By the PolicyKeys™ Editors and POLI the AI
The Judiciary (A17) on the PolicyKeys™ game board (model of the US) are all the players in the legal system; attorneys, judges, law clerks, prison guards, and parole officers. There are 1.3M attorneys[1], 1770 federal judges[2], 30K State judges, 15K law clerks[3], 390K prison guards[4], and 92K parole officers[5].
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) estimates that the cost of crime in the US is significant, with direct costs of $290B a year, primary costs of $690B, and all costs including secondary and generational costs of $1.3T.[6] The legal system is in one of those industries that perversely benefits from a societal ill not being addressed, so if crime went down so would their wages, jobs, status, profits and wealth. About 10% of the prison system is for profit.[7]
The Four Key YES Reasons for the Judiciary to Support Sunsetting DST…
- 100% DST failed in 1974
- 80% want one or the other no changing
- Time changes cause car accidents and heart attacks
- Less cancer, obesity, depression, and diabetes
The Four Key NO Reasons for the Judiciary to Support Sunsetting DST…
- DST reduces crime especially in the PM[8]
- Controversy raises campaign donations[9]
- Kids have more time with their parents who work late
- States on time zone cusps can choose
Our Editors and POLI the AI called the Judiciary saying NO to Sunsetting DST, the main reason is that a reduction in crime would affect the livelihoods of those employed in the criminal justice system.
We predict that the solution of Sunsetting DST is leaderboard-worthy, with a majority of each of the four sides of the political table in support, and a nonpartisan Q-Score (weighted average of 128 societal roles) of 74% with an average error margin of ±4%. We also see support from all 8 of 8 Walls of Information, 13 of 16 Subcultural Windows, and 7 of 8 Bias Columns. We see permanent Standard Time as having significantly larger support than permanent DST. PolicyKeys™ highlights that people frequently vote against solutions in their best interests because the political parrots squawk too much about their own needs.
The Key Reason that tipped the call of the Judiciary saying NO to Sunsetting DST is what we call the The First Law of Public Policy Formation, People with short-term focus will naturally protect their jobs, wages, status, profits, and wealth. It’s a great uniter of the four quartile of earners and consumers in the US. The Second Law of Public Policy Formation is that People with longer-term focus place bets to make life better, longer, easier, and different. The Third Law of Public Policy Formation is that the clash of the short-term and long-term naturally produce noise, angst, conflict, and harm. And the Fourth Law of Public Policy Formation is that solutions should be given a nonpartisan score and then ranked to find the signal in the noise. The signal being the overwhelming sentiment and direction from all four sides of the politically balanced table.
This article pivoted on reducing the crime rate which begs the question, in a country as exceptional as the US, with two parties professing their superiority over the other, and both parties having had total control of the Legislative and Executive Branches of government frequently over the past 50 years—why is the middle class in the US shrinking? We have two solutions to this on the National Idea Leaderboard that neither party is talking about.
One the change-biased people will love, and the status quo people will hate—is to simply raise the Earned Income Tax Credit to P50L, halfway(50%) between the Poverty Line (P) and the Living Wage (L) for full-time workers. While there is some controversy over poverty being the root cause of crime, other nations who have a vibrant middle class have shockingly lower crime rates.10
Another solution that the status-quo people will love, and the change biased people will hate is to give Employers a tax credit to bring their employees up to a living wage in the first place. Just recently, Multi/Nationals are doing this on their own as there is a major shortage of labor in the US. However, Small and Medium size Businesses (SMBs), and Small and Medium size Enterprises (SMEs) are at a disadvantage because they lack the economies of scale of larger firms, and the WELCOME Employer Living Wage Tax Credit (Willing Employer Living Compensation Exemption) would help those workers.
Both these solutions essentially have the same impact on the Federal budget, so therefore there is little to no economic reason to differentiate them. Inflation, which was not a problem for over 40 years until recently, is an issue for both these solutions. As discussed above, the cost of crime in the US is shocking, and way more than the cost of the cures, either the P50L or WELCOME Tax Credits.
We will argue in other puzzles, that at the time of this writing, inflation is not a demand problem, it’s a supply problem made worse by both the Democrats and Republican odd views of the world and the economy.
The US deserves a vibrant middle class, and for this puzzle the reason we expect the Judiciary saying NO to Sunsetting Daylight Savings Time (DST) is because of their needing to protect their Law & Order Guilds over that of the general well being of our society.
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Each week, PolicyKeys™ focuses on one public policy puzzle, and a possible leaderboard-worthy solution. You can play PolicyKeys™ at www.PolicyKeys.com. In case you missed the scores from last week’s puzzle you can see them here (POL-ICYMI).
It takes guts (:: :: :: ::) to understand all four sides of an issue before making up your mind.
[1] https://www.clio.com/blog/lawyer-statistics/
[2] https://ballotpedia.org/United_States_federal_courts
[3] https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes231012.htm
[4] https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes333012.htm
[5] https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes211092.htm
[6] https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-17-732
[7] https://smartasset.com/mortgage/the-economics-of-the-american-prison-system
[8] https://www.brookings.edu/blog/brookings-now/2015/10/29/fighting-crime-with-daylight-saving-time/
[9] https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/judicial-selection-united-states-special-report
[10] https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/judicial-selection-united-states-special-report
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