Brilliant. Of course the irony here is that the US is being attacked, verbally and very physically, for the very poicies it doesn't have. The WTC fell as symbol for privileges the US system, in contrast to Europe, incessantly removes rather than cements.
Nonetheless, I wonder whether you can account for enmity, deep and passionate enmity in you thinking. Is only a reflection of economic imbalances?

Really a tremendously insightful entry; I'd been groping for an explanation of why America assimilates immigrants so much better, and this seems to be it.

"and not objects of significant hostility by non-Muslim Americans."

Two weeks ago, the local Islamic Center here in Bloomington, Indiana was firebombed. That was significant hostility if you ask me.

"if instead, excluded from identifying with the culture of the nation in which they reside they perforce identify with the worldwide Muslim culture"

I assume you are referring to the imaginary monolithic Muslim culture shared by all 1 Billion members of that religion? Yes, lets talk about a Billion people spread around the entire globe as if they share a culture, I'm sure that will be illuminating...

"some of them are bound to adopt the extremist views that are common in that culture."

OH! So now extremism is COMMON in the imaginary monolithic Muslim culture shared by all 1 Billion members of that religion. Lets fear them!

One doesn't even have to read Orientalism to spot the cultural hegemony in that statement. Come on.

It strikes me as a horribly bad idea to even talk about setting policy in such a broad fashion in an environment of obvious stereotyping and fear.

"The resulting danger to Europe and to the world is not offset by long vacations."

OK, but can we have them anyway? I am tired of competing to see who can accumulate the most stuff while taking the least time to appreciate it. Seriously, right now everyone with a job in Europe is pondering which beach to sit on for all of next month. Thoreau is laughing so hard at us in his grave.

This is an insightful writeup. I think there is a complementary reason for the lack of assimilation in Europe when compared to the United States. Immigrants to the US cannot afford to remain unassimilated into society. If they remain unassimilated, their economic prospects suffer considerable damage, and unlike in Europe there is no safety net for them to fall back on. This provides a powerful incentive for them to assimilate , however culturally unwilling they might be. I do not think that this is the case in most of Western Europe.

The other problem with the leisure argument is that a lot of this leisure is enforced. Higher unemployment implies pressure in favor of lower working hours. In addition, a competitive economy would imply that employment in a firm is fluid and there is considerable employee turnover in firms as companies go through periods of expansion and contraction. This degree of turnover is sufficient to ensure longer working hours to offset job insecurity. An economy with considerable leisure time is a relatively uncompetitive one, and hence not particularly a good thing in the long run.

"An economy with considerable leisure time is a relatively uncompetitive one"

Europe competes effectively against the US. Check the Euro exchange rates.

I do agree with you about immigrants being forced to assimilate when they come to the US, but I do not believe it is exclusively economic pressure. Much of it is social pressure, reflecting America's entrenched cultural, religious, and racial intolerance, not to mention our stubborn mono-lingualism.

(And before you call me un-American, consider that I now live in a state that has 7 active chapters of the KKK and in a town that just saw its mosque firebombed. I have never been more glad that I can pass for native.)

The resulting danger to Europe and to the world is not offset by long vacations.

Speak for yourself. If I had to choose between (avoiding) a one in a million chance of being killed by Islamic terrorists and a couple extra weeks of vacation I would take the vacation. I don't know whether that makes me brave or lazy or just good at math. I mean, I probably have a one in a million chance of being killed in a traffic accident on a single trip to the movies but I go anyway.

...poverty cannot be abolished without recourse to measures that produce the social pathologies that we observe in Europe.

If failing to assimilate some Muslims is all it takes to abolish poverty then I, for one, vote for failing to assimilate.

I'm not trying to troll here. That's just where my personal values are. In terms of things that scare me, terrorism is way down the list. In terms of people who offend me, terrorists are way down the list. In terms of sympathy, victims of terrorism are no higher on my list than victims of anything else.

The one thing that does bother me is that so many people are so hung up on Islamic terrorism but I suppose that those people are equally bothered that I am not.

I would note that the london suicide bombers came from relatively wealthy middle-class backgrounds. Economic exclusion is unlikely to have motivated these young men.

My mother's experience as an immigrant is that England does contain a certain element that is hostile to foreign immigrants, within all social classes, which makes social integration more difficult, but certainly not impossible. It cannot be emphasised enough that our experience has overwhelmingly been that the mainstay of English culture, and the main body English are welcoming to immigrants. I have not found the same problems because I speak English as my first language, and have white skin which makes it impossible to definitively say that I am an immigrant, or descended of recent immigrants, just by glancing at me. Those whose English is flawless but have a different skin colour may have a different experience.

Very insightful. I find nothing to disagree with, but I wonder how comparable the Muslim populations in the US and Europe are. It seems to me Europe's immigration is more recent, and from my understanding poorer (not necessarily because of lack of economic mobilility, though that may exacerbate it, but because they arrive poorer).

Also, has anyone here wondered about the relationship between the size and distribution of a minority and its members' propensity to assimilate? It seems to me that the smaller and more dispersed a minority is the more the members are forced to assimilate because there are no functioning communities to partcipate in, so they must branch out and fully embrace and immerse themselves in the host culture. It seems something like this could explain some of the difference between Europe and America, but perhaps this is only superficial (clumping together needn't imply a failure to assimilate in the most important ways).

The one thing I have trouble with about the whole idea that this is enforced leisure is that the French people repeatedly vote in politicians who implement and stnad by these laws. Thus, at least a majority of the French voters show some kind of support for "leisure-friendly" laws (although they may express their dissatisfaction by voting for Sarkozy in the next election). Would the explanation for this be that the 10% of unemployed workers get their votes drowned out by those with secure jobs or that the immigrants either can't vote or are not a large bloc of votes yet due to their being minorities? Or would the French voting populace do well to read the Becker-Posner blog in order to enlighten themselves in preparation for the next elections?

Larry Horse confused.

So, Europe is protecting current workers jobs at the expense of immigrant labor market entry. One can see how this might create resentment, in spite of the social safety net (which, you'd think, should be a countervailing force). Could Europe change its policy so that it's economy uses roughly the same amount of labor while "sharing" the work with more employees? The social safety net would have to adjust as well of course.

Also, as generations go on and [marginally] ever more immigrants [and their decendents] enter the permanent labor force isn't this problem likely to correct itself, barring institutional anti-immigant barriers. Those might be a real problem more in need of correcting than the short work week.

As for the U.S.'s labor market and treatment of immigrants:

The fact that we're a nation "in which the risk of economic failure is significant" hardly seems like the kind of thing we'd want to exclude immigrants who are reluctant to "conform to the customs and attitudes of their new country." If the best reason we can offer people to "conform to our customs and attitudes" (I'm not sure what those are exactly.) is that they won't be able to make a living otherwise, that does not seem to say much for us (whether we're talking about immigrants or natives). In the 21st century, the U.S. and Western Europe both enjoy prosperity so great that we can no longer justify (if we ever could) using a hard-knocks labor market to get people to adopt our way of life.

This is not to say that Europe's failure to assimilate its Muslims won't play some part in future terrorist threats. But, to the extent you're saying that the only way we can get people to live together in peace is to encourage them to (1) take work as the main measure of social participation and/or (2) desire above all to increase their capacity for consumption I disagree.

I am definitely going to have to reread this, but I am mystified. Is Posner arguing that long vacations cause terrorism? That is absurd.

Krugman's prescient column last week discussed the trade-off that the American economy makes versus Europe: slightly higher productivity in exchange for more working hours. We also pay slightly lower taxes but do not have national health care. Krugman argued that, perhaps, both trade-offs are net losses for Americans in terms of quality of life for the average person. The European model also allows people to spend more time with their families. Krugman made a reasonable argument, possibly a compelling one.

Krugman said nothing about terrorism. In fact, he would probably agree with Posner that European terrorism is in part due to cultural barriers in Europe that have made it more difficult for Muslims to assimilate. Of course, however, America's "melting pot" model did not stop 9/11.

Long vacations have nothing to do with terrorism. They have nothing to do with assimilation. Those are separate issues. Posner's attempt to merge them is little more than sophistry. Even accepting that assimilation can be aided by a strong economy, long vacations alone do not create barriers to employment for immigrants. European vacation policy no more causes terrorism than the Family Leave Act (which I'm sure Posner opposes, on different grounds).

Also, there is plenty of terrorism in countries with fewer worker protections than in America. Bali, anyone?

This post is a remarkable attempt to bash Paul Krugman, not to mention France, by trying to say that their policies encourage terrorism. As if Max Cleland wasn't enough. When will the right get a life? I'd suggest a long vacation.

"Is Posner arguing that long vacations cause terrorism?"

When you believe this:

"...extremist views that are common in that culture."

Then it starts to look like everything causes terrorism.

It is interesting how everyone imports their private ideology when attempting to explain irrational events. The neoliberals will say the bombs were a consequence of relaxed efficiencies. I'm sure the welfare-state people will point to the failure to guarantee equality of opportunity to Muslim populations. The Anarchists will say it is just a necessary result of interventionist foreign policy.

The same thing happened after Columbine. The right blamed violent media, the left blamed guns. Like I said before, it isn't a good idea to set policy in reaction to rare, extreme polarizing events (see, the PATRIOT Act).

I don't think America is so different from Krugman's France. I can find five dozen jobs that want me to work 20 to 35 hours per week for a low hourly wage, but I can't find any jobs that require me to put in a good 40 hours or more (the ones with decent salaries and meaningful benefits).

Guess American companies are just looking out for my free time on the Government's behalf.

America, eff Yeah!

Thomas

Corey -

I fear that this is more than just overreaction to an extreme polarizing event. It is the blatant misuse of a national tragedy (9/11), not to mention the recent tragedies in London and Madrid, to promote unrelated ideological ends. The Patriot Act was an understandable reaction to 9/11, even if not entirely necessary or justified. On the other hand, using 9/11 to argue for shorter vacations isn't even in the ballpark. It's like saying that the main problem with Nazi Germany was its socialism. I'm waiting for that post next week..

David and Corey:

You both sound ridiculous. Are you suggesting it is a good idea to have unemployed, unassimilated radical fundamentalists in one's country? That's a recipe for disaster.

There is no doubt that Islamofascism is an idealogy independent of unemployment or lack of assimilation. But the question is: what environmental factors encourage the virulence and prevalence of that diseased idealogy. Assimilation naturally reduces the threat because one identifies with the targeted population. Gainful employment similarly reduces the propensity toward radicalization because it is likely to promote assimilation, while providing an alternative to terrorism. People who are personally happy, content, and who identify with their countrymen are not likely to engage in terrorism.

It is generally accepted that crime is negatively correlated with employment. Do you dispute this? People with good jobs, with families to support, and who identify with their host country are less likely to commit crimes or engage (or sympathesize with) in terrorism. What is so hard to understand?

Great post!

I read "Freakonomics" last month and this post reminds me of it--looking for seemingly unrelated consequences of a given policy decision.

I think that an issue that underlies the post and the responses is how to create incentives for a social group (Muslims living in the West) to change their primary group identification (from "Muslim" to "national of country of residence").

One of the problems with that is a psychological trait most obviously seen in Nationalism, namely that an external threat creates stronger in-group identification. In this case, there is a perceived external threat to "Muslims" as well as a real threat to Muslims, as the firebombing posts show. The fact that this external threat is a product of complex interactions in which Muslim terrorists are a causal factor does not change the psychological effect it has on persons who either identify as or are identified as Muslim. The point is, the more there is conflict between any minority Muslim group and the West, the more all Muslims will be compelled to circle the wagons.

On the difference between Euro and American social/liberal economic policies and the effect on assimilation, I think there is a chicken-egg question and that the policies are indicators rather than causes. I think that a historical difference between the US and Europe is the degree of national identity/cultural homogenity and the level of social welfare that is acceptable.

Europe has traditionally had a greater degree of cultural homogenity within the borders of each country. I think that this is a cultural reason for greater acceptance of social welfare because "my" money (taxes) will not subsidize people who are not like me. In the US, there has traditionally been greater cultural heterogenity. As a result, social welfare is less acceptable because "my" money (taxes) will support peoplw who are not like me, people I do not identify with. Social welfare policies work better in homogenous areas (Scandinavia), but are not as acceptable to countries with great diversity (the US).

I think that the economic policies are not a cause, but rather an indicator of underlying cultural conditions (a homogenous sense of cultural and nationality identity vs. a diversity in cultural and national identity)that are more or less conducive towards assimilation. Does anyone remember the Tory campaign in the past year--"Are you thinking what we are?"

If you have an open society, you are going to have radicals living in it. Here in the US, we have a few disaffected militia types from Michigan willing to blow up Federal buildings, we occasionally get college professors sending bombs though the mail, bullied teenagers sometimes shoot up their schools, klansmen sometimes firebomb mosques.

However, in each of those cases, we can all agree that the perpetrators are individual crazies that should be addressed in an individualized fashion. (i.e. through the criminal law) We do not start acting as if all teenagers, people from Michigan, or white people are potential shooters, bombers, or klansmen.

Yet when some muslims set off bombs, all of a sudden we are talking about national immigration policy and the extremism supposedly common in worldwide muslim culture.

I realize that "Islamofacism" is to today what Communism was to the Reagan era, or what violent media was in the immediate aftermath of Columbine. Its fine to look for social factors that contribute to violent radicalism, but don't go painting such a diverse and peaceful culture with that brush.

"Assimilation" has never been established as a per se good. Especially not in the sense of abandoning one's heritage and adopting the dominant culture. There is no reason a society cannot permit economic integration while allowing a minority to maintain its rich cultural or religious tradition. It is harder to succeed at than forcing a population to submit to dominant cultural norms, but it is worth striving for.

Attempts here to link extremism with the cultural tradition of Islam look like justifications for the more hegemonic form of cultural assimilation. It is just a watered down version of the "savages" myth that lead American colonialists to say to the natives, "look white or die."

Before you jump all over me, ask yourself, are you thinking of economic assimilation or cultural. And if the latter, can you demonstrate the superiority of the culture you want muslims to adopt? Can you do so without sounding like a facist?

"The point is, the more there is conflict between any minority Muslim group and the West, the more all Muslims will be compelled to circle the wagons."

And that is EXACTLY why it is important to cast the conflict as one between terrorists and the countries they attack, rather than as between a minority Muslim group and the West. The minority Muslim group is PART OF the west.

I never had to defend Christianity when Christians bombed the Oklahoma City Federal Building.

I generally don't respond to frivolity, but I'm feeling frivolous today:

"Are you suggesting it is a good idea to have unemployed, unassimilated radical fundamentalists in one's country?"

I don't remember saying that. Certainly not today. Maybe yesterday, after a couple of beers. j/k Seriously, get real.

"People with good jobs, with families to support, and who identify with their host country are less likely to commit crimes or engage (or sympathesize with) in terrorism. What is so hard to understand?"

I don't remember disputing this either. The issue, specifically, was whether long vacations cause terrorism. I distinctly remember disputing THAT.

Posner's argument is based on a chain of suppositions a mile long, and it goes basically like this:

1. Discontented and/or unemployed people become terrorists.

2. Many European Muslim immigrants tend to be discontented and/or unemployed.

3. European Muslim immigrants are discontented and/or unemployed largely because of their countries' vacation policies and tax rates.

4. Therefore, to prevent terrorism, we must lower taxes and not provide long vacations.

5. The Muslim experience in the U.S. shows this to be true (forgetting that little matter of 9/11, of course).

Every single one of Posner's suppositions in this chain is questionable at best. Essentially, Posner's underlying theory is that unmitigated capitalism solves all ills. Unfortunately, the world's actual experience with unmitigated capitalism proves otherwise.

We all want to get rid of the terrorists, or "violent extremists," or whatever may be the "nom de jour" for these despicable criminals. Let's try to find some common ground here, like not giving asylum to preachers of hate, promoting tolerance within ALL communities (Muslim or otherwise), locking up the terrorists when we find them, and using the bully pulpit of government to promote democratic values. Arguing against vacations in the name of terrorism is silliness.

The fairness of a stereotype should be judged by what percent the group actually conforms to it. In your counter examples of white people and Christians, very very few would support the actions taken by the terrorist Tim McVeigh (my guess is less than one tenth of one percent). Let us look into the opinions of the Muslim world, shall we?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/14/AR2005071401030_pf.html

"The proportion that expressed confidence in the al Qaeda leader dropped from almost half to about a quarter in Morocco, and from 58 percent to 37 percent in Indonesia. Bin Laden's standing went up slightly in Pakistan, to 51 percent, and in Jordan, to 60 percent."

"Roughly half of Muslims in Lebanon, Jordan and Morocco said such attacks are justifiable, while sizable majorities in Turkey, Pakistan and Indonesia disagreed. Yet, support for suicide bombings in Iraq still declined by as much as 20 percent compared with a poll taken last year."

And those figures represent a DECLINE from previous years.

The long vacations is one of many attributes of the socialist European system. Posner presents the following logic, which is not hard to follow.

Socialist policies (including very generous vacations)-->Greater unemployment, especially among the poorest segment of population
---->Increased disaffection, and possibly places host country at greater risk.

That is the logic, and there is nothing silly about it. Maybe you dispute that Europe's tilt toward socialism is to blame for their higher unemployment, or their seemingly less assimilated Muslim population. That is a fair criticism. But there is nothing preposterous about Posner's position.

"Yet when some muslims set off bombs, all of a sudden we are talking about national immigration policy and the extremism supposedly common in worldwide muslim culture."

Supposedly? Please see the statistics and article I just posted.

What is meant by "assimilation" aside from getting a job and off the dole?

The original post spoke of "political and cultural" assimilation as well as economic, but what that is is still unclear. The best we can tell is that it means, "being entirely undisposed to become a terrorist." That is indeed a highly desirable property!

But Corey may be right that, assuming non-terrorism, allowing people to "assimilate" at their own speed or not "assimilate" (again what does that word mean?!) may be the better option. In fact, when one looks back to the mid-1990s and Benjamin Barber's "Jihad v. McWorld" one can recall the view that globalization's call for universal cultural assimilation was tribalist violence's dialectical partner in crime. Not that that book was about Islamic terrorism in particular. And I don't know what Prof. Barber thinks about current events. But it seems worth considering the possibility that some of the things to which people are being asked to assimilate are reinforcing Islamist tendancies.

Plus, as others have said: Poverty and lack of opportunity don't seem to have explained the London bombers? How many 9-11 bombers experienced the indolent unwanted leisure of Europe? What about Bin Laden? Did he spend time in Europe as well as the U.S.? The assaults and cemetary defacings we've seen in Europe are terrible, no question. But its possible that their perps have considerably different profiles, motivations, and capacities from the suicide bombers and 9-11 hijackers.

Palooka, I followed the link, and it seemed to me that your post didn't quite convey what the article said in one important spot. OBL is apparently well thought of in various Muslim countries (I wish they'd given specific numbers and questions). But the attacks that about half of people in Lebanon, Jordan, and Morocco thought were justified were suicide attacks against the US in Iraq, as I read it. That's quite different from support for bombing the subways in London or the WTC in New York!

More broadly, support for terrorism in the name of Islam was down. Still uncomfortably high, from what I could tell (for some reason, they didn't just give us a chart with numbers, though the results they reported should have fit on a small chart easily).

I guess I'm a little mystified by the concern with morality of suicide bombings specifically. Isn't it the nature of the target of the bombing that determines the morality of the attack, perhaps along with the nature of the conflict? I mean, it's not like McVeigh would have changed the morality of blowing up that building full of people in Oklahoma City if he'd stayed in the truck till the bomb went off, right?

--John

That article also says:

"As the events in London show, it does not take too many people to cause big problems. If only 1/10,000 of 1 percent [of the Muslim world] is inclined to terrorism, that is still 1,200 potential mass killers."

So the question is, "what are you willing to do to the 1 Billion Muslims in order to insulate against that 1/10,000th of 1 percent?"

And the corolary is, "will the repressive measures and cultural hegemony that you adopt to that end have the peverse effect of GROWING the number of people willing to commit violence?"

Overall I think Judge Posner makes a very interesting argument. However, my concern is that he is seeking to support a broad thesis based on a very limited number of observations (i.e. there have only been a few terrorist attacks perpetrated by Muslims in Europe). Of these London is the only one that I am aware of that was perpetrated by homegrown radicals. Madrid may have been and some of the Paris bombings in the mid-90s may have been, I just don't remember. Even assuming they were that is still a VERY small data set. Moreover, there have been several supposed plots in this country by homegrown extremists (think of the group of Yemenis in upstate New York.) Assuming these folks really were terrorists plotting imagine that some of these folks had succeeded rather than been arrested. In that case we'd have several bombings by homegrown extremists here. Would this support an argument that the American socio-economic model supports terrorism. If not why do the limited number of European attacks support the arguemnt that the European economic model supports terrorism?

That said, I do find the European model of immigration and assimilation quite disturbing. The immigrant ghettos in the Paris suburbs are depressing places. However, this raises a related point. The US certainly has frightening ghettos. However, so far these ghettos ahve not been a breeding ground for terrorists. Steve Leavitt does ahve an itneresting chapter in his book about the increadible risk crack dealers take for what seems like a very small wage. His explanation is that their opportunities are so limited that they take these icnreadible risk in hopes of becoming rich (even though most of them don't). Couldn't the same explanation apply to European Immigrant terrorists (even if we set aside the sample size problems above). Extremely limited opportunity makes engaging in terorism relatively more attractive. However, this would imply that the main reason residents of US ghettos have not yet engaged in terorrism (but rather making sweeping generalizations engaged in crack dealing) is not a function of the superior American economic model, but rather that a terrorist ideology has not yet appeared to appeal to them.

Judge Posner looks at poor Muslims in France behaving in antisocial ways (really? In France? I'd point instead to Spain and UK!) and sees the problem as a result of social policy. Judge Posner looks at our Muslim poplation and sees a productive and integrated class. Also noted is that French Muslims tend to be poor and American Muslims tend to be wealthy.

To me, the better comparison is between French poor and American Poor. Surely Judge Posner would recognize that street crime, especially drug related crime is quite high in the United States, among the urban - and increasingly the rural - poor. If French Muslims are drawn to organized violence against the state instead of ad hoc violence against society I would suggest it is because such an avenue is available.

If you're poor, powerless, and marginalized by your country, you will be more likely to use violence to get where you want to go. Whether or not you get good vacation time when you get there.

Re Krugman's claim (repeated, for example, by David) that France's productivity is higher than American productivity: This difference is likely a statistical artifact arising from French labor market regulations. Labor market regs in France disproportionately reduce the employment of young and less skilled workers thereby raising the average productivity of the workers who remain employed. (Much like dropping the lowest test grade raises one's test average.) If the US adopted policies that reduced its employment-population ratio by 10 percentage points (the difference between U.S. and France) thereby allowing an apples-to-apples comparison, the US would probably have higher output per worker.

This entry is somewhat self-contradictory in that it points to Europe's failure to economically integrate Muslims as the reason for their extremism, and then asserts that it is not poverty but Europe's socialism that is responsible for that extremism. As far as I can tell from Posner's discussion of American Muslims, he's using the terms "assimilated" and "integrated" to mean that they're making lots of money, implying that Europe's Muslims aren't integrated because they're poor. That's a direct contradiction of his last paragraph, in which he asserts that it's not poverty but socialist policies that lead to extremism. It may be true that Europe's social policies lead to Muslim poverty which in turn leads to extremism, but then one must also consider the fact that the Muslim population in these countries is so much larger as a percentage of their overall population. Speaking as a second-generation Asian Indian in America, I can say that a good deal of my "assimilation" stems from the fact that the only other Indians I have regular contact with are the members of my immediate family. Those Indians I know who are more knit into a greater Indian community tend to tilt more socially conservative than I do, since many Indians are somewhat socially conservative (especially when it comes to women's rights). So when I read about huge Muslim ghettos in Europe, it seems pretty clear to me that a lot of the extremism is coming from the tendency of immigrants to build isolated communities -- a tendency which may be fostered by the economics of those countries, to be sure. But I doubt that's the only or even the paramount reason for their extremism.

There are two separate issues that overlap here. The first is, the issue of emigration/immigration and the second a quasi religious "war" that has been declared on the "enemies" of Islam.

Let's deal with the first issue first. In order to clarify this issue a redefinition is in order:

emigration: the exporting of surplus population
immigration: the importing of surplus population

Trying to compare the Euro model and and the North American model is like trying to compare apples and oranges. As for the Euro model, Europe has been a net exporter of surplus population for centuries and as such has no practical experience with immigration. Hence their problems. Whereas, North America was based on immigration from the very begining. (unless of course you happen to be Will Roger's relatives who just happened to meet the boat).
Now there is a comparison between Europe and
N.A. and that lies in rise of the Know-Nothings and Know-nothingism of the early 19th century in N.A. Which is what Europe is experincing at present.

Perhaps an apocryaphal tale will shed light on the N.A. solution to this problem. During the export of Irish and German populations in the 19th century, they were met at dockside when they first got off the boat, by the authorities with question, "What did you do? Go off get drunk and forget to plant the potato crop again? Don't worry, we won't let you have that problem here, ever again!" They really ought to change the words on that plaque at the feet of that statue in New York Harbor to read, "Send us your tired, poor, huddled masses, desirous of being exploited." ;)

As for the "war" which has so recently been declared, the tactic of choice of the enemy is; infiltration, sabotage, assination, murder,etc. and this does spell problems for the larger Islamic community in N.A. in which these agents of mayhem move. Leastways, we haven't shipped the entire community off to internment camps like we did the Japanese in WW 2.

Just to add: aside from the theoretical flaws in Posner's argument, it is wrong on the facts. The London bombers seem to have been well-assimilated individuals with decent jobs and supportive families. They were simply brainwashed by hate-mongering radicals. The argument that they could have been stopped by lower taxes and a more libertarian economic policy is baffling.

As I have argued before, there is no real connection between terrorism and poverty. This is not a war of the "disenfranchised" against the west. It is a war of ideology; specifically, an extremist, violent, religious ideology. Its leaders are well-educated people of means, as are many of its foot soldiers. This war cannot be won simply through economics.

Nor is this war about Iraq. 9/11 predated Iraq and had nothing to do with it. If the U.S. and Britain withdraw from Iraq, the terrorists will not stop. They want to establish a Muslim dictatorship throughout the world, however far fetched and improbable that goal may seem. They are thinking long term and have no delusions that they will succeed *today.*

Fundamentally, this is a "war" of ideology about the future of the world. 21st century versus 14th century. To win, we have to convince the people of the world that our vision is better. I think the west hasn't really come to terms with the fact that much of the world has not accepted the 21st century. Or at least has not accepted that the values of the enlightenment are correct.

While the current administration realizes this to some degree, it has little credibility worldwide, because at heart, it doesn't really believe in the 21st century or the enlightenment. That is the biggest obstacle in the current campaign against "violent extremism." Not issues of economic reform.

Tony Blair has said all the right thinks in the aftermath of 7/7. Hopefully, other world leaders will follow suit. If any good could come out of this tragedy, it might wake up the sleeping European continent: Europe might now realize that this is a war of ideas that the west must do everything to win.

Not a direct comment to this particular thread, but Judge Posner wrote an interesting essay in the Sunday Times and I haven't seen a section on this blog about it. I do recommend the essay to readers, and I offer my response at this link--- http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/archive/ari-melber/the-market-is-the-message_4989.html

-------The Market Is the Message--------- Richard Posner is the only federal judge I can think of with a major blog. Besides his day job over at the Seventh Circuit, he writes all the time - articles, op-eds, book reviews and books of his own. Since last December, he?s been writing a regular blog with economist Gary Becker.

So Posner's unique background makes his views on blogs, politics and the media particularly significant, and he shares his take in a long essay in Sunday?s New York Times. He reviews eight books of media criticism, from Eric "Liberal Media" Alterman to Bernard "CBS Insider" Goldberg, and he finds the mainstream media is disrespected, embattled and rattled.

Posner argues that conservative and liberal media critics agree on more than they realize. They both want a media that educates the public and transcends profit pressures. They resent bias in the newsroom; they lament any polarization that obstructs their agenda; and they like blogs that advance their views. Yet while both crowds have focused on bias and politics, Posner argues economic trends are actually realigning the media. The proliferation of media outlets, cable news and blogs have increased competition, and Posner provides several examples of how that competition has inevitably led to polarization. Thus he concludes the most crippling biases are not pundit-driven, but market-driven:

A market gives people what they want, whether they want the same thing or different things. Challenging areas of social consensus, however dumb or even vicious the consensus, is largely off limits for the media, because it wins no friends among the general public. The mainstream media do not kick sacred cows like religion and patriotism.
This is an important point, and it?s lost on many partisans and journalists alike. If market-driven coverage is designed to avoid offense, we will miss a lot of important news and uncomfortable facts.

Then Posner turns to the blogosphere, where he finds information is efficiently pooled and the "error-correction machinery" is better than the "conventional media." That's high praise from an old-school writer, but he has some sharp criticism too.

"Bloggers are parasitical on the conventional media," he explains, since they copy traditional news and opinion. (Exhibit A: This blog entry about his New York Times essay!) Posner continues, "The degree of parasitism is striking in the case of those blogs that provide their readers with links to newspapers articles," since they can be read "without buying the newspaper." This is a ridiculous claim, since only the newspapers decide whether to offer free content. You can't blame bloggers for a newspaper's distribution decisions. And when newspapers do offer free articles online, the blogs are providing a free promotional service by directing their readers to a paper's website. The biological analogy for that relationship is symbiosis -- not "parasitism."

Posner concludes that blogs have a positive impact on media because they increase competition and lead to a "better matching of supply to demand." He readily admits this means more polarization and sensationalism, but that's okay because the media should just "give the consumer what he or she wants."

In the end, this libertarian faith in the market is the great failing of Posner's essay. We cannot simply reduce all news choices to consumer demand, with different events and realities reported according to consumer preferences. As the late Sen. Pat Moynihan said, ?Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.? If the fractured, market-driven media continues to pander to an increasingly polarized electorate, it will be nearly impossible to attain consensus on any major debate. And if that kind of impasse doesn't worry Posner on its merits, he should at least consider the costs such gridlock might force on the market.

Are we assimilating immigrants today like we did a century ago? I wonder, and I doubt it. As for comparing European and U.S. unemployment rates, we don't know what the U.S. unemployment rate actually is because we don't know how many people no longer seek work. The bottom line, of course, is that there is no free lunch. Two-income households sacrifice family time -- those "family values" the right wing likes to carp about. To be with family, long vacations or not, sacrifices the 50- to 60-hour work week and thus income. You can have a materialistic, consumer-driven economy or you can have emotionally and spirituality healthy families, but the United States has yet to prove that we can have both. Vive la France!

So, Islamic extremism is not inculcated by the US military presence in the gulf or by US support for repressive regimes or by US economic imperialism or US support for Israel, but it is inculcated by European domestic policy led by the French? Okay. Sure.

as an enthusiastic fan of both P's (PK and RP), I'm sorry to have to take sides in a "dispute" between them. but IMO judge P's criticism of prof K's column is unnecessary to his argument and rather unfair to prof K.

some (obvious) points: a blog is significantly different from an op-ed column, the latter being limited to (I believe, and a rough count suggests) about 750 words while the former is limited only by the energy and good judgment of the author, resulting here in a post of roughly 1200 words. this gives the blogger much more latitude to elaborate, go off on tangents, etc. furthermore, the audience is different. despite being the "paper of record" for the "effete eastern intellectual elite", my bet is that the NYT has a readership that is much more diverse and less "elite" than the readership of this blog, which means a columnist must pay more attention to entertaining as well as informing than a blogger (no chance of getting "fired" based on declining readership).

finally, PK's column rather light weight and had a very strong flavor of "it's friday, so what am I going to write about?". judge posner's typically thought provoking post stands on its own without the references to the column, so it's unclear to me why he would bother to apply his formidable capabilites to addressing it at all.

in any event, I find judge posner's jabs strike more straw than meat. specifically:

RP: Krugman's complacency about high unemployment is notable
PK: France's unemployment rate ... is a real problem.

with a severe word limit, there is only so much one can say about something that is somewhat tangential to the main point of the column. he said it's a "real problem" - the absence of a detailed policy discussion in a 750 word column hardly suggests complacency.

RP: they trade material goods for leisure, a trade that Krugman regards as a sign of high civilization
PK: French economic policies ... seem extremely supportive of the family ...

unless one equates "[support] of the family" with "high civilization", this is at best exaggeration. nothing in the piece suggested to me a claim of such a grandiose conclusion, only the possibility of different emphasis.

RP: Krugman argues that without compulsion, workers could not get the amount of leisure they really want
PK: government regulations actually allow people to make a desirable tradeoff . ... It is hard to obtain more vacation for yourself from your employer and even harder, if you do, to coordinate with all your friends to get the same deal and go on vacation together
again, the words in the op-ed piece and the paraphrase just don't align, unless one equates facilitation with compulsion.

RP: Krugman's failure to relate the European model to Europe's Muslim problem is telling.

this seems especially strained. true, PK doesn't mention the muslim problem .... or any other "downside", other than the lower level of income and hence consumerism. but he is specifically addressing the tradeoff between those and leisure time, not suggesting a utopia. (and exactly what is being "told" by the "telling" absence?)

RP: To point to the upside of Europe's social model without mentioning the most serious downside is to provide bad advice to our own policymakers.
PK: Senator Rick Santorum, are you reading this?

one would certainly hope that the clear attempt at a sarcastic jab at "family values" hypocrites wasn't interpreted as intending to provide advice to policymakers. I really doubt that PK envisions being asked to testify before a congressional subcommittee or to participate in a commission based on the "insights" presented.

Ari

Meeting demand for news does not imply unbalanced reporting. You are taking an unnecessarily narrow view of demand. There is a world of difference between demand for "news from Iraq" and "news which makes Party X look good", for example. You have not demonstrated that market forces lead to unbalanced reporting.

POSNER: "Thus, it is not poverty that breeds extremism; it is social policies intended in part to eradicate poverty that do so, by obstructing exit from minority subcultures. If Muslims in European societies do not feel a part of those societies because public policy does not enable them to compete for the jobs held by non-Muslims--if instead, excluded from identifying with the culture of the nation in which they reside they perforce identify with the worldwide Muslim culture--some of them are bound to adopt the extremist views that are common in that culture."

To generalize Posner's thesis, "Minorities who are discouraged from full assimilation into the dominant culture will be more susceptible to engage in antisocial and criminal behavior." Social scientists have long used growth in intermarriage rates as a benchmark for true assimiliation under the theory that those with whom you break bread, befriend, work beside, bed down, and marry are likelier to have a fair shot in political association and allocation of collective resources, or coalition-building and deal-brokering. (Just for example, the intermarriage rates between Jews and non-Jews has skyrocketed since the 1950s.) Thus, to determine if Muslims are truly assimilating, we would need to see if they began to intermarry with other groups already fully assimilated as 'legitimate Americans'.

Given that, one wonders why no one looks to the United States to ascertain that Posner's thesis is almost axiomatic. It would be a rather easy argument to make that African-Americans, in rates disproportionate to their population, engage in antisocial and criminal behavior because they are not fully assimilated into the dominant society. Indeed, African-Americans, unlike other ethnicities (if there is a coherent African-American ethnicity or culture, which many convincingly dispute), are often set aside as part of a different culture or community other than the national one. (I have no idea what it means, precisely, but I have often seen the term "the black community" used, as if all black people live in one large town called, "Blackville.") It is also probably the case that rates of intermarriage between blacks and whites is lower than intermarriage between whites and any other ethnicity, which is pretty indicative of their relative status on the racial totem pole and comparative degree of assimilation. Why Posner did not carry his argument through to its natural and probable conclusion, and use African-American antisocial and criminal behavior as a perfect paradigm of what happens when full assimilation is denied a socially defined group, is bizarre. Especially because he, as he said last week, is willing to analogize blacks to homosexuals over the objection of indignant blacks who feel defamed by the comparison.

That being said, I agree with the thesis, but dispute its ramifications.

One plausible problem with rising intermarriage rates between Muslims and non-Muslims is that it may lead to liberalization of the overall Muslim population, and in backlash a radicalization of conservatism amongst those Muslims who refuse to intermarry. One can see a similar trend amongst Jewish-Americans. As many more Jews are born into mixed marriages and Jews overall become more liberal (Non-practicing, Reform and Reconstructionist instead of Conservative and Orthodox), enclaves of radicalized Orthodox Jews begin to form. Indeed, many of the violent Jewish settlers in the West Bank who Palestinians resent and clash with were not born in Israel, but in places like Brooklyn. The assassin who shot Yitzhak Rabin was not Isaraeli-born, but an American Othrodox Jew who had warped into an extremist by associating with other Jewish radicals. For that reason, I am uncertain whether Posner is correct. It may be that the ever expanding assimilation of the Muslim population as a whole causes a very small segement of Muslims to become more radical, as they are displeased with the decadence and affluence of their fellow Muslims. Hapless politically to change the libertarian impulses of others, they strike back with violence against the society that spawned the corrupting decadence. In that respect, they are little different than the Klu Klux Klan burning crosses and lynching blacks from tree limbs across the countryside to prevent what they feared most from becoming commonplace in the wake of widespread black liberty: interracial marriage.

MTW: "Extremely limited opportunity makes engaging in terorism relatively more attractive. However, this would imply that the main reason residents of US ghettos have not yet engaged in terorrism (but rather making sweeping generalizations engaged in crack dealing) is not a function of the superior American economic model, but rather that a terrorist ideology has not yet appeared to appeal to them."

True, they have not engaged in terrorism. But they are engaging in antisocial behavior. They are:
1. Dropping out of school
2. Renouncing middle-class values
3. Refusing to vote
4. Refusing to pay taxes
5. Committing felonies
6. Carrying "hot" guns
7. Shooting and killing others
8. Often using drugs
9. Having nonmarital sex that produces children likely to become criminals and a drain on taxpayer resources in other ways (i.e., welfare)

They are not:
1. Going to college
2. Getting a job
3. Starting up a business
4. Running for city council
5. Marrying a woman they love
6. Raising socially productive children
7. Owning a home
8. Paying taxes
9. Voting

Crack-dealing may not be terrorism to you, but it certainly ruins the communities in which it occurs.

John Kelsey,

A fuller explanation of the study can be found here:

http://pewglobal.org/reports/display.php?ReportID=248

I don't understand what you feel was misleading about my post. My point was that Posner's characterization that much of the Muslim world is radicalized (by Western standards) is unfortunately true. Corey disputed this, and apparently 60% support for bin Laden isn't high enough to qualify as extremist to him. He has yet to concede the point. Posner wrote:

"If Muslims in European societies do not feel a part of those societies because public policy does not enable them to compete for the jobs held by non-Muslims--if instead, excluded from identifying with the culture of the nation in which they reside they perforce identify with the worldwide Muslim culture--some of them are bound to adopt the extremist views that are common in that culture. The resulting danger to Europe and to the world is not offset by long vacations."

Case in point. The percent of Muslims in Jordan who trust Osama bin Laden to do the "right thing" is 60%. In Pakistan it is 51% Indonesia 35% Morroco 26% Turkey 7%, and Lebannon at 2%. Indonesia and Pakistan are the two most populated Muslim countries and in each Osama bin Laden has MAJORITY support.

So, "assimilation" in the current context also means not living disproportionately in the company of one's co-religionists (or, more likely, language community or ex-nationals). Yes, I do think this will usually be a good thing. But the process of assimilation can be as important as the outcome.

What I mean is that assimilating because you want to get to know America, get a university education, etc. are more appealing reasons than assimilating because you have no access to people from your previous community. Just as economic desparation is not a particularly happy reason to assimilate, neither is abrupt disconnect from one's previous culture. I'm just expressing my opinion here but I expect that many have similar sympathies and would be willing to incur some cost to avoid confronting others with these harsh conditions.

On the other hand...

I do understand that necessity is the mother of self re-invention. That can be a fine thing, but its also a compromise born of struggle and suffering. To the extent we were to "coddle" immigrants would we be "denying" self re-invention or "not putting them through" it? Hard question and different for different people.

If hard knocks eventually make people plenty happier that's another thing, but an unproven (unprovable?) one.

Note: Throughout I've been sticking with a very individualistic frame of reference. This is a community by, if not of, economists, after all.

I see alot of comments made by non-Muslims, Posner included, that purport a certain knowledge of Muslim culture. The comments criticizing Posner for making the assumption that extremism is common in Islam are just as indicative of this tendency, as their references to Orientalism and their denial that Muslims or Arabs share any sort of common identity (Re: Nasser, Syria's Baath, etc.) are just as generalizing.

Amy Waldman has written a great article for the New York Times, based on interviews, in which she tries to answer the question of why the London bombers did what they did. I'm not saying she gives definitive answers, but I think everyone reading this should check it out. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/31/international/europe/31leeds.html.

A few of the things that the article seems to indicate:
--extremism is not just the province of a few, nor is it all-pervasive. It IS a problem, as many in the Muslim community can attest.
--there are a number of Muslims, especially in Europe, who DO share a pan-Muslim sense of identity. Why else are legions of foreign Muslim fighters going into Iraq across the Syrian border?
--as others have suggested, extremism is not dependent solely on employment or the level of assimilation

"The comments criticizing Posner for making the assumption that extremism is common in Islam are just as indicative of this tendency, as their references to Orientalism and their denial that Muslims or Arabs share any sort of common identity (Re: Nasser, Syria's Baath, etc.) are just as generalizing."

Ok, fine, you win, everyone on the planet who isn't a muslim is a stereotyping orientalist, even those who are arguing for understanding and against orientalism. Lets deconstruct everyone! No one shall be spared! Then when everyone is discredited, the world will be grand!

Lets listen to Amy Waldman, a fine Muslim sounding name! She writes for the Times, so of course she knows what she is talking about, no orientalists would be able to work there!

Fight your own battles then, I am not gay, not muslim, and not black, and this is the second discussion in a row where I've been undermined from a standpoint of "I have superior victimhood." Fine, if you think you can do a better job with a link to the Times, have at it.

I. Employment: Posner and champions of aggressive American capitalism blithely accept the following myth:
1) America’s economy has lower unemployment rate than Europe (as if it were one country).
2) The Reason for (1) is because of European labor institutions (and laizze-faire in the US)

[From this they also attempt to portray American living standards as better (untrue by the UN’s Human Development Index, the Human Poverty Index, and many other measures), mobility as more fluid (untrue from all the research I’ve seen, especially that coming from the University of Michigan)].

Both claims are dubious at best. For a thorough econometric debunking go to http://www.newschool.edu/cepa/publications/workingpapers/index.htm. More simply, if one compares the average unemployment rates for the entire span of 1988-2004, which is about the best the US economy has ever done (except the during the Big Government days of the 1960s) we get the following picture:
U.S. unemployment rate =5.6%.
How many Western European countries have lower unemployment rates than this over the same period despite the chaos of the Soviet collapse? Switzerland 2.9%, Sweden 5.2%, Norway 4.7%, Netherlands 4.8%: =4. And they are arguably the most socialist countries of the lot. What about just 2004? The number goes up to 7 (Luxembourg, UK, and Ireland included). So much for the myth.

Moreover see Paul Krugman’s NYT column 7/18/05 “The Dropout Puzzle” or 7/28 Economist article “It’s the Taking Part that Counts;” both are regarding economist Katherine Bradbury’s paper written from the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. Her original can be found at http://www.bos.frb.org/economic/ppb/2005/ppb052.htm.
Basically, if one corrected the US unemployment figures to better reflect a declining labor force participation rate, which is ignored in calculating unemployment levels, the current rate would jump from 5.1% to 6.6% - 8%. That’s still not last place in Europe, but it’s not very good, and well behind the most socialist countries (Finland is an exception for complicated reasons). Smart, well-coordinated reform to encourage job growth shoud not be conflated with the dismantling of healthy and essential institutions.

II. Terrorism/Integration: Poser also makes the leap that foreigners are also better integrated because of America’s competitive labor market.

Problem 1) I don’t know how an economy in which human capital is both essential for a high-paying job and so unevenly distributed is justly called "competitive." Statistics imply that whites have something closer to a monopoly on human capital; according to the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, 72% of whites graduate from college, with 37% college ready; while 51% of blacks and 52% of Latinos graduate with only 20% of blacks and 16% of Latinos deemed ready for college. Many U.S. school districts are still mostly segregated by race, and due to our reliance on local funding discrepancies range from $4,000/student to $13,000/student (see May 2002 Vol. 59 No. 8 publication of Educational Leadership by Bruce Biddle and David Berliner). European penchant for national funding largely eliminates this problem (The Dutch in fact actually give more money to schools in poorer districts with more minorities: the opposite of the US approach). If America is good at integrating its immigrants (a difficult claim), it’s not because immigrants are becoming managers and CEO’s, but because of civil liberties (installed by activist judges on the left after mass protests). Many immigrants are locked in their cabs (or comparative jobs) all day and all night, desperately trying to break even with 80 hr work weeks. (See the book “Taxi! Cabs and Capitalism in New York City” by Biju Matthew).
Meanwhile, who is looking after their youth, many of whom are growing up with stressed out and absentee fathers? This is related to Krugman’s trenchant point on family values and economic structure, and it relates to terrorism in the opposite way Professor Posner claimed.

"this is the second discussion in a row where I've been undermined from a standpoint of 'I have superior victimhood.'

You are mischaracterizing what happened. In the first discussion, you were called a racist. I don't think the person who called you a racist was claiming to be a victim. S/he was asserting a fact.

An excellent article titled 'Why no Indian Muslims in Al-Qaeda'

http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1447371,001301780001.htm?headline=Why~no~Indian~Muslim~is~in~Al-Qaeda

In one paragraph, this is why..
"Why are there no Indian Muslims in Al-Qaeda? There are no easy answers. But there are two probable reasons. One is the assurance of a level-playing field for all citizens in India because of the success of the democratic system. The other is the ABSENCE of American influence on Indian policy all through the Cold War years and, to a large extent, even now."

"What I mean is that assimilating because you want to get to know America, get a university education, etc. are more appealing reasons than assimilating because you have no access to people from your previous community."

As a feminist, I can't help but wonder why you'd assume that a Pakistani woman who escaped to the United States because she was raped would prefer a Pakistani husband to an American one. Your analysis also seems little more than a patent excuse for the dearth of transracial or transreligious social integration in Western civilization. But the entire argument that Posner is making, I think, is that Europe's inability to socially integrate its Muslim emigres has led to homegrown terrorists who strike domestically. The solution is social integration. Posner is simply saying, "Make Love, not War".

"In the first discussion, you were called a racist."

I have never been called a racist in my entire life until your post, and I am not setting any stock in personal attacks from someone posting under the pseudonym 'Not Corey'.

Anyone who cares can go back and read that discussion. Some people objected to my analogy of anti-gay-marriage propaganda to anti-interracial-marriage propaganda.

Actually, Corey, according to Jane Thornbough in Becker's comment On Gay Marriage:

"I also find odd that you and people like you, Corey, always retort with comments that suggest you hate black people. If you respect black people so much, why do you always bring them up as rhetorical strawmen in your arguments as objects of contempt? Why do you trivialize their history? And why do you suggest that interracial marriage is repugnant or nasty in the way that most people view sodomy?"

It seems like Jane was calling you a racist to me.

For lower incomes, social mobility is lower in the US than in most European countries (see Alesina and Glaeser, Fighting poverty in the US and Europe). So I am afraid you cannot say that the US has fewer problems with integration of Muslims because social mobility is higher.

I think a more promising approach is Olivier Roy's. He places the radicalization of small groups of western european muslims more in the perspective of violent urban minorities in Europe in the second half of the 20th century like the Red Brigades in Italy and the RAF in Germany. For several reasons (scale, culture) such violent fringe groups do not seem to prosper as much in the USA. The violent racial uprisings in the USA on the other hand do not happen as much in Europe.

So there are differences. However Posner's reasoning that it is mainly a matter of social mobility and labour markets is inadequate and probably not true.

There were a number of useful points here that I found interesting but it skimmed the surface a little too much, and used too great generalization- for example the blanket term Europe and then throwing the UK in with France, i.e. a multi-culturalist liberal economic decentralized country with a high centralized, mon-cultural, planned economy. As a brit living in France I can tell you that there is two very, very different approaches to dealing with the issues surrounding the various Muslim communities in each country, in the policing of minorities, media representations, education systems, so forth and so on- also you completely skim over the issue of empire- France ahs so many muslims because it ruled Algeria and Morrocco- and many of the Muslims of Algerian origins who live in France are from families that fought on the side of France against their fellow countrymen and then were treated with dubious policies by the French- many were left in Algeria to die at the hands of their countrymen. Britian has similar communities from it ex empire, Pakistan, India., Eastern Africa as well as communities from Sudan, Somalia, Nigeria, Palestine/Isreal- each community has its own issue and relationship with the state and the national culture.

The whole thing is complex and simplistic analysis like yours does no justice to the issue or help move towards any form of solution.

I had a question about the idea that lower hour work weeks, coupled with health benefits not tied to work, cause higher unemployment. It seems to me that that if Krugman's hypothesis is true, and people want more leisure, the above policies would decrease unemployment.

For example, in a big law firm, first year associates often work 80 hour weeks. If Krugman is correct, than many of these associates would take a cut in pay to work less hours. However, because hiring additional employees costs the firm a lot of money (in part because of medical benefits), it is more economical for the firm to have one associate working 80 hours a week than two associates working 40 hours a week. However, if health benefits were provided by the government, employers might be able to afford hiring more employees who could work less hours. This, in turn, would allow for more people to be employed, thereby decreasing unemployment.

Perhaps the law firm is not the best example, but I still am unclear about how the above policies negatively affect unemployment.

cheers,

Neeru

"It seems like Jane was calling you a racist to me."

Jane was maliciously mischaracterizing what I had said. This was two weeks ago. Please drop it, or go post to that discussion.

This is not my blog, I post comments and critiques of Posner's texts because I feel like the open comment format invites me to do so. The amount of time some people spend calling me names suprises me.

Now prseshad responded to the content of my posts, claiming that it is as stereotypical to say that "one _can't_ attach common characteristics to 1 billion muslims" as it would be stereotypical to say that "extremism is common among the world's 1 billion muslims." There are certainly pan-national movements, but I continue to believe that it would be dangerous and unproductive to assume the views of any of them when evaluating the motivations of an individual muslim (like a london subway bomber.)

Extrapolating a linkage between work vs. leisure, labor force inflexibility, and Muslim radicalism is an interesting exercise, but it seems far too myopic to me. Increasing leisure time in Europe is not a recent phenomenon, but a steady trend for 30 or more years, whereas the opposite is true in the US. Likewise, during that period Europe generally has experienced steadily increasing median real hourly wages whereas the US has remained stagnant. While living standards have improved both in Europe and the US, in Europe it has been facilitated by an improving economic lot for the masses. In the US higher living standards have largely derived from the masses selling their leisure. Even if the European model has created an environment that is more conducive to the rise of Muslim extremism, it does not follow that the American model is superior from the standpoint of the commonweal

"it is more economical for the firm to have one associate working 80 hours a week than two associates working 40 hours a week."

And it would be even more economical for the firm to have 4 employees working 30 hour weeks, because then the firm would not legally have to provide benefits for any of them.

WalMart can get away with this, a law firm can not. It is interesting that lawyers will submit to working 80 hour weeks (a serious detriment to health or any outside life) but will not trade health or lifestyle benefits for the free time necessary to enjoy health and lifestyle.

It seems to me that both senarios are a departure from the ideal work life. There is a cultural norm at work there, not just the negative freedom from french-style restrictions. I thin it relates to the Horatio Alger myth, or the fact that (as a Harper's article recently pointed out) 75% of Americans incorrectly believe that the phrase "God helps those who help themselves" comes from the Bible.

"it is more economical for the firm to have one associate working 80 hours a week than two associates working 40 hours a week."

Even if there were no laws governing this sort of thing, firms would need to pay people a whole lot more for that 75th hour than for the 23rd just to get them to show up, not to mention probable declining marginal returns on productivity. For a lot of people, no amount of money would be worth this and they'd go find another job. Unless their was collusion between all employers I can't believe you'd see anything like a 60 hour or more work week.

COREY: This was two weeks ago. Please drop it, or go post to that discussion.

If it is completely irrelevant, then why did you bring it up by slandering Jane? You said that she cast herself as a victim, but she did not. She simply called you a racist because you made comments that she found to be racist. She never said that she was a victim, and there is nothing in her post to indicate that she is black. Let's assume she was white. If a white person calls you a racist for making statements that reflect hatred of blacks, please explain how that white person is casting herself as a victim. You cannot. Jane was not. She was calling you a racist based on your statements. It was not name-calling; indeed, from the rigor of her post and the weaknessof your reply, I took it to be an assertion of fact (and I am not black, either).

If you don't want to be called a racist, Corey, maybe you should not make racist statements.

For those of you reading this exchange. I regret that the discussion has been drawn off topic in this manner. You may not agree with anything I have said here since I started posting comments last winter, you may form your own opinions of my integrity or lack thereof. I would prefer that you did so based on my actual words, but I cannot control that.

"Unless their was collusion between all employers I can't believe you'd see anything like a 60 hour or more work week."

And yet 80 hour weeks are common at law firms as well as engineering companies (though less so in the latter since the internet bubble burst).

Corey,

You wrote re: high working hours: "It seems to me that both senarios are a departure from the ideal work life. There is a cultural norm at work there, not just the negative freedom from french-style restrictions. I thin it relates to the Horatio Alger myth, or the fact that (as a Harper's article recently pointed out) 75% of Americans incorrectly believe that the phrase 'God helps those who help themselves' comes from the Bible.”

I also feel that there is cultural norm at work -- but that's only part of the explanation, and maybe not a large part. For instance, most Americans do not work 80 hour weeks. I would surmise that most Americans who work those kind of hours fall into two groups: (1) members of the elite professional class (lawyers, investment bankers, etc.) and (2) low-wage workers who need to work those hours in order to support their families. The reason that less continental Europeans work 80 hour weeks may be because both of those groups are relatively smaller in Europe.

Obviously, redistributive social polices in many European countries reduce the number of workers in those countries who have to work 80 hour weeks just to raise their children. However, I think that a wide range of social polices in European countries also reduce the incentive and opportunity for young people to enter elite, high-paying jobs.

High income taxes are an obvious example. Even more fundamentally though, educational and labor policies in many European countries suppress students' motivation to strive for excellence (assuming that it's excellent to work 80 hours a week). It's tough to work 80 weeks when it's against the law to work more that 35 hours a week. Anecdotally, I know that the many of the best graduate opportunities in the Dutch educational system are distributed with basically no regard to student merit -- some are even granted by lottery. Instead of the Ivy League, German students have guaranteed access to almost uniformly bad universities (which they are paid to attend). I have met many European students who express frustration with these systems.

Ok, obviously I'm simplifying things a little, but you probably get my drift. I think that incentives do matter (and sorry for the rushed post -- I’m at work).

It is interesting that most of the young men in the US military are also there for economic reasons: lack of better job opportunities.

Whether being forced by economic factors to fight for Bush or for Bin Laden counts as a "social pathology" depends on whose side one is on.

Both Bush and Bin Laden invoke a lot of vague high minded principles to justify blowing things up and killing people. They both claim to be doing God's will and fighting evil and making the world a better place for the common man by fighting oppression, defending human rights and promoting morality.

The one disagreement that they seem to have is whether the USA or the Middle East should have more influence in the world and specifically how much influence the USA should have in the Middle East. They both accuse each other forcing corrupt moral values on the common people.

Despite the alarmist claims of their followers, the reality is that no matter how many things get blown up and how many people get killed by either side, people in the USA will still be predominantly Christian and people in the Middle East will still be predominantly Muslim.

Personally, I don't put much stock in the high minded rhetoric of either Bush or Bin Laden and I don't think that the level of influence that the USA has in the Middle East really matters all that much, certainly not enough to justify blowing things up and killing people.

As far as I'm concerned, young men being forced by lack of job opportunities to fight for either side counts as "social pathology" but, after all, my answer to "Whose side are you on?" is "Neither."

Nothing like a good dose of moral relativity, Wes. So Bush=bin Laden and Islamofascist terrorists are no different than our own boys who are "forced" to serve their country because of economic deprivation? Some things just speak for themselves. I'll leave it at that.

Nothing like a good dose of moral relativity, Wes.

Not to get too off-topic but it would be "moral relativism" if I said that Bush and Bin Laden's morality was relative to their respective cultures. While I acknowledge that others may disagree with me, it is my opinion that they are both morally wrong in an absolute sense regardless of culture.

My apologies. The tone of your post was certainly relativistic, and your only denounciation was pathetically weak, "Personally, I don't put much stock in the high minded rhetoric of either Bush or Bin Laden and I don't think that the level of influence that the USA has in the Middle East really matters all that much, certainly not enough to justify blowing things up and killing people."

Not that this lets you off the hook. Whatever one thought of the prudence of the war, only the most morally bankrupt effete liberal would be agnostic on the current struggle. Bringing democray to Iraq is, apparently, equivalent to murdering thousands of innocent civilians because "the holy land" must not be tainted by "infidels." Yes, they're so on the same scale, their motives equally base. Even Corey wouldn't say something so repugnant and utterly stupid.

Posner argues that restrictive labour policies are creating a barrier to entry into the labour force for new immigrants, thereby leading to less assimilation, more alienation and better breeding conditions for extremism. Posner therefore suggests that because restrictive labour policies (and also more generous welfore) lead to lower working hours for Europeans compared with Americans, that there is a trade-off between long vacations on one hand and more extremism on the other.

Yet isn't the main reason that Europeans work a lot fewer hours than Americans that they get on average many more weeks of annual leave by law than in America? I wouldn't really put a policy for high levels of annual leave under the heading of inflexible labour policies as it doesn't really create a barrier to entry into the labour force or restrict mobility like for instance a highly unionised work force.

Why is it that so many Americans can't see how ridiculous it is that the richest country in the world in material terms (apart from maybe luxembourg) is comparitively poor in leisure hours.

Palooka: "Bringing democray to Iraq. . .[?]"

Wait, wait. I must have missed something. I thought we were 'fighting the terrorists over there so we wouldn't have to fight them here.' No, wait, don't tell me, I remember--we removed Saddam because he had a WMD 'program.' No, that's not right. As I recall, Saddam actually had WMDs, and we knew where they were, and they could be deployed against London in thirty minutes and against, say, Cleveland by the end of a day's news cycle.

(Oh yes. Quite unfair. I mean, everybody who's anybody thought they had WMDs, even the French and the Germans who were urging us to continue inspections. But you know, when I think about that poor sap who drove his sub into an mountain in the middle of the Pacific and lost his job, I sometimes think we're harder on some folks for their mistakes than for others.)

But let's switch from the messiness of foreign policy to the precise science of economics. A quiz: What is the correct tax policy when a) we are in surplus, b) we are running a deficit, c) the economy is booming, d) the
economy is going bust, e) we are at war, f) we are at peace. Answer: cut taxes.

Call me a cynic, but when the answer stays the same, and the rationale changes, the rationale is not the reason.

And so to Judge Posner: I agree that this post is brilliant. Saying that those who support a social safety net actually hurt those they intend to help is run of the mill Orwellian, but linking a concern for economic justice to support for terror is brilliant, the kind of brilliance that only comes from already knowing the answer, and then reverse engineering to discover the rationale.

"Advocates of the European model point to the pockets of poverty in the United States, but may not realize that poverty cannot be abolished without recourse to measures that produce the social pathologies that we observe in Europe. Social mobility implies the opportunity to fail. If society protects jobs, the employment opportunities of ambitious newcomers are reduced and they may end up at the embittered margin of society. Thus, it is not poverty that breeds extremism; it is social policies intended in part to eradicate poverty that do so, by obstructing exit from minority subcultures."

('pockets of poverty'--hardly worth mentioning, really. A few poor families in Appalachia, perhaps? Hey, anybody heard about all those meth labs popping up in Iowa? What's with that?)

Well, you see, there's good fear, and there's bad fear. The good fear is productive. Fear keeps you going to work every day, working unpaid overtime, nights and weekends, and not taking all of your sick time or vacation time because you're afraid you'll lose your job.

Bad fear is the fear that you'll go out the door and not come back at the end of the day because some terrorist blew you up. (Of course, back in the day, pre-union, pre-OSHA, there was a lot of bad fear connected with the job, but we're not talking about that type of safety netting, today. Let's get rid of the minimum wage and unemployment insurance first. . ..)

See. Fear of death: bad. Fear of poverty: good.

Could it be that this view is colored by the fact that we all share equally in the fear of terror, but the fear of poverty is shared unequally--and not at all by some?

If freedom from want and freedom from fear are not fundamental American values, then we did not win WWII--the other side won. Fear is fear, and creating unnecessary fear--whatever the basis--is terror. Want is want, and keeping people in want in a land of plenty is unAmerican and unChristian. Only those who fear terror but not poverty, can think otherwise.

"Bringing democray to Iraq is, apparently, equivalent to murdering thousands of innocent civilians... ...Even Corey wouldn't say something so repugnant and utterly stupid."

No, but I might point out that the process of "bringing democracy to Iraq" has resulted in the deaths of over 10,000 innocent civilians.

Now maybe Saddam or the sanctions might have killed that many in the same time if we had not invaded. However, we have traded maybe for a certainty.

As economists, surely many of you would agree that the justification for a war should be considered relative to the cost of a war. You might even agree with me that an innocent Iraqi life is worth as much as an innocent American life. Or perhaps there I am getting controversial again.

I am not agnostic on the current struggle. I am skeptical that you can bring lasting democracy to a country by bombing and invading it. I am concerned about the consequences of proceeding that way, both in terms of dead Iraqis and dead Americans (at the hands of newly radicalized Iraqis.) I do not think we invaded Iraq to bring democracy any more than we invaded to find WMDs, as the pervious post indicates, rationales that shift are unlikely to be the real reason.

Bringing democracy is what we are doing now though, and I hope we win. I hope we have the character to step back and abide by what the People of Iraq democratically choose for themselves, even if we don't like the result.
Our history suggests otherwise (re: democratically elected leftist gov'ts in Latin America)

Interesting argument. However, Judge Posner doesn't even try to explain why the UK, which has much more competitive economy than continental Europe, seems to have its fair share of marginalized Muslims.

You do not mention the possibility that the United States' success in assimilating immigrants is due in large part to the fact that the children of immigrants immediately become citizens. This might also explain why the United States is the immigrant destination of choice. Yet this is a practice that you have suggested should be abolished in at least one of your judicial opinions. Do you not believe that citizenship by birth plays any role, or do you have some way of rationalizing these views?

Hey Corey! They've already dug up over 300K buried in the desert and they're still finding more daily. To quote Stalin, "a single death is a tragedy, thousands a mere statistic." (I believe Stalin was one of Saddam's hero's)

We're just beginning to find out how efficient and effective the Secret Police and Republican Guard really were. And these guys are the ones who now make up the resistance. We've got a long way to go to quiet the opposition to a liberated Iraq. But then maybe we ought to turn our back and walk away because it's too hard and requires sacrifice.

"But then maybe we ought to turn our back and walk away because it's too hard and requires sacrifice."

Or maybe we should obtain consent before we sacrifice other people en mass.

I only mentioned the 10,000 dead innocent civilians to keep people mindful of the sacrifices. The last administration admitted that the sanctions regime was responsible for 500,000 deaths, with our Secretary of State saying on national TV that such a toll was "worth it".

How hard are you willing to let it get? Maybe we are as good at dismissing statistics as Stalin was?

Willingness to kill statistically does as much to radicalize the friends and family of (or indeed anyone who empathizes with) those killed as does the economic or social marginalization Posner and Becker point to.

In addition to the lives lost, the effects on world opinion, as well as on our own sense of self, are all costs/sacrifices of your willingness to assume the role of enforcer.

History will validate you if you win, because that is the function of history, but I say that with the assumption of police power comes the responsibility to carefully consider the lives lost, both personally and statistically.

And why?...

Wars create violent resistance and dissent, even at home. Shared cultural ideologies (often reflected in the "reasons" for going to war) work to restrain that dissent. Here, the "reasons" have been questioned and undermined, and many members of society have empathic ties to the victims of the war which compete. Some of these same people are marginalized, further weakening the possibility of ideological restraint. Some small part of that group is criminally violent. So in this way, the subway bombings can be seen partly as a failure of the justification for war, and we can understand why even middle class integrated citizens might be led to perpetrate them.

Of course they shouldn't have done it, and are horrible criminals. But this entire discussion is an inquiry into why.

Prof Becker's analysis is spot-on, though others (esp Marty Peretz, IIRC) have pointed out this long before: when it comes to religious immigrants, the US attracts strivers, Europe attracts resenters.

The rather brutal logic of a lack of a large safety net for immigrants, however, is only one aspect of this phenomenon. Also crucial is the difference between cultural laissez-faire, as practiced historically in the US, and the European corporatist (in the Mussolini sense) approach to organization and co-optation of religious minorities. One can even see this today in Sarkozy's "Muslim PArliament" idea in France, or Blair's similar gestures in Britain: bring the aggrieved minority under the control of the state through a corrupt bargain that empowers sham leaders while increasing state interference, and all will be well.

Contrast this with the historic US approach to Quakers, mormons, hasidim, sikhs, etc in which religious groups were encouraged to develop economically and maintain strong local institutions, even if those institutions were separatist, in the belief that religious minorities were per se good and necessary contributors to American pluralist democracy. And as history has shown, good contributors to US capitalism. Our most energetic, entrepreneurial and productive groups have tended to be immigrant groups bound by common religious beliefs, not only because of

a) the self-selection process alluded to above (strivers go the US, slackers and resenters stay home in Europe, or go to Europe)

but also because of

b) the great advantages available to entrepreneurs in the US -- ease of capital formation, strong market opportunities, fewer monopolistic or "national champion" state-backed behemoths.

Put these together and you get Wm Penn, Ben Franklin, superb Mormon businessmen from Utah to Sonora, countless jewish entrepreneurs, sikh and gajarati hindi and confucian millionaires, even irish catholic millionaires (Tom Sowell IIRC determined this group to be the wealthies ethnic group in the US a few decades back).

In sum, it's not enough to offer opportunity and restrict access to the slacker/welfare teat; it's also crucial for the state to get out of the way in cultural and political terms. If you attract hardworking strivers who want what all Americans want -- to build strong families and strong businesses and generally be left alone to pursue happiness -- then you don't need to worry about what they tell their girls to wear. Out in places like Utah we also have our poligamists, but they're part of a law-abiding, respectful and, not least, hardworking and economically successful religious minority community.

A pity the Euros can't seem to learn how crucial it is to attract strivers and then have the state LEAVE THEM ALONE. I don't see any improvement in Europe's muslim problem without such an understanding.

See our post regarding Posner's failed approach and his dumb and error laden articled in this past weekends NY Times.

Posner: Wrong on the Blogosphere - As Biased and Dumb as Ever

Site: Truth and Lies: Blog for a Better America

http://reliantmedia.blogspot.com/2005/08/posner-wrong-on-blogosphere-as-biased.html

I looked at your article expecting to find why you thought Posner's article was biased or wrong. Instead, I learned that you dislike Posner, and that you like to use the word "dumb". (9 times in 2 pages) Both of these things were obvious before I clicked the link.

Criticism that responds to a text is better than criticism that merely labels and rejects a text. Its the difference between discourse and punditry.

You did a little better on "Why L&E is defunct".

As a "European", I would just like to make one (on-topic) point that seems to be under-emphasized in the original post.

Strongly redistributive welfare systems work best, politically, if the transfers are relatively anonymous and run in all directions. On a personal level, even most social democrats don't like it when they work very hard and see that part of the money they earn goes to a neighbour who sits in front of the TV the whole day. The problem with an "underclass" that is mostly composed of identifiable minority immigrants, is that certain wealth-transfers becomes very visible. This creates resentment with a good proportion of the "natives". Some politicians will be tempted to capitalize on this and engage in xenophobic discourse, which in turn creates resentment with members of the minority. A strongly redistributive welfare state thus reinforces certain primal instincts, rather than reducing them. Immigrants are probably easier integrated where they are not perceived firstly as a drag on public resources.

As to why there is a "stable" minority immigrant underclass (many of which are from Muslim countries indeed) in Europe, there is little doubt in my mind that labour market regulations have something to do with it. They just cut the first few sports off the ladder of upward mobility.

On an aside, Krugman?s theory (as related by Posner; I did not read it myself) seems to illustrate just how wrong-headed cost-benefit analysis can get if conducted on this kind of grand macro-level and assuming the computational capacity of a benevolent central planner. The whole of Europe is forcibly trading leisure for money...and better off for it because leisure has a positive network externality component? Come on! I am sure Krugman just loves it to be at the same theme park or the same beach that everybody visits at the same time. This is just plain ex-post rationalization for the outcome of blatant interest group politics.

I guess I did not stick to my one point after all, sorry.

Jeroen from Brussels

Corey, Sometimes there are no "whys and where fors". Evil just is and as such must be confronted, lest it overwhelm the world. BTW, in a combat zone there are no "innocents". Welcome to the brave new world of modern war; terrible as it may be.

"...in a combat zone there are no "innocents"."

That is the saddest thing I have ever heard you say. It sounds like something a radical would say to himself before detonating a bomb in a cafe or flying a plane into a building.

I will not join your dehumanizing "brave new world of modern war." I wish you would stop making Americans look cold-blooded. Most of us would never say that the innocence of a person could turn entirely a declaration by a foreign power that their homeland is a combat zone.

"...in a combat zone there are no "innocents"."

Please look at this picture:
http://www.nomorevictims.org/images/noarm.jpg
And say that again.

Mr. Posner,

Your remarks show an amazing lack of knowledge about or understanding of research on US immigration, immigrant socialization, and history in general. This is truly amazing for anyone, like yourself, who claims to be a conservative intellectual. But the same malady affects many socialist intellectuals, so you shouldn't feel special.

Your remark that the US "tends to attract immigrants who have values conducive to upward economic mobility, including a willingness to conform to the customs and attitudes of their new country," is simply not consistent with research results for several reasons. One, many immigrants to the US came during a time when their home countries were in turmoil (political, economic, or both)and immigration to the US was seen as moving to the "promised land." When they arrived and for many decades there after they found this not to be the case. Discrimination, sometimes very violent, was rampant, including in work and housing. Many were murdered and most were forced to live at least the first 2-3 generations in the US in segregated housing areas (although many preferred this so as to maintain their home culture and language). So your remark that "immigrants can compete for jobs on terms of substantial equality with the existing population" is not borne out by the research, although the research does indicate that discrimination in hiring is less today than it was 25 years ago.

Also, while the U.S. economy may be highly competitive, by comparison to the economies of Europe, research clearly shows that employers in the US have indeed discriminated against able workers merely because they are foreign and perhaps do not yet have a good command of English. Moreover, the research shows that immigrants to the US are MOSTLY integrated into US culture by the 3rd or 4th generation, not the 2nd as you suggest. Plus, the extent of this integration varies by group and is never total, as is borne out by the many ethnic festivals, churchs, fraternal socities, etc. in the US. And religious differences remain among these populations, even among the various Christian groups, up to today.

Most of the differences between immirgation in Europe and the US can be traced to political (particularly colonial) and economic factors. The US never had a true colonial empire (although it has and does generally consider central and south America as needing to follow US foreign and economic policy). Most European nations maintained some type of colonial empire, including the French. This tainted much of the attitude toward immigrants with prejudice, as in the US but for different reasons. The Europeans simply believed themselves superior to the immigrants who were frequently treated as just another colony. In the US, in contrast, discrimination against immigrants was most commonly simply "a part of business." In other words, in the US the game was zero sum, if you win I lose - immigrants were just another competitor for "the green" that had to be stopped. So your remark, "The less fluid, less competitive, less market-oriented, and indeed less materialistic (the only color important to businessmen is green) a national economy is, the less opportunity it will provide to alien entrants," is not consistent with the research. In fact, the statement is absurd. Markets and materialism foster discrimination, only for different reasons than in societies that are not market based or overly materialistic. Which brand of discrimination is worse? - you tell me, and tell me why.

You conclude that Europe has pathologies that c