[This post is part of a series. Part I is here.]

“Don’t pick up any black people, especially if there’s more than one of them,” the experienced cabbie told me. “Stay out of Sunnydale, Third Street, and Bayview/Hunter’s Point. Don’t stop for anybody there”

It was my first day, we were playing pool on the immense 9′ long and slow rolling pool table that appeared to suspend the laws of gravity and friction in order to prove Newton’s first law of motion. No matter how slowly the balls rolled, they kept going until they reached the other bumper far far away. And between shots he was giving me tips on making money and staying alive as a cabdriver.

I didn’t want to be that guy. I remembered Clarence Thomas during his confirmation hearings talking about how hard it was for him to get a cab in D.C., and thinking no matter what kind of person he might be personally, that wasn’t right. And I knew I’d have no trouble stopping for a professionally dressed black person, or an older black person. But…

I was only a couple years removed from my no-stoplight Midwestern farm town, and my safe little religious college. And I knew that cabbies had the highest homicide rate of any profession, mostly from getting shot in the back of the head without warning, mostly at night, the shift I’d chosen. And only a year and a half before I’d gotten jumped and beaten while riding my bicycle through the projects. It had been tough working through my fear of young black men afterward. When I heard footsteps behind me at night, I would tense up and turn, and I would relax if I saw anyone other than a young black male. And because I had friends who were young and black, I like I was insulting my friends every time I did that, so I consciously worked on overcoming that fear, and did so pretty successfully, mostly by telling myself that’s guy’s probably as nervous about me as I am about him.

But as a cabbie? Young black males, particularly in groups, particularly if they were dressed a certain way? I wasn’t sure if I’d pick them up.  (more…)

Technology Review writes about the emerging science of human computation.

Stowe Boyd writes of the emergence of algorithmic HR.

It’s not just the US! Journalists all over Scandinavia lean heavily to the left.

… which, a British sort, perhaps is what gives rise to outfits like The Daily Mail.

IJR points out that 68 public university presidents make more than the President of the United States. And yet, university presidents have employees who make a lot more than they do.

Lelia Shevtsova looks at Russia’s alleged Weimar Syndrome, mentioned last year by Roger Cohen.

Andrew Orlowski is concerned that EU copyright plans will drown Europe in a worthless pop culture. I can sort of understand where he’s coming from, but targeted international release dates are a losing proposition anyway.

Jan Chipchase looks at unexpected ways self-driving automobiles might play out in our daily lives. An example: [M]asturbating in an autonomous vehicle while driving will be a far more practical use case, but is not something that corporates are going to talk about any time soon.

A water park in Japan lets you play with, eat dolphins.

When my mother-in-law was last in town, she used MapQuest to map her way to the airport. Apparently, MapQuest still exists! (Their Android App is pretty useless.)

Alex Tabarrok takes issue with Ursula K Le Guin’s anti-Amazon screed, and makes a good place.

This Eric Posner chart sheds some light about why conservatives are so paranoid about Supreme Court picks. A part of me wonders if Roberts and Kennedy see the writing on the wall, regarding the court’s future, and are hoping by playing nice now the future liberal court will play nice when they are in the majority.

I made a bit of a joke a while back about Elian Gonzales getting on to Facebook when he “gets enough Internet”, but Cuba’s Internet problem is serious.

“Do you want a banana?”

“No banana.”

“Do you want an apple?”

“No appoh.”

“Do you want turkey?”

“No tookey.”

{Stops. Thinks.} “Do you want Hillary Clinton?”

“No Hiyary Kyinton.”

“That’s my girl.”

A long time ago in a sub-thread at one of my guest posts Over There, Brandon Berg raised in the comments an interesting question about unions (in particular about conscience exemptions for union dues and the free-rider problem that union shop provisions are meant to resolve):

I’m not sure I understand the free rider problem. Why can’t unions negotiate for their members, and only for their members? Is there some regulation that requires the unions to negotiate for all employees regardless of membership, or is the idea that simply having the union negotiate wages for its members somehow makes it easier for non-members to negotiate higher wages?

Personally, of course, I don’t see the free-rider problem as a problem at all—the government shouldn’t be in the business of making it easier to form cartels

And James K. chimed in

What you describe is how it works in New Zealand. Union membership is voluntary but the union only negotiates on behalf of its membership, and will only represent its members in other forms of labour dispute. There are a couple of other differences as well, like only union members can strike.

This seems to be an entirely adequate solution to nay free-rider issues.

At the time, I filed it under “interesting things I don’t know much about.” I still don’t know much about it, but I recently ran across a book that addresses Brandon’s and James K.’s points in the American context. It’s The Blue Eagle at Work: Reclaiming Democratic Rights in the American Workplace, by Charles J. Morris (2005). His argument seems to be that our current labor law, initiated by the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 (Wagner Act) and amended subsequently, permits the situation Brandon and James K. describe, at least in some instances. His claims that few since the 1930s have recognized that fact, but he hopes that union supporters will endorse partial representation contracts (my term, I forget which he uses) as a step toward full-shop unionization.

I’ve read only the introduction, so there’s a lot I presume is missing from my synopsis of his argument. And I can’t speak to whether he’s right or not. But I thought I’d bring it up, especially in light of our recent discussion of minimum wage exemptions for union contracts.