RE: Slightly extended (was Re: [Futurework] David Ricardo, Caveman Trade vs. Modern Trade

Mon, 24 Nov 2003 18:30:15 -0800

Ray,
 
You'll note that I mentioned "taking time off from the chorale".
 
It's fun to hear of your past experience, but that isn't the point. Are you now wearing underwear you made yourself? Did you make the podium from which you conduct? (Maybe you did!) How about the recording and amplifying gear. Did you make them?
 
I doubt it. Am I correct?
 
You make a lot of comments that you don't know much about when it comes to where I have come from and done. (So, do we both.) Here is some background.
 
When I got to Canada I heard of earlier times where notices were posted "Dogs and English, don't apply".
 
So, what else is new?
 
My father was a cabinet maker, but during the depression was a carpenter, unemployed more often than he was employed. My Irish mother was a charwoman - cleaning house for some of the minor rich and famous. I remember she worked for a Lady Cooper-Key but know nothing about the woman.
 
I realize now that what they didn't do was as important as what they did. They never taught me that Jews were awful, that blacks were ignorant shufflers, nor that Red Indians were savages. Bless them!
 
Keith's first comment when I spoke to him in England was about my less than middle-class speech. But, then we weren't middle-class. I attended the local elementary school and then with a couple of scholarships moved up into secondary. Then a friend of mine went to engineering college. I liked the idea of building ships and followed him a year later with another scholarship. So, I left my liberal education, which move inadvertently probably saved my life.
 
That isn't an idle statement. The Brits lost more killed than the US from a country perhaps one fifth the size. (The Commonwealth lost another 100,000 - almost a third of the US losses.) As Schwartzkoff said about the D-Day landings, if the US lost a division, they would bring in 35 more, if the Brits lost a division they had no more to replace it. So, had I not gone into engineering, who knows  .  .  .  .  ? 
 
I didn't know then that we hadn't stopped Hitler's entering the Rhineland, nor acted positively and effectively against a Mussolini who was dowsing the Abyssinians with mustard gas. Now I do know and it certainly affects my attitude toward Iraq.  
 
So, I would have been in the services when I came of age, were it not that, shipbuilding forgotten, I was tool making in aircraft production and every toolmaker was needed.
 
After the war and the RAF, I decided to sell and did very well for a Scottish firm in South-East England - later promoted to Central London. My income was better than most, I had enough spare time to become Chairman of London's Young Liberals and a Parliamentary Candidate (I lost).
 
I lived in two rent-controlled flats (35 shillings a week) that I got by repairing the bomb damage for the landlord. There was absolutely no reason to change things. Two apartments for a few dollars a week. Couldn't be better.
 
However, the flats were so good for so little rent, we realized we had absolutely no incentive to get a home of our own. Also, Britain seemed headed for socialism, and I thought the kids deserved a better break in freer conditions. The Aussies paid for British immigrants' travel, but I chose Canada and arrived with $84 to take on the New World. A year later, I had them across - living outside Brampton, Ontario, while our new house was being built.
 
I did very well in Canada, representing three different firms, while also importing science fiction magazines from England and even doing a little Fuller Brush selling. A generalist like myself has an advantage that a specialist doesn't have. It was fortunate that the RAF took me away from the physics degree. Had I got it, I would no doubt have hung around waiting for the proper job.
 
As it was, I could take anything that provided income. (I still had time to run Henry George classes - teaching many of them myself until I built up a cadre of teachers.)
 
However, Gwen's lung ailment and the Canadian winter didn't mix, so I we headed south in a packed station wagon. We had now added a little Canadian to the family, so now we were seven.
 
So, I took on the job of saving the world in Southern California, something that I haven't accomplished yet - but I still have a little time.
 
World-saving isn't a well-paid profession (unless you are a professional environmentalist) so don't get the idea that I have no understanding of being short of cash. However, with five children and a wife with a lung problem, one thing was certain. I needed health insurance. Incidentally, we had no trouble entering Kaiser as an individual family member - even though Gwen left Canada without the lung operation that was recommended. That's for the benefit of those who don't like private US health services "for only the top 60% of healthy middle-class people who can afford them".
 
How did I pay the premiums? Because I had to. Before I had a chance to get insured, Gillian took a short cut from grade school, climbed a fence, fell and cracked her elbow.
 
It cost $400 - a mighty sum 40 years ago - which went on my credit card. I offered the hospital Gillian in payment, but they preferred the credit card.
 
So, don't assume I am part of a favored British middle-class living off the fat of the land , while the "Okies" are kept out.
 
Just ain't so - beg pardon - just isn't so.
 
I've left out most of the rich varicolored tapestry woven over 50 years of life in North America, but it's there. If I show my dislike of the ideas of some of my friends on the list, it is not because I am against welfare, or national health insurance. Rather, I am against the need for these palliatives.
 
Modern reformers spend so much time on these things that they have no time to ask needed questions. Why is poverty an expected companion of progress? Indeed, with our incredible power to produce, why is this production wasted in the maintenance of a welfare state? Why doesn't it provide individuals with livings good enough to handle their own needs and expectations?
 
We'll get no answers to questions that aren't asked.
 
Instead, the system has congealed into a formless mess and the only questions asked are useless. How many weeks should unemployment be paid? Should the minimum wage move with the cost of living? Should seniors get their prescriptions free? Should food stamps be more widely distributed? How can we make very expensive housing affordable? How can we subsidize arts that few people understand, or even care about?
 
So, there is my reply from the noble aristocrat to the prairie savage. But we know that neither of those descriptions is true.
 
I hope you will leave my scalp alone.
 
Harry
 
********************************************
Henry George School of Social Science
of Los Angeles
Box 655  Tujunga  CA  91042
Tel: 818 352-4141  --  Fax: 818 353-2242
http://haledward.home.comcast.net
******************************************** 
 

From: Ray Evans Harrell [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Harry you said,
When you take time off from the chorale to make your own clothes, and build your own furniture, I will know that you don't believe in comparative advantage.
 
 
Reply:
 
I am a cabinet maker and have made plenty of furniture, roofed houses, and built them.    I lived in one of those tar paper shacks for a couple of years when my Father didn't make enough as a school teacher to afford otherwise.   My mother made my clothes and as an Indian I am required to hand make my ceremonial regalia.   All done from a sense of prayer and respect for that which makes it possible for me to be clothed including the plant and animal.  
 
You make a lot of comments that you don't know much about when it comes to where I have come from and done.   I didn't grow up in the same place as you and neither did you me.  I can remember when the highway patrol welcomed Brits to California but turned away Okies at the border.   You should give up being so middle class about it all and come down here and get to know us folks.  We are very nice people and would give you a spot of tea and some fry bread although we wouldn't give you a beer.  We don't drink.
 
REH
 
----- Original Message -----

Ray,

Don't think George ever mentioned the invisible hand. Certainly not in his major books. I must say I can't understand the difficulty about the concept of the invisible hand.

What it says is that if each individual member of the community is better off then it can be said that the whole community is better off. Is this something difficult to understand?

Curious.

A clear understanding of what is private property, and what is common property, is absolutely essential to a free and prosperous society.

When you take time off from the chorale to make your own clothes, and build your own furniture, I will know that you don't believe in comparative advantage.

Harry 

 


---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.541 / Virus Database: 335 - Release Date: 11/14/2003

Reply via email to