4-4-15 Hodgepodge

Bad Government Perpetuating Bad Culture

From a lengthy piece on Cuba's plan to end its dual currency system:

Efficiency and professionalism require reversing decades of perverse Cuban incentives, however. Most waiters are state-trained and paid in worthless pesos: They often spend more time on break, or talking to friends in the street, than attending to diners. "They expect to have their job forever," Alvarez says. "They get used to being bad." So he hires blank slates: English-speaking college grads, many of whom have never seen the inside of a nice restaurant before. "The main thing," Alvarez says, "is we want zero experience." [bold added]

This reminds me of my brother, years ago, commenting on being surrounded by "lazy union workers" during a co-op job he had during college. Thanks to improper laws forcing employers to deal with labor unions, we have some of the same problems here.

Weekend Reading

"When responsibility is just too hard to take, we can always blame the ailment du jour." -- Michael Hurd, in "Rationalization: NOT an Aerobic Exercise" at The Delaware Wave

"[F]or most people fear of flying raises issues of control." -- Michael Hurd, in "Leave Your Fears on the Runway" at The Delaware Coast Press

"[The] principle of bodily autonomy should also apply to ... life choices such as smoking." -- Paul Hsieh, in "Smoking Is Bad, but 18-Year-Olds Should Be Allowed to Smoke" at Forbes

My Two Cents

I think it speaks volumes that "progressives" are usually the ones behind proposals to raise the smoking age (or ban tobacco altogether) and to lower the voting age.

Anti-Human Advice for Humans

After a wasp made an untimely appearance indoors during the kids' bath time, I found instructions on how to build a wasp trap. The following, regarding bait, stuck out at me like a sore thumb:

Meat - This is the best choice in the spring and late winter because wasps are making nests and laying eggs, so they're searching for high protein food; you may even catch a queen this way, in which case the wasps will relocate their nest. [bold added]

No. The colony will die out, because I will kill it. I hardly know where to begin with what's absurd about this, but one place to start might be to ask, "On whose property will they relocate?"

-- CAV