Yesterday #AdamSmith said things work pretty well when people have perfect liberty to choose a trade and where to practice it? In this half of the chapter he specifies the ways people aren’t at perfect liberty, and whose fault it is. (I.x.c.1) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets

And (spoiler) it's government policy’s fault! They restrain competition in some places, increase it in others, and obstruct free movement of labor. (I.x.c.2) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
Many government restraints on competition are “as foolish as can well be imagined.” Like how coachmakers can’t make the wheels for coaches, but wheelmakers can make coaches. (I.x.c.9) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
Lots of the rules he objects to have to do with apprenticeships, which may be one reason he’s not a fan of apprenticeship in general. (I.x.c.11) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
Your labor belongs to you. It’s unjust for anyone to interfere with your sacred right to work. That doesn’t mean they have to hire you, just that it is a violation if a guild or government forbids someone from working. (I.x.c.12) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
Our right to SmithTweet is sacred and inviolable! (I.x.c.12) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
Time to complain about apprenticeship again. It’s not even a guarantee of quality work! It doesn’t even make young people industrious! Unnecessary, idle, worthless. How do you really feel Dr. Smith?(I.x.c.13–16) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
Working in towns is more profitable, but towns rely on rural areas to keep them going. Trade, for Smith, is always as much about cooperation as competition.(I.x.c.19–26) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
Town workers can meet up more easily, so they are more protective of their trades, jealous of their secrets, and try to prevent competition by guilds and agreements when it can’t be outlawed. (I.x.c.22) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
Country labor requires a more diverse skill set, and while the workers sound “rustic” they are often heckin’ smarter than the more specialized town workers. (I.x.c.24) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
“People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public or in some contrivance to raise prices.” (I.x.c.27) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
We’d be mad about that, but in ch 8 he was equally annoyed by masters getting together to drive wages down. The point is everyone wants to make $$. Sometimes they behave badly as a result. (I.x.c.27) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
(This is why humans need all the stuff in Smith’s OTHER book, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, as well as all the stuff we’re tweeting about. It takes both pieces to be fully human.) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
It’s a mistake to think we can predict which trades will need workers and try to do artificial things to promote entry into those trades. It just overloads those trades and makes people poor.(I.x.c.33–37) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
Before the invention of printing, scholar = beggar. Before the invention of Twitter, SmithTweeter = (I.x.c.38) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
Stopping the free circulation of labor is bad for our general prosperity, and it’s inhumane to workers. It forces the poor to stay poor, and impedes their right of exit. (I.x.c.45–57) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
“Whenever the legislature attempts to regulate...between masters & their workmen, its counsellors are always the masters.” Smith is no fool. He knows all about the dangers of aristocracy of pull. (I.x.c.61) #WealthOfTweets #SmithTweets
We're not going to lie to you, Smithketeers. (oh, fine, Smithians.) #AdamSmith is really really bad at dividing up chapters in anything approaching an equal fashion. Chapter 11, coming tomorrow, is going to take almost 2 weeks to tweet. WORTH IT! #DigressionOnSilver

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So, as the #MegaMillions jackpot reaches a record $1.6B and #Powerball reaches $620M, here's my advice about how to spend the money in a way that will truly set you, your children and their kids up for life.

Ready?

Create a private foundation and give it all away. 1/

Let's stipulate first that lottery winners often have a hard time. Being publicly identified makes you a target for "friends" and "family" who want your money, as well as for non-family grifters and con men. 2/

The stress can be damaging, even deadly, and Uncle Sam takes his huge cut. Plus, having a big pool of disposable income can be irresistible to people not accustomed to managing wealth.
https://t.co/fiHsuJyZwz 3/

Meanwhile, the private foundation is as close as we come to Downton Abbey and the landed aristocracy in this country. It's a largely untaxed pot of money that grows significantly over time, and those who control them tend to entrench their own privileges and those of their kin. 4

Here's how it works for a big lotto winner:

1. Win the prize.
2. Announce that you are donating it to the YOUR NAME HERE Family Foundation.
3. Receive massive plaudits in the press. You will be a folk hero for this decision.
4. Appoint only trusted friends/family to board. 5/

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Great article from @AsheSchow. I lived thru the 'Satanic Panic' of the 1980's/early 1990's asking myself "Has eveyrbody lost their GODDAMN MINDS?!"


The 3 big things that made the 1980's/early 1990's surreal for me.

1) Satanic Panic - satanism in the day cares ahhhh!

2) "Repressed memory" syndrome

3) Facilitated Communication [FC]

All 3 led to massive abuse.

"Therapists" -and I use the term to describe these quacks loosely - would hypnotize people & convince they they were 'reliving' past memories of Mom & Dad killing babies in Satanic rituals in the basement while they were growing up.

Other 'therapists' would badger kids until they invented stories about watching alligators eat babies dropped into a lake from a hot air balloon. Kids would deny anything happened for hours until the therapist 'broke through' and 'found' the 'truth'.

FC was a movement that started with the claim severely handicapped individuals were able to 'type' legible sentences & communicate if a 'helper' guided their hands over a keyboard.
"I lied about my basic beliefs in order to keep a prestigious job. Now that it will be zero-cost to me, I have a few things to say."


We know that elite institutions like the one Flier was in (partial) charge of rely on irrelevant status markers like private school education, whiteness, legacy, and ability to charm an old white guy at an interview.

Harvard's discriminatory policies are becoming increasingly well known, across the political spectrum (see, e.g., the recent lawsuit on discrimination against East Asian applications.)

It's refreshing to hear a senior administrator admits to personally opposing policies that attempt to remedy these basic flaws. These are flaws that harm his institution's ability to do cutting-edge research and to serve the public.

Harvard is being eclipsed by institutions that have different ideas about how to run a 21st Century institution. Stanford, for one; the UC system; the "public Ivys".