The two key charts, updated again. Fed funds rate, recessions/crises, and SPX.
QE, SPX, and related events.
When the going gets tough, what does the Fed do?
Among the dumbest of economic policies pursued by politicians is the price ceiling. The thinking is typical authoritarian. Think prices are too high? Then simply declare them lower. Set a maximum price for transactions on the market. Punish those who engage in transactions at a higher-than-mandated price.
What happens when producers are forcibly restrained from selling output at higher prices? Supply leaves the market. Shortages develop.
Not only does present supply leave the market, but future sources do as well. Entrepreneurs are less motivated to develop marginal or substitute sources of supply when the profit signal of higher prices is suppressed.
Over time, prices are likely to be much higher--particularly if it takes a long time to replace capacity once it is taken off the market by the caps.
Cogitate on that as G-7 bureaucrats mull price caps on Russian oil.
Two hundred and forty-six years after our nation's first law, its founding principle of liberty remains radical. From his early days of social existence, man has been tempted to surrender liberty to earthly rulers. As God warned Samuel, doing so invites despotism.
In 1776, the United States startled the world when it chose to 'throw off' that despotism in pursuit of self-determination. Since then, the authoritarians have been seeking to extinguish that flame of liberty and reclaim their power.
Events of the past few years suggest to some that the tyrants have made progress.
Personally, I prefer to believe that the opposite is happening. People tend to wake up when their freedoms are being stolen.
Nearly a quarter of a millennium ago, we learned that when enough people wake up, they--the true radicals--have the capacity to push back.
Governments wanting to engage in war with foreign entities must win consent of the citizenry to do so. If they view the war as illegitimate, the people have capacity to shut the war down via several avenues, including voting officials out of office, withholding funds for military resources, or even overthrowing the regime prosecuting illegitimate war.
Consequently, governments must convince people that their war is just. They must do so at the outset of the conflict, and then continue to do so. Because war requires ongoing sacrifice in order to fund the war effort, it is possible that enthusiasm for war will wane as people increasingly regret what they must forfeit as conflict drags on.
It appears that support for US involvement in the Ukraine conflict is already waning. Surveys suggest that the American public is increasingly wary of US efforts to harm Russia in manners that hurt the domestic economy.
That, of course, is precisely what sanctions do. Any effort to restrict production and trade with entities abroad damages standard of living at home.
As more Americans realize that sanctions are not unilateral, this administration loses its public grant of legitimacy for engaging the country in war.
Administrative staffing (a.k.a. 'overhead') generally increases with organizational size. Small organizations are characterized by decision-makers who wear 'many hats.' A manager might make a production decision one minute, then an HR or accounting decision in the next.
As organizations grow, it usually makes sense to divide up decisions among specialists. Specialists focus on a narrow functional domain, such as R&D or marketing, which increases their decision-making productivity as they benefit from learning effects and lower switching costs.
Moreover, sheer size and complexity makes large organizations difficult for any one person to understand. The number of decisions that must be made on a daily basis could number in the tens of thousands and easily exceed any single decision maker's capacity for rendering them.
There are technical reasons, then, why we should expect more staff and administrative overhead as organizations get larger. More staff can improve productivity.
However, staff could also grow for social reasons. Because they seek to maintain or improve legitimacy in their institutional environments, organizations seek to score points with external social entities. Stated differently, organizations might add staff to 'look good' rather than to 'do better.'
Coercive social pressures might drive organizations to hire regulatory or compliance personnel. Think environmental, safety, and legal departments.
Social pressures might also be normative in nature, motivating organizations to staff in manners that signal awareness and caring about particular social issues and causes. For instance, many organizations have recently staffed departments of diversity and sustainability in response to those popular movements.
Meyer and Rowan (1977) seminally observed that administrative additions of this type may not be accretive to the organization's technical core at all. Adoption of staff for legitimacy reasons is instead largely ceremonial in nature. It is meant to satisfy the social needs of outsiders rather than the economic needs of buyers.
This is the price to be paid for increased social standing. More resources that could be invested toward productive ends, such as process and product development, are allocated bureaucratically for the sake of appearance.
Some have argued that organizations must strengthen their legitimacy in the eyes of others in order to acquire the resources necessary to achieve greater economic performance. However, it is straightforward to theorize that excessive attention paid to looking good robs resources from the technical core, thus decreasing the likelihood that socially conscious organizations will do better and survive over time.
Perhaps this pathology increases with the strength of the institutional environment.
Reference
Meyer, J.W. & Roward, B. (1977). Institutional organizations: Formal structure as myth and ceremony. American Journal of Sociology, 83: 340-363.
Over the past couple of weeks, Western governments have levied countless sanctions on Russia. In this context, sanctions are trade restrictions against a foreign country meant to punish that state for behavior deemed undesirable or bad. Russia's invasion of Ukraine sparked a deluge of sanctions ranging from curtailing or banning trade of particular commodities to freezing Russian bank accounts.
Sanctions aim at achieving various political objectives. One is to make the sanctioned country's population hurt to the point where it demands that its ruling regime cease enacting policies that outsiders find objectionable. Another objective is to weaken a country economically and financially so that it depletes resources for conducting belligerent activities. A third objective might be to weaken a state to the point where it can be overthrown by direct attack.
Despite their popularity, sanctions have marginal track records of success. One reason for this is that sanctions require solidarity among outside states in order to be effective. If only a few countries honor the restrictions, then the targeted state can reconfigure its supply chains toward other countries open to trade. The economic strain of sanctions can therefore be mitigated by developing alternative trade channels.
Sanctions also fail because they commonly strengthen resolve in sanctioned states. When freedom to trade with outsiders is forcibly restrained, then nationalistic tendencies increase among a country's population. Rather than creating animosity toward a domestic regime, sanctions often unify nations behind that regime.
It also seems lost on politicians that the economic penalties imposed by sanctions work both ways. When trade is restricted, the productivity benefits of specialization decline as countries diversify to become more self-sufficient. Less output is produced, and standard of living falls--not just for the sanctioned target, but for all countries--even for those who decline to honor the sanctions. In this manner, sanctions behave like tariffs.
Who is hurt the worst? The world's poor. Because those at the bottom of the economic pyramid have the most to gain from specialization and trade, they become 'collateral damage' when prosperous countries impose trade sanctions.
Consequently, sanctions themselves may be seen as acts of war. Although they are often levied in response to violence, sanctions are also violent in nature. They forcibly restrict trade--often in manners aimed at hurting others--particularly civilians. In this sense, trade sanctions bear similarity to wartime policies such as the Allied bombing of German and Japanese cities during WWII.
While sanctions seem to satisfy popular urges to 'do something,' they possess capacity to do more damage than the bad behavior that those restrictions purportedly aim to punish.
Whenever a 'crisis' comes along, it is tempting to assume that this time is different--that we're at a unique point in history never before contemplated. With a little digging, however, one finds that this is rarely the case.
Murray Rothbard provides useful historical context (penned in 1982) for the present Ukraine situation, particularly as it relates to the notion of 'collective security' and interventionism. Collective security is the philosophy upon which the United Nations and NATO were founded. Each nation state is viewed as an 'individual.' When one state 'aggresses against' an individual state, then it is the duty of the collective to punish the 'aggressor.' No declaration of war is necessary because the collective response is a 'police action.' All nations in the collective, including their media organs, are expected to fall in line.
The left warmly embraced the collective security concept--so much so that they were ardent supporters of US entry into the Korean and Vietnam wars.
Opposition to war was instead a characteristic of the 'old right.' From the 1930s to the 1950s, the old right was regarded as 'isolationist,' objecting American entry into WWII, the Marshall Plan, NATO, conscription of troops, and Korea. Among the politicians in this group were Robert Taft and Howard Buffett (Warren's dad). Garet Garrett and John T. Flynn were among the author/analysts.
The old right isolationists saw grave flaws in the collective security concept. One was that, in reality, there is no single world government or police force. Instead, there are hundreds of nation states, each with their own war-making capacity. In some cases, this capacity is quite formidable. Consequently, when gangs of states wade into a conflict, they invariably widen it. Every controversy invites the gang to decide who is the 'aggressor,' and then attach to the side considered virtuous.
It stands to reason, then, that collective security systems have the potential to turn local squabbles into global conflagrations.
Another problem with the collective security notion is that it can be difficult if not impossible to accurately identify the uniquely guilty parties in conflicts between states. Although the property rights of individuals make actions by an aggressor relatively easy to finger, the legitimate boundary lines of each state are more difficult to discern. This is because state borders are rarely demarcated by just and proper means. Instead, states generally exist through coercion over citizens and subjects; state boundaries are invariably determined by conquest and violence.
Consequently, by condemning one state for crossing the borders of another, collective security systems implicitly recognize the validity of existing boundaries. Why should boundaries of a state be any more legitimate now than they were one hundred years ago? Why should borders be enshrined such that crossing them leads all members of the security collective to wage war, and to force their citizens to kill and die?
It is straightforward to apply the limitations of collective security to the Ukraine situation. Indeed, one can find both of the above problems raised by Vladimir Putin in his address explaining the rationale behind his country's action in Ukraine.
Once again, it seems that we have failed to learn from history.
Discussion about placing masks over one's nose and mouth to prevent the inhalation of airborne pathogens must be grounded in basic understanding of breathing and respiration. In grade school and high school science class, we learn that respiration is a central process of life. To produce energy, organizations take in oxygen and glucose, and release carbon dioxide and water.
Humans obtain oxygen by inhaling air. Ambient air contains approximately 21% oxygen by volume--more than enough for respiratory function under normal conditions. When we inhale, muscular contraction in the chest area causes the thoracic cavity to expand. Expansion causes air pressure inside the lungs to decrease, which permits outside air to be sucked through the nose and/or mouth down the esophagus and into the lungs.
Millions of tiny air sacs in the lungs connected to small blood vessels provide a medium for exchange, trading oxygen from the air for carbon dioxide in the blood. Water from surrounding tissue is also partially vaporized in the air sacs.
When we exhale, the chest area muscles work in the opposite direction and expand. The thoracic cavity contracts, causing air pressure inside the lungs to increase, thereby expelling air back out through the esophagus, nose, and mouth into the air. The 'spent' air includes the respiratory bi-products of carbon dioxide and water in addition to leftover oxygen from the inhaled air that did not take part in the exchange.
Several factors influence respiratory efficiency. Chronic physiological conditions related to the blood (e.g., low hemoglobin) or to the lungs (e.g., COPD) can reduce capacity for respiratory exchange.
Physical exertion can also challenge respiratory capacity, as exertion increases demand for oxygen and produces more carbon dioxide for disposal. To compensate, the cardiopulmonary system ramps up through heavier, more frequent breathing and higher heart rates.
The external environment influences respiratory efficiency as well. Smoke-filled air, for instance, carries less oxygen and more particulate matter, both of which can impair respiratory exchange.
Basic concepts about respiration pertain to the masking context--something we'll discuss in a future post.
Until recently, dividends didn't matter much to me. Like most investors, I focused on price appreciation potential.
A few years back my brother reacquainted me with the value of cash dividend payouts. Managing my mom's portfolio, he invested primarily in stalwart dividend paying stocks. Over time, he built an income-producing machine capable of covering a large share of monthly living expenses. Yes, the portfolio gradually increased in value as well. But so did the dividend payouts.
The capacity of a well-designed stock portfolio to generate income--particularly 'replacement' income for retirees--impressed me, perhaps in part because I'm approaching retirement myself.
In the olden days, common wisdom was that aging people in need of income replacements should invest in bonds and other fixed income instruments. Being traditionally less volatile, fixed income was seen as less prone to big capital loss. Moreover, many fixed income instruments tended to offer yields superior to stocks.
In the late 1970s/early 1980s, for example, 10 yr Treasury yields traded north of 10%. Those cash payouts were far higher than dividend yields on stocks. Of course, inflation was also flying which negated much of those cash gains.
Since then, of course, T-note yields have been in secular decline--due largely to interventionary policies of the Federal Reserve. Dividend yields on stocks have also declined as shown by the yield in the S&P 500 since 1900.
Overlaying the two trends reveals a couple of things. One is that stock dividend yields have not always been lower than bond yields. In early decades of the 1900s, stocks generally yielded more than bonds by a couple of percent. The other note is that, more recently, the offset between stock and bond yields has narrowed to the point where cash returns on stocks once again looks attractive.
Index-to-index comparisons tend to understate the superior cash-yielding capacity of stocks. For example, the yield on the S&P 500 Index currently stands at about 1.3%. However, many stocks in the SPX pay tiny or no dividends. Investors can readily assemble a portfolio of reliable dividend payers from the SPX with an overall yield north of 3%. This handily beats the current 10 yr Treasury yield of about 1.5% (and nearly all other fixed income alternatives for that matter).
If Treasury yields should rise relative to stocks then the calculus changes, of course. That said, because central banks worldwide are determined to suppress sovereign yields, large increases in bond yields seem unlikely unless policy makers lose control of the interest rate markets. While this could certainly happen, it is likely to occur in the context of Big Inflation. Big inflation jeopardizes the attractiveness of bonds. Moreover, companies may be able to navigate inflationary environments in a manner that preserves value. Dividend payouts might even increase.
Preparing for retirement, then, I view the cash-generating capacity of dividend paying stocks as central to creating 'replacement income' when the paychecks no longer roll in. Essentially, the dividend payers write the checks instead of an employer. The more I can draw on steady-to-rising dividend payments, the less I will have to cut in on the principal that generates the cash.
Stated differently, I don't want to kill the dividend-paying geese that lay the golden eggs.
Previously we proposed that in societies that value credentials, people will be prone to outsource their brains to so-called 'experts'--i.e., those with important credentials. The greater the credentialism, the more likely people are to be misled.
An interesting corollary is that the more educated, and thus the more credentialed, a society becomes, the less able that society is likely to be at reasoned, independent, and integrative thought.
Because that kind of thought is critical for coping with novel, disruptive change, the implications are paradoxical if not ominous. As a society becomes 'smarter' via credentialed education, its capacity for adapting to major change declines.
Kids are gullible because they have not yet developed their capacities for reason and critical thought that they were endowed with. Adults are gullible because they do not use their capacities for reason and critical thought that they were endowed with.
Those who seek power know this and seek to exploit it.
When a virus infects the body, white blood cells called B lymphocytes (a.k.a. B cells) imprint on specific virus proteins (a.k.a. antigens) presented to them. Subsequently, many of those B cells become 'memory B cells,' specializing in producing antibodies to combat those antigens.
When different viral infections arrive in the future, memory B cells quickly pour forth antibodies that they learned to produce in the original case, essentially hogging areas around antibodies that slower moving naïve B-cells would use utilize to learn about new viral features. Although the immune system continues to adapt, it does so with 'path dependence.' Stated differently, immune system responses are shaped by the early stimuli that B cells encounter.
This is the central notion of original antigenic sin. Original virus infections during childhood govern antibody responses thereafter.
The concept of original antigenic sin carries important implications. Different age cohorts in a population are likely to have overlapping or layered immunity to different viral strains. For example, children exposed to the swine flu develop immune responses that differ from a childhood cohort exposed to the Hong Kong flu. Consequently, different generations interlock to attenuate the influence of a particular pathogen.
One reason that flu shots lack effectiveness is that they may have limited power to redirect the adult immune systems against novel influenza strains since those immune systems have long since been primed along a different path by childhood infections.
The influence of original antigenic sin on vaccine effectiveness has been contested, however. Opponents point toward studies suggesting that all cause mortalities decline after administration of flu shots. Counter studies suggest that such research is subject to confounding variables that produce spurious relationships between flu shots and effectiveness.
To the extent that the theory of original antigenic sin is valid, it suggests ominous consequences for policies that encourage or require vaccines across large swaths of populations. Instead of layered, population-wide resistance to successive SARS-2 strains that are certain to evolve as the virus adapts to its environment, inoculating the majority of a population with a vaccine designed to combat narrow strains of the virus is likely to attenuate antibody responses to future variants. Most people will have their primary immune responses to SARS-2 conditioned to the spike protein of the vintage 2020 configuration, leaving them less adaptive capacity moving forward.
Vaccinating children would be particularly problematic. The virus is not a threat to them, and as they become naturally infected with future CV19 strains they will help the entire population develop the layered immunity essential to long term resistance to the virus. By narrowly conditioning childhood immune systems to current strains via the shot, these policies risk creating a perpetual pandemic state.
Of course, it is not outside the realm of possibility that this is precisely what some policymakers may have in mind.
Transportation secretary defends widespread shortages, claiming that they are a product of a strong economy. Textbook central planner rationalization.
The truth is that prolonged shortages occur only when markets are not permitted to freely function. In unhampered markets, increased demand motivates producers to increase prices. Higher prices signal opportunity to producers, who subsequently increase production rates and, in some cases, add capacity so that higher demand is met with more supply.
Shortages persist if this process is impaired. If prices are not permitted to rise, or if producers are restrained from increasing supply (through, for example, regulations that slow supply chain activities), then demand continues to outstrip supply and shelves go bare.
Those who defend shortages are typically the people who create them.
Last time we discussed the relationship between specialization and the external environment. Essentially, the higher the degree of uncertainty in the external environment, the lower the appropriate level of specialization.
How can producers manage the tradeoff between productivity and adaptability inherent in specialized work? Two strategies seem plausible--both involving reduced degrees of specialization (or higher degrees of diversification) as uncertainty increases.
The first strategy we'll call static diversification. The concept parallels portfolio theory in finance, except that instead of a portfolio of securities, producers deal with a 'task portfolio.' The narrower the task portfolio, the fewer the skills and the more specialized the portfolio.
In certain environments, task portfolios should be very narrow so that producers can reap the productivity benefits of specialization without concern for having to alter the portfolio to cope with environmental change.
However, in uncertain settings, producers must spread it around, investing in various skills to hedge risk that some skills will be obsoleted by disruptive change. By embracing the adage of not putting all eggs in one basket, producers operate in various lines of work and perhaps in various markets so that they are not dependent on one specific skill set. This variety improves adaptive capacity.
How much static diversification is necessary? Returning to our core proposition that degree of specialization is inversely proportional to level of environmental uncertainty, the more turbulent and uncertain external contexts are, then the more diversified the task portfolio should be.
The second strategy is dynamic diversification. Using this strategy, producers broaden their task portfolios with learning skills that allow them to quickly adapt to changing environments. Ability to sense change, skill in new product and process development, and prowess in organizational change management all constitute 'dynamic capabilities' (Teece et al., 1997) that can be developed or acquired to improve adaptive capacity.
Such dynamic skills may not be directly useful in the production of output for today's market. Instead, they constitute resources that enable timely reconfiguration of production for tomorrow's markets.
Because payoff associated with dynamic diversification is often delayed--perhaps for extended periods of time, managers may be reluctant to invest in it, preferring instead the immediate and visible fruits of static diversification. On the other hand, due to its potential for quickly shaping new, relevant skills when environments change, dynamic diversification may tie up smaller fractions of an overall task portfolio in diversification--allowing producers to specialize more in the here and now--and reap the associated productivity benefits.
So, if both static and dynamic diversification strategies are both viable approaches for dealing with the productivity/adaptability tradeoffs of specialization in uncertain settings, then which one is more preferable? Perhaps the better way to ask the question is this: Under what situations are static or dynamic diversification preferable?
That, my friends, constitutes an interesting research question--one that scholarship will hopefully help us answer at some point in the future.
Reference
Teece, D.J., Pisano, G., & Shuen, A. (1997). Dynamic capabilities and strategic management. Strategic Management Journal, 18(7): 509-533.
In Ayn Rand's classic Atlas Shrugged, protagonist John Galt and producers like him decide to leave the system rather than continuing to operate in oppressive authoritarian environments full of regulations and other restrictions.
As authoritarianism continues to escalate under current political regimes, workers in many industries (e.g., here, here, here) are emulating Galt. They are walking away from workplaces governed by rules, mandates, and ultimatums that they find distasteful.
What happens to an economy if enough workers hit the Galtean silk? Rand crafts a fictional scenario.
Bluff in a game of chicken? Temporary or permanent? We may soon find out, as a real life, large scale version of the Galtean walk is playing out before our very eyes.
Reports growing of 'sick outs' in protest of vaccine mandates. Hospitals, education, transportation companies.
Example of many articles discussing shrinking hospital capacity as vaccine mandates drive health care workers to hit the silk.
No surprise. This is ECON 101 type stuff.
Impose regulations that limit producers and raise their costs and, inevitably, supply will leave the market.
This will mean reduced access to care and higher prices.
Paging Dr Galt.
A common argument among the pro vax mandate crowd goes like this. If you are not vaccinated, then you might infect others with the CV19 virus. Therefore you must get vaccinated to mitigate the threat that you pose.
Let's set aside the scientific issue of vaccine effectiveness for now--an issue that calls into question individual capacity to convey the virus regardless of vaccination status, and the extent to which vaccination protects individuals from infection.
Instead, let's focus on the legal issues. The argument proposes a hypothetical threat: that an individual could be carrying a virus that might be conveyed to others in a manner that could lead their infection. This of course, is purely speculation and conjecture. Accusations of wrongdoing framed in this manner would be quickly dismissed in courts of law.
The Fourth Amendment protects individuals and their property against unreasonable search and seizure by government. Any search and seizure must be preceded by a warrant, affirmed by a judge, that articulates the rationale (i.e., 'probable cause') that justifies government invasion, specifies the particulars of the invasion--e.g, the place to be searched, or the individuals or items to be seized.
The Fifth Amendment prohibits the deprivation of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.
The Fourteenth Amendment extends these protections from the federal down to the state level.
It should be clear that a hypothetical threat, where someone wants to forcibly interfere with the pursuits of another individual out of speculation that the individual might harm them is not a legitimate reason for government intervention. Any forcible interference that does take place under such circumstances must be deemed as a criminal act of aggression.
The forced vaccination argument therefore proceeds along similar lines as the forced quarantine argument.
The pro vax crowd want to preempt a hypothetical threat by imposing forced vaccinations on individuals--with no probable cause nor due process. Similar to preemptive military strikes, such action is characteristic of aggression rather than of self-defense.
One argument advanced by proponents of vaccine mandates is that vaccines are the best way out of pandemic conditions. To hold credence, this line of thought requires persuasive support, much of it scientific in nature. However, theory and evidence are far from conclusive with respect to vaccines. In fact, other alternatives garner substantial support.
The human body's primary natural line of defense against viral infection is the immune system. Immune systems are networks of biological processes that detect and respond to a variety of pathogens that threaten human health. Strong immune systems ward off infections and reduce the impact of infections that do occur. They are also adaptive, meaning that once they interact with pathogens they commonly build resistance against future invasion.
General factors associated with immune system strength are well known and largely life style related. Proper rest and nutrition. Exercise and fitness. Supplements such as Vitamin D and zinc can bolster immune system strength particularly during winter months when exposure to sunshine is reduced.
It should not be surprising that these customary principles of immune system strength appear to apply to the CV19 context. For example, studies have shown that Vitamin D deficiency is associated with CV19 mortality. Seasonality patterns associated with CV19 patterns are also evident. I have also seen several papers (not cited here) suggesting significant relationships between individual fitness levels and/or self-reported degrees of exercise and susceptibility to CV19 infection, hospitalization, and death. We also know, of course, that CV19 generally does far more damage to the elderly and those with serious comorbidities--a skew that coincides with generally compromised immune systems.
Their endogenous, preventative nature make immune systems an intuitive, and economical 'way out' of a pandemic. Why public health officials have not stressed the well established benefits of natural immune system health as a principle route away from the CV19 situation is dumbfounding and, thus, subject to speculation. What we do know is that initiatives to improve natural immunity are plausible alternatives to vaccines as countermeasures to a pandemic.
Another countermeasure involves therapeutics. Therapeutics are medicines that help you get well when you get sick. Therapeutics are primarily remedial in nature. In the context of CV19, monoclonal antibodies and ivermectin are among the remedies that have been employed to help people overcome infection.
Strangely, many public health agencies and officials have downplayed, and in some cases outright criticized, the efficacy of CV19 therapeutic treatments that clearly work in many cases. Regardless, therapeutics offer another proven measure of relief from pandemic conditions.
Assisted by therapeutics or not, people who overcome infections are prone to elevated levels of future resistance against similar illnesses. Once exposed to a pathogen, immune systems develop capacity to prevent recurrence of infection. This elevated resistance is commonly durable for long time periods. This leads us to yet another 'way out' of a pandemic supported by scientific principles: herd immunity.
The notion of herd immunity is intuitive. Thanks to our adaptive immune systems, it is difficult for us to get sick from the same pathogen twice in close by time frames. In the case of an infectious virus, as more people get sick from the virus and then recover, there are less hosts for virus to subsequently infect. At some threshold, enough people have contracted the virus and developed subsequent resistance to reinfection that it is difficult for the virus to subsequently spread. The herd has effectively become immune to the virus.
Precisely what percentage of a population must contract a pathogen to achieve herd immunity has been subject to considerable scientific debate. Evidence suggests that herd immunity thresholds are pathogen dependent and may not be discernable until after the fact. What we do know is that cumulative infections create barriers to more infection, providing another route away from a pandemic.
Compared to the above alternatives, a vaccine does not offer a clearly superior 'way out' of a pandemic--particularly in the case of CV19. The primary objective of a vaccine is motivate immune systems to develop defenses against particular infectious diseases. They typically do so by injecting agents into the body that resemble the disease-causing micro-organism. These agents are often sourced from weakened or dead forms of the microbe. The immune system detects the agent as a threat and then activates the usual self-defense mechanisms.
Finding the right agents for a vaccine--one that both provides effective defense against the pathogen with a safety profile free of significant side-effects--usually takes years. The time lag suggests the impracticality of building public health policy around the development of a effective, safe vaccine to combat a novel virus that creates pandemic conditions. By the time the vaccine is developed, the virus may have run its course.
Enter the mRNA vaccines developed in response to CV19. Unlike traditional vaccines, prospective mRNA vaccines can be designed and produced in a matter of months--making them attractive as timely pandemic countermeasures. Unfortunately, the science associated with mRNA vaccines remains unproven. All previous mRNA projects have failed, meaning that vaccine candidates developed in response to the CV19 pandemic should be regarded as experimental in nature.
One would think, then, that the allure of quick development time would be offset by a prolonged period of careful evaluation--extra careful in the case of an unproven, experimental vaccine technology.
That hasn't happened. Instead, the CV19 vaccines were subjected to small numbers, short period, narrowly focused tests with little evaluation of long term effects, and rapidly 'approved' by regulatory agencies.
There is growing evidence that the CV19 vaccines provide, at best, short term protection against infection that erodes over the course of months. Natural immunity built from previous infection appears to be significantly more durable. There is also increasing evidence of undesirable side-effects.
Proponents of vaccine mandates, it seems, will need to reach for another argument, as ones based on scientific theory and evidence are unfavorable.
Which of these rival hypotheses is more valid?
H1: Government officials and their political operatives will seek to manipulate information, including the reporting of events, in manners that favor their interests.
H2: Government officials and their political operatives will not seek to manipulate information, including the reporting of events, in manners that favor their interests.
Given no particular context, most people will likely choose H1. Government officials, like all people, will be prone to spin information in self-interested manners. Government officials have even more capacity to do so than Everyman, given their influence over media sources and the intellectual set.
But here's the thing, insert the name of particular government officials and political operative into the hypotheses above and response profiles associated with the above question are certain to change. Respondents who are familiar with and oppose the political ideologies of the named official will still choose H1.
But respondents who are familiar with and partisan to the political ideologies of the named official will be more prone to choose H2.
Among the theoretical bases for this prediction is social identity theory. Members of the 'ingroup' are most likely to be perceived as good and unbiased. They say, "Cut me some slack," and ingroup partisans oblige.
'Outgroup' members get no slack. No rose colored glasses for them.
Political affinity alters perception of general truths.
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