Sunday, January 5, 2014

Experts debunk 150-year-old theory

I like that headline. It's actually a sub-head. The top headline is Will surge of older workers take jobs from young (not to be confused with Will Surge of Older Workers Take Jobs From Young?). 

There's even a tiny bit of "balance," featuring Jamie Galbraith, sandwiched into the story:
Still, many remain unconvinced. 
James Galbraith, a professor of government at the University of Texas at Austin, has advocated for a temporary lowering of the age to qualify for Social Security and Medicare to allow older workers who don't want to remain on the job a way to exit and to spur openings for younger workers.  
He doesn't buy the comparison of older workers to women entering the workforce and says others' arguments on older workers expanding the economy don't make sense. If there was a surplus of jobs, he said, there would be no problem with people working longer. But there isn't.  
"I can’t imagine how you could refute that. The older worker retires, the employer looks around and hires another worker," he said. "It's like refuting elementary arithmetic."
Experts refute 7000-year-old elementary arithmetic?

Why not? If experts can debunk a 150-year-old theory that's actually a 123-year-old parody of a theory, it should be elementary to refute that fusty old, Sumerian stuff. Go for it, April Wu!

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