It has been estimated that the cost to an average household is about $15,000 per year, in terms of more expensive food, housing, education, health care, and many other goods and services. We can look at it this way: the annual costs of an average household are $15,000 more than they have to be, because of federal regulations. Or, an average household could have better food, health care, education at the same cost.
Tag: education
Compassionate Connection: Attachment Parenting & Nonviolent Communication
How do we deal with a two-year-old when he grabs every toy his friend plays with? What do we say to a four-year-old who screams in rage when her baby brother cries? How do we talk with a ten-year-old about the chores he has left undone, again? What strategies will keep our teenager open with us – and safe? Nonviolent Communication (NVC), sometimes referred to as Compassionate Communication, offers a powerful approach for extending the values of attachment parenting beyond infancy. A process for connecting deeply with ourselves and others, and for creating social change, NVC has been used worldwide in intimate family settings as well as in organizations, schools, prisons, and war-torn countries.
How Children Learn Bravery in an Age of Overprotection
I doubt if there has ever been any human culture, anywhere, at any time, that underestimates children’s abilities more than we North Americans do today. Our underestimation becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy, because, by depriving children of freedom, we deprive them of the opportunities they need to learn how to take control of their own behavior and emotions.
State Education: Money
Eventually, per Rothbard, the pols saw that leaving the marching minions holding promises instead of solid specie was a dream come true. But they did also realize that an honorable verbal promise was an oxymoron. Enter the written promise, aka the IOU, aka scrip, aka paper currency. The typical note promised exchange for the purported full amount in gold, not sooner than 1 year hence. Many of the veterans began to barter these slips of paper for those things for which they could not wait a year — things like food!
Tacit Submission
Do you and I willingly give up our freedom and property for the benefits of living in these United States? Do we tacitly consent to oppression by not moving to another country? Do we tacitly consent to the authority of our governments by not rebelling, by not throwing the tea into Boston harbor? John Locke and many today say “yes”; we tacitly accept the State by paying our taxes, by receiving its benefits (such as property protection!), and by not emigrating. They say we acquiesce in an implicit contract in which we give up freedom or accept compulsion in exchange for other things that we value. This view is dead wrong.
Slaving Away in the School Factory
You see, the problem is that unschooled kids have fun. They play. They noodle around inside and outdoors, at home and in their communities, messing with projects, indulging their passions, and generally having a good time. These kids are continually demonstrating that learning isn’t hard work when it is need- and interest-based, and when the learner is in control…that, in fact, learning (not to mention life) is fun, even exciting. They are showing that there is no need for being processed by means of mostly irrelevant prepared curriculum, stressful tests, or long hours spent listening to boring lectures or memorizing monotonous and out-of-context facts.
Who Cares About Conspiracies?
I spend little time studying and talking about conspiracy theories. Why? Three main reasons. First, who cares? For your knowledge about a given conspiracy to have any use, it isn’t enough for the theory to be true; you’ll need to convince the very people who are already in on it. So, what are you going to do with this information?
Freedom Cells – Networks For A Free Society
Similar to a mutual aid or benefit society, a Freedom Cell is a network of individuals who share a common understanding of the requirements to bring about a free society. The purpose is to work together and bring those requirements into reality in their own lives and the communities in which they live.
The Civic Duty of an Anarchist
Ok, now I know what you’re thinking. “The civic duty? Do you even anarchy, bro?” No, I get it. We’re anarchists. We don’t vote. We don’t participate in elections. We think paying taxes is for schmucks, and actively look for ways to lessen how much we pay (if we pay at all *wink wink*), and generally, could not care less about the political process. It’s corrupt, fake, and full of deception, pay-offs, theft, armed robbery, and murder. A wise philosopher once said “Government is the price we pay for being uncivilized.” I get it. So how does an anarchist participate? Should an anarchist participate, even? Well, I think there are a number of ways that anarchists can engage the public, if we so choose (and we should).
Bad vs. Worse: Welfare Statism and Tribal Statism
Practically no one believes that so-called welfare states have the right to invade non-welfare states and remake them in their image, so that no one in the world is deprived of state welfare. Likewise, practically no one believes that so-called welfare states have the right to impose special taxes on their citizens with the purpose of creating welfare state systems in those countries that cannot afford to do so by themselves.