but I like the chance to win neat things.
So I’m entering the UneasySilence Wii Giveaway… by making this post.
3/31/2007
3/30/2007
I just learned about a new “surprisingly simple” way to fight cancer:
When we diagnose cancer, the treatment is still primarily surgical, commonly combined with radiation therapy and anticancer drugs. The aim of these treatments is to suppress, or arrest, the unrestrained growth of cells in the body organs or tissues. In the case of many man-made systems we are similarly faced with situations where processes deviate from the normal operation of the system. But the remedy for such deviations is surprisingly simple: negative feedback.
Hmm, feedback. I do hate cancer and I do love modern control theory! Tell me more!
Negative feedback means that the system’s output is fed back into the same system in order to enable the system to determine the difference between the actual and the desired output, and to make the necessary corrections in its own operation. For example a vehicle’s speed control uses the difference between the actual and the desired speed to adjust the fuel flow rate. Those systems which feed back their own output for self-regulation are said to be closed-loop control systems.
Yup, I get that. I use the cruise control all the time. (more…)
Al Gore compared his vision of the future of electricity generation with the current state of the internet. I think it’s a pretty useless comparison. I will, however, spend a little bit of time examining why the comparison might be relevant.
He might be right because the internet has been fantastic for allowing user generated content. If home generation becomes easy and cheap then the electrical grid can contain much more user generated content, in this case power. From the perspective that users can also be producers he is right.
As I said before, though, the content of the internet can enjoy a fantastic multiplier effect where any bit of content can be easily replicated millions of times. Excess power sold to the grid, on the other hand, will disappear as soon as it has been used.
A better comparison that Gore could have made would be to food. Anybody with a little land and a green thumb can grow their own food, and if they have an excess, share it with their community. This too is a far from great comparison. The simple fact is that most people do not find it to be in their own interest to be involved in growing their own food. Plus, at least a gardener with extra food can exchange that for other types of food from other gardeners.
Let’s go back to the comparison with the internet and look at something familiar, perhaps blogging. Many fantastic bloggers are generating valuable content without putting too much, if any, effort into adding infrastructure. Only the geeky and outgoing actually pay for space that they must maintain themselves. The rest don’t bother with the details. They let someone else take care of all that so that they can enjoy a relatively hassle free experience at no cost.
Which leads me back to an idea from Part 1 of disagreeing with Gore. (more…)
3/29/2007
Nobody likes it when bad things happen to good people. Certainly bad things happen to almost everyone. But why is it when big, bad things happen, suddenly everyone it happened to was a “great guy” a “hard worker” and/or someone who “played by the rules?”
I read a similar such comment this morning about Circuit City’s plan to layoff 3,400 employees. To be clear, I don’t consider layoffs to be good news. Nor am I brutally certain that Circuit City’s plan is a good one. But I replied with this:
We are talking about Circuit City employees, right? The people who will try everything in their power to sell you an expensive and almost completely unnecessary extended warranty? Two days ago, how many Loungers would have said, “man, I just LOVE the staff at Circuit City. They are just the best, friendliest, nicest people who always make sure that I get a great deal!”
Apparently the initial comment was really about loyalty. Being the cynical person I am, I can conclude that their “loyalty” was mostly tied to their paychecks being well above market value.
From the NYT:
Income inequality grew significantly in 2005, with the top 1 percent of Americans — those with incomes that year of more than $348,000 — receiving their largest share of national income since 1928, analysis of newly released tax data shows.
To me that means nothing by itself, other than that the top 1% had a good year. It’s not necessarily a bad thing or a good thing. But fixing it at all costs can potentially be a very bad thing:
… you’ll see that the share going to the top 1% peaked in 1929 at 23.94%. In 1933, the number was 16.46.
Hurray! The rest of us, the bottom 99% were getting a bigger share in 1933. The economy was more fair! But there was nothing to cheer about. Real GDP per capita (cool tool—don’t miss it), fell 29%.
There’s nothing like a good depression to level out that playing field.
But it is striking to me that income inequality is usually measured at the national level. And it seems to me that the issue only draws political traction from the left at the national level.
Why is that? If, for example, you are an average American and your neighbor had a great year, you don’t accuse him of creating income inequality or of stealing from you or anyone else (maybe if your only literal means of advancing are theft, you assume that everyone else also steals to get ahead). And I, at least, have never seen the issue even raised on a state level. Do people in Washington feel worse every year when they learn that Bill Gates net worth increased by a few billion dollars? Maybe it’s because it is still too local, or maybe it’s too easy for the-about-to-have-his-tax-go-way-up to pack up and relocate in another state.
It doesn’t gain traction in America on a global level either. You would have an extremely difficult time convincing an American who wants a lower level of income inequality in America that he should be taxed additionally and heavily to help ease the income inequality between him and the global poor. No politician in America will ever get elected on a platform of higher taxes for the sake of giveaways to other nations.
Prof. Thomas Piketty of the Paris School of Economics, said such growing disparities were significant in terms of social and political stability.
“If the economy is growing but only a few are enjoying the benefits [my note: not that this is at all shown to be true in the article], it goes to our sense of fairness,” Professor Saez said. “It can have important political consequences.”
The issue of income inequality has nothing to do with good economics and certainly nothing to do with maximizing wealth for everyone. It doesn’t even have anything to do with being fair. It has everything to do with a wide swath of Americans believing they can get a free lunch and wide swath of politicians eager to give them guaranteed shit for enough votes to get themselves into a precious little piece of DC real estate and power. To the extent that the issue of income inequality is a winner for politicians, I see it only as a failure of people like me to artfully articulate the consequences.
