Real incomes decline in the top two deciles and rise in the lower

Simon Collins, social issues reporter for the NZ Herald, has written a series about Auckland's inequality which was published over the course of last week. Today he recaps and produces the answers (which are very grim):

To briefly recap where this series started: Auckland has changed in a generation from an equal city in 1986, when median incomes of most suburbs were bunched tightly around the regional average, to an unequal city by 2006, where median incomes of the city's 300-odd suburban census units spread widely across the income scale.

Similar increases in inequality have occurred across many developed countries.
The driving forces have been both technological changes, which have strengthened the power of the skilled at the expense of the unskilled; and policy changes, which have weakened unions, opened markets to free trade, cut taxes on the rich and imposed new taxes on spending that bear most heavily on the poor.

To my mind he has omitted the most important factor. The change in family structure. Single parent families  are amongst the poorest. The percentage of families with dependent children that are single grew nationally from 18 to 28 percent between 1986 and 2006. I don't have specific Auckland figures but am willing to bet the percentage there is higher based on DPB numbers. Reconstituted families are also poorer given ongoing obligations to past partners and children.

Collins might argue that this change has been an effect of all of the above in that unemployment can cause family breakdown and there aren't enough unskilled jobs to go around. I would argue that people respond to inevitable change. Human beings  are highly adaptable. Some will react positively to change by making an effort.  But some will take the easy option and adapt accordingly. And the benefit system made it all too possible to take easy options.

So naturally, over time, the gulf between these two groups will widen.

In respect of answers to the inequality, Collins continues:

At the caring end of the spectrum, the Child Poverty Action Group has been lobbying for more help for low-income families since it was formed in 1994.

 Its biggest campaign has been to pay the $60-a-week "in-work tax credit" to parents who lose their jobs or can't work, as well as those in paid work. Since 59 per cent of children in poverty live in homes with no full-time worker, this change alone would slash child poverty.

So there is the acknowledgement that a majority of the children in poverty are in single parent homes (only a small portion are in two-parent homes dependent on the unemployment or other benefit). But how can he be so certain the move would slash child poverty if another predictable effect was to draw more children onto benefits?

Further answers feature more redistribution of wealth for housing, public transport, pre-schools, youth jobs, etc via the ratepayer. The great Super City solution.

Not content with that Collins writes:

Beyond these local moves, a more fundamental shift in the policy balance might mean picking up ideas from the Council of Trade Unions' alternative economic strategy, such as raising the minimum wage to two-thirds of the average wage, strengthening rights to negotiate wages collectively, raising the top income tax rate to 45 per cent and allowing a tax-free income band at the bottom.

So more Robin Hood strategies despite the current situation which is:

-    For half of households with dependent children the amount received through welfare benefits and tax credits is greater than or equal to the amount they pay in income tax.

-    Single-earner two-child families with less than $55,000 from wages pay no net income tax.  They receive more from WFF tax credits than they pay in income tax and ACC.

When all households are counted (working age with children, working age without children, and 65+ households), and looking at households grouped in deciles rather than looking at individual households, the total income tax paid by each of the bottom five deciles is less than the total transfers received (tax credits, welfare benefits, NZS and so on).  It is only for each of the top five deciles that total income tax paid is greater than transfers received.

Finally, I have a problem with Collins using the Census 2006 data. I accept that it was the most recently available for Auckland. However he could have at least acknowledged more recent national data on household incomes. Especially as the trend since 2006 is towards reduced inequality.The Household Incomes in New Zealand: Trends in Indicators of Inequality and Hardship 1982 to 2010 was published late last year. Here are some excerpts:

Income inequality peaked in the early 2000s, then fell from 2004 to 2007 as a result of the WFF package, and in 2010 was lower again than in 2007

·         Inequality remained much the same from 2007 to 2009 – the 80:20 ratio declined a little and the Gini rose.  From 2009 to 2010, inequality declined on both measures.

·    The lower figures in 2010 compared with 2007 reflect two changes: (a) the recent (2009 to 2010) decline in real incomes for the top two deciles (lower investment returns especially), and (b) a small real gain for lower deciles.

On the latest OECD figures (c2008), New Zealand’s Gini score of 33 was close to those of Australia and the UK (34), Japan (33) and Canada (32), and a little above the OECD-34 median (31).  Countries such as Denmark, Norway and Sweden have lower than average inequality (Ginis of 25-26).  The US score is 38.  New Zealand’s Gini score in 2010 was 32.

Yes Auckland has an ethnic mix which features some of the countries lowest incomes due to large or lone parent families, unskilled migrants and expensive housing. But I look forward to Collins repeating the exercise when this year's Census figures become available.
Perhaps he won't.

Novel support for Piri Weepu

Readers of the NZ Herald are sending their own photos of bottle-feeding babies in a show of support for Piri Weepu. Here's my submission. The big sister revels in her role.

Ignoring willpower

Very succinct. From the NCPA:

The Nanny State

Public health officials have increasingly claimed a large responsibility to legislate health to society at large, propping up the mandates of the Nanny State at the expense of personal freedom.  Relying upon a number of pseudoscientific arguments, these vocal advocates argue that the state must enforce certain behavior among its citizens for one of two reasons: first, the state must protect people from themselves, or second, the state must protect people from others who would encroach on their autonomy, says Michael Keane of the Institute of Public Affairs, a public policy think tank in Australia.
In campaigning that we must protect people from themselves, public health officials ascribe to the "disease model," whereby a person's actions are divorced from his or her own decision making.

• In the case of a person who gambles recklessly, their actions are excused as a biological necessity -- that this person is predisposed to the addictive behavior and should therefore be protected from it by legislation.
• This level of intrusion, however, far exceeds commonly accepted standard for medical ethics as it arguably defies much of what we might call being human.
• Furthermore, it fails to incorporate willpower as a relevant force in its model, thereby removing culpability and the importance of self-control from consideration.

Another tactic that is equally pervasive among public health advocates is to focus on the damaging effects of one's actions to third parties.  This can be seen in one-to-one arguments, such as the effect that one's choice to smoke has on the inhaler of second-hand smoke, and one-to-many arguments, such as the effect that one's choice to smoke has on society's health care costs.
The fundamental difficulty with both of these systems and the policies that they advocate is that they limit personal choice -- an idea that in numerous other spheres created great prosperity throughout the Western world.  When one recognizes that most people are rational actors and capable of weighing the costs and benefits of an action if aware of them, the need for the Nanny State is diminished.

Source: Michael Keane, "Ideology, Not Science," Institute of Public Affairs, January 2012.
For text:
http://www.ipa.org.au/publications/1978/ideology,-not-science

De Bres stop kidding yourself

From the front page of today's Dominion Post:

The race relations commissioner has criticised some Pakehas' "lack of generosity" towards deprived Maori as Waitangi Day celebrations have again turned violent..... Race Relations Commissioner Joris de Bres criticised those Pakeha who still resisted moves to give "special treatment" to disadvantaged Maori, thousands of whom suffered inequality.

"I still have a sense that there is a lack of generosity in some Pakeha attitudes to Maori and there is a lack of will to see measures taken that will help to remove that disadvantage and there is a lack of understanding of this notion that it is actually fair to deal specifically with people who are suffering unfairness."

The very person charged with improving race relations stirs up ill-feeling with these sorts of comments.

What does "special treatment" to "disadvantaged Maori"  consist of? Is he talking about affirmative action? Within the welfare-state model New Zealand operates under (which I don't support) I don't particularly care if Maori get funding to do their own thing, for example Whanau Ora. Or run their own schools. Or their own health clinics. Or their own youth courts. I think the jury is still out on how (relatively) successful these initiatives will prove to be.

But if 'measures to remove disadvantage' includes the vast transfer of cash to fund the DPB for example, which is now a firmly entrenched part of Maori culture, then yes, I do feel a distinct "lack of generosity".

And I think I have amply explained why over and over. It is Pakeha generosity that has allowed the deprivation of Maori to accelerate through welfare benefits. It is the benefit system that has absolved Maori (and other deprived people) from becoming better educated, skilled and responsible.

So when we read a headline that says,

Pakeha urged to be more generous

it is hardly surprising if some of us bristle.

Charles Murray closes his book about the failure of the US war on poverty, the war on the particular disadvantage of African Americans, with this salient observation:

"When reforms finally do occur, they will happen not because stingy people have won, but because generous people have stopped kidding themselves."

You just can't win (updated)

You just can't frigging win in this country. Give up Piri. You'll never beat or even meet the fanatical expectations of mammary maniacs. Never mind that you are actively fathering,  hands-on, taking responsibility, and caring for your kids.

You haven't got breasts so forget it.

Seriously, breast is not necessarily best. There are all sorts of situations when bottle-feeding - or a combination of bottle and breast - is necessary or even desirable.

The value in having a Maori All-Black showing how to be a father far, far outweighs any value in constantly shoving compulsory breast-feeding down every-bodies throats.

On second thoughts Piri, don't give up, just tell them where to go.

Update:

Well, well, well. An astonishing reaction to this story in the NZ Herald.

I have read through some of the 334 comments. As yet I haven't found one in support of the decision to pull the footage of Piri Weepu bottle-feeding his baby. The reactions range from puzzlement to very real anger. Some phrases used to describe La Leche etc  like "Breastapo" and the "breast-feeding mafia" give you a taste of the flavour of most comments.

Here's one of the more poignant ones:

The Owl

And they wonder why men are so marginalised from children nowadays, can't teach 'im, never touch 'im, in the same breath they will be saying men aren't doing enough to be a positive influence on children. Really is it any wonder why we have one the highest depression rates in the world.

Who pulled the images they should be fired, lets get some mens rights back.

Sunday graph - growth we don't need

From the Briefing to Incoming Minister of Social Development.

DPB and the exploitation of women

I can't understand why feminists so fiercely defend the DPB.

It is a two-sided coin yet feminists only ever see heads when it's flipped.

While it furnishes some freedom from men who would hurt women, it has increasingly made them more vulnerable to those very same individuals.

Men attach themselves to women who have a certain level of cash security, four walls and a roof over their heads. The logic of that is clear.

But a NZ Herald piece I missed last weekend exposes another way in which men exploit the DPB and the women who rely upon it.

Children's advocate Dame Lesley Max wants more promotion of contraception as a step towards tackling child abuse.

She told a public meeting in Mt Roskill yesterday about a man who came to a parenting class in Papakura saying his goal in life was to have 11 children - even though all his children so far had been taken off him by Child, Youth and Family.

"He doesn't care for them. He can't care for them. He enters relationships with one vulnerable woman after another, and our system enables him to do so."

At last count the man had exceeded his target, fathering at least 12 children with at least three women. Dame Lesley said he was not working. She thought all his ex-partners were on the domestic purposes benefit.

Of course he is not working. Paying child support for 12 children (IF he is the named father) means working makes him no better off. Financially he is better off on a benefit paying the bare minimum. That leaves him broke and he's back to looking for someone else to sponge off.

But who would welcome him? Someone else looking for free money. And his babies guarantee it.

 "My experience, after 20 years of being responsible for a community agency with families facing multiple challenges, is that the planning of families is something that is hardly considered, hardly talked about, and children just happen without intent."

Maybe. Maybe not. While not denying it is a factor, contraception is the wrong primary focus. The attention needs to go on the incentive. The money.

These kids won't be best served by paid workers

The following is copied from the Centre for Independent Studies (Australia) weekly newsletter. No explanation needed.

Hardly fair to vulnerable children

 

For the last three years, I have been arguing that Australia’s failing child protection system is being run in the interests of social service providers and not ‘at risk’ children.

In the name of ‘family preservation,’ state community service departments are leaving children for far too long with highly dysfunctional families and only remove them as a last resort when they have been damaged, often permanently, by parental neglect and abuse.

While the childhoods and life opportunities of children ebb away into intergenerational disadvantage, social workers employed in the public sector and non-government ‘charitable’ organisations receive taxpayer funding to provide an array of support services that try and fail to do the impossible – fix broken families with serious drug and alcohol, domestic violence, and mental health problems that can’t be fixed.

The Fair Work Australia decision on Wednesday to award ‘equal pay’ to more than 150,000 community sector workers at a cost of $2 billion to taxpayers is indecent in its illustration of the political problems in the child protection system.

Forget that the decision is based on dodgy comparisons – why should someone with a three-year social work degree have income parity with a trained economist or scientist? Sadly, the federal government was not only willing to support the claim but also provided the $2 billion additional funding to foot the higher wage bill at a time of looming economic woes.

Many commentators are justifying the pay rise by saying those who choose to work with the poor are saints. The real question is why is failure being rewarded? Public choice, dear reader. I just wish vulnerable children had a public sector union to advocate on their behalf, replete with tame factional serfs in the Labor caucus.

That feathering their own nests has been the priority at a time when the child protection system is crumbling all around us and stumbling from one crisis to another means that social workers have surrendered any pretensions to their ‘professional’ status.

This sorry episode has reinforced my belief that the answer to the perpetual crisis engulfing child protection is to restore citizen-control over the system by re-establishing decentralised, community-governed child protection agencies.

Dr Jeremy Sammut is a Research Fellow at The Centre for Independent Studies and author of Do Not Damage and Disturb: On Child Protection Failures and the Crisis in Out of Home Care in Australia.  

Maori economic situation worsens

The Briefing to the Incoming Minister of Maori Affairs  contains this statement:

Recent research shows that Māori households spend approximately $5 billion more than they earn annually, and transfer payments to Māori now exceed the tax contribution that Māori make to the economy.

I am unsure whether this indicates overspending regardless of source of income, or that by using the word "earn" paid employment is indicated and  the difference is down to benefits.

Back in 2003 a paper (pg12, table 3) by the Institute of Economic Research showed that Maori were paying slightly more in tax than they received in transfers. Specifically they paid $2.404 in tax and received $2.312 in social benefits. So the situation has worsened. Unfortunately the new "recent" research isn't referenced.

What our children face

My children were born in 1994 and 1998. They will turn 65 in 2059 and 2063.

Just looking at some tables  (XLS, Figure 14) in the Treasury Briefing to Incoming Finance Minister.

At the moment there are five 15-64 year-olds for each 65+ individual.

By 2061 the ratio falls to only 2.3 15-64 year-olds for each over 65 year-old.

Charter schools - why the fuss?

I am still perplexed about the fuss over charter schools. According to Stuff:

The charter school system would allow private business, religious organisations, iwi, or charities to take over the management of failing schools and retain state funding.

There are already many examples of existing schools that are run by private organisations and government subsidised. Not least are the Exclusive Brethren schools which teach the state curriculum and employ non-Brethren teachers. Their rolls are growing. There are Catholic schools, Kura Kaupapa Maori, and others, all seemingly schools that parents line up to send their children to.

There are also some good state schools, especially those that have a certain character and ethos that staff are committed to.

But there are state schools that are unsuccessful. Personally I believe the home environment dictates a child's willingness to learn and participate and many schools are just up against it. But if an organisation - or just a dedicated inspirational individual -  is willing to try and improve the prospects of those children, why oppose them?

Jacinda Ardern - nutter

Jacinda Ardern is desperate to get some traction as the new Labour Social Development spokesperson and issues say-nothing press releases in the process. But yesterday's is even worse than saying nothing:

Jacinda
ARDERN
Spokesperson for Social Development

31 January 2012 MEDIA STATEMENT
Statistics can’t hide the truth
With almost twice as many people on the unemployment benefit now as when National first became the government, it is glaringly obvious it has to take a serious look at its policies, Labour’s Social Development spokesperson Jacinda Ardern says.
“Statistics, which should have been released before now, show that as of the end of last month there were 29,456 more Kiwis receiving the unemployment benefit than in December 2008.That’s a 96.5 per cent increase in just three years.

The December quarter benefit factsheets were released "before now" (31 January). They were released last Wednesday, January 25. Which is fairly typical for quarterly statistics, towards the end of the month following end of the quarter. If Ardern had been monitoring the MSD website, her job, she would have noticed them sooner.

On the matter of unemployment the numbers are down. Here is what the fact sheet actually says:

At the end of December 2011, 60,000 working-age people (aged 18–64 years)[1] were receiving an Unemployment Benefit[2].   Over the year to December 2011, the number of recipients of an Unemployment Benefit decreased by 7,000, or 11 percent[3].

Ardern continues:

“The Government has been banging on about a brighter future and more jobs for a while now. The rhetoric is fine, but words without actions are meaningless,” Jacinda Ardern said.
“The figures tell their own story. It’s obvious now why the Minister sat on them for two months to avoid pre-election coverage; they show the Government is failing to stem the tide of jobless.

What? How can the Minister sit on December quarter statistics during November??

And to blatantly ignore the positive unemployment trend and then issue a statement entitled Statistics can’t hide the truth is comedic. Nutter.

Utterly absurd requirement

Just listening to the lunchtime news and I was alerted to the law change that will require trainee drivers to undergo 120 hours of supervised driving before they can sit their restricted licence.

This is UTTERLY ABSURD.

Do you know how many hours one has to fly to sit a private pilot's licence?

50

And some of those will be solo.

But driving a (probably) automatic car, with a couple of instruments to monitor, in one dimension, with the extra security that if the engine stops you glide to a halt rather than fall out of the sky (sorry, within the 50 hours pilots are taught how to perform an emergency landing in the event of engine failure), not having to communicate orally with other drivers or a control tower simultaneously, monitor weather or track,  can only be taught to licence  standard in 120 hours???

Student allowances hide rate of benefit dependence

The most recent student allowance data available is Jan-June 2011. In that period 82,267 student allowances were paid. In 2007, during the same period, the number was 52,231.
That's an increase of 57.5 percent.

To my mind a student allowance is a form of benefit. But it is not paid out of the Ministry of Social Development budget. It comes out of the Education budget, specifically Tertiary Funding.

One consequence of this is  MSD benefit numbers are held down. People who might otherwise have been on unemployment or domestic purposes benefit are on a student allowance and out of the Social Development Ministry's hair.

But it must put incredible strain on the Education budget as more people opt to stay in tertiary education because their job prospects are poor.

I wonder too if student allowances don't have a negative influence in accustoming people to living at a certain income level, thereby creating a tolerance for benefit-living post tertiary education. In the same way that student loans accustom young people to living in debt.

From the state's viewpoint it is better to have young people in education  and out of the NEET group (which seems to be the overarching focus currently) but there is nevertheless an element of 'sweeping problems under the carpet' in play.

Brain teaser

Here is an interesting coincidence I just came across.

Two numbers from the last Census

251,688

251,130

They represent two distinct groups of New Zealand residents by birthplace.

Any ideas?

Make fatties the new smokers?

In her Herald column today Deborah Coddington slams the growing tendency for various parties to blame obesity on the food industry. I don't disagree with her. But there is a paragraph that has an implication I don't like:

Every day, in every town and city, we all see fat people waddling along, heaving themselves into planes and cars, but are we allowed to comment on this, the way we were encouraged to shame smokers into quitting (who also cost taxpayers dearly in terms of the public health bill)?

Putting aside that smokers pay for their health needs via taxes on tobacco, and fat people who getting themselves around in planes and cars are also paying taxes, and that smokers and fatties will pop their clogs early and not draw on the largest publicly-funded transfer - Super - do we really want to see fat people 'shamed'?

Why? Does it make us feel better when we can point out someone else's very overt weakness while conveniently ignoring our own hidden ones? Is it a collective bullying impulse that needs to be satisfied at a more 'civil' level?

The thought of shaming fat people depresses the hell out of me. And I'm not fat. So how the prospect appeals to a fat person, lord only knows.  But is hardly surprising there is so much psychological ill-health associated with obesity (which by the way manifests in the taxpayer picking up a benefit tab).

There are only two healthy ways to approach the problem of overweight people. Leave them alone. They are allowed their choices too. They own their own bodies after all. And from a government point of view they probably appear in the nett contributor ledger over their lifetimes.

Or overhaul the way people fund their lifetime needs. Institute individualised savings accounts so that incurred health costs are borne by the person that caused them.

Then all the thin people can stop feeling aggrieved and resentful. Quite why they are I am still not sure. It isn't the fat people who go around saying it isn't their fault they are fat. It is the people who make their livings off studying them.

Deborah has identified the right target for our scorn.

Work-testing not working

The December 2011 benefit factsheets have been released. The DPB total climbed a further 1 percent over the year to reach 114,230. the work-testing implemented in September 2010 hasn't made an impression yet.

Here's the breakdown:

 

Characteristics of working-age Domestic Purposes Benefit recipients (aged 18–64 years), at the end of December 2006 and at the end of December 2011

Percentage of recipients who were:	Dec-2006	Dec-2011
Male	10.2	12.3
Female	89.8	87.7
Māori	40.4	42.4
Pacific people	9.5	10.1
18–19 years	3.0	2.8
20–24 years	14.8	16.8
25–39 years	51.1	45.9
40–54 years	26.6	28.6
55–64 years	4.5	6.0
Declaring earnings	20.4	16.1
Caring for a dependent child aged 6 years or under*	60.1	62.4
Caring for a dependent child aged 7–13 years*	30.0	27.3
Caring for a dependent child aged 14 years or over*	9.9	10.3
Caring for two or more dependent children*	51.1	47.9
Number of working-age Domestic Purposes Benefit recipients (aged 18–64 years)	100,309	114,230

Manipulating outrage

I wasn't alone yesterday in interpreting media reports about women breastfeeding while driving as applying to women drivers, such was the implied sense of outrage. Look at the NZ Herald coverage. They have a photo with a caption, Breastfeeding behind the wheel has not impressed the police. But the content of the report says nothing of the sort.

The three mothers observed were  passengers. OK. Still an element of risk but an entirely different scenario. I can't even be sure I didn't do this myself, in the backseat, with the seatbelt over the baby and myself, when it wasn't possible to just pull over and the baby was getting very distressed.

Of course, if the baby was bottlefed that could be achieved more  safely in transit. But wait, what about the outrage over bottle-fed babies? Don't under-estimate the potential of the current extraordinary pressure to breastfeed resulting in some people thinking they are doing the right thing regardless of circumstance.

Then there is the punishment for this 'reckless' act. A $150 fine. So the mother is going to be $150 poorer. That's $150 less to put food in her children's stomachs. BUT IT WASN'T THE CHILD'S FAULT. Isn't that the argument advanced whenever we hear about children going hungry because their parents have spent their budget on the wrong things? Personally I don't accept this objection because it allows parents to use children as hostages to their own interests.

Nevertheless I increasingly find 1/media hype 2/ police nannies and 3/ inconsistent attitudes very tiresome.

She's not unusual

Simon Collins has typically turned up another case of someone who doesn't want to work if it doesn't pay better than being on a benefit. Significantly better.

She isn't unusual. Not by any means.

Read it and recall that 46 percent of Maori females aged 20-29 are on welfare.

Call for the suspension of political agendas naive

The writer of yesterday's NZ Herald editorial takes what he or she thinks is a considered and objective stand on child abuse. The piece is titled , Find practical way to save our children

Another baby, 2-month-old Hinekawa Topia, has died in hospital of a head injury police do not consider accidental.

Another round of hand-wringing ensues. Social Welfare Minister Paula Bennett reminds critics that she issued a Green Paper on Vulnerable Children six months ago and it is open for discussion until the end of February. Labour's spokeswoman Jacinda Ardern repeats a call for a cross-party study of abuse as an issue of child poverty.

All of this, of course, leaps far ahead of the known facts in the latest death which is under police investigation. The officer in charge of the homicide inquiry warns against leaping to conclusions. But it does no harm to be reminded yet again that this country must do something about its high rate of child abuse and that it should be a subject beyond political point-scoring.

Separating politics and social problems is not possible.  Politicians make policy. Even the repeal or reform of bad policy requires political action and it will always be contentious because human interests will always conflict.

So far the Government has spurned Labour's request to be included in a study of child poverty, which is to be undertaken by a committee of ministers. The Government sounds serious in its undertaking to do something for children in impoverished circumstances, just as it must want to reduce the country's incidence of child abuse.

But it will be wary of confusing the issues.

Not all children in poverty are abused, not all abuse occurs in poor households. There may be a heavy co-relationship between them but each problem deserves dedicated attention. Neither should be happening in a small society with well-developed social services, good accessible schools and reasonable levels of income support.

What is a "small society"? This may be a small country in terms of land mass and population but it is not a small society. A society implies common values, interests and interdependence. Does anyone believe that describes NZ today?

But still we get cases such as Mikara Reti, killed last January by a blow to his liver, aged 5 months, Serenity Scott in April, dead of brain injuries, also 5 months, baby Afoa, a week old, whose body was found in a makeshift grave in June and James "JJ" Lawrence, 2 years old when he was killed in November.

Every possible way to prevent these things should be considered. No civil liberty should stand in the way of a practical precaution, no ethnic sensitivity must restrict useful discussion, no political agenda should apply.

All New Zealanders care for these children and all want them to be raised safely and well.

No civil liberty should stand in the way....

Again, this is unworkable. The writer advocates the suspension of civil liberties but wants it disassociated from political agendas. Some of us actually value civil liberties. And we are sophisticated enough to understand the fight for them goes beyond that of our own.

Ironically , when the overall tone of the piece is considered, even the writer has their own political agenda. That is their tacit belief in collectivism and assumption that it is desirable for government to dominate social spheres.