"The Eighteenth Amendment proves that the Constitution once meant what it said."

Posted by: Attila Girl at 01:59 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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. . . over at Tammy Bruce's place regarding the morality of pay raises for public servants in general, and Federal judges in particular.

It reminds me of Catherine Beecher's campaign to get women into the teaching profession, especially on the western frontier. Her argument was precisely this: cash-strapped towns in the West could get a qualified female teacher for a quarter or a third of what a male teacher would cost.

And a lot of women got work in those "pink-collar" jobs for years: it became an easy and respectable way to get out of the house. But now the entire profession is underpaid because the tradition of underpaying was established. All this flows from the notion of work as something one does from civic-mindedness, a desire to give. I believe deeply in that, but it does lead to "brain drains" in any number of fields.

The reasons for which society is willing to pay for certain skills are often bizarre and arbitrary.

Posted by: Attila Girl at 11:32 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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