, would certainly have been long dead by then. In general, most of the psalms seem to be responses to events in either the communal history, or the biography of an individual writer, which are unspecified.

 

"According to Lilies" in the introductory note to Psalm 80 probably refers to the name of the tune.

A Psalm of Asaph.

79 O God, the heathen have come into thy inheritance;
    they have defiled thy holy temple;
    they have laid Jerusalem in ruins.
They have given the bodies of thy servants
    to the birds of the air for food,
    the flesh of thy saints to the beasts of the earth.
They have poured out their blood like water
    round about Jerusalem,
    and there was none to bury them.
We have become a taunt to our neighbors,
    mocked and derided by those round about us.

How long, O Lord? Wilt thou be angry for ever?
    Will thy jealous wrath burn like fire?
Pour out thy anger on the nations
    that do not know thee,
and on the kingdoms
    that do not call on thy name!
For they have devoured Jacob,
    and laid waste his habitation.

Do not remember against us the iniquities of our forefathers;
    let thy compassion come speedily to meet us,
    for we are brought very low.
Help us, O God of our salvation,
    for the glory of thy name;
deliver us, and forgive our sins,
    for thy name’s sake!
10 Why should the nations say,
    “Where is their God?”
Let the avenging of the outpoured blood of thy servants
    be known among the nations before our eyes!

11 Let the groans of the prisoners come before thee;
    according to thy great power preserve those doomed to die!
12 Return sevenfold into the bosom of our neighbors
    the taunts with which they have taunted thee, O Lord!
13 Then we thy people, the flock of thy pasture,
    will give thanks to thee for ever;
    from generation to generation we will recount thy praise.

 

To the choirmaster: according to Lilies. A Testimony of Asaph. A Psalm.

80 Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel,
thou who leadest Joseph like a flock!
Thou who art enthroned upon the cherubim, shine forth
    before E′phraim and Benjamin and Manas′seh!
Stir up thy might,
    and come to save us!

Restore us, O God;
    let thy face shine, that we may be saved!

O Lord God of hosts,
    how long wilt thou be angry with thy people’s prayers?
Thou hast fed them with the bread of tears,
    and given them tears to drink in full measure.
Thou dost make us the scorn[a] of our neighbors;
    and our enemies laugh among themselves.

Restore us, O God of hosts;
    let thy face shine, that we may be saved!

Thou didst bring a vine out of Egypt;
    thou didst drive out the nations and plant it.
Thou didst clear the ground for it;
    it took deep root and filled the land.
10 The mountains were covered with its shade,
    the mighty cedars with its branches;
11 it sent out its branches to the sea,
    and its shoots to the River.
12 Why then hast thou broken down its walls,
    so that all who pass along the way pluck its fruit?
13 The boar from the forest ravages it,
    and all that move in the field feed on it.

14 Turn again, O God of hosts!
    Look down from heaven, and see;
have regard for this vine,
15     the stock which thy right hand planted.[b]
16 They have burned it with fire, they have cut it down;
    may they perish at the rebuke of thy countenance!
17 But let thy hand be upon the man of thy right hand,
    the son of man whom thou hast made strong for thyself!
18 Then we will never turn back from thee;
    give us life, and we will call on thy name!

19 Restore us, O Lord God of hosts!
    let thy face shine, that we may be saved!

Footnotes

  1. Psalm 80:6 Syr: Heb strife
  2. Psalm 80:15 Heb planted and upon the son whom thou hast reared for thyself

 

 



Saturday, March 16, 2024

Distributive justice



One last point about Economics 101 may be the most important, is likely to be overlooked or even denied in the U.S. today. Economists claim they can show that if all their assumptions are true – perfect information, willing sellers and willing buyers, perfect competition, no externalities – the hypothetical free market will create what is called a Pareto optimum. That is a situation in which no person can be made better off without making someone else worse off. This is the basis of the claim that the free market allocates resources “efficiently.” But there can be a Pareto optimum in which everybody has an equal or close to equal share; and one in which one person has 90% of the wealth and the remaining million people have 10%. The latter is actually much closer to the situation we’re in right now.

But there is nothing in the theory of the market to support a claim that whatever distribution results is just, or fair, or desirable. If you don’t think it’s fair that one person has 90% of the wealth, there is no reason in the theory of the market why you shouldn’t tax 99% of that wealth away and share it with everybody else. Maybe you can think of arguments against doing this, but they aren’t to be found in introductory economics. The question is simply ignored.

Liberalism, in the modern sense, can be thought of as favoring government policy to repair the defects of the market, and make it more like the theoretical ideal. Environmental and workplace safety regulations limit some externalities. Food labeling requirements and protections against fraud limit information asymmetry. Generous investment in public goods fills important gaps left by market forces. Provision of basic income support and social services reduces inequality. Regulations prevent the formation of monopolies or break them up when they occur. The irony is that conservative libertarians who oppose most liberal policies are actually rejecting attempts to make the world more like their theory claims it should be. 

 

Let me just add that the problems with the UK National Health Service are the result of decades of conservative governments starving it for resources. Once the Tories get smashed in the next election, the problems will be fixed. Meanwhile, the British are free to buy private insurance or pay out of pocket for private health care if they can afford it, so nobody is losing anything by having the NHS available. Try using logic.

 

Thursday, March 14, 2024

Goodness!

The essential, first-order or pure concept of "public goods" is whatever we benefit from that is "non-excludable" and "non-rivalrous." That means you can use it without paying for it, and if you use it, it's still there for others. An example, at least for the time being, is the oxygen in the air. Back in the good old paleolithic, there was a lot more of that. Basically, the land and the water and the plants and animals were there for the taking, and there was usually plenty so rivalry was uncommon. Of course, this only worked within your own tribe -- sometimes people of different tribes tried exclusion and rivalry, and even killed each other. But you get the idea.


For better or for worse, nature for the most part doesn't work that way any more. Land is now a commodity - it is owned, bought and sold, and the law says you can exclude people from your property. The products of the land are owned as well. Most public goods nowadays are actually created by humans, and they may also be thought of as goods and services with very large positive externalities. A classic example is a lighthouse. It was worth it to the local port authorities to build it and maintain it -- perhaps a joint investment of merchants, and/or navigators, or the king who stood to gain from taxing them and dispatching his navies more safely -- but every sailor benefits, even if they're just passing by. A comparable example today is the Global Positioning System. 

 

The point is, the Free Market™ could not create a lighthouse, or the GPS, because there's no way to make people pay for it. Most examples are not quite so pure. The market would produce some amount of the good in question, but less than the optimal amount for society as a whole. That is because the good or service has large positive externalities -- benefits to society beyond their market value. A classic example here is education. Affluent people would send their children to private school, if there were no public education, as they have indeed done since Aristotle tutored Alexander. 

 

However, there are major benefits to society if every child is educated, because nowadays the economy needs a workforce that is literate and numerate, and a lot of people with more specialized skills, be it carpentry or nuclear physics. The road and highway network is another example. People would build some bridges and perhaps roads on which they could charge tolls, but the transportation network that the modern economy requires is far too extensive and interconnected for the market to produce. There is no nation on earth that doesn't have a government funded road network and educational system, and the richest countries have the best ones. But guess what? In order to provide these public goods, the government needs to make you pay taxes.


Medicine also has huge positive externalities. (Of course it has negative externalities as well, including carbon emissions and notably, a huge quantity of plastic waste.) A straightforward positive externality is infectious disease control. Preventing or curing infectious diseases prevents them from being transmitted to others. This is an immense benefit to society that goes far beyond the direct value to people who are vaccinated or treated.

Another positive externality is that people with curable or ameliorable sickness or disability who might otherwise not be able to work can remain in or return to the labor force, and so improve the economic well-being of themselves and their families, and the productivity of the entire economy. They can also better take care of their children or other dependents, maintain their households, volunteer in the community, pay taxes, give to charity, and whatever other good things healthier people are better able to do. And obviously it is distressing to people when their friends and loved ones are sick, disabled or in pain. It may even require them to give up other productive work to care for someone else.

Even if they aren’t directly affected personally, many people are disturbed by the thought that people who are in dire need may go without care that could cure or succor them. It would constitute a great public offense if people were dying at the doors of the hospital because they could not pay, as would the sight of seriously ill or injured people on the streets. Or rather, we do see such sights all the time, but homeless people’s illnesses and injuries are mostly psychological, and for some reason the public seems willing to tolerate that. We’ll get to this problem later.

For now, however, one argument in favor of universal health care (not the only one) is that it will more than pay for itself through these positive externalities. And you know what? That is actually true.



Wednesday, March 13, 2024

History Lesson

Psalm 78 is, I believe, the third longest psalm. It's also one of three so-called "long history" psalms. It basically recounts events from Exodus and Numbers, in chronologically confused order, and then skips ahead to touch on the establishment of the reign of David. The listing of the plagues of Egypt does not exactly correspond to the canonical version of Exodus we have today -- there are no caterpillars or frost in Exodus. This may just be a fanciful addition, or it may be that it draws on a lost version of the story. Once again, keep in mind that there were no printing presses and any document would have existed in various versions. Otherwise, what is most noteworthy about this is that it accuses the tribe of Ephraim of cowardice and then goes out of its way to point out that the kingship went to a descendant of Judah, which would seem to be the central intention of the piece. 

 

BTW, just to finish the story, Aaliyah Edwards did not play in the Big East final game. Nevertheless, with just 7 players dressed, UCONN crushed Georgetown. It was no contest from the beginning. We'll see if they get a number 2 seed in the NCAA tournament, but it doesn't much matter. They'll have to beat a top team to get to the round of 8, and then we'll see what happens.

78 Give ear, O my people, to my teaching;
    incline your ears to the words of my mouth!
I will open my mouth in a parable;
    I will utter dark sayings from of old,
things that we have heard and known,
    that our fathers have told us.
We will not hide them from their children,
    but tell to the coming generation
the glorious deeds of the Lord, and his might,
    and the wonders which he has wrought.

He established a testimony in Jacob,
    and appointed a law in Israel,
which he commanded our fathers
    to teach to their children;
that the next generation might know them,
    the children yet unborn,
and arise and tell them to their children,
    so that they should set their hope in God,
and not forget the works of God,
    but keep his commandments;
and that they should not be like their fathers,
    a stubborn and rebellious generation,
a generation whose heart was not steadfast,
    whose spirit was not faithful to God.

The E′phraimites, armed with[a] the bow,
    turned back on the day of battle.
10 They did not keep God’s covenant,
    but refused to walk according to his law.
11 They forgot what he had done,
    and the miracles that he had shown them.
12 In the sight of their fathers he wrought marvels
    in the land of Egypt, in the fields of Zo′an.
13 He divided the sea and let them pass through it,
    and made the waters stand like a heap.
14 In the daytime he led them with a cloud,
    and all the night with a fiery light.
15 He cleft rocks in the wilderness,
    and gave them drink abundantly as from the deep.
16 He made streams come out of the rock,
    and caused waters to flow down like rivers.

17 Yet they sinned still more against him,
    rebelling against the Most High in the desert.
18 They tested God in their heart
    by demanding the food they craved.
19 They spoke against God, saying,
    “Can God spread a table in the wilderness?
20 He smote the rock so that water gushed out
    and streams overflowed.
Can he also give bread,
    or provide meat for his people?”

21 Therefore, when the Lord heard, he was full of wrath;
    a fire was kindled against Jacob,
    his anger mounted against Israel;
22 because they had no faith in God,
    and did not trust his saving power.
23 Yet he commanded the skies above,
    and opened the doors of heaven;
24 and he rained down upon them manna to eat,
    and gave them the grain of heaven.
25 Man ate of the bread of the angels;
    he sent them food in abundance.
26 He caused the east wind to blow in the heavens,
    and by his power he led out the south wind;
27 he rained flesh upon them like dust,
    winged birds like the sand of the seas;
28 he let them fall in the midst of their camp,
    all around their habitations.
29 And they ate and were well filled,
    for he gave them what they craved.
30 But before they had sated their craving,
    while the food was still in their mouths,
31 the anger of God rose against them
    and he slew the strongest of them,
    and laid low the picked men of Israel.

32 In spite of all this they still sinned;
    despite his wonders they did not believe.
33 So he made their days vanish like a breath,
    and their years in terror.
34 When he slew them, they sought for him;
    they repented and sought God earnestly.
35 They remembered that God was their rock,
    the Most High God their redeemer.
36 But they flattered him with their mouths;
    they lied to him with their tongues.
37 Their heart was not steadfast toward him;
    they were not true to his covenant.
38 Yet he, being compassionate,
    forgave their iniquity,
    and did not destroy them;
he restrained his anger often,
    and did not stir up all his wrath.
39 He remembered that they were but flesh,
    a wind that passes and comes not again.
40 How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness
    and grieved him in the desert!
41 They tested him again and again,
    and provoked the Holy One of Israel.
42 They did not keep in mind his power,
    or the day when he redeemed them from the foe;
43 when he wrought his signs in Egypt,
    and his miracles in the fields of Zo′an.
44 He turned their rivers to blood,
    so that they could not drink of their streams.
45 He sent among them swarms of flies, which devoured them,
    and frogs, which destroyed them.
46 He gave their crops to the caterpillar,
    and the fruit of their labor to the locust.
47 He destroyed their vines with hail,
    and their sycamores with frost.
48 He gave over their cattle to the hail,
    and their flocks to thunderbolts.
49 He let loose on them his fierce anger,
    wrath, indignation, and distress,
    a company of destroying angels.
50 He made a path for his anger;
    he did not spare them from death,
    but gave their lives over to the plague.
51 He smote all the first-born in Egypt,
    the first issue of their strength in the tents of Ham.
52 Then he led forth his people like sheep,
    and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.
53 He led them in safety, so that they were not afraid;
    but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.
54 And he brought them to his holy land,
    to the mountain which his right hand had won.
55 He drove out nations before them;
    he apportioned them for a possession
    and settled the tribes of Israel in their tents.

56 Yet they tested and rebelled against the Most High God,
    and did not observe his testimonies,
57 but turned away and acted treacherously like their fathers;
    they twisted like a deceitful bow.
58 For they provoked him to anger with their high places;
    they moved him to jealousy with their graven images.
59 When God heard, he was full of wrath,
    and he utterly rejected Israel.
60 He forsook his dwelling at Shiloh,
    the tent where he dwelt among men,
61 and delivered his power to captivity,
    his glory to the hand of the foe.
62 He gave his people over to the sword,
    and vented his wrath on his heritage.
63 Fire devoured their young men,
    and their maidens had no marriage song.
64 Their priests fell by the sword,
    and their widows made no lamentation.
65 Then the Lord awoke as from sleep,
    like a strong man shouting because of wine.
66 And he put his adversaries to rout;
    he put them to everlasting shame.

67 He rejected the tent of Joseph,
    he did not choose the tribe of E′phraim;
68 but he chose the tribe of Judah,
    Mount Zion, which he loves.
69 He built his sanctuary like the high heavens,
    like the earth, which he has founded for ever.
70 He chose David his servant,
    and took him from the sheepfolds;
71 from tending the ewes that had young he brought him
    to be the shepherd of Jacob his people,
    of Israel his inheritance.
72 With upright heart he tended them,
    and guided them with skilful hand.

Footnotes

  1. Psalm 78:9 Heb armed with shooting

Monday, March 11, 2024

The worst assumption of all

 Before getting back to Econ 101, I won't keep you in suspense. Aaliyah Edwards didn't play yesterday, so Auriemma had only 7 players suited up, which meant that Ice Brady had to play 40 minutes. The most minutes she has played in any game previously is 14. Ashlyn Shade also played 40 minutes, while Bueckers and Muhl played the entire game until Geno pulled them in garbage time. No problem. Marquette scored zero points in the last 14 minutes of the game, which means the box score shows a bagel for the fourth quarter. UCONN won 58-29. Apparently there's precedent for zero points in a quarter in women's college basketball, but I seriously doubt it's ever happened in the Big East tournament.

The most ridiculous -- and perhaps consequential -- of all the non-existent can openers is the assumption of zero externalities. It is in fact difficult to imagine a transaction without externalities. Let's say you want to buy some tomatoes. You drive to the supermarket spewing CO2 and PM2.5 out of your tailpipe, contributing to congestion and delay for other drivers, and risking a crash. (Riding in a motor vehicle is probably the most dangerous thing you will ever do.) In order to grow the tomatoes you buy, a beautiful wilderness was destroyed to make farmland. Onto the farmland was spread pesticides that kill beneficial insects, and nitrogen that ran off into the river and caused a dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. You put the tomatoes in a plastic bag that ends up in the landfill. I could go on.

 

The reason the disciples of the Free Market™ have so stubbornly and vociferously denied the reality of anthropogenic climate change is that if proves their religion is false. That's it. There's no escape. As Karl Polanyi wrote back in 1947, when we didn't know about climate change but the truth was already obvious:

 

[T]he idea of a self-adjusting market implied a stark utopia. Such an institution could not exist for any length of time without annihilating the human and natural substance of society; it would have physically destroyed man and transformed his surroundings into a wilderness.

 

Yep.

 .