Comments On My Comments

Okay, I hope to eventually turn this into a 'comment of the week' sort of thing, but frankly y'all are going to have to start commenting a bit more often.

First off, LJ helpfully points out the fact that I don't know what the hell I'm talking about. It kind of seemed to me that the material my dog's bed was made of was a bit heavy for a parachute, which I always think of as very light and very flexible material. At the same time, I had this vague memory of cordura and parachutes being connected somehow, and I was too lazy to do any real research on the field. So thanks, Mr. Staben, for now ensuring that I will have nightmares of my dog dying a terrible, splattery death after plummeting to the ground with only his sadly non-parachute-capable pillow for protection.

Jenny points out that even Sarkozy's conservative reforms are the kinds of things that even a liberal in America wouldn't have the onions to suggest. Specifically, he is in favor of allowing (but not requiring) workers to exceed the 35-hour work week limit, if both they and their employer agree that this would be a good thing. Likewise, when conservatives cry "Socialism!" as Democrats ponder the idea that maybe, just maybe, allowing big multinational corporations to be entirely in charge of our health care system isn't the single, most efficient, most productive system imaginable, remember that America is so far to the right of most of the rest of the developed world that an accusation like that has no basis whatsoever in reality.

The thing that, seriously, amazes me more than anything else about the American political discourse is how one-sided it is in terms of quality-of-life vs. quality-of-production modes of thought. I never remember a single serious politician or even mainstream pundit ever mentioning the fact that maybe, juuuust maybe, a policy, which reduces economic growth while increasing opportunities for people to live happy, satisfying lives with the less money they'll have in their pockets, might actually be worth pursuing. Any economic, fiscal, or tax policy has to be represented as increasing growth opportunities, otherwise serious discussion of it is verboten.

This is completely whack, as the kids say these days. If you believe at all in the measurability of the ephemeral concept of 'happiness', then sociologists will tell you (and keep on telling you. Never talk to a drunk sociologist-BORING!) that once you reach a minimum sustenance level of material comfort, which works out to roughly $12K per person per annum in average America, there is almost no correlation between material compensation and happiness. Billionaires are almost as likely to suffer from depression, anxiety, and reckless financial behaviors as Joe Mechanic, who pulls in $40K a year and struggles to put his kid in braces.

So if the goal of our government is to provide the maximum opportunity for happiness to the maximum number of people, which I think is a concept most people would support, then we need to seriously think about supporting concepts like free trade, which have big net positive benefits for the economy as a whole, but from which the lion's share of the upside goes to those who don't need it to be happy (as in, those who comfortably make well over that $12K per person per year threshold), while the biggest losers tend to be those who are skating right at that threshold even on a good day.

All of which is a long way of saying, Vive la France!