Should Japan and South Korea Go Nuclear in Response to North Korea?

As North Korea becomes an increasing nuclear threat, North Korea becomes a central part of President Trump's foreign policy. Its capabilities are getting to the point where North Korea could hit anywhere in Japan, which means that North Korea could also hit South Korea. These increased capabilities make South Korea and Japan nervous because they are in firing range. However, they are covered under U.S. protection vis-à-vis the nuclear umbrella. At the same time, the United States would rather not get dragged into a military conflict in East Asia, not to mention that President Trump has made U.S.-South Korean relations uneasy since he became president. Instead of relying on the United States to provide protection, one suggested policy alternative is for South Korea and Japan to develop their own nuclear weapons.

Before I start, I would like to state that I would prefer a scenario or option of non-proliferation or nuclear disarmament. The havoc and devastation that nuclear weapons causes is jaw-dropping, as we saw with Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II. On the other hand, we have an oppressive despot that is unresponsive to economic sanctions or diplomacy towards disarmament or non-proliferation. Not only is North Korea not responsive, but North Korea's capabilities are getting better and better. There is a good chance that in the next few years, their ballistic missile capabilities will be able to reach the United States with accuracy (see current range below).

Right now, the balance of [nuclear] power in East Asia is that Russia, China, and North Korea are the ones with nuclear weapons. This is a nuclear version of "the bad guys have all the guns."As much as the United States and other developed nations have taken a stance towards non-proliferation, the truth is that we are looking at a bunch of unsavory options. Since North Korea isn't going to acquiesce if we ask nicely, the only way to stop North Korea before it acquires the desired capabilities is through military intervention (and even that is doubtful). Public policy is not about choosing some awesome option, but rather about choosing the least worst option.

One question is how would North Korea and its allies respond to Japan and South Korea acquiring nuclear weapons. Is North Korea pursuing nuclear weapons strictly for defensive purposes (much like it purports) or does North Korea has more nefarious plans in mind? If North Korea views nuclear armament as a way to protect itself, then Japan and South Korea acquiring nuclear weapons could either escalate the situation or create a situation of mutually-assured destruction (MAD). If North Korea has conquest or military conflict in mind, nuclear weapons would make more sense. Even if North Korea is not "suicidal" in the way you saw with kamikaze fighters in World War II, there is still room for miscalculation or elements within the North Korean military that could instigate undesirable outcomes. If North Korea is more unpredictable than the former Soviet Union was during the Cold War, it is going to be difficult to navigate this situation.

It is not just North Korea's response that is dubious. China is in a quandary. China won't meddle in North Korean affairs until it's too late either because it does not want to delegitimize its own regime or because China worries about North Korean retaliation. At the same time, China does not want Japan to have nuclear weapons, especially given China's history with Japan in the Second Sino-Japanese War. Plus, China does not want a scenario that invokes a U.S. military presence in East Asia. China is delicately walking on egg shells, to say the least. And as for Russia, it would benefit because it would reduce American power and increase its power in the region.

North Korea and its actors are not the only ones to have in mind. Japan has a particular aversion towards nuclear weapons because it is the only country that has experienced what nuclear weapons can unleash. When I analyzed South Korea and why the U.S. still guards the border, my concern based on that is that South Korea has been too reliant on U.S. help keeping North Korea in check. South Korean President Moon Jae-in stated last month that he doesn't want to pursue nuclear weapons because he doesn't want an arms race. At least with South Korea, they had nuclear arms on hand until 1991, so at least there is some precedence for South Korea.

Even if Japan and South Korea end up acquiring nuclear weapons, there is still a reality of international politics: alliances shift all the time. During World War II, the United States was allied with Russia until shortly after the end of the war. Afterwards, we had the Cold War. China went through a similar phase. Even now, take India as a more recent example. Historically, India was not particularly friendly towards Israel. Since the Modi regime, Israel and India have become closer than ever. Japan and South Korea have been allies to the United States for many years. However, Japan added Article 9 to its Constitution and took a more pacifist route precisely because of the havoc it reeked during World War Two. The reason I bring up alliances is that I would hate to see one problem be replaced with an even worse one, such as South Korea allying itself with China and sharing U.S. nuclear technology with China. Granted, Japan or South Korea have not given the world reason that they would develop military ambitions, but stranger things have happened before. Even so, there is nothing to indicate that this would end up being the case.

As long as North Korea becomes increasingly antagonistic, there is no easy decision on this front. This could go awry, and it could also become more difficult to persuade others to take a path of non-proliferation or disarmament in the future if we open this door. Nevertheless, based on what information we have, containment and deterrence are the best bet to keep North Korea at bay. Given that primary deterrence is preferable to extended deterrence, perhaps it is time for Japan and South Korea to have a modest stockpile, at least enough for second-strike capability. The U.S. is in no position to plausibly neutralize North Korea's missiles or prevent an initial North Korean attack on South Korea or Japan short of attacking North Korea preemptively. Although there are some risks to having Japan and South Korea having nuclear weapons, there are worse things than giving responsible, democratic nations a viable deterrent against a nuclear power like North Korea. I'll leave you with this quote from South Korean Saenuri party leader Won Yoo-Cheol:

"We cannot borrow an umbrella from our neighbor every time it rains. We need to have a raincoat and wear it ourselves."

#MeToo: Addressing the Nuance in the Sexual Assault Discussion

Last week, I noticed a social media campaign that was taking place: #MeToo. It was in response to a man named Harvey Weinstein. Before the #MeToo campaign, I had no idea who Harvey Weinstein was. Apparently, he is a Hollywood film producer and executive. But it goes beyond that. Earlier this month, multiple women made allegations of sexual harassment, sexual assault, and rape against Weinstein. In response to these allegations, people were tweeting and posting on Facebook the hashtag of #MeToo. I noticed that a number of my female friends, and even some male friends, were posting this hashtag. Essentially, those who had been sexually assaulted or harassed hash-tagged #MeToo, and some even shared their story. The idea behind this social media campaign was to bring awareness about the prevalence of sexual harassment and sexual assault. In the short-run, I think that the campaign succeeded, as it should. Rape, sexual assault, and sexual harassment have no place in civil society.

However, looking at these postings got me thinking about the TV series Law and Order: Special Victims Unit (SVU). Law and Order: SVU is the Law and Order series that covers sexually-based crimes. Sexual assault and harassment often come up as themes. I know that the show is fictionalized. Nevertheless, I have been watching it since it first aired, and what I can say is that it does a good job capturing the complexity behind sexual assault. There is the act of sexual assault itself: often, it is "he said, she said," "he said, he said," or "she said, they said".....you get the idea. Even if you can prove that sex or the given act took place, then there's the matter of proving malicious intent. None of this gets into statute of limitations, false reporting, underreporting, or stigmas and misconceived notions about men and women. It is with that appreciation for the complexity and nuance that I would like to proceed.

Sexual Assault Rates
I think it's important that if we are to identify a problem, we need to determine how prevalent it is. That is where rates come in: so we can determine the frequency with which something happens. I know the #MeToo hashtag covers sexual assault and sexual harassment, but I want to cover rape rates here because at least in part because it's easier to measure. The chart below shows the rape rate from 1972 to 2013. Since the early 1990s, the rate of forcible rape in the United States has dropped by nearly half. To be fair, rates had increased slightly since then from 25.9 to 28.6 per 100,000 from 2013 to 2016 (see FBI historic crime statistics here). This does not consider that the FBI changed its definition of rape in 2013, at least in part to include the rape of a male.

Source: AEI

The Bureau of Justice Statistics also has statistics of rape and sexual assault of women (Planty et al., 2013). Although the the most recent numbers in their reporting go back to 2010, there is at least an overall decrease in completed, threatened, and attempted sexual assault.

False Allegations
This is the least politically correct part of today's blog entry: talking about false allegations. Part of the issue is that many would feel more inclined to believe the victim over the suspect, at least in part because the victim would have less reason to lie than the suspect. Yet there have been instances in which false allegations have been made. While I don't want to minimize the trauma of an individual who has been sexually assaulted, I also want to make sure that we establish the facts and corroborate the evidence before condemning an individual in a court of law. Last time I checked, we are shooting for a legal system in which someone is "innocent until proven guilty." If a victim makes a false allegation against a suspect and it comes to light that said allegation is false, the life of the falsely accused individual is forever ruined. Do false allegations happen often enough where we need to be worried?

The definition of false allegation can be disputed. Are we talking about allegations that are formally filed with the police or does this also include informal, word-of-mouth allegations? Even getting past this definitional quandary, there has been difficulty finding an answer to that question. One meta-analysis from 2006 [see below] puts the range between 1.5 and 90 percent (Rumney, 2006). The wide range suggests inconclusiveness. Nevertheless, there is one oft-cited study (Lisak et al., 2010) that has the rate of false accusations at a range of 2 to 10 percent, although that study is disputed. In his textbook on false allegations, forensic scientist Brent Turvey estimates that the figure could be 8 to 41 percent.

While we cannot ascertain the truth about prevalence of false reporting through the statistical ambiguity, we do know it still happens with frequent enough occurrence where we should be mindful of it. In our attempt to get justice for sexual assault victims, we should become more sensitive, not less, to unfairly accused individuals because we do not want to create additional victims in the process.

Underreporting
Just because a crime is not reported does not mean it did not happen. The advantage here is that the statistics on underreporting are more reliable than those for false reporting. The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) in 2013 found that sexual assault was greatly underreported. Based on that study, Rape, Abuse, Incest National Network (RAINN) estimated that 40 percent of sexual assaults are reported, which is close to the general criminal victimization reporting rate of 35 percent. Although sexual assault is underreported, the silver lining is that it is not underreported more than other violent crimes. What we can say, though, is that underreporting occurs more frequently than false accusations.

Underreporting is not an issue with just sexual assault, but also sexual harassment. In a 2016 report from the Department of Labor's Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) on workplace harassment. Not only did the EEOC find that 25 to 85 percent of women are harassed in the workplace, but 75 percent found that they experienced retaliation when reporting. The EEOC also admitted that sexual harassment seminars at work are ineffective.

Some Thoughts Specifically on the #MeToo Hashtag
There are some benefits to the #MeToo hashtag, particularly for the victim. It provides the opportunity for the victim to tell the story, as well as letting the victim know that they are not the only one. There is empowerment for those who have been victimized, but I did find a few issues with it:

1. The hashtag lumped sexual harassment and sexual assault together. Neither are acceptable, but they are not the same thing. What this hashtag did was blur the line between acts with very different magnitudes of unacceptability. 
2. I wonder if this social media campaign will go beyond a temporary trend. Paralleling the experiences of protests and of boycotts, it is not easy to actualize change. You need a targeted, massive enough of a collective that lasts long enough to make change. If a short-lived social media campaign is a substitute for actual political change, we'll revert back to status quo in a matter of days.
3. The #MeToo hashtag assumed that women are always the victims of sexual assault and men are always the perpetrators. This is simply not true. As this Slate article brings up, men are sexually assaulted almost as frequently as women (Stemple and Meyer, 2014). It is difficult for women to discuss sexual assault. Given the hypermasculinity in the United States, imagine how much more difficult it is for men to disclose. This is why I applaud the FBI for revising its definition to omit mentions of physical force or that rape can only happen to a woman. 

Conclusion
What I was hoping to accomplish here is to not reduce the discussion to "women are victims" and "men are predators." This ill-conceived notion not only causes a divide between the sexes, but it also contradicts reality, which interestingly enough, also plays out in the area of domestic violence. The vast majority of men are not rapists or predators. The vast majority of victims that are reporting rape or sexual assault are not lying. Much like with other crimes, there is an issue of underreporting. These are some of the nuances that we should keep in mind moving forward.

I also don't want us to get sucked into an argument about "rape culture" simply because it sounds trendy or "cut and dry." I looked at the topic of sexual assault on college campuses about three years ago, and the "one in five women is sexually assaulted on campus" statistic is exaggerated by a factor of 33! Granted, colleges are a demographic subset, but at the same time, a good point was brought up by the RAINN, the largest national organization dedicated to fighting sexual assault, on the issue of "rape culture":

"Rape is caused not by cultural factors but by the conscious decisions, of a small percentage of the community to commit a violent crime...[Blaming it on 'rape culture'] has the paradoxical effect of making it harder to stop sexual violence, since it removes the focus from the individual at fault, and seemingly mitigates personal responsibility for his or her own actions." 

I see the temptation about blaming it on "rape culture," but the truth is that male sexual aggressiveness has existed in every society. Dare I say that there is definitely a biological component to sex drives. In [Orthodox] Judaism, the recognition of this fact is why there are safeguards that separate men from women. I'm not to say that the Orthodox views on sexuality are perfect (because they're not!), but what I am saying is that there might be a point with regards to the power of sexual urges.

Without getting into a debate about how men and women are different, what I can say is that because people are not equal, there will be imbalances in power. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. This is why, as a libertarian, I am for smaller government. This is also why I believe in checks and balances: so that dominating personalities don't abuse power. The same goes for our cultural institutions. When men like Weinstein gain and abuse power, we should use our freedom of speech to call him out on it. We should have free of an economy as possible so individuals do not feel that being sexually exploited is the only way to get ahead or retain a certain position or station in life.

A freer society is an indirect way of solving the issue, but there are also more direct ways of approaching the issue. How about when there is some "locker room talk" or someone does some catcalling, how about call out the person for their bad behavior? Can workplaces create a way to anonymously report sexual abuse and create a better environment for workers? What about simply treating people decently because they are human beings? We can get into preventative measures that could be taken to render a sexual assault less likely to happen (e.g., self-defense course, carry a gun or taser). However, the blame ultimately goes to the assaulter or rapist, not the victim, because the criminal is the one expressing a blatant disregard for others. Perhaps laws that make it easier to prosecute sexual assault or modified police training to better navigate sexual crimes would be apropos. What it would take to get sexual assault crime rates down will continue to be a debate. What this does remind me of is that real-life problems, especially on such a large scale, cannot be summarized in a soundbite, hashtag, or Facebook status.

The Jones Act: How This Protectionism Harms Puerto Rico and the Rest of the U.S.

It has been about a month since Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico, and the Puerto Rican community remains devastated by the damage caused. Only a small portion of people have water and electricity again. It will probably take months for the island to recover from this tragedy. One of the responses from President Trump is to temporarily waive the Merchant Marine Act of 1920, which is better known as the Jones Act. You are probably wondering what a shipping act that is nearly a century old has to do with Puerto Rico in 2017.

The Jones Act is a law that regulates maritime commerce between U.S. ports in U.S. waters. The Act states that all goods carried between U.S. ports must be done so on U.S. flag-ships constructed in the U.S., owned by U.S. citizens, and manned by U.S. citizens or permanent residents. The law was created shortly after the end of WWI as a national defense measure against the potential of [German] U-boats attacking, specifically to have a solid supply of marine vessels. Essentially, if the United States found itself in a national state of emergency or under attack, it could better secure its shipments and navy, thereby better securing U.S. commerce.

I want to get less into whether the Jones Act should have been law in the first place, and focus more on whether Congress should repeal the Jones Act. Based on the blog entry I wrote earlier this year about Trump's "Buy American," you can already take an educated guess as to how I feel about the Jones Act. We can bypass the irony that Trump is very pro-"Buy American" and yet temporarily rescinded an Act that is about as "Buy American" as it can get, but let's take a look at the Jones Act specifically in further detail.

Economic Costs
One of the major criticisms of the Jones Act is that it makes shipping goods from U.S. port to U.S. port more expensive. This should be no surprise since this is a predictable economic outcome. Why? When foreign-owned or foreign-operated shipping vessels cannot transport between ports in the United States, the competition in this market is subject to less competition. Here is some research to back up the economic theory that the Jones Act causes economic harm:

• The Congressional Research Service (CRS) released a 2014 reporting finding how the Jones Act made it about three times more expensive to ship petroleum between U.S. ports (CRS, p. 9). 
• In 2012, the New York Federal Reserve Bank found that shipping a 24-foot container from the mainland to Puerto Rico cost $3,063. It cost $1,503 to ship that same container to the Dominican Republic, which is further away from the mainland than Puerto Rico. The major culprit as to why it costs twice as much to ship goods to Puerto Rico? The Jones Act.
• In her paper on Puerto Rico, World Bank Chief Economist Anne Kruger points out how the Jones Act creates a particularly negative effect for Puerto Rico and that by repealing it, the Jones Act could help the Puerto Rican economy be on the mend. 
• In 2012, two professors from University of Puerto Rico estimated that the Jones Act cost the Puerto Rican economy $17 billion from 1990 to 2010 (Valentin-Mari and Alameda-Lozada, 2012; [see infographic below]).
• The World Economic Forum calculated that the Jones Act costs the United States economy $200 million a year in shipping costs. 
• The Right-leaning Manhattan Institute estimated in 2015 that the Jones Act increased gas prices in the U.S. by 15¢. Fifteen cents might not seem a lot, but think of how often gasoline is used, both by individuals driving vehicles and business transporting goods. That fifteen cents a gallon adds up very quickly. 
• As another example of cost, that same Manhattan Institute report estimated that because foreign ships cannot ship liquefied natural gas, Puerto Ricans pay an extra 30 percent for electricity. 
• One recent study from the Grassroot Institute (Kashian et al., 2017) estimated that the Jones Act creates $163 million of domestic activity for shipping jobs while costing $3 billion in economic costs. Since places like Hawaii, Alaska, and Puerto Rico are disproportionately dependent on shipping, they would benefit from the repeal of the Jones Act. 
• Drewry, an independent maritime consulting firm, found that Jones-compliant ships cost about four times as much to construct as foreign ships (also see CRS report here). It should be no surprise that the U.S. went from being 16.9 percent of the world's fleet in 1960 to 0.4 percent in 2014 (Grennes, 2017).

National Security Argument
I can hear proponents of the Jones Act arguing that the economic costs could be worth the national security benefits. Let's examine that for a bit. Even if we accept the assertion that the "national security" argument was valid back in 1920, it has much less validity now. Why? Air transport for shipping purposes didn't exist back then. We have made advancements in railroads, trucks, and pipelines. As an additional side note, the Cato Institute argues how the Jones Act endangers seamen, which would be another facet as to how the Jones Act actually diminishes national security.

You know the Jones Act has to be bad when the neoconservative Heritage Foundation, a think-tank that often is in favor of national security arguments, does not even accept the Jones Act's national security premise (Loris et al., 2014). As the Heritage Foundation brings up, 1,072 ships were Jones-eligible. By 2014, that number decreased to 90 ships. There are very few Jones-Eligible ships that are used for military operations. As a matter of fact, the Department of Defense for Military Sealift Command (MSC) vessels is typically to use lease foreign vessels with military capacity (CRS, 2010, p. 3). In its 2017 report on the Jones Act (Grennes, 2017), the Mercatus Center scrutinizes the national security argument, as well as illustrates economic costs.

As an aside point, the fact that Presidents often waive the Jones Act, much like we see with Hurricane Maria, illustrates how the Jones Act threatens national security in disaster response. In short, the national security argument is nothing more than a smokescreen.

Conclusion
I don't think Trump temporarily rescinding the Jones Act will do much because a) it is to only last for 10 days, and b) Puerto Rico gets most of its oil from outside the U.S. due to the adverse effects of the Jones Act. But I will say this: the research on the Jones Act over the past 25 years consistently tells us that the Jones Act incurs considerable economic costs and contributes to increasing energy costs. What's more is that the national security justification has outlived its usefulness. The Jones Act is another example of why protectionism is harmful: because it protects and benefits a small group of well-connected producers while harming everyone else. The reason customers don't complain about something like the Jones Act is because like with other forms of protectionism, it is difficult for the consumer to see the costs. When I point out how shipping costs are increased because of the Jones Act, this is not just about numbers. Especially when looking at a place as greatly affected as Puerto Rico, we are talking about the ability of people to afford cost of living. The Jones Act makes it that much harder for people to have a livelihood, which affects people in more ways than one.

The Jones Act should not just be waived, but repealed. Aside from the aforementioned reasons, repealing the Jones Act would lower the costs of coastal shipping by 67 percent (Lewis, 2013). Do I think that repealing the Jones Act will solve all of Puerto Rico's woes? No. As I have mentioned before (see here and here), Puerto Rico contends with multiple issues, ranging from economic barriers to harmful tax code exemptions to debt issues. I hope that this blog entry can help shatter the illusion that the Jones Act is of benefit to the American people.

Parsha Noach: Was Noah Really All That Righteous?

It's all relative. The intuition behind that idiom is that something may or may not be what it seems depending on what that something is being compared to. I think that goes for people, as well. Someone like Thomas Jefferson was considered enlightened for his time. However, we would not consider his views on slavery enlightened for a 21st-century, democratic society. We actually see this notion play out in this week's Torah portion with Noah:

נח איש צדיק תמים היה, בדרתיו. את האלהים התהלך נח.

Noah was a righteous and whole-hearted man in his generation; Noah walked with G-d. - Genesis 6:9

This passage in Genesis calls Noah a righteous man (צדיק). The word צדיק is not thrown around lightly in Judaism. Think of it as analogous to the "one percenters" of Jewish spirituality. Noach was righteous enough where he and his family were the only ones on the planet spared from the Flood.  Noah is also referred to as תמים (whole-hearted). The word תמים can also mean unblemished or simple, which brings up some ambiguity. The word תמים, however, is generally viewed in a positive light in this verse (also see Psalms 15 and 101:6). You would think that Noah's status is unblemished and beyond reproach. However, there is a clarifier that casts doubt on Noah's righteousness: "in his generation" (בדרתיו). This caveat is so important that it caused a debate amongst the rabbis.

The phrase בדרתיו can be used to argue either in favor of or against Noah. One can argue that because Noah prevailed in such a corrupt society, Noah would have been, a fortiori, even greater had he lived in another generation (Rashi; Resh Lakish in Talmud, Sanhedrin 108a). On the other hand, one could argue that only by comparison to the rest of his generation was Noah righteous. Another way to say this: If Noah had lived in another generation, he would not have been considered righteous (Ramban). Which one is it? Was Noah adequately righteous or was his righteousness merely relative to his contemporaries?

One can argue that being average in absolute terms during such a time of such depravity is precisely why Noah is referred to as righteous. This is why R. Eliyahu Kitov argued that the righteous of each generation ought to be judged in the terms of their own time (Sefer HaParshiyos). Even so, this solidified why I am inclined to believe that Noah's righteousness was relative for three reasons. One is that Noah walked with G-d. As Rashi points out, walking with G-d meant that Noah needed G-d's support to spiritually advance. Conversely, Abraham walked in front of G-d (Genesis 17:1), meaning that Abraham's righteousness was good unto itself. The second reason for thinking his righteousness was relative was how Noah reacted after the Flood. My take on Noah post-Flood is that he was dealing with a combination of PTSD and coming off a spiritual high. Noah built the ark and survived the Flood. His mission was complete. He ended up building a vineyard (Genesis 9:20), getting drunk (Genesis 9:21), and according to the Talmud (Sanhedrin 70a), was either castrated or sodomized by his son. Noah fell low enough where his sons were ashamed to look at him (Genesis 9:23). Needless to say, Noah did not handle his emotions well post-Flood. If Noah were that righteous, he would not have faltered the way he did.

The third reason is even more intriguing: Noah did not protest G-d's verdict nor did he attempt to save his contemporaries, which is contrasting to Abraham's response to Sodom and Gomorra. This reason is implied in the Talmud (Shabbat 55a) and explicitly stated in the Zohar (Zohar Mashatot, Bereshit 254b). According to the Zohar, Noah did not attempt to save a single person or beg G-d to change His verdict. The Hebrew for Noah (נח) has the same root for the word "comfortable" (נוח). While it is true that Noah did not harm others and he was able to withstand corruptive influences of his generation, he did not do good towards others. This is why in the Zohar, G-d calls Noah a "foolish shepherd." He receded into his comfort zone. In terms of individual responsibility, Noah was fine. As for collective responsibility, Noah did nothing to contribute to the betterment of mankind. The Golden Rule is important and vital. It creates a basic respect for humankind. However, that is not all we are here to do. Certainly from a Jewish point of view, a spiritual vocation does not mean isolation or a monastic lifestyle. It means contributing to the world so that it is better than when you found it. This lack of responsibility towards others is why Noah's righteousness comes with a big caveat. If we want to avoid the downfall of Noah, the righteousness we express through our thoughts, words, and deeds cannot be in isolation and cannot be done strictly for our own benefit. We need to help others, and by doing so, can we truly live a life towards righteousness.

10-16-17 Policy Digest: Iran, Clean Power Plan, and Obamacare

There was so much that happened last week in the world of public policy that I am taking a slightly different format. Rather than go in-depth on one issue, I will briefly cover three issues: the Iran Deal, the Clean Power Plan, and Obamacare. Aside from the time crunch on my end, the reason for covering it in an abridged digest format is because I have already covered these topics in further detail. With that, let's begin.

The Iran Deal
Last Friday, President Trump announced that he is going to decertify the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, more colloquially known as the Iran Deal. This decertification will give Congress 60 days to determine if they want to re-impose sanctions on Iran. This position is a compromise on Trump's end since he despises the Iran deal while his aides like it. The basis of the Iran Deal is to make sure that Iran does not become a North Korea-like nuclear power threatening the world. Trump's assertion is that it is not working. I took a look at the Iran Deal both when it first came out and one year after in 2016. My conclusion? The Iran Deal is doing what it is supposed to be doing. If Congress reimposes sanctions, there is legitimate concern that the United States' trust in the international sphere will be eroded as a result. Not only that, but Iran could shift blame towards the United States since Iran has been complying with the Iran Deal. Since the Iran Deal is succeeding at keeping Iran's nuclear capabilities contained, there is no logical reason for Trump to rattle the cage.  

Clean Power Plan
On Tuesday, October 10, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that they would repeal the Clean Power Plan. EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt claimed that CPP repeal will save $30 billion over the next ten years. Personally, I'm glad that the EPA repealed the CPP. I analyzed the CPP three years ago, and I surmised that the CPP would only reduce global temperatures by 0.2º, which is a far cry from what we would need to avert the cataclysmic effects predicted by climate scientists. For more recent analyses on why the CPP is inadequate, you can read from the Cato Institute, Heritage Foundation (also see here), Manhattan Institute, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Obamacare
If that were not enough, President Trump signed an executive order on the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare. There are those criticizing it as Trump's attempt to unilaterally dismantle Obamacare, which critics argue would roll back health care offerings in the U.S. (see here, here). See analyses from the Cato Institute, Forbes, and Heritage Foundation as to why Trump's executive order is not so bad. In either case, something needs to be done to stop Obamacare. For more on the issues with Obamacare, see my list of 15 reasons as to why Obamacare is poor policy.

Should Partisan Gerrymandering Be Allowed?

Last week, the Supreme Court began its new session and brought in the new session with a doozy of a case: Gill v. Whitford. This case is set to determine whether partisan gerrymandering is constitutional or not. Partisan gerrymandering is the practice of drawing [congressional] district lines in order to give one party an advantage over the other. The term comes from when Massachusetts governor Elbridge Gerry signed a redistricting bill in 1812 in a way where the district was shaped like a salamander, hence the portmanteau "gerrymander." Two main methods of gerrymandering are concentrating the opponent's voters into one district ("packing") or by spreading out the opponent's votes throughout multiple districts ("cracking"). In the case of Gill v. Whitford, the contention is that the Republicans in Wisconsin drew the district lines in such a way to provide the Republicans more seats in the state assembly than the Democrats.

The plaintiffs are arguing using a method calculating what is referred to as the "efficiency gap" (see more here for further details). The efficiency gap is calculated by taking the difference between "wasted votes" (i.e., votes beyond what are necessary to win an election) for each party and dividing that difference by the total number of votes. Anything beyond 7 percent would show that one party is getting a wasted-vote advantage, and would [based on their argument] be gaining undue advantage. The defendants are arguing that the efficiency gap not only fails to take in such traditional criteria as contiguity and compactness, but also that the redistricting ought to be challenged on a district-by-district basis. This Supreme Court case will be important because it will determine how congressional districts will be drawn in the future. The question is whether we have a case of politicians drawing district lines in such a way where politicians choose their constituents instead of constituents choosing their politicians.

As the Washington Post points out, 83 percent of the decline in swing districts between 1997 and 2017 was due to the political evolution of the American voter (i.e., it had nothing to do with redistricting). What this means is that the Republican's rise to power in 2010 did not have to do with gerrymandering. However, the solidification of the Republican hold in Congress is being maintained by gerrymandering. This, of course, is to insulate themselves from competition and insure their incumbency. This makes sense if the lines are drawn in their favor: it would become more expensive for a challenger to campaign in that district. Conversely, even in districts that are dominated by one party, there is still evidence of there being competitiveness within the primary election (Hirano and Snyder, 2014; Abramowitz et al., 2006). Furthermore, the effects of gerrymandering are exacerbated by the fact that voting is not based on issues or candidates like it used to be; it is based on parties.

There is also a question of how much it has polarized legislators. One can argue that gerrymandering has a negligible effect on Congressional polarization (McCarty et al., 2009), which would mean that the polarization is because of how Democrats and Republicans represent moderate districts. Even if the districts are drawn to be more heterogeneous and competitive, the impact on polarization would be minimal. Some, however, disagree about the polarization, and argue that gerrymandering causes more polarized politicians to be elected (Caughey et al., 2017). In terms of polarization, gerrymandering deviates the results away from broader statewide attitudes (Mattingly and Vaughn, 2014). And to think none of this gets into how gerrymandering makes creating third parties all the more difficult.

Additionally, I have to wonder how much of an advantage the parties have had as a result of gerrymandering. Historically speaking, fair districts have been the norm, not the exception. More to the point, there has been a roughly even balance of wasted votes from both parties (Stephanopolous and McGhee, 2014), which would mean that gerrymandering is not as bad as perceived. Other good news: gerrymandering does not increase the rate of incumbency (Friedman and Holden, 2009).

While gerrymandering is not the cause of all political woes, there are still enough problems where it needs to be reformed, regardless of the party that is doing the gerrymandering. Gerrymandering invites more overt corruption, especially when our governance should be representative of the people. The question is how does one reform the redistricting process. One facet that will make this Supreme Court case messier is that there are other measures of a gerrymander, which implies that there is no obvious system that gives people the optimal representation. The Supreme Court is going to have to sift through a question that is not just about politics, but also mathematics and cartography. The two main questions are who draws the lines and how they should be drawn. There ought to be such traditional criteria as being contiguous, compact, and congruent. There is the question of whether or not an independent commission is a good idea because of the mixed results (Henderson et al., 2017).

Ultimately, the Gill case has major ramifications. If the Supreme Court defines the "efficiency gap" as a principled and objective manner of drawing district lines, then Gill v. Whitford will change electoral politics for the foreseeable future.

11-13-2017 Addendum: The Cato Institute recently released an essay on why libertarians, and indeed everyone, should care about the implications of partisan gerrymandering. 

LIHEAP: Maybe the Government Has a Role in Subsidizing Heating...at Least In the Short-Term

Now that it's Fall, I am reminded that wintertime is not that far off. I live in a place where winters are nowhere near as bad when I was living in Wisconsin. I remember that one winter in Wisconsin, it reached -30ºF, and that was without wind chill. Without having an adequate enough of a heating system, my guess is that I would not have made it through that winter or any other winter. I would hardly consider myself rich, but at the same time, I have always had access to heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) when I needed it. There are some who do not have such access or have a harder time paying for energy during the winter or summer. This is where LIHEAP comes in.

In 1981 under the Reagan Administration, the United States Congress created LIHEAP, the Low-Income Energy Assistance Program. The purpose of LIHEAP is to provide assistance to households that pay a disproportionately high amount in meeting their immediate home energy needs. LIHEAP is currently managed by the Health and Human Services' (HHS) Administration for Children and Families (ACF). In its most recent LIHEAP report to Congress, the ACF pointed out that in 2014, LIHEAP helped 5.7 million families with heating and 673,000 with cooling. There is also the case to be made that LIHEAP helps the most vulnerable. 90 percent of LIHEAP households either have children, disabled individuals, or senior citizens. This suggests not only this directly helps many low-income households, but that it helps those who are disadvantaged.

The economic theory that would support having LIHEAP in the first place is the market failure of a negative externality. The idea here is that on its own, the market fails to provide an adequate output level of affordable energy for people to make it through arduous seasons. The LIHEAP subsidy is supposed to push private demand up to social demand, thereby creating greater social benefit. Given where I lie on the political spectrum, I used to take the opinion of "there isn't a subsidy out there I like." The reason is that the government's attempt to subsidize comes with unintended consequences, and usually makes things worse. In 2014, I came across the first subsidy I did like: the birth control subsidy. At that moment, I realized that it is more prudent to look at subsidies on the individual level instead of assuming a generalization (even if it is true) because an exception might come along. The question here is whether the LIHEAP subsidy falls under the exception of being a helpful subsidy or not.

I started to ask myself this question when I read this policy brief from the Urban Institute entitled "Eliminating LIHEAP would leave poor families in the cold." What makes it difficult to ascertain the impacts is that the ACF has not conducted an evaluation of any kind since 2005. And even that 2005 evaluation was a case study, and not a nation-level evaluation. We do, however, have a study showing that cutting LIHEAP would decrease energy security amongst low-income households by 17 percent (Murray and Mills, 2014), which would indicate that LIHEAP actually helps out those in need. Plus, the Center of Poverty and Social Policy at Columbia University estimates that 200,000 would transition into poverty as a result of eliminating LIHEAP.

There is a concern over fraud rates. A 2010 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found that the fraud rate for LIHEAP was 9 percent. With a program that cost nearly $3.4 billion for FY2017 (see LIHEAP funding history), that comes out to about $305 million. Urban Institute questions whether the fraud rate is still that high because it asserts that improvements on verification and monitoring have been made in the past seven years (e.g., improved program monitoring data in May 2017). Assuming that these initiatives have decreased fraud, that means fraud is less prevalent of an issue.

So here we have a program that is relatively well-targeted and actually provides the service it promises to provide. Sure it could use some tweaks, but generally, LIHEAP is doing pretty well for itself. Since successfully providing a service is a rarity in the world of public policy, I would consider that enough for government to play a role in subsidizing heating. However, my main issue with LIHEAP is that it does not address why energy costs are growing at a faster rate than wage growth (also see here). The subsidy simply provides a cash transfer to help low-income households with their utility bills. My contention is that such a subsidy could be contributing to higher energy costs. The reason for this concern is looking at how the U.S. government subsidizes college tuition. Federal subsidies are the primary culprit for rising college tuition costs because it's a demand-side subsidy, and that contributes to rising costs. Granted, LIHEAP is nowhere near as large or prevalent as federally subsidized student loans, but it should make one pause.

Even so, we need to ask why energy costs growing this quickly in the first place. This certainly is a discussion for another time and another blog entry, but we need a better focus on bringing energy efficiency to low-income housing so their energy bills can go down. If we cannot address this issue, LIHEAP is at best a temporary bandage over an increasingly large problem. By finding ways to provide energy at a lower cost can we solve the main issue LIHEAP is trying to mitigate.

Las Vegas Shooting: Why Mental Illness Is a Poor Target for Gun Violence

Las Vegas experienced the worst mass shooting in recent history this week. Stephen Paddock fired an automatic weapon into a crowd of people at a country music festival. It left nearly 60 dead and over 500 injured. Many people have been speculating as to why Paddock would do something so horrible. We are still unclear on motive as of date, but one of the running theories is that Paddock might have been mentally ill. Although Paddock did not show any signs of mental illness before, his father, Benjamin Hoskins Paddock, was a psychopathic robber. There is an argument to be made that psychopathy and other mental disorders have a genetic component to it. Even if it is not the sole factor, it would not be a surprise if mental illness played a role in it. In response to the Las Vegas shooting, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan advocated for mental health reform. The National Rifle Association (NRA) has also taken this approach in the past of addressing mental health over gun control. Most Americans think that mental illness is a major cause of mass shootings (Gallup). Since there plausibly will be a conversation about mental illness and gun ownership in the weeks to come, I might as well ask the question: how much would addressing mental illness affect rates of violence?

The argument for addressing mental health reform in response to mass shootings goes something like this. A normal, mentally stable individual would not commit such an act. In mass shootings, the percent of shooters with mental illness range from 11 percent to 22 percent. By addressing mental illness and better providing access to mental health facilities, we can better prevent gun violence in the United States. Here are a few issues I take with the argument:

1. We like to focus on mass shootings as representative of gun violence in America, but the truth is that mass shootings account for a small fraction of gun violence in the United States. Historically, mass shootings have accounted for 1.2 percent of gun homicides. Let's not forget that gun homicides only account for about a third of gun deaths, which means that mass shootings only account for about 0.4 percent of gun deaths. 
2. Between 2001 and 2010, only 5 percent of gun homicides were committed by those with a mental illness (Metzl et al., 2015). Most gun violence is caused by something other than mental illness (Swanson et al., 2015). Since most people who are violent do not have a mental illness, it has to make one wonder about efficacy of targeting mental illness.
3. According to one epidiomelogical study, eliminating the adverse effects of mental illness would only reduce violence by 4 percent (Swanson et al., 2015). Much like most people who are violent don't have a mental illness, most people with a mental illness are not violent. Only about 4 percent of people who have mental illness are violent (Swanson et al., 2014; Stuart, 2004).
4. This assumes that we can target the dangerous individuals through better mental health access. There is research that shows that risk prediction works better for low-risk individuals than high-risk individuals (Fazel et al., 2012).

The criminal use of firearms is a violation of the nonaggression axiom. Protecting citizens against rights-violating actions can easily be construed as a legitimate role of the government, even for those who advocate for limited government. The libertarian Cato Institute believes that using mental health reform could help individuals, provided that the mental health assistance applies to those who could legitimately cause harm and also make sure that civil rights are protected in the process. The APA agrees that the intervention should be specifically targeted for those who possess behaviors for increased likelihood of violence, as opposed to generally targeting those who need mental health treatment. Plus, voluntary mental health treatment is more cost-efficient in the long-run.

My issue with trying to target mental illness to lower gun violence is that it lacks a coherent risk-identification strategy. Additionally, most violent people don't have a mental illness and most people with mental illness don't commit violence. The connection between mental health and violence is tenuous at best (Metzl and MacLeish, 2015). I am worried about further stigmatization of mental illness when mental health access is just as important, and in some cases more important, than physical health. I am also worried that such a targeting would discourage individuals from getting treatment for mental health issues, which would cause all sorts of social costs. Pouring all those resources into a major mental health reform effort to lower violence would be low-yield and ineffective. Mental health reform should take place, but given the lack of correlation between mental illness and gun violence, mental health reform and gun reform should be analyzed and enacted separately.

Another "Medicare for All" Bill From Bernie Sanders, Another Attempt at Single-Payer Failure

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. That quote is commonly attributed to Albert Einstein, but today, I would like to apply the content of the quote to Bernie Sanders. Sanders loves clinging to the failed idea of socialism. He wants to provide free college. He thinks that breaking up big banks will help (it won't). He even mistakenly believes that Denmark is socialist when in fact it is even more of a free-market nation than the United States. But there is one idea of his that doesn't want to die: single-payer healthcare. Last week, Sanders introduced the Medicare for All Act of 2017. Unlike his failed attempt to introduce a single-payer healthcare bill back in 2013, this Act received the backing of 15 Democratic Senators. Single-payer healthcare is gaining traction in this country, and seeing how the fight over Obamacare has gone, it is not difficult to see why. Plus, there are those on the Left who think that if we centralize the buying power into the federal government, we can bring healthcare costs down and improve the quality of healthcare.

This should be a shorter blog entry because this is not the first time I covered the topic of single-payer healthcare. In 2013, I looked at single-payer through an economic theory lens and it wasn't flattering. In November 2016, I examined Colorado's referendum for a statewide single-payer healthcare system, and it was as unflattering as it was costly. Most relevantly, I wrote a piece back in January 2016 that not only analyzed the three most prominent cases of single-payer healthcare (and even these countries feature some role for private insurance), but also scrutinized the "Medicare for All" plan that Sanders proposed while on the presidential campaign trail. Although I was staunchly opposed to his "Medicare for All" bill in 2016, there is still a theoretical possibility that Sanders worked out the kinks. Let's take a brief look.

While single payer comes off as alluring, the biggest concern is that of cost. Sanders doesn't have a clear idea of how this will exactly be funded, which should be a red flag right there. However, he has a list of options of how to finance "Medicare for All," which primarily consists of a list of taxes on the rich that we can increase. Since he is unsure as to how exactly he is going to fund it, I am going to avoid (at least for the time being) comparing his financing options currently versus who he proposed back in 2016. What I can say is that if Sanders, by some miracle, were able to pass all the proposed policy alternatives, it would generate $16.2 trillion in tax revenue. All of this assumes, of course, we take Sanders' estimates at face value, which is not something I would do given how he was so off base back in 2016. Since we don't know how Sanders would finance "Medicaid for All" yet, it is premature to officially say whether his bill is fiscal insolvency. However, if estimates from his 2016 proposal are any indication, this bill is insolvent. According to the Left-leaning Urban Institute, Sanders' 2016 proposal would have cost $32 trillion, which would potentially be a shortfall of over $15 trillion!

Let's think of the cost in another way. Medicare's cost curve is already unacceptable (Steurele, 2015). The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) project that the trust fund for Medicare is to be depleted by 2029. Looking at other countries, implementing single-payer did not keep costs down, but rather expanded the cost curve. Colorado and California had similar issues when trying to implement single-payer healthcare. Sanders' home state of Vermont could not pass a single-payer bill because, "surprise, surprise," single-payer healthcare does not contain costs in theory or in practice. Increasing the aggregate demand for healthcare without working on increasing the supply would actually increase prices: who would have thought? The Bernie Sanders of 1987 surely understood that concept (see below). What happened to him in the past 30 years with regards to healthcare reform is beyond me.

This is more an exercise of one Jew kvetching about another Jew's incapability of understanding the basics of economics than it is anything else. However, I do worry, not because I think this bill will pass. Given the Republican majority in both chambers of Congress, I'm not worried about that. Plus, the recent Obamacare debates show that the American people are leery of drastic changes to the healthcare system. Sanders' bill could be positioning the Democratic Party for whenever it gets itself back into power. What is scariest about this bill, though, is how far to the Left the Democratic Party is moving. My liberal friends often complain about how far to the Right the Republicans have moved, but they should also take a look at the party they are most likely to be sympathetic towards. This is scary because the government has botched up Obamacare so badly, not to mention single-payer systems such as the Veterans Affairs (VA) or Indian Health Affairs (IHA). Why should I trust the government with more power over healthcare when it has proven its incapacity to run healthcare exchanges or adequately provide health under the VA or the IHA?

If it does gain enough traction one day, that is what is scary. According to the Peterson Institute for International Economics, the United States is the only major economy facing a sizable increase in public debt burden. The bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget illustrates how Sanders' plan would increase the debt-to-GDP ratio nearly 60 points over the next decade (see below). As previously mentioned, we already have issues with affording Medicare, and turning it into a single-payer system would merely exacerbate our debt issues. It is not just an issue of cost. Since Medicare pays doctors far less than private insurers (and therefore are less likely to see Medicare patients), there is also legitimate concern that doctors would refuse to participate in "Medicare for All." As observed with Obamacare, the technical and administrative transitions would be horrendous. However, that is not going to stop the Democrats on pushing something like this.

The truth of the matter is that the Democrats are much more unified on healthcare than the Republicans are. For those of us who want less government involved in the healthcare marketplace, this needs to be a wake-up call. It might be tempting to dismiss single-payer outright since the Democrats don't have a workable plan. That is why alternatives to reform the system are vital. As but one example, the centrist Brookings Institution suggests, in response to Sanders, universal catastrophic coverage. Brookings asserts that it would combine the Left's dream of universal access and the Right's dream of using market forces to best efficient and cost-effective. In any case, if proponents of limited government or a freer healthcare market don't come up with something, we could wake up in an America that not only has healthcare completely controlled by government, but ends up being more bloated and inefficient than it ever has been before.