David Hines
Dirty fingernails
By David Hines
When I was young, my mom had to sweep the porch every day. Soot from steel production settled every night. She no longer has that chore. The foundry is long closed. The mill is still operating, but not at its former capacity. Instead of dirty porches, real estate prices are dirt cheap, inviting people to sleep there and commute elsewhere.
The town has lost many of its young people. They seek work in more promising locations. The population has dropped to 70% or 60% of its one-time high. Some who stayed have been making ends meet in illicit drug trade, the one pecuniary opportunity that seems to have increased. Most business has moved to malls out of town. Ozone, platinum dust (from catalytic converters), and unburnt hydrocarbons are less visible than coal soot.
It's not the first change to occur there. My dad remembered when our street was unpaved, and had wooden planks for pedestrian convenience.
Things are so much better now. Residents can't work, but they can breathe. They can easily walk across the street that, though paved, carries little traffic. Young entrepreneurs still exercise ambition, albeit in an illicit trade.
Somebody decided that all Americans could make a living with nary a dirty fingernail. We could get rich typing on computers and selling overpriced junk to each other. Ed Rendell has a plan for Pennsylvania to prosper by placing bets with one another.
People in other nations were glad to do what we no longer found convenient — get their fingernails dirty. They make the products we sell to each other.
They buy those jobs from us. China, for one, pays a sort of tribute; they buy US dollars. This keeps the value of their currency low, and prices cheap so we keep buying. This can last only so long. Once they have all the jobs, there will be little reason to continue subsidizing our government's printing-press budgets.
The price of oil is an indication of the growing power of what many still think of as "third-world economies." Since the end of World War II we grew unused to competing for such resources. We produced them here, and had the industrial might to buy them elsewhere on terms we could live with. Now those who are doing the work we used to do are in the market — to stay.
There are some who think we ought to force the rest of the world to abide by Capitol Hill's labor and environmental dictates. Though our Constitution does not even mention OSHA, the EPA, etc., it is believed that these bureaucrats ought to dictate labor-management relations all over the world. Ironically, many are the same ones who oppose a "war for oil" in Iraq. Instead of oil, they believe, we ought to be fighting to enforce Congress' unrealistic mandates.
Why do I consider them unrealistic? Somebody has to get dirty fingernails. If not us, then someone else. Nothing of value is produced without somebody getting dirty. We can't sell junk to each other if no junk is being made.
We have prioritized clean air, high wages for even the least competent, and government handouts over production, deferred gratification, and free markets. Though it cost us dearly, the bill is only beginning to come due. What is lost is not easily regained. There is no magic bullet to reverse decades of sending our production overseas. Once a plant is closed, it is not easily re-opened.
The American people were happy to put politicians and bureaucrats in charge of the economy. They imagined management that eliminated all the pitfalls of capitalism while retaining all the benefits of a robust economy. Instead, they got the diametric opposite — corporate control of government, and a dearth of gainful employment. Yet they still think the next politician can produce the magic bullet: prosperity without dirty fingernails.
Ain't gonna happen. We are rapidly losing the right to set our own priorities independent of DC. Did we get what we paid for? If the increased bureaucracy is so effective in cleaning our air and water, why are environmentalists still complaining? The dollar value of a minimum wage job may be higher, but the buying power of those dollars is at an unprecedented low. You may benefit from government handouts — if you spend enough time on arbitrary paperwork instead of doing something truly productive.
Yeah, coal is dirty. So is real work. We can decide to go back to work, or to keep hoping everybody can make a living selling or typing.
Or we can try to force the rest of the world to abide by our politician-dictated priorities. If we could win that war, we could eliminate all production that meets our bodily needs. Then we would all be in the same boat — a sinking one.
Instead of blaming all our problems on those who have decided to do the work we decided as a nation to not do, maybe it's time to examine the efficacy of our priorities.
© David Hines
When I was young, my mom had to sweep the porch every day. Soot from steel production settled every night. She no longer has that chore. The foundry is long closed. The mill is still operating, but not at its former capacity. Instead of dirty porches, real estate prices are dirt cheap, inviting people to sleep there and commute elsewhere.
The town has lost many of its young people. They seek work in more promising locations. The population has dropped to 70% or 60% of its one-time high. Some who stayed have been making ends meet in illicit drug trade, the one pecuniary opportunity that seems to have increased. Most business has moved to malls out of town. Ozone, platinum dust (from catalytic converters), and unburnt hydrocarbons are less visible than coal soot.
It's not the first change to occur there. My dad remembered when our street was unpaved, and had wooden planks for pedestrian convenience.
Things are so much better now. Residents can't work, but they can breathe. They can easily walk across the street that, though paved, carries little traffic. Young entrepreneurs still exercise ambition, albeit in an illicit trade.
Somebody decided that all Americans could make a living with nary a dirty fingernail. We could get rich typing on computers and selling overpriced junk to each other. Ed Rendell has a plan for Pennsylvania to prosper by placing bets with one another.
People in other nations were glad to do what we no longer found convenient — get their fingernails dirty. They make the products we sell to each other.
They buy those jobs from us. China, for one, pays a sort of tribute; they buy US dollars. This keeps the value of their currency low, and prices cheap so we keep buying. This can last only so long. Once they have all the jobs, there will be little reason to continue subsidizing our government's printing-press budgets.
The price of oil is an indication of the growing power of what many still think of as "third-world economies." Since the end of World War II we grew unused to competing for such resources. We produced them here, and had the industrial might to buy them elsewhere on terms we could live with. Now those who are doing the work we used to do are in the market — to stay.
There are some who think we ought to force the rest of the world to abide by Capitol Hill's labor and environmental dictates. Though our Constitution does not even mention OSHA, the EPA, etc., it is believed that these bureaucrats ought to dictate labor-management relations all over the world. Ironically, many are the same ones who oppose a "war for oil" in Iraq. Instead of oil, they believe, we ought to be fighting to enforce Congress' unrealistic mandates.
Why do I consider them unrealistic? Somebody has to get dirty fingernails. If not us, then someone else. Nothing of value is produced without somebody getting dirty. We can't sell junk to each other if no junk is being made.
We have prioritized clean air, high wages for even the least competent, and government handouts over production, deferred gratification, and free markets. Though it cost us dearly, the bill is only beginning to come due. What is lost is not easily regained. There is no magic bullet to reverse decades of sending our production overseas. Once a plant is closed, it is not easily re-opened.
The American people were happy to put politicians and bureaucrats in charge of the economy. They imagined management that eliminated all the pitfalls of capitalism while retaining all the benefits of a robust economy. Instead, they got the diametric opposite — corporate control of government, and a dearth of gainful employment. Yet they still think the next politician can produce the magic bullet: prosperity without dirty fingernails.
Ain't gonna happen. We are rapidly losing the right to set our own priorities independent of DC. Did we get what we paid for? If the increased bureaucracy is so effective in cleaning our air and water, why are environmentalists still complaining? The dollar value of a minimum wage job may be higher, but the buying power of those dollars is at an unprecedented low. You may benefit from government handouts — if you spend enough time on arbitrary paperwork instead of doing something truly productive.
Yeah, coal is dirty. So is real work. We can decide to go back to work, or to keep hoping everybody can make a living selling or typing.
Or we can try to force the rest of the world to abide by our politician-dictated priorities. If we could win that war, we could eliminate all production that meets our bodily needs. Then we would all be in the same boat — a sinking one.
Instead of blaming all our problems on those who have decided to do the work we decided as a nation to not do, maybe it's time to examine the efficacy of our priorities.
© David Hines
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