Will the storms change public opinion?

by  Tyler Cowen in

Highlights

Individuals experiencing extreme weather activity more likely to support climate adaptation policy.

Effect of extreme weather activity on opinion is modest and not consistent across specific adaptation policies.

Effect of extreme weather activity on opinion diminishes over time.

Here is the paper, via the excellent Kevin Lewis.

Dan Klein writes me about The Teaching Company

by  Tyler Cowen in

Here are the Teaching Company courses that I feel I have benefited most from:

Rufus J. Fears, Famous Greeks

Rufus J. Fears, Famous Romans

Bart D. Ehrman, The New Testament

Seth Lerer, The History of the English Language

Andrew C. Fix, The Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Rise of Nations

Brad S. Gregory, The History of Christianity in the Reformation Era

Robert Bucholz, The History of England from the Tudors to the Stuarts

Dale Hoak, The Age of Henry VIII

Peter C. Mancall, Origins and Ideologies of the American Revolution

Thomas L. Pangle, The Great Debate: Advocates and Opponents of the American Constitution

Patrick N. Allitt, The Rise and Fall of the British Empire

Patrick N. Allitt, The Conservative Tradition

Frederick Gregory, The Darwinian Revolution

Which do you all recommend?  Here is a Quora forum on the same issue.

The reserve army of the unemployed ant?

by  Tyler Cowen in

Social insect colonies are highly successful, self-organized complex systems. Surprisingly however, most social insect colonies contain large numbers of highly inactive workers. Although this may seem inefficient, it may be that inactive workers actually contribute to colony function. Indeed, the most commonly proposed explanation for inactive workers is that they form a ‘reserve’ labor force that becomes active when needed, thus helping mitigate the effects of colony workload fluctuations or worker loss. Thus, it may be that inactive workers facilitate colony flexibility and resilience. However, this idea has not been empirically confirmed. Here we test whether colonies of Temnothorax rugatulus ants replace highly active (spending large proportions of time on specific tasks) or highly inactive (spending large proportions of time completely immobile) workers when they are experimentally removed. We show that colonies maintained pre-removal activity levels even after active workers were removed, and that previously inactive workers became active subsequent to the removal of active workers. Conversely, when inactive workers were removed, inactivity levels decreased and remained lower post-removal. Thus, colonies seem to have mechanisms for maintaining a certain number of active workers, but not a set number of inactive workers. The rapid replacement (within 1 week) of active workers suggests that the tasks they perform, mainly foraging and brood care, are necessary for colony function on short timescales. Conversely, the lack of replacement of inactive workers even 2 weeks after their removal suggests that any potential functions they have, including being a ‘reserve’, are less important, or auxiliary, and do not need immediate recovery. Thus, inactive workers act as a reserve labor force and may still play a role as food stores for the colony, but a role in facilitating colony-wide communication is unlikely. Our results are consistent with the often cited, but never yet empirically supported hypothesis that inactive workers act as a pool of ‘reserve’ labor that may allow colonies to quickly take advantage of novel resources and to mitigate worker loss.

That is by Daniel Charbonneau, Takao Sasaki, and Anna Dornhaus, file under “speculative.”  For the pointer I thank Eric Durbrow.

Using tax data to measure long-term trends in U.S. income inequality

by  Tyler Cowen in

That topic has been knocking around for some time, with varying opinions.  I’ve now seen the clearest and most thorough treatment to date, namely from Gerald Auten and David Splinter.  It hasn’t received that much attention, perhaps because the results don’t have such a strong built-in constituency, but here goes:

Previous studies using U.S. tax return data conclude that the top one percent income share increased substantially since 1960. This study re-estimates the long-term trend in inequality after accounting for changes in the tax base, income sources missing from individual tax returns and changes in marriage rates. This more consistent estimate suggests that top one percent income shares increased by only about a quarter as much as unadjusted shares. Further, accounting for government transfers suggests that top one percent shares increased a tenth as much. These results show that unadjusted tax return based measures present a distorted view of inequality trends, as incomes reported on tax returns are sensitive to changes in tax laws and ignore income sources outside the individual tax system.

You’ll find the paper at the first link here.

Another estimate of the gains from deregulating building

by  Tyler Cowen in

Here is the abstract:

Counterfactual experiments show that deregulating existing urban land from 2014 regulation levels back to 1980 levels would have increased US GDP and productivity roughly to their current trend levels. California, New York, and the Mid-Atlantic region expand the most in these counterfactuals, drawing population out of the South and the Rustbelt. General equilibrium effects, particularly the reallocation of capital across states, accounts for much of these gains.

Alternatively, note from the paper that:

…deregulating all of the regions to 1980 levels would raise labor productivity by about 10 percent, and consumption by about 9 percent in the neoclassical economy, and would raise labor productivity by about 16 percent, and consumption by about 11 percent in the economy with the externality.

That is from Herkenhoff, Ohanian, and Prescott.  I’d like to make two broader points about the paper:

1. This is yet another example of real business cycle theory methods proving useful.  There are genuine problems with these approaches, but at least most of the blogosphere critics don’t understand them, and their uses, very well.

2. Sometimes you hear Texas described as a “low-wage” economy, perhaps contrasted with the high wages of California.  But there are some subtle wage effects from the Texas approach that often go unnoticed.  By drawing people out of high-rent areas, Texas keeps the lid on land rents elsewhere, thereby boosting real wages in say San Francisco.  Furthermore, San Francisco employers must pay their workers more, the more attractive is the “move to Texas” option.  So the full positive effect of the Texas model on wages is considerably higher than you can see by looking at Texas wages alone.  Once again, the distinction between the seen and the unseen turns out to be relevant.

Are Ideas Getting Harder to Find?

by  Tyler Cowen in

There is now another paper on this theme by Nicholas Bloom, Charles I. Jones, John Van Reenen, and Michael Webb, abstract:

In many growth models, economic growth arises from people creating ideas, and the long-run growth rate is the product of two terms: the effective number of researchers and their research productivity. We present a wide range of evidence from various industries, products, and firms showing that research effort is rising substantially while research productivity is declining sharply. A good example is Moore’s Law. The number of researchers required today to achieve the famous doubling every two years of the density of computer chips is more than 18 times larger than the number required in the early 1970s. Across a broad range of case studies at various levels of (dis)aggregation, we find that ideas — and in particular the exponential growth they imply — are getting harder and harder to find. Exponential growth results from the large increases in research effort that offset its declining productivity.

Here is the NBER link.

Tuesday assorted links

by  Tyler Cowen

1. Robert H. Bates, The Development Dilemma: Security, Prosperity, & a Return to History, provides an interesting look at Kenya vs. Zambia with regard to state capacity, and drawing some parallels to earlier England vs. France.

2. Stephen Williamson on the Phillips Curve.

3. Catching up on the Chinese economy.

4. The science of producing new colors.

5. Do groups lie more than do individuals?

Will China invest $30 billion in Haiti?

by  Tyler Cowen in

The People’s Republic of China is preparing to carry through with plans to invest a massive US$30 billion in developing Haiti’s infrastructure, including power plants, sanitation works, water systems, railways, affordable housing, and marketplaces, in an agreement that is expected to have a major social, economic, and developmental impact.

This week, workers have started to be contacted for the approximately 20,000 jobs needed to carry out the ambitious initiative, Haitian press has reported.

Here is further information.  To put the sum in perspective, Haitian gdp is about $8 billion at market exchange rates.

*Gorbachev: His Life and Times*

by  Tyler Cowen in

That is the new biography by William Taubmann, who won a Pulitzer for his Khruschev book.  At first I didn’t want to read it, feeling I was already too familiar with the topic, but it was a fascinating treatment throughout, with many revelations.  It is perhaps the best overall treatment of how the Soviet Union collapsed, and the parts on Gorbachev’s early career provide a superior look at how Soviet bureaucracy and the Communist Party actually functioned.

Here is one bit:

In retrospect, his best chance to prevent Communism from collapsing, taking with it the whole Soviet alliance system in Europe, would have been to encourage reformers like himself to take command of their countries with the support of their people.  Instead, he gave every appearance in his public meetings with the old guard [Honecker, Husák, Zhivkov] of backing them…

One of the best parts of the book is when Taubmann shows how Gorbachev’s treatment of the Nagorno-Karabakh Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict reflected both Gorby’s strengths and weaknesses early on.

Here is another bit:

“She [Raisa Gorbachev] displayed an extraordinary knowledge of British history and philosophy,” then British ambassador to Moscow Bryan Cartledge remembered.  “When she came across a portrait of David Hume, she knew all about him.”

Mrs. Thatcher was stunned, and later Nancy Reagan was envious and tried to keep up.  As for Ronald Reagan, to prepare for his meetings with Gorbachev, for a while he was receiving several two-hour tutoring sessions a week from Russian historians and other experts.

Perhaps the most startling part of the book is when the reader learns that even during the height of the Eastern Europe crisis, foreign policy received no more than five or six percent of the time of Gorbachev and the Politburo; the focus instead was on domestic issues and reforms.

Strongly recommended, this will be one of the two or three best books of the year, compulsively readable, fun, and informative all at once.  Here is a rave New York Times review.  You can order it here.

The “Trade Talks” podcast series

by  Tyler Cowen

Chad Bown writes to me:

“I write and take the liberty of drawing your attention to a new and weekly podcast series called Trade Talks that Soumaya Keynes (The Economist) and I are publishing.

According to the iTunes description, we promise to

cohost a weekly podcast on developments in international trade and policy. From trade wars to trade deals, this podcast covers the week’s trade news with insights and economic analysis from two of the world’s top trade geeks.

What more could you want from a couple of economists?

How to find the podcast?

  • Subscribe (for free) to Trade Talks in iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn, or from most anywhere you find podcasts, whether on an iOS or Android device.
  • Either click through one of the blue links above, or type “Trade Talks” into the search bar of your podcast directory (and look for our logo, below).

Here are our episodes thus far:

Parenting by Panopticon?

by  Tyler Cowen in

The cameras record the families’ lives — conversations, arguments, every interaction. If something is amiss, Cognition Builders can provide instant direction on how to remedy the situation, either verbally through a microphone in the camera or by sending a text to the parent.

Jessica Yuppa, Cognition Builders’ director of curricula and assistant clinical director, said the Nest Cams give CB an “unfiltered look” at what goes on inside the home. “Families think they know about themselves, but they don’t. Cameras give us a beat-for-beat of interactions. If a parent is struggling to communicate with a child, for example, we can watch a conversation and say, ‘Okay, why do you think he looked away when you said this?’” Yuppa said it doesn’t take long for families to adapt to the scrutiny. “My experience is the self-consciousness goes away very quickly,” she said. “People live their lives and forget we’re there.”

…A new rule was thus established. When an adult comes into the room and says hello to one of the children, the child stops what he or she is doing, looks the adult in the eye, shakes his or her hand, returns the greeting, and asks the adult how he or she is doing. This became the new expectation. If any member of the household failed to meet this expectation, he would receive a strike.

…At the end of each day, Elizabeth and Jason would receive a detailed, many-paged report on everything the family architects had observed.

Here is the article by Kim Brooks.  Yikes!  Read the last paragraph.