Young Women and Old Men

Most people would probably agree that it is disgusting for young women in their 20's to sleep with men in their 60's, and 70's, right? How about a man in his 80's? Before you continue, think about that. What kind of woman comes to mind? This morning I was listening to the radio where a 20 year-old model admits that she sleeps with an 82 year old. At this point, you are probably cringing from disgust.

But then I tell you that the 82 year old is hugh hefner (I deliberately put his name in lowercase so that it wouldn't stand out as you were reading). Suddenly your perception changed slightly, and the 82 year old man doesn't seem as disgusting. Why is that? Nothing has changed except that you've put a name and a face to the 82 year old. I find this to be a weird concept.

I don't buy into the media brainwashing, so I still think it's pretty foul, but obviously the general public doesn't think so. His and his bunnies lifestyle's are glamorized through TV shows, magazines and radio, and there are plenty of people who seem to enjoy the coverage.

The Wage Gap

There is a common misconception in the media, politics and the general public. It is the concept of wage discrimination towards women. Unscrupulous politicians, like Obama, pay lip service to fixing "the problem" in order to garner more votes. It's a frequent sound-bite that captures attention because it uses the word "discrimination" and it sounds "unfair."

Yes, it is true that women on average earn approximately 77 percent of what men earn. The key phrase here is "on average." This means that when you take all the men's salaries and and take all the women's salaries and throw them into separate pots and divide by the total number in each pot, the average salary is the result. This is not the same as picking only a specific job function, like teachers, and comparing the averages. This is also not the same as knowing the difference in salary between your aunt Sally and cousin Frank.

As my above explanation demonstrates, much of what determines what one makes is what they do for a living. (Wow! What an insight, eh?). The point is that women on average choose lower paying careers, such as teachers and receptionists whereas men choose higher paying careers such as scientists and engineers. This by itself makes an important point: If there are more men than women in higher paying careers and fewer men than women in lower paying careers, then clearly, men are going to have a higher average salary. Holding other factors constant, the only way you will get the wages to equalize is if you have an equal number of men and women in every career.

But there are other reasons why women earn less than men. But I thought you said.... Yes, the key phrase was "holding other factors constant." Aren't you paying attention?

Some other factors are personal preferences and experience. Men are more willing than women to work long hours, undertake frequent business travel, work in dangerous (hazard pay) or labor intensive (construction) industries, and stay with a particular company for longer periods of time.

Also, on average, men have more work experience. This is narrowing though because women are holding off on starting a family until later in life or are skipping it altogether. And when they do start a family, they are more likely these days to re-enter the workforce and have shorter durations of maternity leave.

But there are potentially lots of unobserved factors that influence wages that cannot be measured. Perhaps men are better salary negotiators, for example. How do you measure that?

There are tons of reports that come out every year by feminist groups, such as the American Association of University Women, that highlight the news catchers (i.e. women earn less!), barely brush over the facts and reasons and then attribute any unknown to whatever point they are trying to make (i.e discrimination). Whenever you run any economic model, you're not going to be able to account for everything. So just lumping any residual effect together and labeling it as "discrimination" is misleading.

Still not convinced? You have to ask yourself one thing: If a company could pay women less for the same quality of work, why would it ever hire a man? To maximize profits, it would make sense to only hire women!

Flying Without ID

Up until June 23, it will be possible to fly without showing ID. I didn't know this and you probably didn't either because it isn't something well publicized and goes against all the signs at the airport informing fliers to show ID.

I would use a fake name if I could. Why? It doesn't mean I'm a terrorist, it just means I want privacy and don't want my name entering some government database that datamines for information. Or being tracked. I don't want anyone not in my circle to know where I am. Why? It's nobody's business, that's why.

And really, what real security is added by checking a name? I'm sure a well-funded terrorist could get some genuine looking falsified documents and book his or her flight under a pseudonym.

Obama on NAFTA

Obama is against NAFTA (paragraph 7).

Obama is for NAFTA.

It has been suggested he might be ::gasp:: "Political positioning."

Four years ago when John Kerry "flip flopped," the media drove his campaign into the ground. But this hasn't happened yet with B. Hussein Obama [sorry ;)]. If we compare the media on Hillary vs Obama, there's no surprise that it hasn't happened, and it's a safe bet to say that it won't happen.

I think Obama just wants to remove as many controversial issues as he can out of the equation involving him against whatever his current opponent happens to be. This way when voters go to the polls, voters will not be able to factor that particular issue into their voting decision. If it is a major issue, the risk of being on the wrong side of the fence is removed. Presto.

When he was competing against Hillary, her position was Anti-NAFTA, so he was as well. Now that she is out of the way and McCain is pro-NAFTA, Obama warms up to it.

Let's take the farm bill (which is another item I need to rant about). Originally before he or anyone else realized he even had a chance in the election (Dec 07) he was against the bloated 2008 Farm bill. But by May 2008 he was for it, naturally because Hillary had been supporting it the whole time. Read the outstanding USA Today article.

Isn't this neat? There are plenty of other Obama flip-flops for your reading pleasure, such as his war funding stance.

When competing against Hillary, he lined up his message with hers. Now competing against McCain, he is lining up his message with his.

By the time Obama is done, the voting decision will have come down to:
1. old guy
2. young guy

Delegate Divide

The final DNC decision is utter crap. It's like they are making the rules up as they go along to favor Obama in any scenario. Okay, not only is it crap that delegates only get half a vote (see my previous blog entry about this), but it is also crap that Obama was awarded ANY delegates from Michigan. Hillary was awarded 69 and Obama was awarded 59 (55 plus an additional 4 which would have been hers based on the percentage of the vote alone).

If you withdrawal your name from the ballot, why should you get any? Think about this scenario: What if Obama had low support in Michigan and people voted 'uncommitted' just because they didn't like any of the other candidates (e.g. Clinton). Then this exact same scenario pops up where Obama can complain that "[his] name wasn't even on the ballot." Suddenly he gets almost half. What a strategy don't you think?

MY name wasn't on any of the ballots, so can I complain and get half of the other candidate's?

Another Obama Priest Association

Does this priest think he is black? Look at the way he speaks and the races of those in the congregation and what he says. Obama has known this priest for 20 years too. Isn't America seeing a pattern yet? Obama can speak out and say he disagrees with what these people say, but actions and associations speak louder than words! It is obvious that the people Obama associates with think today's white people must pay for what their great great great grandfathers did with slaves. That second video is a -must watch-. America must pay? What about those Americans whose grandparents were born outside of the United States (like mine)?

It's really cute that politically correct white people are about to elect an "afro-centric" cult member to the presidency. Oh yeah, and why hasn't it really been brought to attention that 90% of the black community votes for a black candidate just because he has the same skin color as them. Isn't that kind of racist? If 90% of white people were voting for the white candidate, we'd be hearing about it.

100 Years In Iraq

Of course in politics, words are often taken out of context. Back in January, McCain was lampooned by Democrats for saying that America could be in Iraq for 100 years. Watch the video. He is not referring to a continued insurgent conflict, but to a military presence or base. He clearly states, "As long as Americans are not being harmed, it would be fine with me." He references the fact that we have been in places like Korea for 50 years and Japan for 60 years. The point, people, is that war hasn't been waging the entire time in those countries and the Democrats are trying to imply 100 years of waging war is what McCain says is fine with him. Something to think about: has our sustained presence maintained stability in those regions?

OMG! It's The End Of The World!

My son saw some human flesh!! Ay dios mio, what the hell am I gonna do?!?

Big deal lady, get over it. Maybe America should move beyond its Puritan roots and quit shaming the human form. I'm so sick of the hypocritical behavior in this country where sex is (quasi) taboo, and everyone does it.

And remind me again why children have to be completely shielded from a natural human behavior that resulted in them coming into existence?

What A Sycophant!

Gee, you think Edwards is looking to be #2 on the presidential ticket? A little late pal - your actions are transparent. I bet you would have endorsed Clinton if the delegate count were reversed.

Student Loan Debt

Student loans are not as cheap as they used to be. These days Federal Stafford Loans are set at a fixed 6.8% interest rate and if you need more money than the $20,500 a year limit, Graduate PLUS loans are available at 8.5%. Seven and 8.5%... are you kidding me? This is so ridiculous - they used to be 3%! Student loans should be 3% since they cannot be discharged in the event of a bankruptcy and lenders have the option to garnish your wages. Where's their risk? Seven percent is a great return for a lender, almost on par with the stock market!

The government has firmly declared that education is not a priority in this country. In 2006, Dubya signed a bill into law that cut $12.7 billion out of education funding, which caused the federal student loan interest rates to soar. There was chatter that the Democrats were going to fix the student loan problem when they took control, and there have been some House votes, but today the status quo remains. Hillary Clinton has pledged to make some changes as President, but now it looks like she won't win the nomination.

The leaders in our government must want our country to lose its edge in innovation because bright people will either put off going to school (maybe forever) or will go somewhere else. Technical majors have been declining for years, so the government has been trying to boost math, science and engineering majors. We are still importing our scientists and technical minds. The government's plan is to throw money at organizations, like the National Science Foundation. Uhh Duhhh, if college tuition and student loans keep getting more expensive then there are going to be less graduates overall. And those that do bend over and take it for these ridiculous interest rates will have more incentive to pursue higher paying careers, instead of teaching positions like the government wants.

This hits very close to home for me because I need to borrow $75,000 for graduate school (only the cost of tuition - I've decided to deplete savings for housing and food). You know how much and how long it takes to pay off loans set at 7%? I'm actively trying to make a decision on whether or not I should go because I recognize this as the great burden that it is. Could you imagine 18% student loans?

To put things in perspective, a $75,000 loan @ 7% (which might be higher due to annual loan limits), taken over 3 semesters and deferred for 1.5 years means that by graduation the loan balance will be $80,311. A 10 year re-payment schedule comes out to $932.48 a month, or $111,897 total ($36,898 in interest).

Raise that interest rate to 8% for the same loan terms, and the payments become $983.72, or $118,047 total with $43,047 in interest.

Lower the interest rate to 5% with the same loan terms and the balance at graduation is $78,781, and the payments become $835.60, or $100,272 total with $25,272 in interest.

Surely you'd hope someone about to take out a loan of this magnitude would be getting a high paying career, right? But you have to remember that a lot of these high paying careers are concentrated in large metropolitan areas with high costs of living and high taxes, like California and New York.

Lets see what $932 a month would be before taxes accounting for a 25% average federal tax rate, 7.5% payroll tax and California income tax of 9.3%. It comes out to be $1,482 a month or $17,784 a year. So your $80,000 salary just got lopped to $62,216 before taxes. And that's for ten years folks. Or put another way, after taxes in California, an $80,000 yields $4,182 a month (Yeah, I know, it is pathetic) so your effective take home drops to $3,250 a month. Then lop off $2,000 a month for a 1 bedroom apartment, and wallah!, you're back to being a poor student again!

One last comment:
Student Loan Origination fees. What a crock. Just another way to screw the consumer.