Making Minimum Wage is Better than Earning 60k a year?

Usually I tend to dismiss this sort of study as making bizarre assumptions or just ignoring some major facts, but I'm not seeing them this time. Any ideas?

World Series Game 5

I watched World Series Game 5 again tonight and I remember when I was watching it, it only hit me what they had done when Joe Buck started naming all the Giants who didn't win a World Series in San Francisco over years: Willie Mays, Orlando Cepeda, Willie McCovey, Juan Marichal, John Montefusco, Steve Garrelts, Robby Thompson, Will Clark, Matt Williams, JT Snow, Barry Bonds, Jeff Kent, Robb Nen, Rod Beck.

I never expected them to win this year. I thought they were at least a year away. The hitting wasn't good enough. The bullpen was too shaky. But they did it. I can't believe they did it. For all the teams that deserved to win and didn't, this one did it. Wow. Lincecum, Cain, Sanchez, Bumgarner, Zito, Ross, Uribe, Huff, Sanchez, Renteria, Wilson, Sandoval, Torres, Rowand, Burrell, Lopez, Casilla...

The 2010 World Series Champions San Francisco Giants.

Could you pass the 8th grade?

I'm not sure what counts as passing on this exam but I'm not sure I could have passed the 8th grade in 1895. It's not exactly a ringing endorsement for the US educational system now is it?
http://people.moreheadstate.edu/fs/w.willis/eighthgrade.html

Live from Chapel Hill

I suppose the name for this blog was destined to have an expiration date. Still, in some sense I'll always be blogging from Tucson...

Uncomfortable truths

Here are some truths that you will not like. The US retains pride in its free market can-do spirit while practicing welfarism as soon as anything goes awry. Europe preaches taking care of everybody but makes sure its market institutions stay solvent when the weight of public spending begins to threaten competitiveness. Citizens take pride in their difference, even when indicators of public spending/GDP, poverty rates, growth rates, are all pretty similar. I guess it comes down to whether you would rather pretend to be self reliant as you get bailed out or pretend that you're taking care of everyone when you're not.

Yeah...

see more Funny Graphs

Bone to pick

John Lewis Gaddis remarks that communism did comparatively well in the 1930s by preserving full employment when the rest of the world was suffering in the depression.

I suppose it's easy to maintain full employment with forced labor and killing between 15 to 20 million of your own citizens. As far as I can tell, that's about 12% of its then 165 million population. If the US had killed 12% of its 125 million population, the unemployment rate would sure have looked a lot better (somewhere between -4 and 12%)

It's frightening to hear anyone say that the Soviet Union did comparatively well at anything during the 1930s. Except democide. That they were good at.

Moreover, the unemployment rate is just not a good statistic to compare countries with free and forced labor: it tells you nothing about the productivity of labor or its remuneration.

Green Energy

By and large, I am enthusiastic about the possibilities for safe and clean energy. I look forward to a world with more wind turbines, solar panels, recycling, and who knows what has not yet been invented.

But, and there's always a but, we need to be careful when considering policies that promote these energies. The fact that green energy costs more than fossil fuels means that in some very relevant sense: they cost more in resources.

To simplify the intuition: if Joe Coalminer needs to mine more coal in order to buy his Toyota Prius to replace his F-150 truck, it's not clear that the environment wins out. Of course, if Roger Recycler has to recycle more so he can purchase his Prius, everyone wins.

The point is that prices signify a cost in resources and in a relatively "dirty" economy it looks like higher prices for clean energy mean an extra expenditure of dirty resources to buy clean ones.

Yes, you have to start somewhere, and yes you have to make sure prices signal relative scarcity but let's not immediately sanctify everyone who buys into the green economy. (Much the same could be said of high priced Organic farming, I think)

Irony

Irony defined: US Senate Committee on EPW global warming hearing postponed due to snowstorm

[hat tip Geoffrey Plauché]

Constitutional Issues

In Freedom's Law, Dworkin draws the distinction between constitutional persons and actual persons. He argues that the constitutional status of fetuses, slaves, and corporations doesn't actually depend on biology but on the legal definition of personhood. Fair enough.

But the question also presumes the constitution has ANYTHING at all to say on these issues. On some it does, but I am at a loss to find the concept of a fetus written anywhere in the constitution. I'm sorry people, the constitution just doesn't say aye or nay on this issue. Anyone who claims they can find it is engaging in pure sophistry.

Interestingly, if biologists and philosophers managed to come to a consensus on what a person is then it would be still a question whether constitutional jurisprudence would need to alter its definition. That depends whether one holds an originalist interpretation (what did the authors of the constitution mean when they referred to persons) or a best available theory interpretation which would update our idea of personhood or due process of law depending on the best available current informaton about what that requires.

Campaign finance

Liberals reacted to the supreme court decision to strike down donation limits on corporations like conservatives reacted to allowing due process for enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay.

I don't claim to know much about the constitutional merits of the question, but I share the liberal concern this much: corporations are fictional, legally created entities. They receive the privilege of limited liability for their shareholders. This limited liability subsidizes their levels of risk taking but also comes at the price of extra taxation.

My concern is that the corporation is created for a purpose, and that purpose is economic, not political. When corporations can pursue profit by political means, both the efficiency and the legitimacy of the market are compromised.

The free speech of individual shareholders is not compromised by restrictions on political contributions, as long as they can set up other organizations for this purpose.

Here is where liberals and I part ways: there is nothing wrong with individuals pooling resources together to advocate for a candidate or give money to a candidate. That is the essence of free speech and free association. Money does not taint politics as long as it is not explicitly exchanged for favors.

The solution is not to eliminate money from campaigns but eliminate discretionary spending, logrolling in large bills, and the line item veto. A healthy democracy is one that constrains its legislative process, not its citizens.

Thoughts on what appears to be the Giants' new lineup

I look forward to going to at least two Giants spring training games here on March 12 and March 21.

With the resigning of Bengie Molina, we can look at the lineups from last year and this year and see whether anything's improved.

Player/OPS

2009

RF Eugenio Velez .708
2b Freddy Sanchez .776
1b Pablo Sandoval .943
C Bengie Molina .727
CF Aaron Rowand .738
3b Juan Uribe .824
LF Randy Winn .671
SS Edgar Renteria .635

Avg OPS: .752

2010

CF Aaron Rowand .738
2b Freddy Sanchez .776
3b Pablo Sandoval .943
C Bengie Molina .727
1b Aubrey Huff .726
LF Mark De Rosa .799
RF Fred Lewis? .738/ Nate Schierholtz .702
SS Edgar Renteria .635

Avg OPS: 760

So maybe Huff rebounds somewhat, maybe so does Renteria, but Sandoval and Molina could easily regress. The improvement seems marginal.

The major good news is that Randy Winn is no longer producing outs at an alarming rate and that Eugenio Velez is on the bench learning that you can't steal first replaced by Fred Lewis (let's hope) and Mark De Rosa.

The problem is that the signing of Aubrey Huff means no spot for Juan Uribe, the Giants' (gulp) second most producive hitter last year, who is now in reserve. Huff is off a bad year, but could perhaps regain some of his .912 OPS from 2008. Sadly Mays field is no Camden Yards. The clear solution would be to bench Renteria and his stupid contract and play Uribe at short. With Renteria still in the line up, the team's chances to score runs look marginally improved. Replace him with Uribe and the lineup's average OPS scoots from 760 to 783!

Ok, it's Juan Uribe, but it's still more entertaining to watch him hack than watch Renteria swing a noodle. I also have a feeling that Bruce Bochy is going to start cannon arm Nate Schierholtz instead of stone hands Fred Lewis, despite the latter's greater offensive value. Unfortunately for Fred, a couple of errors on easy pop flies have made him look worse than he is, while a bunch of ridiculous throws have made Schierholtz look a lot better in the outfield than he really is.

While I happen to like Molina's resigning, I think Buster Posey probably would have been an offensve upgrade. Molina's contribution for me lies in game calling.

Avoiding flying

It appears that airport security measures are reaching new paranoid heights. Ticket prices are also climbing. I just don't feel like flying anymore. If I can drive I will. If there's a train I will take it. At this rate, ocean liners will be making a come back because I'd almost rather travel more pleasantly than be treated like cattle: searched, prodded, herded, and questioned at every turn.

I would gladly assume the risk of a suicide bombing and take an airline that doesn't subject me to this nonsense. Of course, legally that's impossible, and I can't really imagine that the insurance cost would make it worthwhile even absent government regulation. Market regulation could be just as stringent or worse.

The problem is that the risk of terrorism makes the cost of airline travel rise regardless of how it rises, through inconvenient screening and/or through higher insurance rates passed on to the consumer.

A market in security regulated by insurance rates would have the advantage of creating a large profit opportunity for providers of security technology capable of improving screening procedures and wait times and comfort at airports. I confess that I do not know whether government take over of airport/airline security blunts this monetary incentive but I suspect that it does. I suspect that if the "price" of travel were not measured in passenger time and indignities, but instead in money, the incentives for improvement would be larger. It remains to be seen whether anyone could take advantage of these incentives, but at least the opportunity would be there.