Category: Family

  • David Brooks Tries to Eff the Ineffable Again

    A friend and I were discussing Brooks’ recent column about Anthony Kronman’s new book, “Confessions of a Born-Again Pagan.” I thought I’d share my thoughts here. Full disc: I haven’t read Kronman’s book, only Brooks’ column. Some good stuff in there. Love the focus on books and writers. (Though Brooks’ [and Kronman’s?] barely-concealed dog-whistle adulation…

  • Which Countries Work Hardest? You Might (Not) Be Surprised

    Imagine you had to choose, and could choose: you can spend your whole life and raise your family in either of two equally prosperous countries. In one country people work lots of hours to attain that prosperity. In the other country people work far less. You don’t know anything else about these countries. Which would you choose? The answer…

  • No: Rich People Don’t Work More

    The meme is ubiquitous, and widely documented: Rich people work longer hours. Obvious implication: they deserve what they get, right? Ditto the poor. Bunk. Why? All the research supporting that meme looks at workers, not families. It completely ignores students, the retired, and anyone else who isn’t working. Alert the media: workers work and earn more than non-workers. And, news flash: rich families…

  • It Could Have Been My Kids. Or Yours.

    I have two daughters in college, a freshman and a junior. You’d love them. Everybody does. So when I see this video of a policeman casually walking along a line of college kids who are just sitting there, pepper spraying them right in the face, …and I think about this: … I think how easily…

  • Washington 1098: Will the Wealthy Leave the State?

    Update: It turns out, millionaires don’t care about income taxes. You’re a Washington business owner making $500,000 a year. You have millions, maybe tens of millions, in the bank. You live in a big, gorgeous house on the water on Mercer Island, with sunset views and your sailboat and powerboat out front. You and your…

  • Can John Gottman Predict Divorce? (Probably Not.)

    Update: Instead of saying “Probably Not” in the title, I probably should have said “We have no idea.” Being a Seattle parent with kids in private schools, I’ve been assailed for years by pronouncements and lectures by and about the Seattle-based Gottman Institute (tagline: “Researching and Restoring Relationships”). Their most widely known claim is their…

  • Does Having Kids Make You Happier?

    I can’t even begin to match the thinking and research that Bryan Caplan has done on the subject of kids and happiness (he’s writing a book titled Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids), but I can add my two bits, which generally support everything he says. Short story, the research generally says “no.” Over large…

  • Teenage Moms and Welfare Incentives

    Bryan Caplan has done yeoman’s duty for us all by reviewing “all the major research on the response of fertility to economic incentives.” He finds a “striking contrast” between two types of literature: In the “birth subsidy” literature, researchers usually find fairly large effects in the expected direction.  In the welfare literature, in contrast, most…

  • Shakespeare Authorship (sigh): They’re At It Again

    Yet again, we have Supreme Court justices giving credence to the wacky notion that William Shakespeare of Stratford did not write the plays of William Shakespeare. Reported in the the WSJ. It just goes to show that even supreme court justices who have long histories of probity and prudence can issue totally loony opinions. (cf…

  • Home-Work: Increase GDP by a Third?

    I wrote recently about the fact that non-remunerated work — anything that doesn’t involve a money transfer — isn’t included in GDP. So painting your mother’s house, fixing your car, or cooking dinner isn’t reflected in that key measure of our prosperity and well-being — even though that work quite clearly contributes greatly to our…

  • Medicare: Government Does It Right

    I recently had occasion to go through two years of my 84-year-old mom's medical and insurance statements, to be sure that everything was kosher and that insurers were, in fact, paying all the bills they were supposed to be paying. You've undoubtedly attempted similar, so you can imagine that it was a daunting task–trying to…

  • Europe vs. U.S.: Family Time Versus Four-by-Fours and Two-by-Fours

    Finally! Someone has come back at me (well he didn’t know he was talking to me) with the key, perhaps-trumping argument on my Europe vs. US longatribes. I gave this argument away in a previous post, hoping someone would pick it up, but have yet to hear it well enunciated elsewhere. Summary of my arguments:…

  • Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, yea unto the third and to the fourth generation

    It is both triply appropriate and at least triply ironic that this quotation (it’s Exodus 34:7, KJV) should lead off the first posting to this blog. First, because it’s all my father’s fault, rest his soul. (Isn’t everything? <g>) Everything you read here started with him. All of it: with one three-word opening line. Ben…