Archives: Reg Murphy Pubs

The Manifold Causes of Homelessness

Written by Roscoe Scarborough on . Posted in Reg Murphy, Roscoe Scarborough.

The CDC’s eviction moratorium has ended. The cost of housing keeps going up. The prices of goods and services are rising due to inflation. For many, homelessness is coming for the holidays.

According to HUD data, more than 580,000 people are homeless on a single night in the US. 61% are in sheltered locations and 39% are in unsheltered locations. Rates of homelessness are higher among men and African Americans. Nationally, the number of homeless persons has increased in recent years, but Georgia has experienced a significant decline in homelessness over the past decade. Conversely, Georgia has high rates of rural homelessness and unsheltered veteran homelessness.

But, why does homelessness persists? Americans tend to think in individualistic terms, focusing on character, motivations, personality, or mental illness. As a sociologist, I strive to transcend individualism and examine how social institutions shape behavior. If one individual in a city is homeless, it’s likely the result of a personal failing. If many people in a city are homeless, there are structural conditions that cause homelessness.

Housing costs, poverty, and the economy impact rates of homelessness. Many people are priced out of the housing market by the high cost of homes or a lack of affordable options. Meanwhile, wages have stagnated since the 1970s. Many local economies do not provide enough careers with incomes that cover the costs of housing. Our modern economy offers many opportunities for part-time and service-industry work, but this work often pays less than a living wage and often does not provide health insurance. Poverty and reduced labor market participation increases one’s chances of homelessness.

Declining marriage rates and weakening of family bonds put individuals at risk of homelessness. Spouses, parents, grandparents, and adult children provide a social safety net that keeps people off the streets. Homelessness is often a direct result of lacking strong ties to relatives or a family of affinity.

The cost of medical care, a lack of emphasis on preventative medicine, and insufficient access to mental healthcare contribute to homelessness. 28 million Americans did not have health insurance at all in the past year. Many millions more had gaps in insurance coverage or were underinsured. In particular, deficient access to counseling, mental healthcare, or addiction treatment services perpetuates chronic homelessness.

The criminal justice system contributes to homelessness. Anti-vagrancy laws and similar statutes criminalize homelessness in many communities. Homeless people who have run-ins with the law develop criminal records that create a barrier to employment, resulting in a cycle of homelessness.

Low quality education increases rates of homelessness. Our schools offer deficient health, drug, and personal finance education. In the U.S., 1 in 5 adults in the U.S. are functionally illiterate. Many Americans lack basic quantitative reasoning skills. Those who attend low quality schools or fail to graduate are at heightened risk of poverty and homelessness.

Other structural conditions play a role, such as underfunded public health departments, inadequate support programs for veterans, political alienation, ineffective drug interdiction efforts, and weak government responses to climate change. Taken together, these are some of the manifold institutional causes of homelessness.

Sociology challenges us to transcend individualistic explanations of behavior. Personal troubles can lead to homelessness, but these are often symptomatic of institutional conditions. For example, an individual may experience homelessness due to a substance abuse disorder. Americans tend to think about this as a personal problem, but addiction is also a product of deficient health education, underfunded public health, failed drug interdiction efforts, and poor access to mental healthcare.

If we ever hope to end homelessness, it’s essential to transcend individualism and identify the manifold institutional conditions that cause homelessness. This is a prerequisite to developing practical policy recommendations to mitigate homelessness.

Roscoe Scarborough, Ph.D. is an assistant professor of sociology at College of Coastal Georgia and an associate scholar at the Reg Murphy Center. He can be reached by email at rscarborough@ccga.edu.

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Bitcoin, Cigarettes, and Money

Written by Skip Mounts on . Posted in Reg Murphy, Skip Mounts.

I think to get our collective heads around this, I should start at the end. Bitcoin is one form of digital money and the blockchain is a digital ledger. Clear? Now, let’s start at the beginning.

Money is anything that performs the functions of money. Money, then, is anything that is (1) a medium of exchange, (2) a standard of value, and (3) a store of value. Please note that this does not include a required role for government.

Richard A. Radford was a flyer for the Royal Air Force during World War II. He was shot down over France and spent the rest of the war trying to escape from prison camps. At war’s end, he wrote a classic article called ‘The Economics of a POW Camp’ where he described the economic system that arose and developed in a camp of prisoners. It is fun to read.

Two things are of interest. Every so often, the Swiss Red Cross would bring packages to the prisoners that contained assorted items. The first thing that would happen as the boxes were being distribute, is that each prisoner would look in their box and then start trading with others. Apparently, barter is basic to the human condition. Next, with time, the cigarettes that came with the Red Cross packages began to serve as money, replacing barter. Barter requires a coincidence of wants – to get what I want from you, I must have something you want. It is costly and difficult. With cigarettes as money, I can get what I want from you by giving you cigarettes because you know that those cigarettes will be accepted in exchange by others. All we need to agree on is the price – the number of cigarettes. With time, every item, like blankets, had prices expressed in cigarettes.

Cigarettes became a medium of exchange and shows the fundamental reason that makes something money —- others accept it. I accept money – whatever the form – because I know that you will accept it. Nothing is said of government. The key is acceptance.

The Radford article is cool. All of what we call monetary theory, was found in cigarettes. When the Red Cross brought a new supply of cigarettes, prices in terms of cigarettes would rise (inflation). As the supply of cigarettes decreased (by smoking for example), the money supply declined and prices in terms of cigarettes fell.

There two types of money in our economy – private and government: coins and currency (cash) are government money and checking accounts are private money created by commercial banks through the system of fractional reserve banking.

The largest part of the money supply is in privately produced checking accounts. As private money is used in transactions, it goes through third parties like commercial banks, other financial institutions, and the Federal Reserve. If you want to keep your transaction private, you need to use cash. Cash transactions are only between a buyer and a seller and no one else need to know about it. (We have been binge watching The Sopranos so I will leave out rat informants.)

Where does government fit in? The creation of money needs to be guided by a rule, a monetary regime. Excessive money creation reduces the value of each monetary unit and impacts whether it will be accepted by others. A gold standard, a silver standard, the Federal Reserve are examples of monetary regimes. Yet, a government presence is not necessary for value in acceptance. It is just one way.

Bitcoin was created, it is claimed, by Satoshi Kakamoto. This may be a pseudonym for several founders wishing to be anonymous. Remember that cash transactions are only known between a buyer and a seller and can be secretive (again, see The Sopranos). This is cumbersome. For example, coins and bills must be carried around. But what if the coins and currency could be represented digitally? Things would become much easier. This is the idea behind Bitcoin. It is a digital money that can be traded directly between buyers and sellers and avoid the third parties present in traditional check transactions.

For Bitcoin to become money, it simply must be accepted by others and be subject to a monetary regime. The Bitcoin regime is very simple. Bitcoins cannot increase (referred to as mined), and the supply of coins is limited to 21 million units. The blockchain is a ledger – an accounting book – that keeps track of Bitcoin transactions. This ledger is observable by everyone and validates Bitcoin acceptance. There must also be on and off ramps. These are places where Bitcoins can be exchanged for more traditional forms of money, like dollars. These ramps form the marketplace which creates a dollar value to a single Bitcoin, like $61,000 per coin unit recorded while I was typing this article. Ramps are everywhere. A few weeks ago, I saw a Bitcoin ATM machine outside of Metter in a run-down gas station, but I could not tell if it was better than other ATMs (Get it?).

These are the principles for Bitcoin to be money. But can it really be money? I think it is true that before anything can really be money it must have stable and relatively predictable value. The volatility of the dollar price of a single Bitcoin coin would suggest that they will not truly be acceptable in exchange. Also, these price fluctuations compromise the ability of Bitcoin’s to be a standard of value and as a store of value. In theory, Bitcoin may be money but in practice not so much.

While there is much more to discuss, there is nothing new about Bitcoin other than they are new. What is interesting, however, is that the digital world is allowing the development of alternative forms of money. As a result, there will be competition between them. This competition to me —- someone whose intellectual development has not moved too much beyond the Scottish Enlightenment —– will be, in the long run, a good thing.

Dr. Skip Mounts is the Dean of the School of Business and Public Management at the College of Coastal Georgia, an economist, and an associate of the Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies.

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Democracy diluted when threats of violence become the norm

Written by Heather Farley on . Posted in Heather Farley, Reg Murphy.

Liberty and democracy are fundamental values upon which our country was founded and they remain central to the architecture and function of our government. Though both definitions are endlessly debated, our Constitution uses liberty to describe freedom from arbitrary and unreasonable restraint upon an individual. Furthermore, freedom from restraint is not just physical restraint, but also the freedom to act according to one’s own will. And though the word ‘democracy’ does not appear in the Constitution, the Federalist Papers give us plenty of clues as to the fundamentals of what they meant to establish when they set up a democratic republic – a system by and for the people.

Recently, however, both values have been put at risk as a growing number of Americans feel emboldened to use threats of violence and intimidation when elected (and in some cases non-elected) officials make decisions or have opinions that are contrary to one’s particular perspective on an issue.

Last week, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland ordered the FBI to investigate harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence aimed at school boards in Georgia (one of several states)  over objections to mask mandates and critical race theory. The Attorney General’s order came after he received a letter from the National School Boards Association citing the need for immediate assistance to protect our students, teachers, staff, and school board members. In response to mask mandates in several Georgia communities, parents and community members have used threats and intimidation in counties such as Gwinnett and Cobb as a form of protest.

Last year, we saw spikes in death threats and plots against those running for office, such as Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock and even elections officials such as Republican Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger. These threats were not aimed at a single political party – Republican and Democratic figures alike have been subject to these acts of intimidation. Now, a Georgia state oversight panel is rethinking its position on whether home security systems should qualify as a legitimate campaign-related expense. Let that sink in for a moment. In order to run for elected office, it is now expected that you will likely need to invest in additional security to ensure you are not harmed during your campaign.

There are many fine lines in our country when it comes to what we allow under the law. Free speech? Yes, but with exceptions. Protest? Absolutely, but with limitations. Our legal system has dealt with the interpretation of our rights and liberties through cases that have, over time, come to draw the lines for our society as to what is and is not acceptable. But threatening one’s life as a method for extracting your own will? Not acceptable. Inducing fear suppresses free speech and dialogue, it does not foster it. Intimidation keeps people who would otherwise run for office from doing so, thereby constricting the ability for democracy to operate.

Last week Chuck Williams, a reporter with WRBL in Columbus was a panelist on NPR’s Political Rewind discussing this issue of increased threats of violence. During the discussion, he stated that, “people…either have forgotten or don’t know where the line is…and they chose to run for the job, nobody should feel sorry for them, but there needs to be – people need to know where the line is…”. While I concur on his central point, I must disagree with at least part of his statement. When people run for office, they are choosing to run for the job, not threats on their life or the lives of their family. This cannot be a part of how we the people get what we want from our political system. Perhaps the U.S. Attorney General is aiming to remind us of where those lines are that we seem to have forgotten.

Dr. Heather Farley is Chair of the Department of Criminal Justice, Public Policy & Management and a professor of Public Management in the School of Business and Public Management at College of Coastal Georgia. She is an associate of the College’s Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies. 

How the U.S. Labor Force Got Well-Educated

Written by Don Mathews on . Posted in Don Mathews, Reg Murphy.

Generally speaking, American workers are well-educated. We got that way through a uniquely American process that began long ago.

Education was valued in America even before there was an America. The colonists valued education. Before the war for independence, schools were present in most communities in every colony.

With independence came a more urgent sense of the importance of education. John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and many others argued passionately that a republic must have well-educated citizens if it is to survive. Most Americans agreed.

Historians often note that the American ethos has always been an odd and sometimes conflicting mix of individualism and egalitarianism. Early American education manifested both streaks.

Our individual streak showed itself in the organization, control and financing of education. From the beginning, American schools were organized, controlled, and financed locally. The federal and state governments had their roles, but their roles were quite limited. Americans must have wanted it that way, because local organized, controlled and financed public schools spread rapidly.

Our egalitarian streak showed itself in who education was intended for. In virtually every other country at the time, education was the exclusive privilege of the elite. It was centrally controlled, expensive and, with an occasional exception, restricted to males.

Early American education stands in sharp contrast. From the start, Americans wanted education for the masses – the free masses, at any rate. They designed local public schools to be free of charge and coeducational, and they stayed true to the design. 

How did this uniquely American innovation turn out? By the mid-1800s, school enrollment rates in the U.S. far exceeded those in any other country. The gap would not be closed until the mid-1970s.

By the 1880s, free local public education was ubiquitous in the U.S. – even in the south, and even for blacks, though southern schools were segregated.

The 1900s brought another uniquely American innovation: the high school. The public schools that spread at such a rapid rate in the early decades of the 1800s were “common” schools, what we today call primary or elementary schools. The U.S. had secondary schools well before 1900, but they varied considerably from place to place. Many were private and almost all were designed to prepare select students for college. Educators across the land prescribed a standard structure for high schools in 1902, but the institution continued to evolve over the next 18 years.

In 1910, locally controlled and financed public high schools, also free of charge and coeducational, began to spread. They spread even more rapidly than local public primary schools had decades before, and with even less involvement from federal and state governments. The American “high school movement,” as it has come to be called, was an uncoordinated, decentralized effort from below, executed simultaneously by local people in 125,000 independent school districts across the country.

The primary force behind the spread of high schools was another uniquely American innovation: the modern business enterprise. Producing increasingly sophisticated products in increasingly sophisticated ways, and getting those products to a growing population spread far and wide requires sharp, well-educated people. Lots of sharp, well-educated people.

The “high school movement” was a spectacular success. Between 1910 and 1940, the high school enrollment rate increased from 18 to 73 percent, while the graduation rate increased from 9 to 51 percent. 

The success continues. Among Americans age 25-29 years today, 95 percent have graduated from high school, while 39 percent have graduated from college with a bachelor’s degree.

The U.S. is an extremely wealthy country for a number of reasons. Its education history is one.    

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It’s the Federal Reserve, Stupid!

Written by Skip Mounts on . Posted in Reg Murphy, Skip Mounts.

James Carville, as head of Bill Clinton’s first presidential campaign, made famous the phrase ‘It’s the economy, stupid’. His purpose was to keep campaign workers, volunteers and probably even Bill Clinton focused on what mattered to the campaign at the time —– the state of the economy. I have paraphrased this today to have us focus on what is, and what is not, important if we are to worry about inflation in our future. Here is some data: the year-to-date change in the Consumer Price Index is 5.4 percent; for just 2021 so far, the CPI has increased by 7.1 percent, while the Producers Price Index increased 10.6 percent between January 2021 and June. In my opinion, we should be concerned, but let’s be concerned about the right things.

Inflation is defined as a continual rise in the general level of prices. In introductory economics, we teach that a price rises when the quantity demanded exceeds the quantity supplied —- when there is excess demand. As the price rises, excess demand diminishes and, eventually, the price stops rising. Inflation requires that excess demand is everywhere and continual even as prices rise.

At present, spokesmen for Fed and others are saying that current inflation is only temporary. They argue that the pandemic reduced supply by disrupting supply chains and that supplemental unemployment compensation discouraged people to return to work. In addition, federal government pandemic relief packages increased demand in many sectors of the economy. With such things going on, demand should be greater than supply and prices should rise. However, with time, supply chain issues will be corrected while enlarged unemployment payments will end along with pandemic relief spending. This will bring excess demand to an end, and prices will stop rising.

For the attentive reader, this is not inflation. The underlying argument is popular in use, but it is wrong. Excess demand is correcting itself, not all prices are rising, and temporary does not mean continual.

Next, contrary to the opinion of many, excessive government deficit spending is, in and of itself, not inflationary. Deficits bring government borrowing. If the Treasury sells new deficit-required debt to private individuals and institutions, then these entities must spend less. So, spending is offset, and prices will not rise, and most certainly, not continually. Some prices may change temporarily as spending moves between the private and public sectors, but not continually.

Inflation requires that there is continual excess demand everywhere, not just somewhere. Reaching back to graduate school, Walras Law (not the relative of the sea lion and ignore the ‘s’) states that excess demand can be everywhere in every market only if there is an excess supply of money. Drawing on Milton Friedman, inflation is purely and simply only a monetary phenomenon.

Thus, worries over inflation need to be aimed at Federal Reserve policies, the associated changes to the monetary base and other monetary aggregates, and the issues that are driving central bank policymakers. Here is some more data. Concurrent with the start of the pandemic and continuing today, the Fed is buying $120 billion in Treasury securities and in mortgage-backed securities every month. Since then, the Fed has added $4 trillion to its balance sheet. The Fed is supporting Treasury borrowing and, no doubt, will continue doing so with the proposed $1.5 trillion in new infrastructure spending and the $3 trillion spending in new human infrastructure (whatever that is).

The Fed is in a tight spot. It is using monetary policy to finance unprecedented fiscal policy spending. This has added to the monetary base which is slowly leading to an excess supply of money and to our inflation potential.

So, if you are worried about inflation, worry about the Federal Reserve. Fed Chairman Jay Powell is up for reappointment by the President (with advice and consent in the Senate) and I bet he wants reappointment. What incentive does this create for him? Does the Fed have the courage to lean against the wind of rapidly expanding government deficit spending and stop budget accommodation? Until they do, the words of former Nobel Laurette Thomas Sargent (paraphrasing Milton Friedman) are very appropriate when he said, “Persistent high inflation is always and everywhere a fiscal phenomenon.”

 

Dr. Skip Mounts is the Dean of the School of Business and Public Management at the College of Coastal Georgia, professor of economics, and an associate of the Reg Murphy for Economic and Policy Studies.

Are Markets Correcting Their Own Failures?

Written by Melissa Trussell on . Posted in Melissa Trussell, Reg Murphy.

Two weeks ago for this weekly column, our newest Murphy Center writer, Dr. Roscoe Scarborough, wrote about two conflicting moralities that are dominant in our culture—collectivistic morality and individualistic morality. According to Dr. Scarborough, progressives tend toward collectivistic morality and conservatives tend toward individualistic morality.

Then last week, Dr. Heather Farley wrote about an interesting case in which markets are emerging to help offset carbon emissions by paying firms not to cut down trees.

These two columns by my colleagues are related in a fascinating way.

The standard, modern take on market economics is that markets generate efficient outcomes when players behave in their own self-interest. It is no surprise, then, that American conservatives, with their individualistic morality, are often the loudest opponents of government regulation of markets.

On the other hand, collectivistic American progressives often argue that government intervention in markets is necessary to promote the common good. Their arguments often focus on what a Principles of Economics textbook might call “market failures,” or situations in which individuals’ behaving in their own self-interest do not produce an efficient outcome or, more commonly, do not produce an outcome that is equitable for all groups or individuals.

In this new market that pays firms to leave trees, we see a clash of the two moralities. According to The Journal podcast’s August 23 episode, the carbon offset market got its start due to government regulations, but the market has really begun to soar recently because of pure, free-market pressures. Firms have found that it is good business (good press) to promise to reduce their carbon footprint. This is likely because more Americans have begun to think collectively about sustainability and climate change. As consumers care more about the process by which goods are produced, businesses also begin to care.

And this is the type of situation that makes an economist’s heart flutter! The market is doing something traditional theory says it would never do on its own—internalizing an externality. Environmental impacts are classic examples of negative externalities, or negative impacts of market transactions on individuals not directly involved in that transaction. When everyone involved in a transaction behaves in their own self-interest, the market ignores the interest of third parties, and externalities cause markets to fail to reach an efficient level of production.

But, market demand is derived directly from consumer preferences. And, the fallacy of the standard view of market behavior is that it assumes market participants hold an individualistic morality, so that their preferences are for self-interested behavior.

When individuals begin to think collectively, their preferences change, and market magic takes over! The market Demand curve now shifts to reflect preferences that consider environmental impacts to be important. When Demand shifts, producers maximize profits with a pivot to meet the new consumer preferences. And, without government action, the market begins to consider trees more valuable planted than cut.

Dr. Farley makes a compelling case that, while carbon offset markets are a move in the right direction, they do not do enough to combat climate change, as they do not reflect systemic improvements in sustainability.

But, even this relatively small change for sustainability is a big deal for how we view the power of free markets. Is it possible that markets are now beginning to correct their own “failures” in environmental externalities? I am on the edge of my seat!

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Dr. Melissa Trussell is a professor in the School of Business and Public Management at College of Coastal Georgia who works with the college’s Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies. Contact her at mtrussell@ccga.edu.

Not Cutting Down Trees is Good Business

Written by Heather Farley on . Posted in Heather Farley, Reg Murphy.

In the state of Georgia, we are very familiar with the economic engine that is created by the lumber industry. Our state has the most commercially available, private timberland in the country at 22 million acres. In 2019, the industry had an economic impact estimated at over $36 billion and employed over 141,000 Georgians. Recently, however, a colleague of mine in the Murphy Center sent me a podcast from the Wall Street Journal in which the host explains the economics of the carbon offset market – that is, not cutting down trees and getting paid for it.

Historically, the best way to profit from a forest was to cut down its trees and sell it. Today, the carbon offset market is changing that paradigm and landowners can make money from trees by keeping them planted and healthy. This is because some of America’s largest corporations are eager to purchase these offsets created by the carbon absorption capacity of forests. It allows a company that cannot avoid certain emissions to offset them instead by purchasing credits, or offsets, from a landowner. Thus, this carbon offset market both reduces CO2 in our atmosphere and keeps trees standing.

So, problem solved? Maybe not. If we look just at the question ‘Do carbon markets reduce the number of trees cut down and thus reduce carbon intensity?’ the answer is, yes. But, where I have a problem with the carbon offset market, along with any market that purports to produce more stuff with less environmental inputs (also referred to as eco-efficiency), is that it ignores system-thinking.

If we want more sustainable systems and economies, we can’t just offset carbon (ie. reduce the carbon intensity of a product) – though this is an important part of the equation. We also have to reduce overall consumption. For example, in this case, it’s important to reduce the number of trees being removed from the system, but if that ultimately just passes the buck so that we produce more stuff, the impact does not change much.

I think Ehrlich and Holdren’s 40+ year-old IPAT equation is still the most elegant model for understanding environmental impact.

I = P*A*T

I – impact

P – population

A – affluence (GDP per capita)

T – technology (a measure of the amount of resources required to produce a unit of GDP)

So, if we think about carbon reduction as a technological reduction method – it reduces the amount of resources per unit of GDP – the rate at which we reduce the carbon and bring down the “T” variable is only useful if we also reduce “A” and “P” (the rate of emissions growth that stems from population and per capita income growth). In short, overall environmental impact does not change much by changing the rate of only one of your variables; they have to be considered together.

I love the idea that carbon offsets are booming. The more trees the better as far as I’m concerned. But, if the result of a carbon offset is simply to allow a company or individual to feel better about behaving in the same way that they always did without changing habits of consumption, is the impact really changing in any meaningful way? Probably not. More likely, it just encourages business as usual.

Dr. Heather Farley is Chair of the Department of Criminal Justice, Public Policy & Management and a professor of Public Management in the School of Business and Public Management at College of Coastal Georgia. She is an associate of the College’s Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies.

An Educated Labor Force? We’ve Got One

Written by Don Mathews on . Posted in Don Mathews, Reg Murphy.

If you find good news boring, you should probably skip this column.

Changes in the characteristics of a population of a country, state or county tend to be gradual. For instance, changes of any significance in the median age or racial composition of a population typically require a generation or longer.

But there are exceptions. A surprising exception – at least it’s surprising to me – is the increase in the level of educational attainment of the populations of the U.S., Georgia and Glynn since 2000.

According to the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey data, of people age 25 years or older in the U.S. in 2000, 52 percent had at least some college, while 48 percent had at most a high school diploma. Twenty-four percent had a bachelor’s degree or higher, while 20 percent had not graduated from high school.

Of people age 25 years or older in the U.S. today, 62 percent have at least some college, 38 percent have at most a high school diploma, 33 percent have a bachelor’s degree or higher, and 11 percent have not graduated from high school.

That’s quite a change. Yes, it happened over 20 years, but it takes a good bit of time to produce an educated person, and it takes unrelenting persistence and dedication over a good bit of time to significantly reduce the high school dropout rate. Reducing the percentage of the 25 years or older population without a high school diploma from 20 percent to 11 percent in 19 years is a remarkable achievement.

Georgia is part of this national success. In 2000, of Georgians age 25 years or older, 50 percent had at least some college, 50 percent had at most a high school diploma, 24 percent had a bachelor’s degree or higher, and 21 percent had not graduated from high school.

Of Georgians age 25 years or older today, 60.5 percent have at least some college, 39.5 percent have at most a high school diploma, 32.5 percent have a bachelor’s degree or higher, and 12 percent have not graduated from high school.

How about hometown? Glynn is in on the success, too.

In 2000, 53 percent of Glynn residents age 25 years or older had at least some college, 47 percent had at most a high school diploma, 24 percent had a bachelor’s degree or higher, and 18 percent had not graduated from high school.

Today, 62 percent of Glynn residents age 25 years or older have at least some college, 38 percent have at most a high school diploma, 28 percent have a bachelor’s degree or higher, and 10 percent have not graduated from high school.

What’s more, this trend is going to continue for a while. Within the 25 years or older population, the level of educational attainment varies inversely with age. That is, in aggregate, the level of educational attainment is highest among younger people and lowest among older people.

 Today, while 33 percent of Americans age 25 years or older have a bachelor’s degree or higher, 39 percent of Americans age 25 years to 29 years have a bachelor’s degree or higher. And while 11 percent of Americans age 25 years or older have not graduated from high school, only 5 percent of Americans age 25 years to 29 years have not graduated from high school.

Of course, the past 20 years is just the most recent stretch of the trend in American educational attainment that began long ago. But in case you’ve now had enough good news for one day, we’ll save the long-term trend for my next column.

The Contested Morality of Mandating Masks

Written by Roscoe Scarborough on . Posted in Reg Murphy, Roscoe Scarborough.

Many Georgians have strong opinions about mask mandates. Savannah and Atlanta are mandating masks again. Gwinnett and other metro Atlanta schools are requiring students and staff to mask, while Glynn County is not. Governor Kemp maintains a rigid stand against statewide COVID restrictions. Pro-maskers and anti-maskers both contend that they hold the moral high ground. These attitudes toward face-coverings amid the COVID-19 pandemic reflect divergent moral worldviews on the left and on the right.

Progressives tend to hold a collectivistic morality. Many on the modern left pursue social justice and strive to achieve equitable outcomes as an ultimate goal.

Progressives declare that it is morally imperative to wear a mask to safeguard our collective well-being. Wearing face-coverings during a pandemic reflects concern for protecting high-risk populations: the elderly, the immunocompromised, essential workers, and the unvaccinated. Progressives’ pursuit of equity extends to communities of color, indigenous groups, and the poor. These populations tend to be underinsured, have insufficient access to healthcare, and experience high rates of preexisting health conditions. Progressives contend that the healthy, asymptomatic, and vaccinated should bear the minor burden of wearing a mask if it can have even a marginal impact on health outcomes. This emphasis on requiring face-coverings reflects a collectivistic morality and pursuit of equity that dominates the public policy of progressives.

Conservatives tend to hold an individualistic morality. Justice is equal opportunity and equal treatment under the law. Those on the right valorize individualism as an American virtue. This individualistic moral worldview encourages personal responsibility and celebrates rights and freedoms.

Many conservatives assert that wearing a mask should be a personal choice. Requiring anyone to wear a face-covering is a new instance of governmental overreach that infringes on civil liberties guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. Much like stay-at-home orders and other restrictions, compulsory face-coverings represent an expansion of governmental control over the lives of citizens. This erosion of personal freedom threatens to persist beyond the pandemic. Perceived through an individualistic moral lens, it should be an individual’s decision to wear or not wear a mask.

Depending on one’s worldview, mandated masking is either a moral obligation to protect others or an instance of governmental overreach that threatens liberty. Folks in each camp view the world from their own moral vantage point, unable or unwilling to appreciate an alternative moral perspective on face-coverings. Collectivistic and individualistic moralities produce different policies on masking, vaccine “passports,” placing restrictions on indoor dining, and numerous other policy issues.

Not all of those on the left share these progressive attitudes, while not all those on the right embrace these individualistic, libertarian ideals. Morality is always contested among and within groups. Those with power will impose their morality on others through policies that have real-world consequences.

Most of us live in moral echo chambers. We consume media and journalism that reinforces our ideological worldviews. We cultivate a social network of peers with a common morality. In our contemporary moment of hyperpartisan politics, these moral differences are exacerbated and politicized. Unfortunately, understanding the moral worldview of “the other” has fallen out of favor. These divergent moralities reinforce real-world moral and social boundaries between progressives and conservatives.

Roscoe Scarborough, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at College of Coastal Georgia and an associate scholar at the Reg Murphy Center. He can be reached by email at: rscarborough@ccga.edu.

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Number 200

Written by Skip Mounts on . Posted in Reg Murphy, Skip Mounts.

Many of you know Dr. Don Mathews. Don, excuse me. Dr. Mathews is a professor of economics at the College, a beloved teacher, the comedian at the UGA/Terry School of Business economic forecast given every January at the Jekyll Island Convention Center, and our faithful leader of ‘From the Murphy Center’ columns. However, I think he has a mean streak. Don, oops…Dr. Mathews, told me that my column today is number 200 from all the Murphy Center associates. After telling me this he said, in his loving tone, “So, don’t mess up.” So, here it goes.

Classes begin at the College next week on Monday the 16th. In partial preparation, we have been holding new student orientations over the summer. Here, we talk about procedural things like financial aid, dorm residency, grants, loans, bookstore hours, etc. We also begin to talk about the ‘Mariner way’ —– the culture of our learning environment and campus life.

As Dean of the School of Business and Public Management, I have some time to talk with our future students during orientation. I think it is important to ask our incoming scholars, “Why are you here?” I hear many things: ‘to prepare for a job’, ‘a step toward law school’, ‘I was told to come’, ‘I don’t know’, and ‘I want better.’ All are right in some way, for each student has their own unique situation at that moment in time.

I ask them to consider another reason. They are here to prepare to receive a gift, a gift of a new path for their lives that offers them more choices compared to the number of choices offered on the path they are now on. They come to college to prepare for a world with more choices.

Choices, alternatives, are good things. The ability to pick one from many is cool. What is cooler is to have the ability to say no to a choice when you think that there is no other way. Choices are basic to our freedom and to our control over our lives. Choices force others to stop thinking of themselves and start thinking of others. Back in the day, under the regime of the Soviet Union, Russian women had many choices for shoes so long as they liked black T-straps. That is the only style that shoe manufacturers made. The Russian shoe manufacturer only had to think of themselves and the payout the government offered if the manufacturer was efficient in making black T-Straps. However, with the opening of the Russian economy, more than black T-straps were available. Shoemakers had to start to think of their female customers and stop thinking of themselves. Choice changed the focus of what matters.

Choice is also the key to the civil rights issue of our time —— the quality of the education offered in public schools. To me, a quality school focuses on students and their futures. They think of more than just themselves. Choice gives families the right to walk away or to stay. Milton Friedman said that ‘choice gives an individual the ability to vote with their feet’. Choice can take many forms and one can see its local impact in many positive ways. Yet, one just needs to look at Baltimore-City schools to see where limiting choice can lead and the failure that it produces.

We also talk about entrepreneurs and choice. Entrepreneurs create choices for us as we face the problems of day-to-day life. Successful entrepreneurs think of others and rarely think of themselves. A world of choices is the goal of an entrepreneurial ecosystems.

Another way to say all this, is that we are preparing our students for the competitive marketplace where choice thrives. They will lead, they will follow, they will create, and they will live with the freedom to choose.

So, this brings #200 to an end. Don, are you good?

Thank you Buff for the space every Wednesday. Thank you Buddy for the freedom to write about ideas and for correcting my bad spelling. And thank you, Golden Isles, for all you do for us at the College of Coastal Georgia.

Dr. Skip Mounts is the Dean of the School of Business and Public Management at the College of Coastal Georgia, a Professor of Economics, and an associate of the Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies.