I come from a country (the Soviet Union) where all workers were required to join unions. After immigrating, my father joined a company where all the labour was part of a union. He refused to join the union and has for over 30 years been the only non-union member (the circumstances allowed it). That's how much we hate unions.

Unions are nothing more than parasites which serve only the union bosses. They certainly hurt workers. They amount to a labour monopoly, keeping out non-members and contribute to general unemployment. They deny the individual employee the right to negotiate his own compensation and to compete with other workers. Because most labour unions negotiate compensation based on seniority rather than merit and for all workers as if all human beings are the same and interchangeable, workers are have incentive to do only the bare minimum. For this pleasure, the workers pay a substantial fee to their Union overlords. Like parasites, they suck the life out of companies and labour alike and when the company sputters under the weight of the union and becomes less competitive, the union members lose their jobs. If, as socialists (who now hate being called socialists but who are just the same) had their way, labour unions would represent all labour. So what of the workers who lost their jobs because of union enforced inefficiency? Why, they remain unemployed. It's not the union's problem. If they aren't employed, they aren't members of the union anymore and aren't the union's problem. If you don't believe me, take a look at Europe.

So, if you want to talk about unintended consequences, the unintended consequences of unions for labour are far worse than any real or imagined unintended consequences of busting the unions. If that were not true, then union membership wouldn't be in a persistent decline. Now, for the marginal worker with no motivation (what employers like myself call "dead weight" and fire), the demise of unions is a bad thing. But then, if you can't motivate yourself to actually perform the job for which you were hired, then you don't deserve to keep the job. There are other workers who are more willing, more competent and more deserving. Personally, I've worked in union shops before and I would rather eat my own head than join a union and everyone I have met in my lifetime who has been faced with that question has changed jobs, if necessary, rather than join. Few institutions are as dehumanizing, humiliating, self-serving and deserving of a gutting as unions.

As for the contracts, I'll admit that they are not always good negotiators.

Methinks:
Depends on what part of the nation and who you ask. While there are many places that have prospered, they do not forget the cost.

For what that means today, I'm suspicious of both major candidates- even if one sounds like William Jennings Bryan.

What the dominant liberal media (and Sethstorm) don't like to mention is that the PATCO strike was illegal and that Reagan told them that if the went on strike that they'd be fired. They didn't believe him.

I have no problem with private-sector unions going on strike, but I do want government to be neutral. If a businses whose labor went on strike wants to replace those workers, then it's up to labor to convince the customers of that business, and the labor that's willing to replace the strikers that their strike is justified. If there are enough people willing to take the job at the wages and benefits offered by the company, that would indicate to me that the union just priced itself out of business.

One other thing that Sethstorm and big labor never like to talk about are the fourteen-week paid vacations, and tonnage benefits paid on made steel rather than sellable steel, which resulted in tonnage bonuses being paid on steel that was sent right back into the mill to be melted down for a second (or third) try to get it right, all the while garnering one or two more tonnage bonuses before a product was even sold. I'm sure those kinds of contracts had nothing to do with the demise of Big Labor.

I have seen some gross mistakes in this coments section about argentina, for example that alfonsin was a dictator. He was a failure, but not a dictator.

If u wish to learn more about argentina's economy from the perspective of an austrian go to my blog argentineaneconomy.blogspot.com where I have lots of graphs and data.

Best.

Not likely until at least 2030-2050. There are enough people who remember what damage he did. They aren't just those who were laid off. This set includes those who may not know the 70's, but they knew what happened in the 1980's – good and bad.

They knew about PATCO and the signal it sent to business. They may have known the incident of mistaken identity with Ebens and Nitz. They may know about the last decade of the Cold War. They now know that what killed Detroit would move on to more skilled workers.

They know the signs of Reaganism. Soon, they'll be able to preempt it. They remember what caused the misery, and know it was not just government.

The Fed rate cuts were a very small portion of that. Also, when are we finally going to get past the fiction of an independent Fed? It's one thing for those in government to always say it, it's quite another for a thinking person to believe it.

friendly and trustworthy country in Asia, rather than by those villainous Europeans.

The Europeans aren't villains. They're freeloaders. There's a difference.

Thanks for playing!

Republicans must be comforted to know that freedom from regulations in the US allowed the independent Fed to reduce interest rates to the point where thousands of (temporarily) low-interest mortgages could be taken out by people who could never have afforded a mortgage at normal interest rates.

It must also be a comfort to know that, although America's external debt continues to rise, it is held very largely by a supportive, friendly and trustworthy country in Asia, rather than by those villainous Europeans.

It's of some concern, though, that there seems to be no hope that a change of government will put a stop to those currently ballooning entitlements, etc.

But it is nice to know that Senator McCain is quite devoid of any lust for power, even though some of his promisees are occasionally disturbing.

Thanks for the feedback on the book. I was wondering if you found it funny. We read it aloud to each other around here. My husband's family is Egyptian and most of them still live there. As you may know, Egypt has a lot of the same economic problems as the Soviet Union because Nasser modeled the regime on the USSR. We were dying laughing reading the book to each other. I'm curious if you thought it was funny or if it's only funny to us because it hits so close to home.

It is sad how much is still unknown about that system – even though it's out in the open now. Sadder still is how much of what's being proposed today has already been tried and failed so miserably (which ties it right back to this thread). It seems that every new generation has to learn by making the same mistakes. The only difference is that they are no longer willing to call the ideas Socialist or Marxist. The idea is the same but the name has changed. A bit scary.

The saddest (or most disgusting) part was how Western "intellectuals" (Marxist morons) admired that system.

I've been around, just haven't had a lot to say.

Last time I was at the Cafe, you were in the midst of "Meltdown". What did you think?

I would be surprised if Clinton personally decided to cut Arab related intelligence, the only reason for such a move would be to create an opening for an attack or maybe racism (not to mention homophobia) within the intelligence community. (I had read that there were a number of translaters let go because they were homosexual.)

I suspect the big problem with our intelligence community is that they are huge government bureaucracies, jealous of each others, um, subsidy claims, and perhaps a little too independent.

I think all foreign intelligence should be folded into the military with perhaps an independent agency answerable to the White house for the sole purpose of verification/oversight.

Please don't even get me started on Nixon (price caps) and Burns (cheap money! Come and get it!)! Carter came up with some "brilliance" of his own – the gas lines of the 70's were pure Jimmy Carter price controls, for example. Let's not forget his windfall profits tax which led to more dependence on foreign oil either. Not to mention, we have Jimmy to thank for the current state of Iran. Iran and the Shah of Iran were American allies. The Shah's regime was dictatorial and unpalatable, no question. But Jimmy couldn't differentiate between a bad dictator and an even worse one. So, now we have Iranians living in a situation worse than they were in under the Shah and the world is worse off too. I could go on, but you get my point.

All presidents inherit the good and bad policies of the preceding administrations. Thus, it would be a mistake to credit the peace dividend and a strong economy solely (or even mostly) to Clinton. Just as it would be a mistake to blame Bush (although it pains me not to blame him entirely) entirely for poor intelligence and things coming to a head in 9/11 and the frenzied response. After the cold war, Clinton decided that the world will live magically in peace for eternity and proceeded to hack and slash military and intelligence spending to the point that there were virtually no speakers of Arabic in the intelligence department. He also completely ignored the Osama bin Laden issue. Certainly, Jimmy inherited the same good and bad as other presidents. But, if you're not willing to cut Bush any slack, why would you cut Jimmy any?

Jimmy and Barack have the same socialist ideals and the same economic policy ideas to deal with oil companies and the evil rich and turn the same blind eye to threats to American security. I know you don't want to be in perpetual war (who does?), but ignoring someone who is coming after you is not really the best solution. That's usually the thing that leads to all out war.

You already said that ideally, you would split the branches between the parties. If that is ideal, why not vote that way? Is your repudiation of the Bush administration really worth doing something that you admit is suboptimal.

It was before my time, but how much should Carter be blamed for the economic problems under his administration? My sense is that a lot of the damage was actually caused by Nixon and Burns, and Carter got stuck with cleaning up their mess.

True. The alternative this time around even less palatable than usual.

the alternative is McCain, heir to the Bush administration….If the Bush administration doesn't qualify [as really bad ruler], what does?

I can't say I prefer Bush either. But Obama is heir not to the Clinton administration (constrained by a Republican congress) but to the socialism of the Carter administration (unconstrained by a democrat congress). As someone who lived through that once, I don't wish to do so again. Personally, I don't love McCain either but splitting the legislative and executive branch between the two parties seems to yield the best results. For these reasons, I prefer McCain.

The Bush administration, in my opinion, would genuinely like to turn America into a police state. They openly ridicule any notion that there should be any restraints on their power whatsoever. Their economic and fiscal policies are terrible. Their grand vision is America at eternal war with one country after another in the Mideast (Saudi Arabia excepted).

Democracy is supposed to allow the people to get rid of really bad rulers. If the Bush administration doesn't qualify, what does?

I think it is a bit unfair to talk about the foolishness of Americans in supporting Obama without mentioning what their alternative is.

"Advancing towards ruin
…What differentiates Barack Obama, what turns him unique in America and the world, is not the color of his skin, but the level of crude, vulgar, almost infantile mendacity. …. his candidacy is the evident sympton of the deterioration of American democracy.

Just this week two more eloquent pieces of evidence appeared that the Democratic candidate falsifies his biography with the malicious ingenuity of a small con artist. First, he as not turned in his birth certificate to the secretariat of the Democratic Party…. and now the person who repudiates Obama, afirming that in his childhood he was Muslim and not Christian as he afirms, is not a schoolmate — it is his own brother.

All politicians lie, but they do this with some class, avoiding foolish small lies easily contested. Obama doesn't have this refinement. … Obama, if elected, can cause serious damage to American democracy: that such an obviously unqualified type may be accepted as candidate to the presidency is already a monstrous and irreversible loss not only to the leading nation of the world, but to all of humanity. This candidacy is an advance, yes, but in the direction of the final ruin of the Western world, foreboding the 'one thousand years of darkness' which Ronald Reagan spoke of."

1. Many of Obama's economic policy stances are disagreeable, wrong, or both. Some are ok (on gas taxes, or being pro-growth). I find it very difficult to read what a candidate really wants, especially given that both Obama and McCain have no executive experience. For sure, a lot of Obama's proposals are standard, old-style liberal boilerplate. So were Bill Clinton's, who turned out to be an economically moderate president. For sure, I cannot recall a president in my lifetime who had any economic education and knowledge. For Clinton, thank Rubin, Greenspan and the republican Congress. For Obama or McCain, wait and see. Neither candidate has bad economic advisers.

2. O'Grady's point about Argentina is well taken. A natural comparison is with Chile, which like Argentina has a strong agricultural foundation but has diversified its economy thanks to self-organization. However, the comparison between argentinian populism and Obama's "populism" is incredibly superficial. It ignores the cultural and economic differences between US and Argentina, the influence of Mussolini's communication techniques on Peron, the dictatorship of Alfonsin… I would not know where to start. And the basis for this comparison? That Obama's policies are overall liberal in a vague sense (see point 1).

3. I believe that, at their best, blogs will have great influence in this election cycle. For economy-obsessed readers, they will filter and amplify relevant information, advertise thoughtful analysis, and eventually steer public opinion. When it comes to evaluating and posting tidbits of useful information on McCain and Obama, I find Mankiw's blog to have been excellent. As a fan of Hayek and Econtalk, I enjoy Cafe Hayek, but for the time being the only thing that has perspired regarding the presidential campaign is Boudreaux's visceral dislike for Obama. Ok Don, we get it. Can we talk business now?

Sorry for the long post.

The question for any responsible citizen to ask, in case he is allergic to Argentinean policies, as so many are, is how to take away from the attractiveness of so many of Argentinean type promises, by doing things better.

It is as if to say that chávez happened autonomously to Venezuela… chávez was only the result of very bad policies and of very irresponsible elite in Venezuela.

Even today, the elite, professors, entrepreneurs, writers, bankers and all the “outstanding citizens” of Venezuela tank their cars at ten cents per gallon, and with that de-facto rob those who do not have cars with about 10 to 15% of GDP … and still think this is all a perfectly natural thing to do and that they are in their given rights. ¿In such scenario would anyone wonder if chávez also turned up to be Evita´s long gone nephew?

We have in Venezuela professors blaming politicians instead of themselves, so pray you get professors in your country willing to live up to their responsibilities to see that society delivers to most in such a way as to make certain that Argentinean type of politics are rejected.