June 21, 2023: Lifestyles of the Super rich, Conservation leases on BLM Land, UNESCO, Legalize voting for non-citizens

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A study was recently published that looked at 30 years of data from 1989 to 2019 from the Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances. They examined how couples divide work, focusing on three different wealthy groups, the Super rich, the just plain rich, and the upper middle class. They found that in 2019, 53% of super rich heterosexual couples had arrangements in which the woman was not gainfully employed, compared with 27% of rich couples and 20% of upper middle class couples and 26% of less affluent couples. Only 28% of super rich couples had both the man and the woman working full time. Super rich couples had a median net worth of $17.6 million in 2019. Rich couples had a median net worth of $2.3 million and the rich or upper middle class had a median net worth of $796,000. You guys are always telling me that it would be bad for the government to just give people money. Because if they had money, they would spend their time lazing away their lives and doing nothing. Yet if we look at people who don't have to work in order to make ends meet, we still find that most of them are being productive with their time. Do you really think that these super rich people are different than poor people? Can't we just assume based on these data that if we were to give everybody enough money to survive that people would choose to do productive things with their time?
The BLM is proposing a new rule That would change the way in which public lands are managed. Here are some links about the specifics of the rule changes. In short, the BLM would like to add conservation as a key component in decisions it makes about public land use. Some people are upset because it will affect how much people pay to graze their animals on public lands and might make it difficult for them to find places to graze animals. Other people are pretty excited because they think that nature needs to be protected. If not for Teddy Roosevelt and his efforts to conserve natural spaces a 100 years ago, I think it's likely that we wouldn't have Yellowstone or Yosemite or most of the natural wonders in the United States today. Do we have a moral obligation to protect the lands we have from greedy capitalists or recreationalists who would otherwise destroy the public lands? Is conservation a moral imperative?
The Trump administration pulled out of UNESCO because they did not approve of that organization allowing Palestinians to be a part of it. They also felt like the organization had an anti-Israel stance. Under Secretary of State for Management, John Bass, said Rejoining UNESCO will “help us address a key opportunity cost that our absence is creating in our global competition with China,” “If we’re really serious about the digital-age competition with China, from my perspective, in a clear-eyed set of interests, we can’t afford to be absent any longer from one of the key fora in which standards around education for science and technology are set,”. This week. UNESCO announced that the United States plans to rejoin and pay more than $600 million in back dues. Is the Biden Administration making the right decision to rejoin this organization and pay hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in back dues in order to be a part of the organization? Is it a mistake for the United States to use monies set aside f