For No One

➩ An Ignored ‘Disparity’

Thomas Sowell, at NRO:

Gross inequalities in skills and achievements have been the rule, not the exception, on every inhabited continent and for centuries on end. Yet our laws and government policies act as if any significant statistical difference between racial or ethnic groups in employment or income can only be a result of their being treated differently by others.

I see this type of thinking all the time, whether it’s talking about bias in some test, or the need for some type of affirmative action.

➩ Kodak and the Post Office

Thomas Sowell, at NRO:

Post offices were once even more important than Eastman Kodak, and for a longer time, as the mail provided vital communications linking people and organizations across thousands of miles. But, today, technology has moved even further beyond the post office than it has beyond Eastman Kodak.

How much longer until Congress allows other companies to fill our own mail boxes? As public unions are involved, I won’t hold my breath.

➩ Random Thoughts for the New Year

I love these “Random Thoughts” posts by Thomas Sowell. Always an entertaining read, and covers such a wide range of topics. Reads as if Sowell maintained a Twitter feed.

➩ Individuals, not brackets

A classic Sowell piece, about how the rhetorical use of income brackets intentionally misleads. A fact that drives the point home:

A University of Michigan study showed that most of the working people who were in the bottom 20 percent of income earners in 1975 were also in the top 40 percent at some point by 1991. Only 5 percent of those in the bottom quintile in 1975 were still there in 1991, while 29 percent of them were now in the top quintile.

It’s really not at all shocking, when you think about it.