Results for “age of em” 17236 found
What are our personal obligations toward the environment?
From the hum of the city, while pondering fossil fuel consumption, Megan McArdle writes:
I understand that people’s desires for large houses in leafy suburbs
are every bit as valid as my ardent desire to live near the peaceful
hum of traffic. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as a policy that
effects everyone equally, and the painful job of being an adult is
doing things we don’t like because they’re the morally right thing to
do.
From my mid-sized house in a leafy suburb, I will assume that a) environmental concerns are real, b) we will fall short of fixing those problems through public policy (Megan uses the word policy but mostly her post is about personal obligation), and c) we do in fact have personal obligations to limit consumption. The question remains how much fun we can have. Fossil fuel consumption isn’t necessarily the area of optimal sacrifice. For instance here are two other options:
1. Send money and other forms of aid to the victims and future victims.
2. Have fewer children than otherwise, if only in the stochastic sense (e.g., don’t move to Alaska at a young age). Climate change is not the last environmental burden we will place on the world and probably not even the biggest such burden, but fewer people does mean less human pressure along many environmental dimensions, present and future.
Assuming that restriction is indeed called for, either of those might be more personally imperative than:
3. Fly and drive less and buy a smaller house.
Most people focus on #3 because lower energy consumption makes them feel less affiliated with the particular problem at hand. But instrumentally speaking at a low discount rate #2 is more potent and at any discount rate #1 can be a more effective form of aid to the victims.
In this setting, I can see a few theories of our duties:
a. Do that which yields the highest net social return if only you do it.
b. Do that which yields the highest net social return if many people were to do it.
c. Cut back on your activities which most closely resemble aggressive interference into the lives of others.
d. Perform the action most likely to influence the behavior of others.
Belief in "a" favors sending money. Belief in "b" favors having fewer children. Belief in "c" favors restricting your driving and flying. I am not sure which course of action follows from belief in "d."
You might think that you should do some mix of 1, 2, and 3, But if your MU schedules are sufficiently flat, an argument from Steven Landsburg implies it is optimal to concentrate your sacrifice in a single "best returns" project. So it may suffice to pick either 1, 2, or 3 and do it very well.
The bottom line: Perhaps I should call this blog post An Apology for Me.
Did we *really* need that bail-out?
The highly-praiseworthy-but-ever-so-occasionally-totally-wrong Bryan Caplan suggests that Paulson should have simply let the debt securities of the mortgage agencies go. In addition to the fact that he favors The End of the World, Bryan is underestimating at least two points:
1. The current operation of the money market requires ongoing faith in a variety of assets and commitments. Just try tracing through the consequences of a general "run" on money market funds, which "promise" a redemption ratio of $1 a share but on the other hand really don’t make such a promise. How quickly would Merrill Lynch cry Uncle, how quickly would the Fed’s balance sheet be exhausted, and how many commitments would they have made in the meantime and how many people would have to sell stocks to find cash and make margin calls? Or think about what would happen if FASB ruled that Frannie debt securities did not qualify as "ready cash" for accounting purposes. (As a general tendency I find that economists vastly underrate the importance of accounting as an economic force. I might add that many market advocates are unaware of how quickly liquidity can vanish in these markets; just look at auction-rate securities.) And those aren’t even the biggest potential problems arising from a default.
2. In essence we already agreed to the bail out some time ago. Have you ever spent $17,000 on a car and asked the dealer what the warranty for the car "really meant"? Well, the Chinese spent $340 billion on agency debt and probably asked the same question at least once or twice. They live in a world of secret agreements with leaders, not transparent democratic arrangements. So when it comes to the U.S government decision, we’re not just starting from scratch here. How many phone calls do you think Hank Paulson has received from the Chinese central bank since August 2007?
"Are you *sure* that paper is safe enough for us to keep on buying?"
We’ll never know exactly what kind of verbal dance Paulson concocted in response, but just look at the resulting flow of purchases and the relatively slight mark-up over Treasuries over that period of time. The Chinese (among others) thought we were standing behind the securities, at least in any world-state short of federal government quasi-bankruptcy. (In fact Paulson is in a total bind once that phone call comes in. He doesn’t have much incentive to just say "tough luck" and precipitate a crisis when otherwise no crisis is on the horizon.)
So should we try this: "Oh, is that what you thought? Guaranteed? Did we use that word? Sorry, try reading our signals better next time. We love you. Great job with those Olympics. And when it comes to those Treasury Bills, we really do still mean it. And don’t forget to support us on Iran and North Korea."
The libertarian critique of the mortgage agencies is, in my view, very much on the mark. But still the error has been made and we must pay up. As Steve Chapman points out, the bailout is a necessary evil, but with emphasis on the word "evil."
Assorted links
1. Via Craig Newmark, a short class on behavioral economics (are the speakers or the audience more impressive?)
2. List of very good contemporary TV shows
3. Diasyrmus
4. The first Haitian opera (to buy it, right click on "shop" and then click on the Dutch phrase at the bottom of the page)
5. Nursing home reform I can favor.
6. Which three Senators receive the most Fannie Mae money?
Brazil fact of the day
In Brazil, they segregate their prisons according to gang membership.
No exceptions. Not even for individuals who in fact are not members of
any gang.How does that work? Easy. Upon being admitted to the prison system, unaffiliated prisoners are required to join a gang.
Here is more, from Amanda Taub. Here is her blog. Here is another new economics blog, on models and agents.
Insect politics
In case you had forgotten:
"Have you ever heard of insect politics? Neither have I! Insects don’t
have politics…. they’re very brutal. No compassion…. no compromise.
We can’t trust the insect. I’d like to become the first insect
politician. I’d like to, but…. I’m an insect…. who dreamed he was a
man, and loved it. But now the dream is over, and the insect is awake."
That’s from David Cronenberg’s The Fly. I was reminded of the scene by this post. Best of all, the YouTube of that scene is here. I will genuinely be glad when this campaign is over.
Addendum: The new operatic version of The Fly is receiving negative reviews.
Markets in everything, China edition
Stir Fried Wikipedia.
Or so the translation goes. Here is the explanation (with photos):
It’s not entirely clear how this error came about but it seems likely that someone did a search for the Chinese word for a type of edible fungus and its translation into English. The most relevant and accurate page very well might have been an article on the fungus on Wikipedia.
Unfamiliar with Wikipedia, the user then confused the name of the article with the name of the website. There have been several distinct
citings of "wikipedia" on Chinese menus.
That’s from the Revealing Errors blog and I thank Kat for the pointer. The blog is very good; here is an interesting post on "the Cupertino effect."
China incentive of the day
A handsome teacher in China is offering pupils autographed photos of himself to encourage them to work harder.
Ji Feng, also vice principal of Zhiyuan Foreign Language Elementary School, is so popular among students that a lot of them were asking him for pictures.
"I came up with the idea of giving them my signed pictures as a reward," he told the Nanjing Morning Post.
Students who put in exemplary work can now pose for a picture with Ji who then signs the printed photograph.
Ji added: "It absolutely is not narcissism, but a way of encouragement. And only the students who perform the best can get such a reward."
Here is the story, the pointer is from Allison Kasic.
Alaskan state politics, circa 1976
"You were against statehood?"
"Oh, sure. Oh, sure. Before then, three-quarters of the people here weren’t here. Eight or nine hundred people ran the Territory. Ten thousand now run the state. Where it used to take one person to investigate you, it now takes two to four. The state spends too much. If a tree blows down, two guys from the state come with a chain saw. The state has sold the state out. To the unions. To the oil companies. The oil companies have more power than the legislature. The capital move [away from Juneau] is a lot of talk. That’s all it is, a lot of talk. What we need is not a new capital but better legislators than we have. I’d say leave the capital where it’s at. The state can’t afford it. There is no economy. They’re dreaming about all this oil money.
That is from John McPhee’s excellent Coming into the Country, a study of Alaska recommended to me by several MR readers. Here is a short 2002 piece on switching the capital of Alaska and the oddity of putting it in Juneau. Here is a useful map. Here is a picture of Juneau and from the air. Googling "Juneau traffic report" does not in fact bring up any traffic reports.
World’s biggest bail-out: update
Arnold Kling wonders: what is the exit plan? Brad DeLong and John Hempton think the Bush Administration showed some courage. Brad thinks the preferred stock can do OK. Here’s what forced Paulson’s hand. All lobbying from the agencies has been eliminated. WSJ reports: "House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D., Mass.)
said in an interview that the near-term effects of the conservatorship
will be to "strengthen the public mission of what they do" to prop up
the housing market." Preferred shareholders lose dividends. CalculatedRisk has the clearest bottom line so far.
What if we didn’t bail out the creditors?
"Could you clarify just how far on the hook I should be for someone else’s frauds?"
That’s MR commentator CK and the answer is "lots." Here’s more detail on the bail out, by the way. Not good.
But let’s say that the Treasury did not support the debt of the mortgage agencies. The Chinese bought over $300 billion of that stuff and they were told that it is essentially riskless. The flow of capital from them and from other central banks, sovereign wealth funds, and plain old ordinary investors would shut down very quickly. The dollar would fall say 30-40 percent in a week, there would be payments system gridlock, margin calls at the clearinghouses would go unmet, and only a trading shutdown would stop the Dow from shedding half its value. Most of the U.S. banking system would be insolvent. Emergency Fed/Treasury action would recapitalize the FDIC but we would lose an independent central bank and setting the money supply would be a crapshoot. The rate of unemployment would climb into double digits and stay there. Many Americans would not have access to their savings. The future supply of foreign investment would be noticeably lower. The Federal government would lose its AAA rating and we would pay much more in borrowing costs. The deficit would skyrocket.
And I haven’t even mentioned the credit default swaps market. Well, I have now.
But for another point of view, try Jeff Rogers Hummel.
What I’ve been reading
1. The Future of the Internet — and How to Stop It, by Jonathan Zittrain. The main claim is that everything will be sterile, tethered appliances. The opening up of the iPhone would seem to bely this message plus competition usually works in giving consumers what they want. A smart book (that is rare for internet books, oddly) but I suspect it will prove to be wrong.
2. Paul Auster, Man in the Dark. Reviews for this work have a bimodal distribution. I like most of Auster’s books but I vote no.
3. The Gargoyle, by Andrew Davidson. So far this is excellent junk reading.
4. Epilogue, by Anne Roiphe. Ideally this book deserves its own post but it is difficult to excerpt. It’s about why the author, now a widow, finds it hard to fall in love again. Definitely recommended.
5. The Boy with Two Belly Buttons, by Stephen Dubner. It’s a children’s book. I haven’t read so many of these since Mr. Pines Paints a Purple House — my favorite as a tot — but to me it seemed very good. Ages 4-8.
Is this a sustainable business model?
Alternatively, you could call this "Markets in Everything":
The secret-spilling site Wikileaks announced this week that it’s
acquired thousands of e-mails belonging to a top aide to Venezuelan
president Hugo Chavez. But don’t look for them online. In a departure
from its full-disclosure past, Wikileaks is auctioning off the cache to
the highest bidder.Wikileaks began
soliciting bids from media organizations on Tuesday, for what it
describes as thousands of e-mails and attachments from 2005 to 2008
that provide insight into Chavez’s management, CIA activities in
Venezuela and the Bolivarian revolution.The winner gets exclusivity and embargoed access to the documents, though Wikileaks will publish all of them eventually.
Here is more.
Do economists think TV is good for you?
In a nutshell, yes:
The variation Mr. Gentzkow
and Mr. Shapiro exploited was the timing of the introduction of TV into
different cities. Television began taking off in the U.S. in 1946,
after a wartime ban on TV production was lifted. But the Federal
Communications Commission stopped granting new commercial television
licenses from September 1948 to April 1952 while it made changes in
allocating broadcast spectrum. There was a long lag between when some
cities got television and when others did.The economists then
looked at results of a survey of 800 U.S. schools that administered
tests to 346,662 sixth-grade, ninth-grade and 12th-grade students in
1965. Their finding: Adjusting for differences in household income,
parents’ educational background and other factors, children who lived
in cities that gave them more exposure to television in early childhood
performed better on the tests than those with less exposure.The
economists found that television was especially positive for children
in households where English wasn’t the primary language and parents’
education level was lower. "We don’t exactly know why that is, but a
plausible interpretation is that the effect of television on cognitive
development depends on what other kinds of activity television is
substituting for," says Mr. Shapiro, 28.
Here is much more. And yes the "Mr. Shapiro" is in fact Wunderkind Jesse Shapiro, a familiar figure to MR readers everywhere. You’ll find two versions of the paper here.
Addendum: Here is Alex’s excellent post on the topic.
Magnus #1?
17 year old Magnus Carlsen won a chess game today and is probably now, unofficially, ranked #1 in the world. (World champion Anand lost and fell behind in rating points.) Here is an illuminating recent profile of Magnus. I believe Paul Samuelson is the closest to an economics prodigy we have had. He was thirty-two when his Foundations of Economic Analysis was published but I have heard that he wrote the book at a much earlier age (does anyone know the exact age?). He was probably one of the best economists in the world when he received his undergraduate degree at Chicago at the age of 20. Frank Ramsey is another example of an economics prodigy although he didn’t even think of himself as an economist per se. Can you think of other prodigies in mathematical economics? I attribute their scarcity to the relative aesthetic poverty of mathematical economics (for most people it’s not that fun or beautiful) rather than the need for complementary experience-acquired wisdom. Do you agree?
Addendum: Andrew Gelman considers statistics.
Why so many churches in Las Vegas?
Robert, a loyal MR reader asks,
I lived there for four years and was always curious. I guess the more sin, the more churches???
For background, here is a 1997 look at the numbers. It seems the city has more churches than average in per capita terms. Among the cities claiming the highest number of churches per capita are Nashville, Grand Rapids, Mich., Waco, Texas, Wheaton, Ill., and Berkeley, Calif. (Berkeley?) Overall the South has more churches per capita than the rest of the country.
I would think that most of the churches in Las Vegas are for the residents, not the tourists, and thus the quantity of sin is not a major factor. Why should the residents be especially sinful? (Don’t forget that lots of sinful activities seem to be produced at constant returns to scale, so there’s not always free-riding upon the sin infrastructure for tourists plus parking is an issue.) In explaining the number of churches, I would expect three factors to play a role:
1. Perhaps migrants to Las Vegas are more likely to come from the South.
2. Most of the population growth is recent, so churches serve a valuable function of social networking.
3. Las Vegas has no dominant established religion so there is much religious competition and thus many different churches.
But surely Jacqueline (and others) can set us straight…