Governments and Women

Rather than write about the sequester (which is much ado about not much), I thought I'd comment on some items that came up over the past couple of weeks on how governments treat women, and how they manage to muck things up.

Let's start with Iran.   It turns out that even the mullahs are figuring out that a key to prosperity is population growth (contrary to the claims of the eco-statists like Paul Ehrlich).  With an aging population, you need young, productive workers to support us aging folks in their dotage and Iran is beginning to suffer the same demographic issues that are plaguing Japan, Russia, and Europe.

As someone with some background in economics, I believe that people do respond to financial incentives.  And I applaud the mullahs in this regard.  They apparently have set up a series of financial incentives to induce women to have more babies, including generous time off, and a gold coin upon the birth of a child.  Maybe the mullahs are catching on a bit.

I'm not sure financial incentives alone will be sufficient to do the trick, however.  Iranian women are, in my view, among the most stunning in the world, with their dark brown eyes and hair and beautiful olive skin.  Yet, the mullahs keep them wrapped up in what amounts to black plastic hefty bags and make their brothers accompany them on trips outside their homes.  Somebody needs the explain to the mullahs what actually causes babies and that these measures are a structural impediment to, ahem, spontaneous baby generation.  If you really want more babies, boys, loosen your collars a bit.   Maybe start by introducing a more fashionable burka (see above).

But not to be outdone, public policy choices here in the good old USA toward women also appear to be somewhat schizophrenic.  Our own government is hell bent on providing women with free birth control (with the indomitable Sandra Fluke as its leading advocate), and we have heard the hew and cry of the Republican War on Women.

But while the liberals want government to provide free birth control to women, it is simultaneously launching a campaign to curtail the right of a woman to possess and carry a firearm for self protection.  Intruders and rapists will have less to fear from women if the Left is able to curtail 2nd Amendment rights.  Taken together, these policies on birth control and guns make a powerful statement about what our government intends to permit women to be empowered to do.

Oh, and by the way, it turns out that spousal coverage is being dropped by many companies because of Obamacare mandates.  So Obama's claim that "if you like your coverage, you can keep it," apparently will not be true for many women covered on their husband's policies.

Absurd government policies toward women appear to be something we have in common with Iran.  If women are to be truly free, independent, and fully empowered, the mullahs and the American Left don't quite get it yet.