Hawk Talk

There has been quite the groundswell in recent years in the efforts to legalize marijuana. In fact, a majority of US states have at least some sort of access to legal weed, despite its still being criminalized at the federal level. But the state of Colorado led the nation when it legalized marijuana for all purposes, even recreational ones, in January of 2014. The anti-marijuana advocates warned that such an action would lead to increased drug use — especially among teens — higher crimes rates, and a whole spate of other undesirable consequences. Nevertheless, the plant prevailed. It's still early days, but we do have almost four years of data about the effects of legalizing marijuana to look at. Were the anti-marijuana crusaders correct? Are teen drug use and violent crime rampant? Are visitors shunning Colorado? Was it all a huge mistake? Antony Davies and James Harrigan discuss this and more on this week's episode of Words and Numbers.

Quick Hits Unemployment rate is at its lowest level?

https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesfinancecouncil/2017/12/08/why-you-cant-rely-on-the-unemployment-rate-as-primary-economic-indicator/

Sweet Briar college no longer discounting tuition

https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/beloved-womens-college-slashes-tuition-prices-30/

https://bigfuture.collegeboard.org/pay-for-college/college-costs/college-costs-faqs

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/05/16/discount-rates-rise-yet-again-private-colleges-and-universities

Venezuela’s diaspora is growing: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/12/14/flood-venezuelans-fleeing-their-depressed-country/941463001/

US better educated now than at any time in its history: http://triblive.com/news/education/classroom/13077368-74/us-more-educated-than-ever-before-census-bureau-says

Foolishness of the week Bulletproof glass is an indignity

http://reason.com/blog/2017/12/15/philly-votes-to-regulate-bulletproof-gla

Marijuana and Crime 

Adolescent pot use is falling in Colorado

http://reason.com/blog/2017/12/12/contradicting-prohibitionists-survey-say/amp?__twitter_impression=true

The war on marijuana has failed

http://triblive.com/opinion/featuredcommentary/11974018-74/marijuana-colorado-drug

Colorado’s pot full of benefits

http://triblive.com/opinion/featuredcommentary/6487136-74/marijuana-state-war

Commercial pot in Colorado

http://gazette.com/editorial-the-sad-anniversary-of-big-commercial-pot-in-colorado/article/1614900

Milton Friedman on drug criminalization https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLsCC0LZxkY

Attorney General Jeff Sessions on marijuana policy http://www.newsweek.com/will-jeff-sessions-war-marijuana-next-week-744089

Teen marijuana use is down since legalization https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/12/11/following-marijuana-legalization-teen-drug-use-is-down-in-colorado

Data

https://www.colorado.gov/pacific/cbi/colorado-crime-statistics-ucr

https://www.colorado.gov/pacific/cbi/crime-colorado1

http://worldpopulationreview.com/states/colorado-population/

https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/table-1

https://www.denverite.com/chronic-homelessness-ten-year-high-metro-denver-heres-citys-38546/

https://www.colorado.gov/pacific/sites/default/files/PW_ISVP_PDO_Heroin-in-Colorado-2017.pdf

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Christmas is right around the corner, and people everywhere are in the holiday spirit. In addition to giving gifts to loved ones, Americans are also giving to their preferred charities. Indeed, about a third of all charitable donations occur during the month of December. And Americans are, in general, incredibly generous. Recent estimates have the total dollar amount of charitable giving, both cash and labor, at about $600 billion. That's more than almost all other countries take in via taxation. Most of this money comes from those "selfish" rich people you read so much about, and all but about 5 percent of it comes from individuals. Businesses, for all their fanfare and PR campaigns, give very little in comparison. Of course, not all of this giving goes to what might be called poverty relief, but about 82 percent of it does, about $500 billion, as of 2016. And all of this giving is completely separate from what the government takes through taxation and redistributes through what is loosely defined as "welfare spending." So how does all of this private charity compare to what the government is doing? What does the future for government welfare look like? Is the market capable of taking on the role of the "first line" of help for those who need it? Antony Davies and James Harrigan discuss on this week's episode of Words and Numbers.

Episode Data and Articles:

Voluntary Giving

http://triblive.com/opinion/featuredcommentary/11522510-74/christmas-war-holiday 

http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/commentary/charitable-giving-generosity-government-poverty-20171204.html 

Welfare

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/01/12/no-we-dont-spend-1-trillion-on-welfare-each-year/?utm_term=.e907f7625b56 

https://www.usgovernmentspending.com/year_spending_2017USbn_17bs6n_2030#usgs302 

Data

https://givingusa.org/giving-usa-2017-total-charitable-donations-rise-to-new-high-of-390-05-billion/ 

https://www.philanthropy.com/article/Giving-Tuesday-Haul-Is-an/238534 

https://www.nptrust.org/philanthropic-resources/charitable-giving-statistics/ 

https://www.independentsector.org/resource/the-value-of-volunteer-time/ 

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2056.html 

https://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=content.view&cpid=42 

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Economist Paul Krugman is well-known for his pro-Democrat stances. Recently, he's claimed that the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has said that if the Individual Mandate portion of the Affordable Care Act, often called Obamacare, is repealed, 22 million Americans will "lose" their health insurance. What he doesn't say is that the vast majority of those 22 million people are simply opting out. They are _choosing_ not to have health insurance. But here's the problem with CBO forecasts: they're usually wrong. And they're wrong in almost the exact same way. Why are the CBO forecasts so bad? Why do they consistently get it wrong in such a consistent way? And what does this mean for our economy? James Harrigan and Antony Davies discuss this and more in this week's episode of Words and Numbers.

Quick hits

Emirates’ new 777

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ericrosen/2017/11/13/new-emirates-first-class-suites-on-777-300er-revealed-at-the-dubai-air-show/#13ce46a256b8

Curing disease by rewriting our DNA

https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/first-scientists-try-edit-faulty-dna-inside-patients-body-cure-genetic-disease/

iHeart Radio:https://www.wsj.com/articles/iheart-creditors-reject-another-offer-from-company-as-they-push-for-chapter-11-1512090362

Jeff Sessions on marijuana:http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/11/sessions-hints-at-a-coming-crackdown-on-recreational-weed.html

http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/29/politics/sessions-opioid-news-conference-marijuana/index.html

http://reason.com/blog/2017/10/26/sessions-continues-to-push-gateway-drug

Foolishness of the weekhttps://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/30/us/politics/republican-tax-bill-moves-closer-to-senate-passage.html

The CBO

https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2017/07/22/cbo-three-fourths-of-coverage-difference-between-obamacare-gop-bills-driven-by-individual-mandate/#327a3b9e3627

Follow us on Twitterhttps://twitter.com/JamesRHarrigan

https://twitter.com/AntonyDavies

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Recently, in a small town Pennsylvania, an insurance agent for Nationwide Insurance noticed a certain plant growing in a garden on the property he was inspecting. This insurance agent identified the plant as marijuana and notified the police about this nefarious behavior. An elderly couple lived at that property, and while the husband was out at the time, the wife was dragged from her home, in her underwear, while police proceeded to ransack the home for four hours. They found nothing illegal. And that marijuana plant that started this whole debacle? Actually a hibiscus. This is only one of countless examples of this exact sort of "raid first, ask questions later" mentality that police forces in this country have adopted. But it's only natural that this sort of bad behavior has evolved because of the huge problem of overcriminalization. And when the difference between "criminal" and "lawbreaker" is more than just splitting semantic hairs, something needs to be done. Special guest Clark Neily of the Cato Institute joins James Harrigan and Antony Davies to talk about this and more on this week's episode of Words and Numbers.

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It never seems to fail that whenever any kind of change to the tax code is proposed in Washington, billionaires and millionaires come clambering out of the woodwork to tell Congress not to cut their taxes. This current round of tax reform is no exception. Recently, more than 400 of the super-rich signed a letter asking exactly that, claiming that both the national debt and wealth inequality are at all-time highs. But are these claims true? Is taxation the only way to financially support the government? Even if the government raised taxes on the rich instead of cutting them, would it make one whit of difference to the national debt? James Harrigan and Antony Davies discuss this and more on this week's episode of Words and Numbers.

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The World Fair Trade Organization has declared this week to be World Fair Trade Week. "Fair trade" is quite the buzzword in commerce these days and is generally associated agricultural products. Chief among those is coffee. The popularity of fair trade coffee is undeniable. But what even is "fair trade" and what does it entail? How "fair" is it? Or is it just a marketing gimmick? James Harrigan and Antony Davies get into the nitty-gritty of this and more in this week's episode of Words and Numbers.

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If the government of France was to suddenly and magically cease to exist, France itself would definitely still go on. If the government of the United States was to suddenly and magically cease to exist, would the United States itself still go on? The answer isn't entirely clear. In a recent interview, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas stated that he doesn't know what binds us, Americans, together anymore. The subject of American unity is a touchy one. With so much political divisiveness in our country, is it at all possible to come together over even one defining characteristic? Do we still have a cohesive national identity? James Harrigan and Antony Davies talk about this and more in this week's episode of Words and Numbers.

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This year, Deficit Day - that is, the day the federal government runs out of money for the year and starts spending money it doesn't have - fell on October 24. This is about average for the last 30 or so years. And yet, somehow, this year's deficit spending is on track to be the largest it's ever been. How does that work? And what's the difference between mandatory and discretionary spending? Is the rate of expansion of government spending sustainable? James Harrigan and Antony Davies discuss this and more on this week's episode of Words and Numbers.

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It’s important to approach the subject of guns and gun control with a cool and rational mind. It’s easy to make snap judgments in the heat of the moment that feel good but might not have any bearing on reality. Now that we’ve gained a little distance from the horrific shooting in Las Vegas, what do the data say about gun deaths and gun violence in America? Is it really as bad as it seems? James Harrigan and Antony Davies break down the statistics for us in this week’s episode of Words and Numbers.

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Healthcare is a hot topic right now after a couple of failed attempts to repeal Obamacare and an executive order that rolled back some of the restrictions on selling insurance. There’s no doubt that health care and health insurance are both expensive and getting more expensive all the time. But how did it get this way? And how can we fix it? Antony Davies and James Harrigan discuss the how and the why of the cost of healthcare in this week’s episode of Words and Numbers.

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