Best Libertarian Jew Blog Posts of 2019

As we close out the year 2019, and indeed this decade, I like to reflect on the previous year and see what to look forward to in the upcoming year. With the impeachment of Donald Trump, the elections of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Indian President Narendra Modi, protestors in Hong Kong, increased tensions in the Gulf region, and increased refugees from Central America and Venezuela, it has been anything but a dull year. As always, I am thankful for your readership. As such, here is a recap of the best of the Libertarian Jew blog for 2019, in chronological order.

1. Top Marginal Tax Rate of 70 Percent. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) proposed this sheer brilliance. The problem with that idea working is economic history and economics don't work in its favor.  
2. Elizabeth Warren's Wealth Tax. Presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren wants to implement a wealth tax in the United States. The issue is that it has not panned out so well in Europe. 
3. A Nuanced View on Masculinity. The razor manufacturer Gillette aired a commercial about "toxic masculinity." Here is my take on the commercial specifically, as well as a healthy way to approach masculinity in a country that is culturally divided. 
4. Psychedelic Mushrooms. Earlier this year, Denver was the first city to legalize psychedelic mushrooms. Read to find out why it was the right ballot decision. 
5. "I'm a pro-life libertarian, but...." I still consider my pro-life, but here is a thirty-plus paragraph explanation as to why that comes with caveats, caveats I am guessing more U.S. citizens hold than we realize.
6. Baby Bonds. Presidential candidate Corey Booker (D-NJ) added onto the pile of bad policy ideas. Baby Bonds might have some merit in dealing with racial inequality, but it comes with its fair amount of issues. 
7. Good Intentions Do Not Help the Poor. One of the arguments used by the Left in the U.S. for various anti-poverty measures is to argue based on intent, and not results. This blog entry covers why that notion is faulty. 
8. Is It Fair for Transgender Women to Compete in Female Sporting Events? This was certainly my most controversial of blog entries for the year, and not easy to answer when all things considered. Read on to find out the answer to the question.
9. Red Flag Laws. I have found most policy revolved around reducing gun violence are of very low caliber. Consider red flag laws to be an exception. 
10. Amazon Forest Fires. There are actual problems in the world and then there are problems that are either misrepresented or exaggerated to stoke fear. The clamor over the Amazon forest fires is of the latter.    
11. Mandated Paid Leave in California. The latest evidence from California shows that mandated paid leave does not increase women's employment, wage earnings, or attachment to employers, the very things that proponents say that would happen.  
12. The Absurdity of "Latinx." The word "Latinx" was meant to give a gender-neutral option for Latin individuals. However, the word "Latinx" is linguistically incongruous and inoperable in the Spanish language, condescending to the Hispanic community, and shows how out of whack priorities can be.  

May you have a Happy New Year!

Why Add an Extra Candle on the Menorah for Each Night of Chanukah?

Chanukah, which is the Jewish festival of lights, represents both a military victory of religiously conservative Maccabees over the Hellenic assimilationists and the fact that the oil for the menorah in the Temple lasted eight days when it should have only lasted one. To commemorate, Jews are commanded to light the menorah. On the first night of Chanukah, only one candle plus the helper candle (שמש) are lit. The second night, two candles plus the helper candle. This progression leads to the eighth night, during which we light all the candles on the menorah. Why do we add a light each night? Why not simply light all the candles all nights, or just one night for that matter? To answer these questions, I first wanted to see what Jewish texts had to say. The Talmud (Shabbat 21b) provides a couple of answers:

1. There is a practical reason for this practice: it is a way to keep track and indicate what night of Chanukah it is. 
2. As Rabbi Hillel brings up, one elevates to a higher level when it comes to religious matters and sanctity. 

While I appreciate those answers and find validity in those answers, I came up with some answers of my own. One idea, which I realized a decade ago, is that the process of lighting the candles over Chanukah is gradual. If the menorah is to be symbolic of our spirituality and the light we bring to the world, it does not happen overnight. Spiritual growth, much like anything else worthwhile, is a process. It is not instantaneous like fast food or the Internet. We have to work on bringing that light to the world gradually. 

This segued into my second thought, which is why we do this gradually. As mentioned in the last paragraph, spiritual growth is a process. It takes years to reach a certain level to develop such traits as equanimity, patience, and humility. They are not handed down, they do not happen at the click of a button, and for many people, they do not come naturally. 

This leads to my third thought, and explains why we do not light all the candles all nights. If we push ourselves at full throttle and beyond our means, we will burn the candle at both ends (pun intended). If we push ourselves beyond our maximum capacity, we will become disengaged from spiritual pursuits, if not downright antipathetic and angry towards the whole idea. It is why we have to live our spiritual lives gradually. It is not an excuse to make mistakes or to slack off, but rather an acknowledgement of our limitations and make sure we maximize our potential.

My final thought is that much like with all things, they have a limit. Even when shining at our brightest, there is only so much that we can shine. This is not to self-deprecate or put ourselves down, but to remind us that we are human and that we can only go so far. The ideals that exist in Judaism de facto ask us to be like G-d, except that is impossible. Only G-d, a being of transcendent Infinite Oneness, can be perfect. This is the paradox of these ideals, and one we hold in constant tension: we do our best to be as close to living these ideals as humanly possible, yet we know deep down that they are not obtainable. As Pirke Avot says, "you are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to desist from it." Yes, our imperfections exist as human beings, but we continue to work on ourselves and become better human beings through the process. 

I think it's important to ask what all of this means for us. Practically speaking, life does not happen in a gradual progression. Life throws us curve balls, things we were not expecting, things that set us back. The road to success is a messy and imperfect one, especially since we are beings with limitations. Instead of viewing the idea of spiritual growth literally as gradual progression, perhaps the menorah is teaching us that we should always be aiming upwards and that we shouldn't lose sight of that on our bad days. Our goal is to grow spiritually. We have to do it at our own pace without burning ourselves out, but as long as we work on growing and we make progress, I think G-d is happy that we are doing the best with what He gave us. 

California's Gig Economy Bill Will Cost Consumers and the Employees It Was Meant to Help

In September 2019, the State of California signed Assembly Bill (AB) 5, more colloquially known as the Gig Economy Bill, into law. What AB 5 is going to do when it takes effect on January 1, 2020 is that it will severely limit an employer's ability to classify an employee as an independent contractor. While this bill takes particular aim at ridesharing companies (e.g., Uber, Lyft) since they heavily rely on independent contractors, it can apply to any employer unless they can go through the extensive loopholes to get an extension. In order to determine whether an employee is an independent contractor is based on the ABC test:

• A) the worker is free from control and direction in the performance of services; and
• B) the worker is performing work outside the usual course of the business of the hiring company; and 
• C) the worker is customarily engaged in an independently established trade, occupation, or business. 

If the employee meets the criteria of the ABC test, they are considered an independent contractor under California state law. Proponents of the ABC test contend that employees need such protections in the first place because a misclassification means employers do not have to pay such benefits as unemployment insurance, overtime, or minimum wage. Essentially, those who view independent contracting unfavorably see the classification of independent contractor as a loophole to exploit workers (see analysis from Left-leaning Economic Policy Institute here). With AB 5, fewer employees are to be classified as independent contractors, which means greater labor protections. 

The Left-leaning news and opinion site Vox opined in September that the Gig Economy Bill is a victory for workers everywhere. It might seem like that for those on the Left....until irony strikes. In anticipation of the enactment of the Gig Economy Bill, Vox Media, which is Vox's parent company, had to let go of 200 freelance journalists in anticipation of AB 5. This example with Vox Media reminds us of an observable reality when it comes to labor law. Whether we are discussing paid family leave, minimum wage, or menstrual leave, there are tradeoffs to greater employee benefits. When we look at predictive analyses on AB 5, that's exactly what we see. 

Earlier this week, the libertarian Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) released its report on the impact of AB 5, specifically with regards to ridesharing. CEI's main takeaway was that AB 5 would result in "greater costs for the platforms, reduced pay for many drivers, reduced flexibility for all drivers, and higher fares for customers – as much as 50 percent higher in some cases." You are welcome to read the report for further analysis here on the impact it would have for health insurance, work hours, employee expenses, paid family leave, and state disability insurance. As an independent contractor, an Uber driver costs an estimated $31,776 annually. CEI calculates that costs would go up to $53,008 annually. If minimum wage is an indication of what happens when labor regulations increase labor costs at this magnitude, we will most likely see a combination of fewer hours for drivers, lower salaries for drivers, fewer choices for customers, and increased costs for customers. 

CEI is not the only think tank to have estimated the costs. The R Street Institute, which is a Right-leaning think tank, preliminarily did so in light of the Dynamex ruling of the California State Supreme Court. R Street estimated that if Dynamex's ABC test were to become law, like it has with AB 5, it would cost the California economy anywhere from $1.3B to $6.5B annually. 

A California-based consulting firm, Beacon Economics, looked at the impact from another angle: effects on employment for Lyft drivers. Depending on the scenario, their study found that it could mean anywhere between 219,547 and 300,673 fewer Lyft drivers in California. For context, there were 323,914 Lyft drivers in California in 2018, which could up to a 92.8 percent reduction in Lyft employment in California. Another interesting find was that flexibility was "very important" or "extremely important" for 95 percent of Lyft drivers, especially since the average Lyft driver in California works about 4 hours a week. 

This analysis brings me to another important feature: why people choose independent contracting in the first place. As R Street points out in their aforementioned analysis, independent contractors have the flexibility to dictate their own work schedules and work for multiple firms. Plus, employers like the arrangement because it entails fewer expenses, less risk, and fewer long-term commitments in a labor market in which employees are staying with their employers for less time than in previous generations. 

Not everyone wants the standard "9 to 5" work arrangement that has become standard in U.S. culture. There are those who would rather have the flexibility over the extra benefits. According to a June 2018 survey from the Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), 79 percent of independent contractors prefer their working arrangement over a traditional employment arrangement. Fewer than ten percent of independent contractors would rather be in a traditional work arrangement. The flexibility also provides a financial benefit. The Right-leaning Heritage Foundation found that worker flexibility generated a worker surplus of 38-51 percent of earnings.

Far from feeling exploited, most independent contractors like the work arrangement they have. When you account for the costs and how independent contractors feel about their work arrangement, it really feels like a solution in search of a problem. We live in the 21st century, a time in which technology is advancing at a rapid pace. We cannot be beholden to working arrangements that worked better "back in the day." We need the flexibility and adaptability of independent contracting to enjoy that growth of on-demand services. Otherwise, states such as California undermine their own progress. 

Is Strengthening Food Stamp Work Requirements for Able-Bodied Adults Without Dependents a SNAP Decision?

This past week, the Trump Administration's Department of Agriculture (USDA) finalized rules for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), more colloquially known as food stamps. When initially proposed last February, USDA had proposed reforms on three aspects of SNAP. The rule the USDA passed last week only covered one aspect: able-bodied adults without dependents (ABAWD). Those who are ABAWD are those who are of working age (18-49 years), who are physically and mentally able to work, and are without dependents.

As part of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, which is the major welfare reform act from 1996, federal law requires ABAWDs to work, train, or participate in volunteer programs for at least 20 hours a week for those who were receiving more than three months of SNAP benefits within a three-year period. While this has been the law for over twenty years, there has also been allowance for waivers for areas when certain economic conditions were met, most notably when unemployment for a given area had 20 percent higher unemployment than the national average for a two-year period.

When the Great Recession hit, every jurisdiction received a waiver to deal with the difficult times. However, as the American Enterprise Institute brings up, there were those districts used various tactics to maintain their waivers post-recession. Illinois and California are two such states that have done so to its maximum effect. Those two states account for over two-thirds of the waivers in this country, in spite of accounting for 16 percent of the overall U.S. population.

This waivers exist in spite of the fact that the average unemployment rate for these waived jurisdictions was at 4.5 percent as of this past August. As of 2018, nearly fifty percent of ABAWDs lived in districts that allowed for these waivers (USDA). On top of that, about a third of ABAWDs already have income (USDA, Table 3.2). These facts illustrate that the usage of the waivers in their current form undermine the intent of the waivers.

What the new USDA rules intend to do to restrict the waivers by requiring that the unemployment rate for a given area is to be 6 percent. How would that play out?

What Will Be the Effects of the USDA Rule?
According the USDA statistics, 2.99 million out of 20.60 million households on SNAP are ABAWD (Table 3.2). While 14.5 percent of SNAP recipients are ABAWD, this does not mean that 14.5 percent of SNAP recipients are affected because it only affects those who will no longer be exempted from the waiver. The Left-of-center Urban Institute estimated earlier this year that such a rule would affect 588,000 households (3 percent), which about to 716,000 fewer people (1.8 percent reduction of SNAP recipients). These estimates are close to what the USDA calculated, which was 688,000 individuals off the benefits that are to save $5.48 billion over five years.

Other studies have measured the impact of stricter work requirements for SNAP. The Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA) preliminarily found that work requirements in Arkansas, Florida, and Mississippi have been successful. The Upjohn Institute for Employment Research had more modest findings: for every five individuals who stop receiving SNAP benefits due to work requirements, only one individual receives a job (Harris, 2019). Taking the Upjohn findings at face value, it comes off as a 5:1 ratio in terms of individuals being affected. At the same time, losing SNAP benefits does not have the same magnitude as being able to have a job and better support your household.

If you want to read more about SNAP and work requirements, you can read my 2016 analysis on the topic.

Where Do We Go From Here?
One of the underlying bases of economics is that we live in a world of scarcity. It is not realistic to think we can provide everything for everyone, and that goes for SNAP benefits. As such, there is a line that needs to be drawn for eligibility, which means not everyone can qualify or receive SNAP benefits.

SNAP beneficiaries are at 36.4 million [as of 9-2019], which is about the same as the 36.9 million in September 2009 during the height of the Great Recession (USDA). We're not in a recession anymore. If SNAP is supposed to a welfare benefit that meets counter-cycical demand, then the number of beneficiaries should have, at the very least, dropped to pre-recession levels.

I don't want to get into a debate about whether long-term usage of food stamps creates an unwanted dependency because that it is another discussion for another time. I will, however, conclude here. The United States has reached over $22 trillion in federal debt. Looking at the Congressional Budget Office's projections on debt, things are only going to get worse from here. When taken into consideration with everything I have mentioned so far, any reasoned argument would ask about tradeoffs or how to rank priorities. Who is greatest need of SNAP benefits? Are those who are ABAWD really in need of them in comparison to other recipients? And if they are not, should they still be SNAP beneficiaries?

I have been saying for years that we need to reform the SNAP program. It would be nice to have that discussion, but given how polarized this country is, it would be nigh impossible to do so, certainly on the national level. Politicians such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have already played the emotional card by saying how Trump's reform could have affected a younger version of herself. If we cannot even have a debate about a $5.5 billion cut over a five-year period because it is easier to accuse those with whom you disagree politically of being callous towards the poor, then I have little hope for the fiscal future of this country.

The Word "Latinx" Is Unnecessary, Linguistically Improper, and Condescending

United States citizens who are of Hispanic or Latino origin have grown to be the second largest ethnic group in the United States. Trying to find a label for this demographic has proven difficult over the years. There is still a debate between whether this demographic group should be referred to as Hispanics or Latinos. In spite of being used interchangeably in everyday conversation, they are not the same thing. Latino refers to the geographical area in North and South America that is to the south of the United States. Hispanic refers to countries where the majority language is Spanish. For example, Spaniards are Hispanic, but not Latino. Brazilians are Latino, but not Hispanic. Argentinians and Mexicans are both Hispanic and Latino.

In case that is not confusing enough, throw in the term "Latinx" to the mix. The term "Latinx" was first used in 2004 in activist circles. It was not until 2014 until it took off and became popular among progressives and in social media, as well as those in higher education (Salinas, 2017). "Latinx" is a gender-neutral neologism that is a substitute for "Latino" or "Latina." The premise is to create an alternative for those of Latin American origin or descent (especially LGBTQ individuals) who would like a gender-neutral or nonbinary way to describe themselves in Spanish. "Latinx" might sound like a well-intended attempt at diversity and linguistic inclusion. However, as a polyglot who loves Spanish enough to have pursued Spanish as one of his three majors in college, I take issue with the term "Latinx."

First, let me lay out the objections I have on grammatical grounds. Unlike English, Spanish is a gendered language. In gendered languages, there are two main types of gendering: natural gender and grammatical gender. A natural gender is when a noun, pronoun, or a noun phrase has a gender attributed to it based on relevant attributes to the referent (e.g., amigo is "male friend," amiga is "female friend"). The second type of gendering, grammatical gender, is a way of classifying nouns that is not dependent on biological sex or sociocultural expressions of sex or gender. Grammatical gender does not indicate whether a given noun is substantively masculine or feminine. As but one example, the word for "masculinity" in Spanish (la masculinidad), in French (la masculinité), in Russian (мужественность), and in German (die Männlichkeit) are all classified as feminine nouns.

Much of the gendering in gendered language is grammatical gender, but there is still natural gender in a language such as Spanish. It comes with such a rule that if you had a large group of women, but one man decides to join the group, "Ellas" suddenly becomes "Ellos." I never understood the rule that a female-majority or gender-neutral plural would be the same word for the masculine plural, but I digress.

There are those who oppose Latino/Latina descriptors because they are gendered, which attributed to the creation of "Latinx". Here is the issue with that. In Spanish, words ending in "-o" are generally masculine and words ending in "-a" are generally feminine. Obviously, there are exceptions to the norm, but binary gender is the norm of how gendered nouns work in Spanish. The suffix "-x" does not exist in the Spanish language. Earlier this year, the Real Academia Española (Royal Spanish Academy), which is the official committee of linguists that preserves the integrity of the Spanish language, ruled on the matter of the suffix "-x". To translate its response (see below), "the use of the letter "x" as a supposed designation for gender inclusion is foreign to Spanish morphology, not to mention unnecessary. The grammatical masculine (the suffix "-o") already serves this function." To apply that ruling here, the word "Latinos" in Spanish can either be masculine or gender-neutral.

When you look at the grievances of those who use "Latinx," the problem is not with just one word, but gendered language, specifically the gender binary that exists in so many languages. The fact that the RAE had to rule on the suffix "-x" tells you it is about more than just one word. Taking this grievance seriously, the suffix "-x" would not only apply to the word "Latino" when speaking Spanish. Even if your argument is that "the suffix would only apply to naturally gendered nouns because inanimate objects don't have feelings," it still remains a problem to use the suffix "-x" in the Spanish language, not only with nouns, but also because adjectives are gendered in Spanish. Here's an example:

Esxs chicxs mexicanxs fueron al cine a ver sus amigxs guatemaltecxs.

(Those Mexican individuals went to the movie theater to see their Guatemalan friends.)

As we see, not only does "Latinx" not grammatically correspond with Spanish, it also does not orally correspond with the Spanish language. The inserted "x"'s make it impossible to pronounce that sentence in Spanish, not to mention it is very confusing for Spanish speakers. And as a side note about aesthetics, it takes a beautiful language and turns such words as "Latino" into an ungainly linguistic bastardization.

This is not simply an academic debate about Spanish phonology. Applying this morphological rule consistently would have major implications for the Spanish language and Spanish speakers. As this well-presented argument against "Latinx" from Swarthmore College points out, the irony of Latinx is that its proponents advocate for its usage in the name of inclusivity, yet manage to exclude millions of Spanish speakers. Even with some fluency in English, pronouncing that "-x" is difficult for Spanish speakers. It excludes older Spanish speakers who would have difficulty adopting such a major change. And finally, how does it empower gender nonbinary individuals? It doesn't provide a gender-neutral alternative for those it was meant to help because "Latinx" is inoperable in the Spanish language.

I can see someone argue "Well, it wasn't meant to be used in Spanish. It was meant to be used in the English language." This is insulting because you are trying to accommodate a minority demographic in the United States that is predominantly Spanish-speaking, as well as provide a form of expression for Spanish-speakers who are gender nonbinary. For argument's sake, let's say it is a valid argument. You still run into an issue, mainly that the English language already has gender-neutral terms for Latino/a and Hispano/a: Latin and Hispanic.

The fact that another term was created when an adequate, gender-neutral term existed speaks to motive, as does the usage of "Latinx." I question motive here because the "Latinx" crowd specifically chose a suffix that does not make sense to use in Spanish. If these activists bothered to learn about Spanish or engage with the demographic that they are supposedly helping, perhaps they would have chosen "Latine" instead of "Latinx" in order to find something that could work within the confines of the Spanish language. At least it would head off some of the issues that come with "Latinx."

Additionally, you can tell the inception of "Latinx" came with little to no forethought. As Merriam-Webster brings up, there is not a consensus on how to pronounce it. All these reasons add up to why "Latinx" comes off as a capricious and politically correct ploy to tell a group of people how they should manage their language and social constructs. Even proponents think "Latinx" is elitist! Such a linguistic shift comes off as culturally and linguistically tone-deaf, which is ironic considering how so many on the Far Left complain about cultural and social ignorance.

Using the suffix "-x" in this fashion imposes an Anglophone norm on the Spanish language in a way that does not grammatically or orally correspond with the Spanish language, which is all the more pronounced when considering that the primary usage of the letter "x" in Spanish is in words borrowed from foreign languages. Such a step is the beginning of linguistic imperialism. What else would you call it when a group of people from the outside looks at a language, deems it too backwards, and attempts to use their linguistic and grammatical structure to force a change on the other group's language? From this mindset, it doesn't matter that millions of Spanish speakers are offended by the fact that foreigners are telling Hispanics how to speak Spanish. It hearkens back to the inherent issues many "Latinx" proponents see with the Spanish language.

Did the Latinx proponents bother to ask the Hispanic/Latin community, the very people that would use "Latinx" as a descriptor, about Latinx? A progressive Latino polling organization and market research firm, ThinkNow Research, did ask the Hispanic/Latin community earlier this year about how they self-identify with their ethnicity (see below). Through its polling, ThinkNow Research found that only 2 percent of Latinos prefer the term Latinx. Hispanic and Latin millennials polled at a slightly higher 3 percent. Another way to frame this finding is "the vast majority of Latins and Hispanics prefer another term to describe their ethnicity." The main pollster, Mario Carrasco, was surprised at the results upon realizing that Latinx has limited appeal. Maybe politicians and marketers should think twice before imposing the term "Latinx" on a community that deems the "Latinx" designator as unpopular.

It makes sense that not many Latinos are not using the term "Latinx", and it's not simply from a grammatical standpoint. Latinos have to worry about discrimination, immigration and labor exploitation, lower literacy rates, access to health care, and a myriad of other issues. With all of these issues facing Latin Americans in the United States, why would they care about using "Latinx?"

To summarize the issues with "Latinx":

1. "Latinx" does not grammatically or orally correspond with the Spanish language. 
2. Because of this inoperability, it does not practically do any favors for the demographic it was meant to help: non-binary and gender-neutral Latin and Hispanic individuals.
3. Consistently applying the "-x" suffix to Spanish would ironically exclude more people than it includes, which is contrary to the intent of the creation of "Latinx." 
4. Spanish already has a gender-neutral term: Latino. So does the English Language: Latin. "Latinx" is, at best, superfluous. Honestly, calling it superfluous is giving it too much credit. 
5. After existing for 15 years, the term "Latinx" is still not popular amongst Latins and Hispanics in the United States.
6. "Latinx" was conceived in such a disorganized fashion and such a disregard for the Spanish language that it feels like it comes from an outside force, rather than the organic process in which language almost always evolves. 
7. "Latinx" is a distraction from the real issues that Hispanic and Latin individuals in the United States face. 
8. The "Latinx" debate is not ultimately about inclusivity or how language evolves. It comes down to whether gendered language, particularly in gender binary form, should exist.

If Spanish ever becomes gender-neutral or at least allows for a gender-neutral option, it will most probably evolve that way organically and naturally. People have the freedom of speech to use what words they want, especially when describing themselves. If someone wants to describe themselves as "Latinx," more power to them! But let's not kid ourselves about the paternalism behind the predominant usage of the term "Latinx." All the argument for "Latinx" perpetuates is the stereotype that elitists on the Far Left think they know what is best for everyone else, including how Spanish should be written and spoken.