{"id":200,"date":"2009-04-19T17:45:00","date_gmt":"2009-04-19T17:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/2009\/04\/19\/200\/"},"modified":"2011-05-28T19:43:32","modified_gmt":"2011-05-29T00:43:32","slug":"200","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/?p=200","title":{"rendered":"ECONOMICS and INJUSTICE"},"content":{"rendered":"

On my daily commute to and from the office, I try to find some intelligent discussion of contemporary issues on the radio. There’s talk radio, that certainly qualifies as “discussion of contemporary issues”. But it fails the “intelligent” test. I’ve found there to be only two good sources: NPR<\/a> and Bloomberg Radio<\/a>. So, throughout my 30 to 40 minute drive each way, I find myself constantly pushing the channel button on the radio, trying to dodge the commercials on Bloomberg and the fundraising and “progressive music” breaks on NPR. <\/p>\n

Thus, by the time I get to work or get home, I’ve heard a blend of two different views on what is important in this country. On Bloomberg, the important things are economics, investing, finance and business management. On NPR, by contrast, you hear a lot about injustice. You hear stories about exploited workers, both in the USA and around the world. You hear about people struggling without health care. You hear about migrant workers and community activists angry with utility companies. NPR certainly does not ignore the current economic crisis; but their stories and interviews generally have a different slant than on Bloomberg. NPR likes to focus on the injustice of an economic downturn that is punishing working class families who live within their humble means, comparing them to the extravagantly compensated corporate leaders whose unreasonable financial risks helped to cause the crisis, yet whose firms are being “bailed out” by the public (while those leaders continue to demand compensation over a hundred times greater than what the working class family gets by on). The commentators on Bloomberg generally acknowledge such sentiments, but in the context of dangerous populist over-reaction to necessary government stabilization measures.<\/p>\n

My heart is with all the NPR reporters and commentators who believe that they are helping to bring about a more just world by streaming a constant parade of woe stories (with the regular Obama accolade slotted in). But the Bloomberg people know the nuts and bolts of the world better. NPR and its clients make a meritorious effort to appreciate the nitty-gritty; but I don’t think they could run a container ship port or a distribution warehouse or replace a sewer system or design a mini-steel mill or finance a computer software start-up firm. <\/p>\n

For better and for worse, our economy is directed by a mix of greed and politics; and it’s generally good that NPR questions this, and it’s not always good that Bloomberg doesn’t. But our (partially) market-driven economy must ultimately shape itself around millions of people like you and me who try to spend and save our money wisely and try to earn enough to get by on. The Bloomberg people focus on the stuff that will affect these millions of people in their everyday lives. The Bloomberg people better know the forces and mechanisms of world commerce that have brought millions of Chinese and Indians out of poverty (and which now might cast a lot of them back into poverty, along with too many Americans). The Bloomberg people tell you how the world works (in case you’d like to make some money off of it); the NPR people tell you about the injustices of those workings (in case you’d like to stage a protest or change the government — or go down trying, anyway). But unless the rabid NPR fans arrange a return of the Bolsheviks, or Obama manages to nationalize the major corporations, Bloomberg’s topics will affect more of the masses in more ways than NPR ever can.<\/p>\n

It’s a complex and confusing world, and if you want to fully experience that complexity and confusion, flip back and forth between Bloomberg and NPR some morning. You will arrive at your destination more enlightened about both the wonders and pitfalls of the crazy-quilt economic and political systems that somehow keep our world turning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On my daily commute to and from the office, I try to find some intelligent discussion of contemporary issues on the radio. There’s talk radio, that certainly qualifies as “discussion of contemporary issues”. But it fails the “intelligent” test. I’ve found there to be only two good sources: NPR and Bloomberg Radio. So, throughout my […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=200"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2113,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200\/revisions\/2113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimgworld.com\/blog1\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}