A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

The Associated Press has an article on Indiana’s obligation to pay penalties and interest on the loans for the State’s unemployment insurance shortfall.

The state will begin paying millions of dollars in penalties and interest to the federal government next year because it has borrowed nearly $2 billion to pay for jobless benefits, an Indiana unemployment official says.
. . .
[T]he state will have to pay $80 million to $100 million in interest in 2011. The first payment of about $60 million will be due Sept. 30.

The Journal Gazette of Fort Wayne and The Times of Munster reported that Indiana businesses in January also will begin paying a penalty of $21 per worker because Indiana has not yet repaid the loans. The business penalty increases by $21 per worker per year until the loan is nearly paid off.

We’re hardly the only state having economic trouble, but if you hear folks saying that our state budget is balanced, it’s only because their squinting and turning their head just right when they look at it.

The Lafayette Journal & Courier makes the point that social security recipients shouldn’t grump about a second year with no cost of living adjustment (COLA). The COLA is designed to help social security recipients maintain their standard of living in the face of inflation. In years with essentially zero inflation, no COLA should be forthcoming. That’s true, but it ignores the fact that a good number of Americans are basically innumerate. It’s the whole Nigel Tufnel, “but ours go to eleven” thing:

Nigel Tufnel: The numbers all go to eleven. Look, right across the board, eleven, eleven, eleven and…

Marty DiBergi: Oh, I see. And most amps go up to ten?

Nigel Tufnel: Exactly.

Marty DiBergi: Does that mean it’s louder? Is it any louder?

Nigel Tufnel: Well, it’s one louder, isn’t it? It’s not ten. You see, most blokes, you know, will be playing at ten. You’re on ten here, all the way up, all the way up, all the way up, you’re on ten on your guitar. Where can you go from there? Where?

Marty DiBergi: I don’t know.

Nigel Tufnel: Nowhere. Exactly. What we do is, if we need that extra push over the cliff, you know what we do?

Marty DiBergi: Put it up to eleven.

Nigel Tufnel: Eleven. Exactly. One louder.

Marty DiBergi: Why don’t you just make ten louder and make ten be the top number and make that a little louder?

Nigel Tufnel: [pause] These go to eleven.

These social security recipients just want their check to go to eleven, not thinking much about whether that higher number actually buys them any more stuff.

Having suggested that people are dumb with numbers, I’ll have to confess that I’m no genius about this stuff. I can’t figure out who, exactly, wins and who loses when inflation is minimal. For example, I know that my home loan is locked in with nominal dollars and a fixed interest rate. If, down the road, I got paid more dollars because of inflation for the same work; that would make my home loan a smaller percentage of my income and, in that sense, I would benefit. (Though the other consequences to me from inflation might offset that benefit.) Speaking very generally, it seems to me that inflation benefits long term debtors and hurts long term creditors.

And, if I were really smart, I’d digress into a discussion about quantitative easing which I’ve recently heard a lot about but which, to me, sounds an awful lot like just printing money dressed up with a fancy name.

John Russell has a good story in the Indy Star about the cozy relationship between Duke Energy and the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission’s general counsel who recently took a job with Duke. What is more interesting to me are the raw e-mails posted by the Star. (h/t Indiana Law Blog).

Option #1, clearly, is not to get so cozy with the people you’re supposed to be regulating. Be friendly – you have to work with the people; there’s no shame in polite chit chat here and there, but these e-mails seem to reflect a camaraderie that goes beyond the pale.

Option #2, don’t put this yukking it up between government entity and regulatory agency in e-mails going to the government e-mail account. At that point, you’re not even trying.

And both of these things don’t even address the horrible conflicts presented by having a job offer on the table from what is (or should be), in effect, a party adverse to your client.

Today is apparently National Coming Out Day. My thinking has really evolved over the years on the issue of gay rights. (“Gay rights” is something of a misnomer, I think — what I mean by it is basically the notion that you should treat gays with the same respect and decency that you’d show to anyone else.) I grew up thinking I was homophobic, probably into college somewhere.

Anyway, I think my evolution on the subject was triggered when I actually knew real people who were gay – gays weren’t just abstract, notional others upon whom I could project fears and prejudices. Once they were real people, I had to start thinking about them as such.

The thinking went from “gays are bad and icky; I dislike them.” To, “that guy seems pretty decent; oh, he’s gay; no skin off my nose.” After that first encounter, and the advent of Facebook, I came to learn that I knew a lot of gay men. (Oddly, the only friends I know to be lesbians are online – as opposed to in-person – acquaintances.) I suppose I don’t know what I would have done with that information had I known they were gay in high school or college or whatever. (Maybe they weren’t quite sure, themselves.) Regardless, I’m glad they are friends now. From my perspective, the value of gays “coming out” is that most of us have an easier time hating abstract strangers who are different; it’s a whole different story when it is your friends and family. Maybe when we have a more accurate idea of how many people, and who, are actually gay; we will treat the issue a little more rationally. A guy can dream anyway.