It's hard for me to believe that, in this day and age, some employers do not give their employees paid sick leave. How can they live with themselves?

That being said, I'm not a big fan of federal legislation to address this. Washington, D.C., in my opinion, was right to address this, and other cities and states should do the same. I federal standard just rubs me the wrong way though. Employers should still have the option of providing compensation in other ways than sick days. If there's a national law, they can't move to a jurisdiction that allows them that choice.

My employer is small, and doesn't really have a sick day policy. You take off when you need to, and if it gets excessive you'll have to explain why you need to take so many days off. A federal law wouldn't allow for employers and employees to reach creative agreements. Maybe someone could convince me that a federal law is the right way to go, but I think these things are best worked out at the city or state level.

Posted by: Eric | March 10, 2008 4:57 PM

If I took seven sick days in a year, I'd be fired. That will remain the case with our without legislation.

Posted by: kevin s. | March 10, 2008 5:58 PM

"As much as one might sympathize with the working poor, how sick leave is handled is an issue that is best left to employers and employees."

After all, it's their own damn fault for being poor anyway.

Posted by: bud duncan | March 10, 2008 8:02 PM

Kevin, it sounds like you could benefit from a similar ordinance where you live. You ought to consider finding as decent job that treats you better.

In general, a state ordinance mandating a certain number of sick days shouldn't be anything to get too upset about. Most of the people with the luxury to complain about it on ideological grounds are probably fortunate enough to have an employer who gives sick time.

Posted by: I and I | March 10, 2008 8:51 PM

What does this have to do with government?
This is a private matter people should be able to work without government interfernce.

Posted by: Roger | March 10, 2008 10:19 PM

No one gets what they're worth--neither the CEO who makes a bazillion dollars more than his workers (well, actually, one who makes in 15 minutes what it takes his employee to earn in a year) nor the workers. That's because if we got what we were worth, the economy would be significantly worse off than it is now.

When the markets rule, as they do now, we are saying that the capacity to earn money is what governs our actions. That's what capitalism is all about--earning money--for those who have invested money. Sweat equity contributed by the workers has no worth. That's not to say that capitalism is bad; however, calling this 'justice' suggests Roger is cracking a joke.

My dictionary says that 'justice' means 'fairness'.

Posted by: bren | March 10, 2008 11:23 PM

“No one gets what they're worth”

You understand that wages are the price of labor. So when the wages are set by the market through trillions of economic decisions…that is the price. That is exactly what you are worth. So, I have no idea what your comment means. Do you mean “no one gets what they THINK they are worth?”

“Sweat equity contributed by the workers has no worth.”

Yes it does. I can tell you the exact worth of every sweat equity job I have had. Taco John’s: my sweat equity was worth $5.35 an hour. UPS: $9 an hour…ect.

What is just about markets is they only allow voluntary exchanges. If you don’t like a job you can quit. If you think something is expensive you don’t have to buy it. What is unjust is when the government makes economic decisions involuntary. All they major authoritarian regimes in the last century were built on helping the laborer through making more economic decisions involuntary.

Posted by: DontImmanentizeTheEschaton | March 10, 2008 11:59 PM

In general, a state ordinance mandating a certain number of sick days shouldn't be anything to get too upset about. Most of the people with the luxury to complain about it on ideological grounds are probably fortunate enough to have an employer who gives sick time.

Posted by: I and I

This is an example in my opinion of people without the knowledge of Business making mandates for the working and employers of this area . I would have to lok at the law, but the editorialist did not seem that kind of information was neccessary .

My wife runs a daycare/preschool . In our state by the way minimum wage is over 8 dollars an hour . But one aspect of this day care is it takes in special needs children , sometimes a special needs child which other day cares do not take ysually will cause one staff worker to be with that child ALL the time . Law and regulations require certain amount of staff per children , if you babies , the staff number increases .

This busisness/ministry is always almost broke , our church boardevery other month appears to be close to shutting it down . My point I and I , causing this business would shut down this busibess , this datcare could never afford to pay employees who were not there , thats about 15 people or so , plus the kids it ministers to.

Special needs , DSHS , minorities , God's Rainbow so to speak . Thats why I would have to see the regulations , but just the us VS them attitude of businsee employer and employee here shows me that there is much not being thought about .

Appears as our state is head for state run daycare anyway , growing regulations , requiring all employees to have college schooling etc , the only folks that will be able to perform day care services if regulations continue to increase will be the state . I think thats the plan , perhaps i am just a conspiracy type of guy , Jesus Loves Me This I Know will be songs learned in Sunday School and homes , but I always thought it was great that some kids could sing it every day and think its just normal . That praying to the Father, Son and Holy Ghost was something kids thought was cool , that parents could come to a place they knew would give them support , and actually you all would be surprised how many grand parents have had to take the role in bringing up their Grand kids because of this new culture we live in .

I do have sick leave , I am one of those folks who get the goodie good award for never using it , but we are allowed to use sick days even for going to the dentist . I have a Union , and work for the state . I am thank full for my sick leave .

When my wife was sick I was allowed to use it , in fact my boss ordered me home . Right now i got about 1000 plus hours on the books .
I think that is a few months ?

But I see both sides here .

Posted by: Mick | March 11, 2008 12:27 AM

DontImmanentizeTheEschaton that was quite artiuculate . At least corporations are required to sell something that the public wants in order to stay in business. The state can say like it or not , here it is , you paid for it .

The problem is monolopies .

You most likely have read about the cycles of republic such as ours , and how it is doomed once the voting public realizes it can vote themselves the Treasury . And then does it .

Hope you stick around ,

Posted by: Mick | March 11, 2008 1:01 AM

"If the markets ruled now, the laws described would never have been passed. If a CEO calls in sick for seven days, he's gone."

Yeah, with a 54 million dollar golden handshake.

"It is not simply a coincidence that the laborers in a business friendly state like Texas are doing much better than those of Ohio or Michigan."

What kind of cars do they make in Texas? Oh, yeah, oil is $106 a barrel, that helps in Midland. If only Enron could have held outto now, Ken Lay would still be alive and guesting in the Lincoln Bedroom.

"Do you really believe that a system where greed is limited to the free choices of consumers and the rule of law promotes the evils of greed more that of the ruling powers of Stalinist Russia or Mao’s China?"

Holy smokes. We're not talking about greed in entities that no longer exist, we're talking about the very real unaccountable, unregulated greed of multinational corporations in the here and now.

"So, for the owners and shareholders to only care about profits they have to be accountable to the consumers that make revenue."

That accountability consists in creating markets and customers. It might not be at the point of a gun, but it can still utilize the best psychologically manipulative mneans that money can buy. Tobacco and alcohol are legitimate businesses, but they utilize a drug dealer business model to create markets, where the product ends up creating its own demand once introduced. That's true for weapons manufacturing and sales, also.

Too often, it's about creating psychological needs for products that aren't really needed, on the basis of spreading unfulfilled satisfactions and resentments, in order to sell products that inherently can't satisfy those needs - which is useful for selling the same thing over and over again. But it is irresponsible and dangerous for the political well-being of communities to create unrealistic senses of unfocussed insecurities and dissatisfactions in large populations that can never be fulfilled.

Where there is no accountability is in the lack of realization that employees of corporations are human beings, not disposable raw materials, and that business exists for these people, not people for business.

There is a moral and societal obligation that an artificial legal construct like a corporation meet the needs of all segments of society, including obligation to employees, not simply becoming "splendid mechanisms for conveying enormous personal wealth," as convicted ex-newpaper baron Conrad Black put it, in his eloquent way.

Corporations were created by civil mandate to serve all of society, not act as levers to benefit only a few, and so society has every right to demand that they fulfill whatever function it wants them to. It's a scandal that the largest number of lagal cases decided on the basis of the 14th amendment have nothing to do with former slaves' rights - essentially put on hold until the 1960s - but with establishing the right of corporations to have the full rights of persons, without any of their accountability.

Posted by: N.M. Rod | March 11, 2008 1:48 AM

"The fact is workers are best served by employers that value profits above all else."

So when good jobs are outsourced to low wage countries, because it's even more profitable for a few people's personal wealth to do so, that's good for those workers, my neighbors, who lost their employment?

What about long-term employees at companies like Hewlett-Packard, who are laid off one month shy of their thirty-year retirement, so that it serves company profits better not to have to pay the pension they expected? How does that serve them best? Ten thousand jobs from one company went marching from my town right to Shanghai, in a city of 50,000.

As the ratio between what employees make, as compared to managers, becomes ever steeper, because the shareholders do better and better as owners, how does a reduced pay scale without benefits like health insurance, better serve employees and their families?

"Every company’s primary concern should be the consumer."

Well, coulda, woulda, shoulda - the concern is not the consumer, but getting hold of the consumer's money. Anyone who tells you a company cares about its customers as people must be in PR. Do you really believe a corporation cares about its customer's well-being, except to the extent that it hopes he lives as long as it can continue to get its hands on his cash?

Kind of like health insurnce where you pay premiums all your life until you run out of money, when you're out of luck and out of health. Sayonara, stupid.

Lately we have the phenomenon of the financial derivative meltdown where the greed became so great that the golden goose accidentally got strangled in the frenzy to extract the Faberge eggs. Please.

"Also, tobacco, alcohol, and weapons existed before America, capitalism, or Ken Lay. They also make up a very small percentage of the market."

85% of our remaining manufacturing infrastructure value is in the military-industrial complex. A trillion here, a trillion there - pretty soon you're talking real money. This is about greed being wrong, not about America, capitalism or even your standard-issue Ken Lay corporate huckster.

Kenny-boy suffered his fatal heart attack due to the stress of Enron's financial meltdown. The top could have been kept spinning if energy trading losses hadn't been mounting due to unforeseen market forces. If Enron could have papered things over longer - with the continued connivance of all its arms-length major bankers, who knew everything, and profited from it handsomely - until the energy markets skyrocketed, as they now have, they would still be called the smartest guys in the room. They could put one over on consumers again, just like they did to Californians, with a regulator they owned appointed by a friendly administration. And maybe George would be in the Lincoln on his visits, giving the best bed to born-again Ken.

"no matter what liberals say, I do not believe that humans are so pathetic that we always succumb to the 'psychologically dominance' of the elites."

Who cares what liberals or anyone else says. Your "beliefs" might even be a manufactured product created by someone else for their own purposes. But billions of dollars spent on manipulative advertising that constantly lies, isn't a charitable donation to ad agencies. It costs, because it's worth it - it works - and how.

"There are, however, certainly market incentives to hiring and keeping good employees. Again, if you don’t think a company is treating you fairly you are free to quit and find an employer you think will."

There are definitely market incentives to firing employees in higher wage countries and hiring cheaper employees elsewhere. It's called labor arbitrage - you take advantage of differentials through employee churn on the labor side, just like you do with currency trading hedges and price manipulation for products in various jurisdictions. Buy low, sell high. It happens as fast as stocks are traded. At close of market, you lost your job, Willy Loman. Human beings are nothing more than ledger entries or ticker numbers on the big board.

Yeah, in company towns, the ultimate expression of the generosity to employees under the unregulated accountability of business, every employee either got rich or was free to leave, while owing more and more, to the company store.

Bill Buckley wrote a few years back, in an article titled, "Capitalism's Boil," "Every ten years I quote the same adage from the late Austrian analyst Willi Schlamm, and I hope that ten years from now someone will remember to quote it in my memory.

"It goes, 'The trouble with socialism is socialism. The trouble with capitalism is capitalists.'"

RIP, Bill, I just did.

And I'll let the conservative's conservative speak again from beyond the grave:

"What brought this on this time around was the published recapitulation of executive plunder. But the loss, viewed on a larger scale, is a loss to the community of people who believe in the capitalist free-market system. Because extortions of that size tell us, really, that the market system is not working — in respect of executive remuneration. What is going on is phony. It is shoddy, it is contemptible, and it is philosophically blasphemous."

No wonder Bill sold off his National Review stock. With age comes wisdom.

Posted by: N.M. Rod | March 11, 2008 4:11 AM

Odin's Beard wrote:
*quote:*
'more than 50 million workers in the U.S. must work when they are sick'

Does this number strike anyone else as absurdly high? The BLS places the labor force at around 150 million. So one third of the labor force doesn't have sick days?

Maybe it's just me.
*unquote*

Yes, it's just you.

I do not know anyone who IS granted paid sick days by their employer. One-third seems a very low estimate of those who are not granted paid sick leave, actually.

Posted by: Rebecca Davis Winters | March 11, 2008 9:19 AM

Bud Duncan wrote:

After all, it's their own damn fault for being poor anyway.

From my experience a lot of workers do get paid sick leave. Most of them either have college degrees or have been in the workforce a while.

And that's an important clue to what's going on here. Employers are reluctant to extend paid sick days, not because they are mean and cold hearted, but paid sick leave can be abused. Employers want to know that the employee will use sick days as intended, otherwise they risk having their workplaces disrupted by unnecessary absences. Among other things unplanned absences mean that workloads increase for coworkers.

Consequently unpaid sick leave tends to go to workers who have demonstrated diligence, preferably by building up a good work history.

In the absence of that an employee with an advanced degree or important skill will often have paid sick time, partly because his or her value to the company is great enough to be worth the risk, and partly because employers will figure that getting the degree or developing the skill by itself requires a certain amount of discipline. (Even if college students do cut classes occasionally, they usually either pick classes where they have little trouble with the material, or make up for it with extra study.)

Otherwise there is a rational, non-evil reason for employers to prefer to extend unpaid leave, which is to create an incentive for employees not to call in sick, even if the weather is really nice outside or if their favorite college basketball team is playing an afternoon game in the NCAA first round.

Now, as for my trip, I should say that while I wasn't 100 percent the worst of the flu was done with, meaning that odds anyone caught anything from me were modest -- not zero, but modest. If the trip had been a day earlier I probably would not have gone. As it was I weighed the pros and cons and decided the trip was important enough and I was healthy enough -- even though I would have gotten paid sick leave.

What I did isn't all that unusual. These are the kinds of decisions that people have to make in the real world every day -- not just the poor. After all, there's always a risk of something, if it isn't catching a virus it's getting run over by a cement truck.

Bud Duncan falls into an old but forgiveable fallacy in assuming that when someone has a difficult situation there must be someone at fault, but this isn't a "fault" situation, it's just a reasonable precaution that employers take.

Wolverine

Posted by: Wolverine | March 11, 2008 10:17 AM

Tacking on to what Wolverine said.

Many 'high-skill' workers do get paid sick days. But there are several reasons why low-wage employees rarely do. At your local burger joint, or in a manufacturing plant, employees are a part of a system. When someone doesn't show up, it is more costly than the loss of productivity of that employee.

In a workplace dependent on output, one less employee can decrease the output by 1.5, or even 2 times. That sounds a little abstract, even to me, so here's an example.

Let's say an employee makes $75 a day. Paid sick leave costs the company $150 (wages to the employee + lost productivity of the employee).

Now, if the employee worked as a burger flipper, and not showing up to work slows down the assembly line, it could reasonably cost the employer $250 (wages to the employee + lost productivity of the employee + lost productivity of the business).

Of course, even in an office, missing one person could slow things down. But it's much easier to work from home if you're not technically required to be physically present.

Posted by: Odin's Beard | March 11, 2008 11:27 AM

A couple of these comments either make a false comparison between white collar jobs and working class work---"I can't take sick leave from my office, so why should they?"--or place different categories of work in such different worlds that no comparison is possible ("work at a burger joint is an assembly line so it's a whole other thing...").

It is more important, I think, to focus on the core issue, as the post does so well: what is fair. Then, everything else will fall in line.

Is fairness not a legitimate realm for government? For faith?

Posted by: Old Tales Retold | March 11, 2008 2:01 PM

Most state employees are gien sick days . I work a blue collar job , but because of a Union I get sick days .

Most Unions only exist in the State paid jobs , not always , but otherwise Unions are shrinking .
The state subsidizes the ferry system I am employed by . We we would need to be subidized regardless if we were Union or not . If we were a private firm , I doubt my wages and benefits would be as high .

I had to make many compromises , working weekends , in rain , I have sick days but the employer still plays games with how employees use them by the way .I work Christmas most of te time , had to wait a few years working on call , etc . I could have worked elsewhere ?

But regardless , the problem with regulations like these is all busisnesses do not fit the same mode . Making employers pay benefits may be the actuall dollars that employer was going to use to hire another employee. This bill may actual cause a person supporting his family loose his job . That happens . Just like some businesses treat their employees like dirt .

I am glad I have a Union , but wow , I am glad I live in a country that allows us choices also .

Posted by: Mick | March 11, 2008 2:41 PM

"Wages plus compensation has been going up in America for decades. If you want to get into a stat-off about the trends in well-being of the average American worker, I would be more than happy to engage."

The average wage has been flat or declining since the 1999 high-water mark.

Now add stagflation to the mix.

I realize that for you, this may be all about ideology (hence the head-to-head "stat-off") and also therefore the constant references to long-ago defunct Soviet states. Your aged ideological skirt is showing. "Stat-offs" have no interest. We all know "figures don't lie" but liars sure can figure. That is about like the experts and pundits who are in denial about there being a recession or that various "new economies" had changed everything and it was forever up, up and away. Carlyle called economics "the dismal science," for good and ironic reason.

The real world for many families and children isn't so blithe, with Adam Smith's "unseen hand" on their throats.

Look, I've been in management, at director level, for a Fortune 500 company. I've been in on the management meetings where we agreed our purpose was to get rid of as many American employees as we possibly could, as fast as we could, and to reduce their wages and benefits as much as we possibly could.

We also agreed (at least those willing to speak) that we would spin this in an entirely different way and try to manipulate employees' and the public's thinking. I can tell you that if anyone had the courage not to think this was a good idea, they certainly didn't have enough to speak out about it.

Outsourcing and offshoring were seen as key to increased profits. We didn't exist for any other reason than to make money for ourselves - we weren't really intrinsically interested in either our products or our customers except as mere conduits to the profits. Respectively, they could have been anything or anyone.

Everything was reduced to the love of money, to be quite honest. If I could characterize the hierarchy's management ethos, it was "kick down," "kiss up."

Can I say it? "We didn't give a shit."

"Did you notice [Buckley's] article did not call for government intrusion? His article was not a critique on government policy. It was a critique on the growing number of inexperienced stock owners that make bad decisions."

Nope. Bill was well aware stock owners aren't in charge of compensation and management fights tooth and nail that they never will be, putting down any revolts to the contrary at annual meetings. There are "compensation committees" that are essentially self-dealing and non-arms-length. This isn't a small problem of a couple of bad apples. The whole greedy barrel is mutually stinking.

"If people made perfect economic decisions every time, the business cycle would not experience peaks and troughs. These fluctuations are exponentially milder than the certain damages of even the noblest government planner."

Exponentially? How pure doth the libertarian rhetoric rise to the clouds. Rules and regulations are not "central planning." A financial system without oversight ends up being one in which the boldest and most outrageous crooks gain the ascendancy, because corrupt behavior is financially rewarded. You have to have an unwarranted faith in the alchemic nature of holy free enterprise to believe it transmutes souls of lead into gold. I passed on Ayn Rand soon after adolescence.

1929 was no joke as to the consequences and neither are those of the untrammelled, unsupervised, unaccountable greed-driven credit derivative scams. Those losses, and their dire consequences for families, are going to be orders of magnitude over predictions, so hang on to your calculator to figure those exponentials as the hurricane blows through.

Posted by: N.M. Rod | March 11, 2008 3:09 PM

"am glad I have a Union , but wow , I am glad I live in a country that allows us choices also ."

I've never been in a union, and have been in management, have run a successful small business and worked for them too.

I can say that without a union, some, if not all, of our employees would have been mistreated and they definitely wouldn't have had the benefits they did nor the job security.

Unions can be problematic and they have been. But overall they level the relationship when it's adversarial between employer and employees. Otherwise the employer really holds most of the cards as he can divide and conquer.

I think it's just too bad when management and union folk can't agree to be mutually respectful and not see each other as enemies, but as those with naturally different perspectives.

In my own management career, I have been careful to always try to see the union's perspective, and seek to understand it, even if I might not always agree with the interpretation or means. I really want people to know I am for them and for their aspirations. You will note however, that I am not currently employed as an executive, so you may with some validity surmise just how much this approach was appreciated by my management team and those we reported to.

Posted by: N.M. Rod | March 11, 2008 4:49 PM

Yes, yes. We after all must be _reasonable_ when discussing how far we should go with this Christian decency thing. Next thing you know, folks might demand a living wage.

Posted by: carl copas

Thats it , I can't take it , Im moving to France . ;0)

Posted by: Mick | March 11, 2008 5:38 PM

"Thats it , I can't take it , Im moving to France . ;0)"

Hope it's the south of France!

"Au revoir Mick!! Revenu bientôt mon frère chrétien. :)"

Pardon my French, but did you just call someone an imbecile?

That sounded like something out of Talladega Nights.

I have found that when in foreign lands, if people don't understand you, just repeat in English, louder and louder, until they do.

Posted by: Sojourner Truth | March 11, 2008 6:27 PM

The English translation of the remark to Mick is: "Good-bye Mick! Come back soon, my Christian brother."

It's easier to translate French to English than it is to translate some uses of English to other uses of English. Just because we all write here in English doesn't mean that we give the same words similar meaning.e.g., the suggestion that there is a difference between one dictionary describing 'justice' as 'fairness', another as 'impartiality'. One meaning of impartiality is 'fair'.

It's taken me a while to figure out what the problem is in our exchanges here about capitalism and, say, the right to sick days. Unlike the non-difference in two definitions of 'justice', there is a significant difference in meaning of capitalism and taking care of employees in capitalism's jobs. In capitalism, there are only commodities, not communities. When we care about children's healthcare so that the disease they pick up at school doesn't get passed on to a father who might lose his job if he stays home to get better (instead of passing the infection further along) we are talking about community--caring for our brothers, if you will. Capitalism has nothing to do with creation and care of communities but rather the creation of widgets at a price lower than the sale price or about the movement of money even when no concrete object is created. No wonder we disagree with each other--we're talking about at least two different things!

Posted by: bren | March 11, 2008 6:52 PM

Right Bren , I went to one of those translation sites ,

Close to understanding that often we talk about different things . But I believe your somewhat wrong about capitalism . Capitalism is no better then the people who are using it . We seem to have little loyalty to our employers and they to the working man and women in our era . It was not always so . I have seen it in my jobs , which is why I am glad I am in a Union . But do not let yourself to believe that all unions are run by those who really care about their employees, in my years I have seen both .

Capitalism unchecked I agree can be quite harsh , as can government being involved in our affairs also . Once the government gets hold , their is usually no going back .

I have changed my views on health care to some extent , some nasty stories on this web of tradegies I admit tilted me that way , but I still want a system that prvides choice and causes doctors, hospitals , and clinics the need to continue to strive to provide choice and superior service . Working for the government , and most already know this , sometimes you can have a inferior service without the need to feel it needs to improve . Because they are the only choice , which is why monolopies are so dangerous to the free market place and consumers .

You can be for capitalism Bren because you believe people will better off with it . But your right about talking from two different starting points causing confusion .

Posted by: Mick | March 11, 2008 7:10 PM

But we also have universal health care and we also do better on IQ tests (but so does almost every other english speaking nation vs the US).

Be Blessed,

Posted by: Trent

Besides Koala's , what has Austrailia ever produced worth keeping ? ;0)

Posted by: Mick | March 11, 2008 10:58 PM

"we also do better on IQ tests"

Do children of comparable backgrounds do better than their American counterparts? How would our minorities compare to the aboriginals in your country? Care to reassess the merits of this assertion?

Students from my school who went to Melbourne Uni have unilaterally found it to be a cakewalk, which left plenty of time for hiking and drinking.

Posted by: kevin s. | March 12, 2008 12:21 AM

Mick's comments are very useful but just for a moment, I would like to flip them. While Mick is quite correct that not all unions have workers' interests uppermost, it's equally true that there is no company with a unionized staff who didn't deserve that union. There are many occasions when companies need to forced (by the union) to treat their workers reasonably.

The majority of the situations I think we're discussing are relatively benign. Except in the fruit and vegetable picking industries, few people are shot for joining a union. There is a new book out called THE FATE OF THE FRUIT THAT CHANGED THE WORLD by Dan Koeppel that reminds us of an industry that is anything but benign.

The forces of capitalism in the form of the United Fruit (in addition to destroying land and water systems, overthrowing governments and murdering activists, have helped to spread Panama disease in bananas (through their destruction of land and water systems). If even I know that current banana monocrop is dying out, surely they do as well. But instead of finding alternatives, they are working the crop until it dies out.

Will our lives be significantly diminished when, one day, we wake up to discover there are no bananas? Maybe not. But the corporate behavior that enabled the spread of Panama disease (esp. through the destruction of land and water systems) will wreak a cost to be paid by people who live in the countryside--and the corporation will laugh all the way to the bank. It's criminal behavior, in my books.

Posted by: bren | March 12, 2008 12:54 AM

Mick, congrats on 20 years of marriage. My wife and I celebrated 20 last summer, and went to .....Boston. But that's what she gets for marrying a historian who wanted to see the cradle of liberty.

"The depression was primarily a result of poor monetary policy and a protectionist trade policy. There were also franchises, subsidies, and taxes on companies…so we were far from a free market."

But the stock market prior to the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934 was virtually unregulated. Read about the incredible pyramid schemes embodied in holding companies and the like. Moreover, banks, prior to the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933 had no limits on amount of $$$ they could loan out. Hence the infamous bank runs of 1930-31, and the nine million savings accounts lost 1929-32.

Posted by: carl copas | March 12, 2008 11:03 AM