The Michigan Department of Human Services, acting very much like a department of inhuman services, issued a warning to Lisa Snyder for watching three fellow mom’s kids before school. They say that if Mrs. Snyder continues to take the neighborhood kids in before school, she’ll be violating the same law as unlicensed daycare providers.
No this isn’t a fictitious story; although with liberal lunacy and bureaucracy, fiction and reality are getting harder and harder to determine. Lisa Snyder, a 35 year old mother of a first grader, helps her neighbors out in the mornings before school by watching the kids until the bus comes.
A Michigan law states that you can’t care for a child not in your family for more than four weeks during a calendar year. So, according to that statute, Mrs. Snyder is breaking the law. But common sense says that law is arcane and draconian.
How many of us live in a neighborhood where one mother tried to help others out by watching their kids for an hour or two? I’d venture to say many of us have known that mom. I’d say many of you are that mom. So what’s up with Michigan?
Democratic Governor Jennifer Granholm says that the agency is just following procedure, but she acknowledges that the law is absent of common sense. Granholms spokeswoman said:
“We want to protect kids, but the law needs to be reasonable,” she said. “When the governor learned of this, she acted quickly and called the director personally to ask him to intervene.”
Then there’s the question of who ratted her out? Who actually called officials and told them that Mrs. Snyder was running an unauthorized daycare out of her home? Michigan has been in a recession way before the rest of the country. You’d think that it would be viewed favorably, a woman allowing her neighbors to work and be productive in a state that has missed its fair share.
This is a great illustration of the ineffectiveness and inefficiency of bureaucracies; a woman simply helping her neighbors by watching their kids, has the full force of a bureaucracy thrust upon her for no apparent reason. Common sense people, please.
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September 30th, 2009 at 8:33 pm
I live 10 miles from her…trust me…we are all humiliated by the idiotic neighbor and the states handling of this. The neighbor will be outed soon..
September 30th, 2009 at 10:41 pm
This one for the “You gotta be chitting me” file.
Hmm what other useless crap does MI DHS waste time and tax payer money on?
October 1st, 2009 at 12:09 am
KnightHawk, where are you writing these days? Hint hint, wink wink.
October 1st, 2009 at 3:27 am
Now the state is going to dictate, I mean legislate, when and how often you can help your neighbors?
joanne, I wouldn’t worry about the neighbor who ratted. I’d find out what idiot legislator introduced that bill and who voted for it and then throw them all out.
October 1st, 2009 at 5:06 am
Yeah this is reprehensible; I read about this on Reason and couldn’t believe what I was reading. Sooner or later maybe we’ll just decide that parents really aren’t qualified to raise their children in general, and we can have little kid farms. Sweet.
By coincidence, there was another case recently of a regulatory law leading to unintended consequences and hurting “regular folks”. A woman in Indiana bought two separate packages of cold medicine — Zyrtec-D for her husband and Mucinex-D for her daughter — within the course of a week. No big deal, right?
Wrong. Turns out she bought a total of 3.6 grams of pseudoephedrine inside of a week, which according to state law qualifies her as a meth dealer. So grandma got cuffed and arrested, and her picture made the front page of an article with the headline “17 Arrested in Drug Sweep.” For buying cold medicine.
http://reason.com/blog/2009/09/30/put-down-the-cold-pills-grandm
Cultural insanity, I tells ya.
October 1st, 2009 at 6:53 am
“which according to state law qualifies her as a meth dealer.”
–
I wish the crazy cons and their lust for doing right, would just leave people alone. Why do you cons have to tell everyone how to live? Seems they love their freedom almost as much as they love their prisons.
October 1st, 2009 at 7:02 am
Seems they love their freedom almost as much as they love their prisons.
Yeah right, it’s not even close. Prisons get them votes. So far as I can tell, neither major party gives two sh*ts about freedom these days.
October 1st, 2009 at 7:16 am
But Rhayader, you must admit that the cons are a little hypocritical. They pretend to own the word freedom, but incessantly insist on telling everyone what to do.
They rant about drugs, abortion, same sex marriage, sex except in strict missionary position by married opposite sex couples, on and on. Why can’t they just leave people alone?
October 1st, 2009 at 7:22 am
Oh I absolutely agree with you, no question. I’ve been railing about that for a while now.
Both parties are moralizers. You’re stuck with either the “social conscience” lefties who want to take away your big macs and your SUV, or the religious right who want to make sure you don’t violate the wishes of their God in your own home. Neither party can legitimately claim to embrace freedom or constitutionalism.
That’s why I relegate myself to the fringes by calling myself a libertarian. It means nobody listens to me, but at least I’m not supporting power-hungry zealots.
October 1st, 2009 at 8:07 am
This story gives new meaning to the term “Nanny State”. I can’t believe this, since when did we lose all common sense?
October 1st, 2009 at 8:09 am
“lefties who want to take away your big macs and your SUV,”
–
I think regulations can work for the good also. I don’t know how you would regulate big macs, but obesity is a problem that we all end up paying for. And the big SUVs suck a lot of gas that we buy and that money ends up in the other zealots pockets. I have no problem with a large gas tax, to encourage the soccer moms to buy more fuel efficient cars. And getting lead out of gasoline is a good that regulation enforces. Also, isn’t lack of regulation a prime contributor to the bankers etc buying derivatives that no one could understand, which nearly caused a complete financial meltdown?
October 1st, 2009 at 8:33 am
I don’t know how you would regulate big macs, but obesity is a problem that we all end up paying for.
I used the term “big macs” meaning fatty foods in general. It’s the new rage: mandatory calorie counts, trans fat bans, soda sin taxes, etc etc etc.
More importantly, there’s not a shred of evidence to suggest that “obesity is a problem we all pay for”. In reality, obese folks have a shorter life expectancy; fewer of them grow old. Shorter lifespans lead directly to reduced health care costs over time. The same could be said for cigarette smokers, alcoholics, and unhealthy sinners in general. It’s not exactly a politically correct concept — that death saves us money — but it’s true nevertheless.
And the big SUVs suck a lot of gas that we buy and that money ends up in the other zealots pockets. I have no problem with a large gas tax, to encourage the soccer moms to buy more fuel efficient cars.
I reject the notion that profiting businessmen can be classified as “zealots”. They provide a product that people want, at a price they’re willing to pay. It’s how the market is supposed to work.
Also, there’s no evidence I’m aware of that demonstrates a significant move toward more fuel-efficient cars with marginal increases in gas prices.
Also, isn’t lack of regulation a prime contributor to the bankers etc buying derivatives that no one could understand, which nearly caused a complete financial meltdown?
That’s the story we hear, yeah. In reality, it was government regulation in the first place that created perverse incentives for companies to embrace these shaky assets. Jeffery Miron, Harvard economist, has done some great analysis of this:
http://reason.tv/video/show/764.html
(The vid’s about a half hour, although there are plenty of interesting tidbits in the first few minutes. Miron is a smart guy — his estimates on the cost savings associated with ending the drug war are widely referenced.)
In general, I think that in a free market system, people get what they want. Consider indoor smoking bans; my home state, North Carolina, recently passed a ban similar to those now in effect in many other states. However, well before the ban, the great majority of restaurants and stores in the area had instituted no-smoking policies. Why? Because their customers wanted it. If smoking drives people away, the business allowing it will suffer. The market takes care of the problem; why is it necessary for the government to encode and calcify what is already a demonstrable public preference?
That same sort of reasoning can be applied to virtually any product or service in existence. Let people choose what they want.
October 1st, 2009 at 9:25 am
“The economic cost of all this extra fat is immense. Direct medical costs are easiest to calculate, coming in at $93 billion, or 9%, of our national medical bill. But there are other costs as well that are harder to pin down.”
http://www.forbes.com/2007/11/08/obesity-health-economics-biz-health-cx_mh_1108obesity.html
“zealots”
I was referring to the ones we buy oil from that fly planes into buildings.
And guaranteed, gas at 4.00 + per gallon will eventually reduce consumption. Or how about 8.00 per gallon or whatever Europeans pay? They pay way more than we do and they manage. But people have to know that the price will not go down.
I say legalize drugs, or rather decriminalize them.
“The same could be said for cigarette smokers, alcoholics, and unhealthy sinners in general.”
We tax the hell out of cigarettes and alcohol.
All I am saying is we have to pay some bills. So why not have taxes that accomplish more than just raising money?
October 1st, 2009 at 9:46 am
“I wish the crazy cons and their lust for doing right, would just leave people alone.”
“lefties who want to take away your big macs and your SUV,”
–
“I think regulations can work for the good also.”
RayGun, your posts have hypocrite written all over them.
October 1st, 2009 at 10:06 am
“The economic cost of all this extra fat is immense. Direct medical costs are easiest to calculate, coming in at $93 billion, or 9%, of our national medical bill. But there are other costs as well that are harder to pin down.”
Those sound like per-year costs, not lifetime costs. I’d argue that the latter is more relevant. Here’s a study that addresses that issue:
http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pmed.0050029
This is the conclusion: “Although effective obesity prevention leads to a decrease in costs of obesity-related diseases, this decrease is offset by cost increases due to diseases unrelated to obesity in life-years gained. Obesity prevention may be an important and cost-effective way of improving public health, but it is not a cure for increasing health expenditures.”
(Emphasis mine)
In other words, a thinner population actually costs us more in the long run. Now of course, there are public health considerations beyond cost, but the idea that fat people “cost us money” is bunk.
I was referring to the ones we buy oil from that fly planes into buildings.
Is there any established link whatsoever showing contributions to terrorist organizations from US-generated oil revenue?
We tax the hell out of cigarettes and alcohol.
I never said we didn’t. I was just pointing out that unhealthy lifestyles don’t cost us more money.
And guaranteed, gas at 4.00 + per gallon will eventually reduce consumption.
Agreed. And if the market dictates $4+ per gallon, that’s what will happen. I see no self-evident need for the government to meddle with that natural process. Let stuff cost what the market says it costs. There’s no better mechanism by which to address the concept of resource scarcity.
All I am saying is we have to pay some bills. So why not have taxes that accomplish more than just raising money?
I’m not sure about you, but to me a free society is not interested in “accomplishing” the goal of driving people toward certain lifestyles. That line of reasoning is dangerous. Suppose, for example, that someone decided that homosexuality imposes some sort of nebulous societal cost (say, hypothetically, through increased AIDS cases). Would we have the right to somehow “tax” homosexuals to discourage that activity? Or maybe taxes on text messages, which are linked to increase vehicular accidents? Maybe tax TVs and video games because of their link to lower school test scores? Where exactly does that stop, and what activity could truly be considered private in a scenario like that?
October 1st, 2009 at 11:33 am
But why not have most activities pay their full price? For example, the cost of gasoline. Why isn’t the military cost figured into the price of gas? We all know why we invaded Iraq and why we have bases in Saudi Arabia, etc. Is that cost figured into the price? How about the pollution cost? Is that figured in? Highway costs? And weren’t the 9/11 nuts crashing into the World Trade Center because we have bases on their holy soil? How can the market set the price, when the price is heavily subsidized by government?
And same with most other activities? Wouldn’t the libertarian thing be to make every activity pay its full cost?
October 1st, 2009 at 12:02 pm
How can the market set the price, when the price is heavily subsidized by government?
Well that’s a great question — and my answer to that would, of course, be that we need to substantially decrease government intervention and subsidies. You’re right, it’s hard to impose a free-market analysis onto something that isn’t exactly a free market.
But that doesn’t invalidate the idea of a free market. In fact, I see it as doing the opposite; it’s a great example of government intervention harming or even incapacitating a market’s natural corrective forces.
October 1st, 2009 at 12:09 pm
…it’s a great example of government intervention harming or even incapacitating a market’s natural corrective forces.
—
Damn,
“Real Price Of Gasoline” Report Reveals Actual Cost of Gas to Consumers Is as High as $15.14 per Gallon”
http://www.icta.org/press/release.cfm?news_id=12
They’re might be counting that imaginary global warming the cons are so familiar with.
October 1st, 2009 at 12:21 pm
Rhayader, do you believe in science? :-). Do you think global warming is man made?
October 1st, 2009 at 12:33 pm
Yeah that’s a perfect illustration of what I mean. From the CTA Director himself:
The real price of gas has been hidden from the consumer for far too long… Once the public understands how much they are really paying for gas we should see a tremendous increase in political pressure for alternatives.
Notice the problem he identifies: a disconnect between the consumer and the final price. This, by definition, totally throws off the informal cost/benefit analysis that takes place every single time we make a purchase. It is this analysis that lies at the heart of the free market.
Regulation, subsidies, and the like all serve to distort this basic analysis. It over-dampens the market, to the point where the most advantageous corrective actions cannot take place. No governing body can regulate commerce nearly as well as the aggregated purchasing activity of billions of individuals. It’s the economic equivalent of a democratic political process: bottom-up, not top-down.
October 1st, 2009 at 12:41 pm
“should see a tremendous increase in political pressure for alternatives.”
Right. That report was from 1998.
October 1st, 2009 at 12:55 pm
So what’s your point? That we’ve failed to correct our propensity for government interference in the ensuing 11 years? I would agree wholeheartedly. Like I said, every politically viable proposal we hear about serves to exacerbate this problem, not alleviate it.
So even when we have a condition sufficient enough to generate “political pressure”, we almost always apply that pressure in exactly the wrong direction.
October 1st, 2009 at 1:11 pm
What a stupid stupid idea. Shouldn’t it be the parents choice over who watches there kids.
October 1st, 2009 at 1:25 pm
“So what’s your point? ”
The cons and lobbyists would be screaming bloody murder.
So you agree we need to massively raise the price of gas? Slowly of course.
October 1st, 2009 at 1:41 pm
So you agree we need to massively raise the price of gas?
We don’t need to actively do anything. We just need to get the heck out of the way and let the market decide what the “real” cost of oil is.
If that price increase is justified by the economic facts, you’d undoubtedly see it happen.