Speaking of Cliches

     My kids have been visiting and they reminded me -- with all the politeness and sensitivity you'd expect from 20-somethings -- that I tend to offer up a lot of free, gratuitous advice in the form of tired old cliches. I don't think they take much of it to heart (although it is all excellent advice), but when they're not ignoring me they do sometimes find my offerings amusing.

     For example, I try to tell my two kids to remain friends as adults, even as they get older and their lives diverge both professionally and geographically. Don't you think that's important? I do. Friends come and go, I tell them, but you always have family. Remember, blood is thicker than water.

     However, my advice typically elicits no more than a big sigh and an obvious eye roll.

The usual reaction

     I'm sure I was no different when I was a young adult. But I do recall my mother's favorite bit of advice. She always told me, A stitch in time saves nine. But then, she was a Depression baby. She also would trot out another chestnut: You can't have your cake and eat it too. Which I thought was a terrible piece of advice, since I figured the whole point of having cake was to eat it. But then, eventually, I did learn that if you eat the cake, you no longer have it.

     My mother also warned me many times not to be a bull in a china shop (come to think of it, B sometimes tells me the same thing!), and when I got too anxious about something she'd warn me, Don't count your chickens before they hatch.

     My dad used to say: There's more than one way to skin a cat. He was a crafty old soul, who felt that you had to take the world as it is, and figure out a way to carve out a place for yourself. And if you couldn't do it one way, you had to try another. He would also sometimes warn me that a person might have an ace up his sleeve. I could never quite figure out if my dad thought a person with an ace was dishonest, or whether he secretly admired the guy for being smarter than he looked.

     There was one more my dad used, when he was trying to counsel me to be patient: Rome wasn't built in a day. I found that one particularly puzzling, because while I knew my dad counted his birthdays in Roman numerals, I couldn't figure out what Rome had to do with me. (Of course, now my kids count my birthdays in Roman numerals.)

     My best friend's dad had a favorite phrase. He always talked about how some young fellow needed to cut his teeth on something -- meaning the fellow was green and had to get some experience. But what that had to do with teeth, I never did figure out.

     I also remember once when I was in high school, a girl with an unfortunate skin condition who was also too-obviously overweight, took a shine to me. I was trying to avoid her without hurting her feelings. My friend smirked at me and said I should go out with her because, after all, beauty's only skin deep. Later, when I suggested to my friend that maybe he should ask her out, he retorted, yeah that'll happen when hell freezes over.

     Of course, I hate to think what cliche Janie Smith, the prettiest girl in our class (or so I thought), trotted out when she found out I was smitten with her prepubescent charms. Probably something along the lines of, eeeww ... not in a million years.

     When I was a kid, I found many of these old sayings annoying, even if they were sometimes instructional. But once I had my own kids, I found myself trotting out these old phrases like -- well, like I had an ace up my sleeve, even though I was really laying an egg.

     But the one my kids find most laughable is:  A penny saved is a penny earned. Like most kids (and adults too, I might add) if they see a penny on the sidewalk, they won't even bother to stoop over to pick it up. Not worth the effort.

     So what's your favorite cliche, or favorite piece of advice? My kids still have a few problems in their lives, a few big decisions to make, and I would like to be able pass on some cogent advice to them. And who knows, maybe someday I'll have grandchildren, who will be eager for my words of wisdom.

     In the meantime, let me pass on another favorite:  Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

The Friday Front

  An item this week that caught my attention, and might catch yours . . . 

     I saw two articles this week that seem to offer dueling views on the economy, and what it means for Baby Boomers and our children.

     In "The Baby Bump" from the New York Times, two former members of the Obama administration, Kenneth S. Baer and Jeffrey B. Liebman, argue that there's really no good reason to worry about the federal budget deficit and the nation's high unemployment rate.

     The reason the government is spending so much money, they point out, is not because Congress has gone on an out-of-control spending spree, as some have charged. It's because of a demographic shift.

The unemployment rate has started to go back down

     We're spending more on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, because Baby Boomers are getting older, so there are a lot more retired people with a lot more medical problems. But aside from this demographic shift, the government has actually been fiscally responsible in recent years. Spending on discretionary items, such as defense, agriculture and education, has gone down, at least as a percentage of our gross domestic product (GDP).

     The authors also say the high unemployment rate is a temporary problem that will correct itself over time. The economy is currently generating about 150,000 jobs a month. According to critics that's not enough to employ all the new high school and college graduates entering the workforce. The critics point to the falling labor participation rate, and say the only reason the unemployment rate is going down is because so many people are discouraged and have given up looking for work.

     But the authors claim that 200,000 Baby Boomers are retiring every month -- and it's all those retirees, not discouraged workers, who account for the falling labor participation rate. They figure that 200,000 replacement jobs, plus 150,000 new jobs, offer plenty of opportunities for newcomers to the employment rolls.

But the labor participation rate has not improved

     The authors don't say where they get a figure of 200,000 Baby Boomers retiring every month. Honestly, I don't believe it. Maybe it's possible that 200,000 Baby Boomers are leaving the workforce (although that figure still seems inflated), but no doubt a lot of them are getting laid off or packaged out.

     Regardless, just try to tell any of this to young people, says Robert Samuelson in his Washington Post article "Is the Economy Creating a Lost Generation?" His analysis shows that for young people jobs are scarce, and those that are available pay low wages with few benefits. The result is some 20% of young workers are underemployed -- either officially unemployed, working part time, or so discouraged they've stopped looking for a job.

     Furthermore, the stagnant job market blocks the traditional path to better jobs and higher pay. Historically, young people moved up the economic ladder by changing jobs, learning new skills, developing their business network. But today, with  jobs so scarce, those who are employed are clinging to their old jobs. They're too scared to jump at new opportunities, the time-honored way to increase pay and responsibility.

     As a result, fewer young people are getting married, buying houses and starting families. In 2011, the birth rate dropped to its lowest level since numbers started being reliably recorded in 1920. The expected fertility rate (the number of children born to a woman in her lifetime) has now fallen for four years in a row, down to 1.9 (the replacement rate is 2.1).

And young people are left behind

     Samuelson does not hold out a lot of economic hope for our children, at least for the immediate future. He points out in another article, "Job Creation's Glum Arithmetic," that even if you take the official unemployment rate at face value (ignoring all the underemployed), given current job-creation rates, it will take until  2018 to get the unemployment rate back down to a barely acceptable 6.5%. Even if we start generating 250,000 jobs a month, it will be the end of 2014 before we reach that rather modest goal.

     And that's assuming we fix the fiscal cliff, reform the tax code, avoid future energy shocks, and do not suffer another recession.

     I don't know whether to believe Baer and Liebman from the Times, or Samuelson from the Post. But all this is somewhat disconcerting to me. I'm no longer looking for a job myself. But as someone who was forced out of the labor pool prematurely, as someone who is officially counted as retired but is really just underemployed, what I really wonder is:  If those young people don't start making more money, who's going to pay my Medicare and Social Security?

Gun Safety, Not Gun Control

     People have been talking about gun control, and how we treat the mentally ill, ever since last Friday when the Newtown shootings took place. I've seen various comments in the media and postings on Facebook like the ones below.

     The Newtown wound is still very raw -- the first funerals were held yesterday. Nevertheless, I think we should keep the conversation going about how to stop these killers. And before we all get too depressed, we should also keep things in perspective.

Some 8,800 of those U. S. handgun fatalities were murders; almost 2,000 were accidents

 
     First of all, remember that violent crimes in America have gone way down since they peaked in the early 1990s. Murders have declined from over 24,000 per year to less than 15,000 per year, even though we have a larger population. The violent crime rate has dropped from over 700 per 10,000 residents to less than 400 per 100,000 residents.

     And we also have to remember that mass killings have a long tradition in this country. Don't you remember Charles Whitman picking off students from the observation deck of the main building at the University of Texas in 1966? He killed over a dozen people -- and was killed at the scene by a police officer.

     But of course the fact that mass shootings almost rate as an American tradition is cold comfort to the latest victims. Indeed, if anything, what it says to me is this: It's about time we finally do something about them.

     In 1994 the U. S. Congress passed a law banning automatic assault weapons. But the law sunsetted after ten years, in 2004, when Congress did nothing to extend or renew it. So presumably it was perfectly legal for Mrs. Lanza to have all those weapons in her house -- the ones her disturbed son took and used to kill her and the young students at the school.

I saw this table on the Internet. It is wrong. CDC figures for 2009 do say 11,493 firearm homicides, but the 16,799 number is for TOTAL homicides -- meaning only 5,306 were non-firearm homicides

 
     I have seen a few articles making essentially the same argument for guns that my brother-in-law makes -- that if more people were armed, then potential mass murderers might think twice before they initiated their attacks. See this article by John Fund at National Review if you want to follow the reasoning.

John Oliver from The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

     These arguments make a certain kind of internal logic. But they just don't square with reality. First of all, many of the killers like Adam Lanza are on a suicide mission. What do they care if someone else has a gun? Besides, they typically outarm any potential gun-carrying citizen. Plus, the proof of the pudding is that, with all the guns in America, it's never a civilian who stops the killer. It's always the cops.

     In 1966, a civilian joined the police officers who attacked Charles Whitman on the observation deck. But the civilian's rifle went off prematurely by mistake. It was the cops who actually took down the killer.

     Furthermore, I don't see any justification for allowing normal citizens to carry automatic weapons. There's nothing in the 2nd Amendment about automatic weapons. We banned them once before; we should do it again. Here's a report on what some U. S. Senators are beginning to propose.

     I understand that Americans want to be able to hunt, and go take target practice, and the 2nd Amendment clearly gives them the right to do that. But I don't see why the ownership of guns can't be regulated on the basis of public safety, just like we do with drugs or automobiles. After all, it's not hard to get a driver's license, or buy a car. Nobody is trying to "take away" our cars by requiring us to have a license and register our cars with the state. But if a car is used in a crime, or a driver hurts someone in a hit-and-run, we at least know how to track them down. And the fact that people know this likely has some deterrent effect against reckless driving and criminal behavior.

    
     Obviously, regulating guns more effectively is not the whole answer to the Newtown type of crime. But instituting some reasonable safety regulations is absolutely part of the solution. Certainly, we can also work to improve our schools and our mental health facilities. But that's a long and uncertain road.

     Some people have fingered violent video games and violence in the media as contributing factors to violence in the real world. I'm sure there's some truth to that. But I doubt we're ready to start down the road to censorship, so we have to rely on the media to police itself, which you know is not going to be very effective.

     You might have seen the following message on the Internet, supposedly from Morgan Freeman. I read it and thought it made some sense. Then I found out the message is a hoax. It did not come from Morgan Freeman. But whoever posted it ... maybe they weren't so very wrong.

The apocryphal message from Morgan Freeman

    
     I hope we keep the conversation going. I hope those Senators are successful in banning assault weapons. And I hope the U. S. continues the trend of less gun violence, and less violence in general, as the months and years go on. Because I don't want to be the next victim. And I sure don't want my kids to be the next victims.

Blogging Boomers

     Just a note to prompt you to head over and take a look at the Midlife Crisis Queen to check out the Winter Solstice edition of the Blogging Boomers Carnival.

     She's got some news from the writing front; plus, you'll of course find links to several interesting Baby Boomer posts.

     One entry discusses how as a general rule Baby Boomers talk more frequently to their adult children than their parents did. Another offers a few tips on how to cut holiday costs. And there's a new member, with a blog called Life After Married, who covers all the vicissitudes of Baby Boomer relationships.

     Go ahead, click on the link. It's worth the trip.

What the Future Holds

     Whew! Well, that's over and done with. I'm good for another five years.

     The strangest thing happened on our way out of the medical office. As we exited the elevator, we ran into a friend of mine. He moved to the city a few years ago after he got divorced, but still comes out here to the suburbs to see the doctor. He was just going in for his physical. (I asked him later how it went. He frowned and said, "My doctor wants me to lose weight." I told him: "Well, just get yourself a fatter doctor!")

     Half a minute later, in the lobby, we saw a woman I used to work with. Hadn't seen her in at least five years. We exchanged startled hellos, and briefly caught up on what we'd been doing. I don't know what she was there for, but she looked happy enough, and so it couldn't have been anything serious.

     Then before we even got to the parking lot, we saw our dance instructor, who was coming in to the facility with her mother. More surprised hellos, and quick catching up.

     Is this what happens when you get older -- you see all your friends at the doctor's office?

      Anyway, B and I have already made a date, for December 2017, for our next colonoscopy. But, I wonder, will we still be living here then? Will we be somewhere else? But at least it's likely that we'll be alive.

     It seems embarrassingly petty and self-centered to be worrying about a possible polyp in my colon when 20 little kids are being shot and murdered up in Connecticut. What are my problems compared to theirs? Just think of the lives cut short, the horror the parents must be going through. Our hearts obviously go out to them.

     My brother-in-law would say that if more people were armed, then maybe these things wouldn't happen. Somebody with a gun might have stopped the shooter; and besides, if the shooter knew there was a good chance he'd run into someone who'd shoot back, maybe he wouldn't try to kill these kids and their teachers in the first place.

     My brother-in-law spent 20-plus years in the military, and I know he owns at least one gun -- he showed me his license once -- and is comfortable carrying a lethal weapon. He's a conservative who believes in individual freedom and personal responsibility, and the right to carry arms. He talks the conservative line in general, and since he's a mature, responsible person his outlook works pretty well for him. And honestly, for the most part I respect his beliefs. I even share some of them, at least to some reasonable extent. I certainly don't think he's a stupid kuckledragger -- the way a lot of liberals think of people who don't agree with them.

     But I do think my brother-in-law is wrong on guns.

     How can anyone seriously think that arming more people would prevent incidents like the one in Newtown, Conn.? We're not in the wild west anymore -- and besides, that wasn't such a safe place anyway. Is a civilian really going to pull out his gun and confront a killer? And if he did, how would he fare against a shooter who's wearing combat gear and carrying semiautomatic pistols and a semiautomatic rifle?

     Did any armed bystander pull out a gun and stop the killing in Tucson in Jan. 2011? Or in Aurora, Colorado, in July 2012? Or at Virginia Tech in July 2007?

     No, instead we hear news like we did last week, of a man in Pennsylvania who accidentally shot and killed his son in the parking lot of a gun store. He thought the gun was not loaded.

     It's time to interpret the 2nd Amendment in the light of the 21st century, instead of the 18th century, to make sure we keep semiautomatic guns out of the hands of people who are mentally disturbed, or even just careless. Would it be that horrible to require people to be trained and licensed before they could shoot a gun? After all, we don't hesitate to require that of people who drive an automobile. Would it be that horrible to register guns, like we do automobiles, and require owners be responsible for them and to carry liability insurance?

     And while we're at it, do we have to all be so resentful and angry all the time? Do we have to call people nasty names when they don't agree with us? Do we have to be so aggressive when we're on the road and cloaked in the anonymity of our cars? Do we have to beat people up (as they did in Michigan last week) when they vote on legislation we don't like?

     I think we all need to be a little less self-centered, a little more caring of others, a little less insulting to people who don't agree with us. Let's do it for the kids.