Banning Child Labor Pushes Street Kids Into Crime
from the article: "The world over, as per the estimates of the United Nations, there are up to 150 million street children. Almost every city in the world, even the biggest and most developed ones, have street children. These children are vulnerable to all forms of exploitation and abuse."
So obviously I agree with the conclusion of the article. I can only see the culture And the governmental idiots as preventing the learning of some valuable live long lessons, but for those kids in India...they have been deprived of a whole lot more.
Bobby Barrows was baling the hay in his small field down the street from us, and was having trouble navigating the baler through the bales on the ground. I went in and rolled the bales out of the way. Got paid a nickel.
Nobody told me or him that we couldn't do it.
Laughing also, I threw the bails on the truck for my friends down the street...don't know How I did it...the bails were bigger than me... a great sunday dinner was my pay.
Being a street child is a form of slow death. Death of spirit, death of innocence, and in many cases, death of soul and then body. Banning a bad situation without making provisions for the consequences is usually worse than the thing being banned.
In this country, billions of dollars are spent by local governments to provide things to"keep kids out of trouble". (Which by the way I've never agreed with) Maybe we just need to make it easier for them to get a paying job, at a younger age.
I'm reminded of the situation in Ukraine and Russia which turned into a human trafficking situation not without help of our own government.
Much of that group of victims were well within childhood years.
again thanks for the reference I have my copy open to Chaper Eight in front of me.
One might also read the chapter in Return of The Primtive on Comprachicos for a detailed background that pertains to this question
It would be hard (not impossible) to shut down the gov't agencies and reduce the level of policing. Many people in those jobs don't want them to go away. So they need to be fighting a never-ending war on these enterprises providing people what they want. As you say it teaches that criminality pays. It also makes the law this kind of arbitrary peril, like accidents. Most people break the law, but it's rare that someone gets unlucky and gets found out. Maybe the police enter because of a house fire and look the other way to some drugs because everyone does it. Or maybe they don't. It could be luck. They could be acting on their own personal biases of any sort, including racial. That leads to another huge can of worms. It's hard to quantify the costs of drug prohibition.
And why do they need weapons? When I first heard about them as a teenager it sounded like a joke, not something in real life.
2) without prohibition propping up the prices of street drugs, peddling on the street wouldn't be profitable. Why go through a street peddler when you could get them at a safe and reliable Walmart.
The difference is that the government gives the physician a monopoly over prescriptions, and the doctors make money on the office visits. A conflict of interest, perhaps?
I also believe that there are responsibilities on both the patient's and doctor's sides to do their best to manage a chronic condition. Many patients simply see drugs as a quick fix rather than an aid. Some doctors don't have the time (or just don't want to invest in the patient enough) to coach them through the lifestyle changes necessary for their condition.
2) You are side-stepping the issue, which is that of protecting the mind. The illegal "recreational" drugs you are referring to displace rational thought and logical decision-making. We already have too many zombies who believe what the mainstream media tells them. I really don't want to enlarge that crowd. I want people who are lucent. I want people who invent and solve problems. I want people who contribute and provide value.
Do we want people to live in Reality or some artificial realm? Do we want people to be free to choose what they value, or be enslaved to an artificial chemical need?
Just to set the record, I would not auggest anyone actually use the drugs, just that its not my business to police someone elses use of their body.
Uh, that's exactly the same thing. Removing criminality is legalization.
"Just to set the record, I would not auggest anyone actually use the drugs, just that its not my business to police someone elses use of their body."
But the rest of us pay for it when someone else chooses to abandon reason. We pay for it in taxes for law enforcement, jails, etc. We pay for it in the broken homes which result from parents too concerned about their next fix that they fail to take care of their own families. We pay for it in domestic abuse and violence. We pay for it in the lives ruined and lost due to intoxicated drivers. We pay for it in higher insurance premiums.
You focus on merely the economic aspects of the argument, but I ask you this: given all these additional societal costs, does that not make these very cartels not businessmen at all, but leeches - and leeches of the very worst kind? They enslave people in order to make a profit, and by virtue of their operation defer the auxiliary costs of their operations onto all of the rest of society! The only way I would support people taking recreational drugs is if as part of the price of their psychosis they agreed to be incarcerated by these drug cartels for the remainder of their lives so that society would never have to bear the burdens of the choices of these self-deluded individuals.
"The anti-drug laws are much more destructive to both economic growth and personal liberty than drugs themselves."
You tell yourself that if you choose. Enslaving one's mind and will to chemicals does not qualify in my book as any form of personal liberty.
no need for the ad hominem.
Precisely. There is only risk mitigation. I see no need to assume the risk of someone else's choices - especially when the choices stem from intentionally abandoning rational thought and personal control.
"In fact, a lock does not keep someone from breaking into your home."
No, but it limits my exposure to risk. Legalizing drugs widens my exposure to risk from many undesirable behaviors. You and others here seem to be willing to take those risks. If I want risks, I'll go play the stock market. If people want to separate themselves from society for the entire period of time under which they are chemically altered, I can probably agree with that. But those aren't the conditions being proposed. What is being proposed is a societally-approved and unfettered mixture of the irrational and literally delusional person together with the rational and sane. To me, that's nuts. There is a reason we institutionalize people who can't discern reality - to keep the rest of us safe from their irrational behavior.
"no need for the ad hominem."
I made an observation about myself and where I apparently differ from the other opinions in this conversation. Ad hominem is calling someone else names. I respectfully retain the right to call myself whatever I choose ;)
Heavy enforcement costs, in manpower and sometimes in lives, due to the increased number of drug dealers, many of them well-armed.
Diversion of law enforcement resources from controlling actual crime to fighting the drug trade.
Corruption within law enforcement, since it becomes profitable to bribe policemen to look the other way.
More people (including schoolchildren) introduced to the drug culture, due to its profitability.
More welfare costs, due to the higher number of people introduced to the drug culture.
The “lawlessness of drug cartels” financed by the high prices and profitability of the drug trade, courtesy of the anti-drug laws.
Contrary to your assertions, it is the “financial costs of obtaining the chemicals” and not the “use of the chemical agents at all” that causes most of the problems I cited. If the drug trade weren’t so profitable, thanks to the anti-drug laws, the extent of these problems would be a small fraction of what it is today, and we all would not be facing the heavy financial cost and loss of liberty arising from the government’s futile attempt to control personal behavior.
Why does society through law affix penalties for certain actions? Answer: as a disincentive to that behavior. It is to try to dissuade the individual from taking a certain action by assigning a penalty which rational people find extreme enough to tip the scale of opportunity cost and perceived value against such an action. That's key right there: the whole rational people thing. When people are irrational (such as in the case in question on mind-altering substances), the natural disincentives of certain choices get discarded or ignored. People who have done some immoral things are much more likely to engage in other immoral things. But one immoral act does not and can not justify another, nor can the immorality of one act justify the morality of another.
"Anti-drug laws raise the price of street drugs"
That goes without saying. The only argument here is on the price of drugs - not their underlying morality.
"Heavy enforcement costs... Diversion of law enforcement resources"
The CDC costs out impaired driving accidents at $44 BILLLION annually and a cost of 28 lives daily (http://www.cdc.gov/motorvehiclesafety.... "according to government estimates, alcohol problems add $36 billion to the nation's health care bill." (http://www.alcoholcostcalculator.org/.... Can you offset that $80 BILLION with your proposed law enforcement savings? We haven't even added in the value of lost inventions, the psychological problems with children of abusers, etc. I think that if you run the numbers, we're already well behind and the problem gets worse - not better - with legalization.
"Corruption within law enforcement..."
Again, a justification of immoral behavior because of other immoral behavior. It's a false argument.
"More people (including schoolchildren) introduced to the drug culture..."
And that rate is somehow going to go down with legalization and lower prices? I don't think so.
"More welfare costs..."
I was pretty sure that as Objectivists we agree that government welfare is immoral and thus not a valid justification for a moral activity... Given that to be the case, this would be another "immoral justifying immoral" argument I'm going to discard as invalid.
"The “lawlessness of drug cartels..."
And you think that somehow their moral compass is going to change if drugs are legalized? Again - is the act immoral because of its profitability or is it immoral because it deprives people of rational thought?
"the extent of these problems would be a small fraction of what it is today..."
Prove first of all that the incidence of problems would go down (which given the laws of supply and demand is completely illogical). Second, prove that the ancillary costs such as those I cited above would also decrease. This statement is nothing but unsubstantiated conjecture.
"we all would not be facing the heavy financial cost and loss of liberty arising from the government’s futile attempt to control personal behavior."
The whole problem with mind-altering drugs is a loss of individual control of personal behavior. What is worse is that it isn't the government trying to take it away, but it is the individual choosing to divest himself or herself of that control! You're trying to argue that telling people not to give away their rational abilities is an immoral act simply because it comes from the peoples' own authorized representatives?
Most of your arguments cite “society” as the arbiter of appropriate behavior. “Society” recognizes the morality or immorality of certain actions. “Society” affixes penalties for certain actions. “Society” makes recreational drug use illegal.
I asked you earlier if you put the wishes of "society" above individual rights. You said I was mistaken. I think I am not.
Think about it. Now businesses have to get liquor licenses to operate. There is no freedom to distribute alcohol! And now customers pay "sin" taxes on alcohol - no matter where you buy them. And all for what? So the government can run rehab programs and make "three strikes" laws all while wailing over the lives lost due to intoxicated drivers! It is just one more crisis the government can take advantage of to tax and control us.
Prohibition didnt work at all. It created organized crime. Good documentary on netflix on it. Prohibition was a disaster.
Many people choose to take the easy way out. Crime has always existed because people choose to seek to enrich themselves at the cost of others. How they choose to do so changes with the times. But to argue that it's just too hard to enforce the law - regardless of the consequences to the people? If that's the argument you have in favor of legalizing drugs, you've already lost the most important argument: that of the morality of the underlying principle.
this is a completely socialist statement and leads to all sorts of problems. If I do harm to myself -but nobody else, why is it any of your business? If, under the influence, I harm others, there are myriad laws on the books to punish and keep citizens safe. It is not the role of a proper government to create "society knows best" rules. That is immoral. By all means, educate and get your message out to influence, but laws? good grief. are you channeling Cary Nation?
on a practical note. If you outlaw, you de facto have created a black market for that stuff you outlawed. The same is true for taxes on products "society" deems unhealthy for you. drive the price up enough, and there is a healthy street market (backed up by weapons and crime) to make communities worse off than they were before you implemented a stupid prohibition law.
Society is nothing more than a collection of individuals. If we permit or encourage individuals through lawmaking to diminish their rational capacities, we encourage a loss of productivity and a loss of reason from that individual and we as potential customers lose out on benefiting from the exchange of the products of their minds. (BTW - I have no idea who Cary Nation is) We also agree to the risks and the costs that come from impaired judgement.
I look at the morality of the issue first and foremost and the economy second. I am obviously alone in my sentiment, so I'll sign off here unless there is a significant question being asked. I thank you all for your polite conversation.
citizen is not allowed to drive while drunk, or to be
drunk in public. These acts should still be crimes.
Also there are people who have undertaken special obligations, such as cab drivers, police officers, military servicemembers, who are not
allowed to be "under the influence" while on duty. They should still be punished if they do, and held responsible. And a parent who lets his
child wander into a pool and get drowned while
he (the parent) is under the influence of drink or
a drug, should also be held responsible for it by
the law.
that the mere FACT of being drunk on duty, or
while driving, is punished, regardless of whether
any accident harmful to another actually occurred; as well it should, as the offender was putting other(s) at risk.
Freedom isn't free. Part of living is a free society is you may somehow be affected by the repressions of other people's decisions.
I think no one argues for the government to encourage that.
Junk food same thing. But add in the dijmension of younger children. Junk sugar foods on Saturday morning with Violence filled cartoons. At one point does society interfere in how a parent raises a child?
Morality must be determined first and foremost. If you can demonstrate how the legalization of recreational drugs is not a license to abandon reality, we can then discuss costs. Without that, however, your argument fails on principle.
Govt (or anyone for that matter) not using force to stop someone from doing something is not tantamount to their approving of the activity.
Some people see it that way. They see gov't as encouraging people to eat Taco Bell, go to payday lenders, have affairs, lead sedentary lifestyles with insufficient aerobic exercise, let kids watch TV all evening every day b/c they're not trying to jail people for it. In their mind men with guns hauling people away the default position, except for gov't-encouraged activities where they grant societally-approved license for people to do something in peace.
This is all backwards. People have the right to be left alone. Making stupid behavior illegal, just turns over all power to state, since being stupid sometimes is part of the human experience. We should only use force in direct self-defense.
should be made to go by rules so that the arrange-
ment shall be humane; children are not free agentsand responsible adults; but, if properly handled, it would be better than their being on the street and getting into crime, at least until such
time as it would be no longer economically nece-
ssary for children to work.
Far better if the whole package could be achieved, but not by libtards who confuse education with brainwashing.
320 million USA population
1.4 million homeless students in the USA
no figures on homeless children
Millions if children are starving in the USA the closest number II could find openly stated.
1 in seven families rely on food banks or pantries or food stamps
25% of military families rely on food banks, food pantrys or food stamps
Number of food banks ???google had no answers but every state has them . One organization http://FeedingAmerica.com is a nationwide network of 200 food banks and 60,000 food pantries and meal programs that provides food and services to people each year.
You don't get precise figures anymore but they all stem from USDA and local school districts.
Here's another 49 million Americans going without food and are food insecure.
'Food Insecure' has now replaced hungry or going without meals. If you want to know what a good job Obama has been doing go to http://www.childtrends.org/ and leaf through the pages.but take another deep breath. It's either hearr breaking reality in it's scope or in it's mendacity.
But the new way of viewing the situation seems to center around food insecure which is defined as a family that cannot put food on the table at least one time some time during the year.
Here's a few more statistics in contrast.
In FY 2015, USAID provided over $2.5 billion in emergency and development food assistance to the poorest corners of the world. Contributions included almost 1.2 million metric tons ...
one lady commenting in one of mega multiple but not much with facts said she pays all her bills with her salary except food, visits the food bank once a week and hasn't stepped foot inside a grocery store of any kind in over ten years. three children and is NOT on welfare.
So let me state again. with a food bank or pantry on every corner and those operate on donations with 1.2 million metric tons (each 1000 kilos at 2.2 pounds or one long ton in non metric 2,200 pounds) being shipped overseas every year. with a social services worker in everyones hip pocket like a block warden doing whatever, with government food donatons not counted in the food bank program apparently With all of that not to mention the suspect figures With WIC and Unearned Income Refunds with welfare with all of that
How the hell do we have that many children a. on the street and b. starving.
Another Obama failure except in the redefinition portion and his preferred follow on is tax cut hillary? Obviously if it's true then Obama must take the fall and that will be his legacy.
Oh yes and one thing more. Where the hell are the real COLA increases for the last eight years Mrl Obama while you and your Queen dine in Paris. One percent COLA No percent COLA one half percent COLA Obama your legacy is one of shame shame shame and that goes for your wanna be replacement. No military pay raises after he has cut them in half and still that many on the dole just to survive.
Last time that happened was during Carters reign of terror and the answer was all the troops on Fort Bragg that needed food stamps were marched from the Fort to the nearest welfare facility where they stood in line silently, many with their families and the TV cameras recorded it all.
It's either lies or it's truth. If it's lies shame on us for believing and allowing it to continue. Iif it's the truth have our last three or four Presidents check in at the nearest prison facility.
Making a separate topic of it as you wish.
KH:"just as cruel."
It occurs to me for children who need to work to pay for a home, it a child labor law that exempted homeless children would create a catch-22.
I don't know what to think of this issue. I agree with using gov't force to prevent parents from making really bad decisions for their kids, like denying them a proven treatment for a grave illness. I don't agree with using gov't force to make parents doing things like vaccinate their kids or have their kids use helmets, even though these are proven to save lives. It's just not direct enough.
So I think of the case of a family sending their kids to work in a manual job with no opportunity for learning new skills instead of sending their kids to school. That's worse than failing to vaccinate. It's not as bad as denying them treatment for a grave illness.
I always have these discussions with my wife who was from a troubled/poor background. She hates gov't handouts, but supports a gov't nanny-state forcing parents to do basic responsible things for their kids b/c the kids can't do it for themselves and some parents won't rise to the occasion. I say when the gov't makes parenting rules (helmets, car seats, vaccines, school instead of work), it promotes the idea of gov't as the responsible authority in kids' lives.
I hate the notion of gov't making life a little harder for these homeless kids. Then I think about poor kids who live in a home with severely alcoholic parents and their friends, and gov't force takes them out of that and makes them go to school.