Voice For Liberty in Wichita

The Wichita Eagle’s Rhonda Holman, writing for the editorial board in today’s lead editorial (Where do city, county stand on bond?) makes a few points that illustrate the highly partisan nature of this board.
Here’s the first example. She complains about lack of transparency in knowing who is contributing to the campaigns for the Wichita [...]

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In the July 5, 2008 Wichita Eagle, a Mr. Chet Syres of Hutchinson contributes a letter promoting the virtues of liberalism, proponents of which he now wants us to call social progressives.
I remind Mr. Syres that leftists stole the terms “liberal” and “progressive” from the classical liberals. From For A New Liberty by Murray N. [...]

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An audio version of this post is available here.

A Mr. Greg Abbott of Clearwater, Kansas makes the case in the June 13, 2008 Wichita Eagle that there are many good government programs: the interstate highway system, the post office, the air traffic control system, police and fire departments, etc.

I believe the writer makes a huge error in logic by assuming that because these programs exist and have been provided by government, then they are good things to have, and that these things can only be provided through government. To make this conclusion requires a huge leap and a good measure of misplaced faith in the institution of government.

Many of the programs the writer cites as examples of good government programs are frequently criticized. The interstate highways in our nation’s cities are often congested to the point where loss of time spent stuck in traffic is a serious problem. Then there is the problem of safety of the nation’s highways, on which some 40,000 people die each year, and many more are seriously injured. Walter Block writes “As far as I am concerned, [these deaths are] taking place in spite of, not so much because of, the actions of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, despite their tendency to take credit for anything positive that happens on their watch, as do all statist agencies.” I recommend his article Deaths by Government: Another Missing Chapter.

The post office? Do many people rely on the post office for delivery of critical shipments when private alternatives such as FedEx and UPS are available?

As for flood control, the federal government’s flood insurance program, by suppressing signals that would be expressed in the price system as insurance premiums, if there was indeed a free market for such insurance, has lead to numerous deaths. Ask the residents of New Orleans how they feel about government levees and government flood insurance. See How Government Insurance Destroyed New Orleans.

Need I continue? Each government program Mr. Abbott mentions has severe problems, and most crowd out efforts by private enterprise to provide alternatives.

There is a truth in the writer’s letter in this sentence: “We need to wake up and realize that we all depend on the government.” That this is true is profoundly sad. Government, Mr. Abbott, operates through force and coercion. Wouldn’t it be better if we could solve problems and provide services through the voluntary cooperation of people?

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Part of the Wichita Eagle opinion watch series.

A writer in the April 2, 2008 Wichita Eagle presses the case for passenger train service in Wichita. But there are several problems with the writer’s argument.

The writer makes this claim: “With Kansas’ vast wind resource, we could power our trains with no fossil fuels.” Yes, there is a lot of wind in Kansas. But it doesn’t blow continuously. What does the writer suggest we power the trains with at those times? Until there is an economically feasible method of storing the electricity generated by wind, we will be reliant on traditional methods of power generation. Wind can only be a supplement.

The writer admits that high-speed passenger train service will require a lot of public money. That’s okay, he says, as we presently spend a lot on our roads and traffic systems. The government-built and owned roads are frequently criticized, however. The fact that we’ve spent a lot on them — with often unsatisfactory results — is not an argument in favor of more government involvement in transportation systems. There is, in fact, a small movement towards more private highways, and there are persuasive arguments that all roads and highways should be privately owned.

If there is in fact a demand for high-speed rail travel in Kansas and the United States, let private entrepreneurs, rather than government, lead its development. That’s the best way to have a system that meets the needs of customers, rather than the needs of politicians and government bureaucrats.

I wonder if the writer remembers that the government does have a track record of owning and operating a railroad. That’s Amtrak, and having mentioned that, I believe no more needs to be said.

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Part of the Wichita Eagle opinion watch series. An audio broadcast of this article may be heard by clicking here.

A letter writer in the April 27, 2008 Wichita Eagle makes the case that investment in USD 259 (the Wichita, Kansas public school district) has a good return.

By way of comparison, the writer argues that the Wichita airport, having been built with public funds, represents “an investment return.” Whether it represents a good return on investment the writer doesn’t say, but I believe he means that the airport was a good investment of public funds.

The mere fact that the airport exists, however, doesn’t prove a good return on investment. Since the airport is owned by government and doesn’t calculate its profit or loss in a competitive market, we can never know how wise is the “investment” made in the Wichita airport.

Then the writer really gets off track. He speaks of “my own school bond issue within my family,” that being day care, preschool, K through 12, then a degree at the University of Kansas and a master’s degree. These activities are all voluntary choices that the writer and his family made. Taxation by the government, however, is not voluntary. The writer might also be reminded that it may be a voluntary choice to attend the University of Kansas, but the people of the State of Kansas have no choice but to fund its operations.

Finally, the writer states “Some opponents of the school bond issue have even said the kids in USD 259 don’t need tornado shelters. That is ridiculous.” It is true that 60 schools in the Wichita school district don’t have safe rooms, and this situation is the result of decisions made by the school district and its board. They had an opportunity to build more safe rooms as part of the bond issue in 2000, but they decided to spend the money on other things. Similarly, each year the district has a large capital budget to spend, and each year they decide to spend it on things other than safe rooms. Blame for the lack of storm shelters, therefore, rests solely with the Wichita school district. They have decided that other things are more important.

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Part of the Wichita Eagle Opinion Watch series. Audio is available here.

The school bond issue in Wichita and those occurring in surrounding districts overlook one crucial necessity: a fair wage for teachers. They are critically underpaid for all levels of education, service and abilities. (From The Wichita Eagle Opinion Line, April 27, 2008)

This writer is misinformed on several levels.

First, bond issues such as the one proposed by USD 259, the Wichita, Kansas public school district, are usually reserved for capital expenditures, such as constructing buildings. Ongoing expenses such as salaries are not considered as part of a bond issue. The writer might also remember that in August 2007, the Wichita school district raised property tax rates to pay for an increase in teacher salaries.

Then, who can determine what constitutes a “fair” wage? I know of no teachers who were forced to accept the jobs they filled. We can only presume that both the teacher and the school voluntarily entered into an agreement, with the wage to be paid as part of that agreement.

But the issue might be a little more complex. For one thing, most public school teachers work under a collective bargaining agreement which specifies the wages to be paid for teachers, based on their length of experience and educational credentials. There is little or nothing that most teachers can do to escape that pay scale. It works both ways: there are excellent teachers who are underpaid compared to the value they generate through their efforts and skill. At the same time there are poor teachers who are overpaid when compared to good or average teachers.

Related is the fact that public school teacher wages are not set in a free market by willing participants on both sides. Whenever teachers get a raise, it is inevitable that letter writers and opinion line callers will express outrage at having to pay for a raise in teacher pay. That’s characteristic of coerced transactions: many taxpayers don’t like to see their taxes go up. But that’s usually the only way that public school teacher pay can be raised.

The public schools, also, have the same problem as does any public agency: they are not able to perform economic calculation to properly evaluate their use of resources. They are not able to calculate profit or loss, so we really don’t know if they use inputs — such as the taxpayer funds used for teacher salaries — wisely.

Besides, the myth that teachers are underpaid relative to other jobs has been exposed for just that. Jay Greene, in the book Education Myths, reports that based on U.S. Department of Labor data for 2002, accounting for the number of hours worked, school teachers earned about $31 per hour. That is more than architects, economists, biologists, civil engineers, mechanical engineers, and chemists.

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A writer in the January 2, 2007 Wichita Eagle laments the loss of farmland to development, particularly residential homebuilding. The writer states that if farmland were preserved, Kansas could become more prosperous.

There are two areas in which I believe this writer is mistaken. First, if the transaction between developer and farmer was voluntary, each is better off than they were before. The developer (and by extension the people he hopes to sell houses to) valued the land more than the farmer did. Otherwise, why would the transaction take place? These voluntary transactions that make both parties better off than before are the basis for the creation of wealth and prosperity.

Second, farmers in Kansas produce so much output that they continually complain of the low prices they receive. Farmers tell us and Congress that if they don’t receive huge subsidies, they will go out of business. In 2005, farmers in Kansas received $1,056,866,760 in subsidy payments. This involuntary transaction reduces the wealth and prosperity of Kansas and the United States.

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