> There are upper class Americans in particular who basically work extremely long hours (80-105 hour work weeks) to game the system, with no net productivity gains whatsoever compared to the middle and upper middle class who typically work 40-60 hour work weeks at maximum. In fact, the productivity gains generally wane off at about 32 hours per week, and we really do not need longer work hours in modern society
There is some confused language being used here. If you're saying the marginal productivity of the 81st hour worked in a week is 0, then that is almost certainly wrong.
If you're saying that the marginal productivity of the 81st hour in a week is less than that of the 32nd hour, that may well be true, but if so, nothing else of what you said follows from that.
I mean, all observations involve a subject. The question is whether there are other subjects that can observe an object and reach consensus about the object. If yes, then, in my view, it's objective. If not, then it's purely subjective.
I go for a run most days and my watch asks me how I feel afterward. I don't answer, because I really have no idea whether my "Good" answer one day corresponds to a "Good" answer on another day. Often, it probably doesn't. In my view, talking about subjective well-being is anything but simple.
Agree that "arbitrary" was a poor word choice, but it seems as though he meant something like "subjective", which is consonant with the rest of the article.
I think differentiating subjective scales from objective scales isn't terribly fraught, and treating subjective measures as less rigorous than objective measures seems correct to me.
Its best to punish only one side of a bribe arrangement -- usually, the one granting access in exchange for cash.
The reason is that the more parties that have a strong incentive to keep the bribe arrangement a secret, the more likely it will remain a secret.
This is especially true with poorer countries' police forces. If you punish the guy trying to get out of a traffic ticket, you just cement the corrupt cop's power. What you want to do is turn the bribe-taker's position into a very lonely one.
>> Unsurprisingly, USA near the top with 1780 hrs worked annually by the average worker
According to the chart, US workers work < 1% more than the average for OECD countries. There are only two countries that are closer to the average.
"Near the top" is not even a close description of this data.
Given that your premise is false, how do the rest of your claims follow?
This is not really true.
Here's the National Organic Program: http://www.ams.usda.gov/AMSv1.0/nop. Anything sold as organic in the US has to abide by these guidelines. Here's the equivalent EU program http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EU-Eco-regulation. There are some small differences in requirements between the two in terms of prohibited inputs, but for the most part they are pretty similar.
Other countries tend to follow one or the other programs as the US and Europe is where the organic consumers are.
Obviously, determining where to draw the line between synthetic and natural is a judgement call, which some may disagree upon. But in a lot of cases it's pretty clear, and the authorities make distinctions accordingly. Another big question determining an input's permissibility: how does this input affect the biodiversity of the system?
You're right about "biodynamic" being ridiculous. All biodynamic farming, however, adheres to organic input regulations.
If you had some critique of the actual National Organic Program, that would be a more interesting avenue of inquiry.
"Civility" enforced by a coercive state is no civility at all; it is the protection of the interests of the politically connected against the interests of everyone else.