Monday, March 25, 2013

Why Do People Love Public, Hate Private?

Move over, Atlas Shrugged, here comes real life! You'd believe that this article on unionized postal "workers" protesting the end of six-day delivery was a satire. Yet it appears to be authentic, and the people quoted seem to really believe what they say.

She added, "We will lose the security of the mail because if we don't deliver on Saturday, somebody will and you don't know who will be delivering on Saturday."

This is wrong on so many levels. In my experience, pretty much every time I deal with a private business, I get cheaper and better service than from one that's regulated or even run by the government. Any service the government pretends to provide can be provided cheaper, better, and more humanely by the free market.

So the government won't deliver on Saturday anymore? Somebody will? We don't know who it is?

Yay! Whoever it is, if experience is a judge, the service will get better!

Of course, the unionist that made that original statement had an ulterior motive. She'd say anything, any nonsense, to keep her and her looter and moocher accomplices' jobs.

But I keep hearing that insane sentiment from people independently of whose ox is being gored. Why do people root for the state like that?

(In other countries even more than in the US. In Europe, people complain if corporations collect their customer data and send them to the US with its less restrictive data protection laws for processing, but don't mind filling out all the bullshit forms their governments force them to, giving their governments personal data they'd never even dream of giving out voluntarily. The best thing about the US is that it's the only country where there are still freedom-loving people left that don't trust the government.)

I don't understand why most people are such knee-jerk collectivists. Why is it that most people tend to approve of anything if it comes from the state, but criticize anything that comes from private industry?

Is it because in a democracy everybody gets one vote in the state, so the state is "we," but a private company is "they"? Is it because the majority figures they can vote to force the minority to pay for the service? Is it because private industry is out to make profit, and religion holds that profit is immoral?

Anyways, the article continues with plenty of funny antics from your local chapter of the CCCP (Communist Clowns and Comedians of the Posts) union.

We want the PMG (postmaster general) to know we stand in solidarity, all of the craft unions," Warren said in a speech to the participants, eliciting applause from the group.

So delivering mail is a craft now? What special skills does it require?

Fitting rectangular envelopes into rectangular slots? Checking the numbers on the stamps against tables with the correct postage?

What's next? The Wal-Mart cashier craft? The burger flipper craft?

Oh, my bad! Of course it's all crafts. I forgot about those hygiene technicians and appliance technicians. :)



With ongoing cuts including the Saturday delivery, she worried that "we'll be a private company" when its over.

Again, what's so bad about private? The loss of your cushy benefits and homing from work?

Reminds me…

Sacking out on his sacks of mail, a postal "worker" finds himself lying on something hard punching him from below. Rooting for it, he finds an old oil lamp. He proceeds to rub it, and out comes a genie.

"Hi! Thanks for getting me out of that cramped lamp," says the genie. "For that, I owe you three wishes."

"Hmm… Lemme think… First, I want to go to Hawaii."

Bang!

He's lying on the beach in Waikiki.

"Second, I want a beautiful girlfriend."

Bang!

There's a supermodel lying next to him.

"Third, I never want to work again."

Bang!

He's back lying on his sacks of mail.

Clay Myer, vice president of the Alabama Rural Letter Carriers Association, said customers want to retain the six-day delivery. "We work for the American people and the American people want six-day delivery. That's it," he said.

Unfortunately, the American people want six-day delivery only if they don't have to pay for it, buster.