Emptying the Bottle: Late-May '10 Links

Here is a list of the worthwhile sites I've Bookmarked recently:

• It may be most cost effective not to clean oil-soaked birds in the Gulf, but to kill them.
• Asking voters when and where they intend to vote increases turnout.
• It's important to ask why terrorists attack and what, if any, role we played.
• Playing volleyball with an Arizona/Mexico border fence [photo].
• Feeling of public embarrassment is continuing to decrease. Should we care?
• Commercial involving a great storyteller [video].
• In vitro fertilization may become the norm in conceiving babies (earlier).
• Does the recent oil spill disprove libertarianism? Probably not.
• Why tax rebates do not work.
• Competition is only good if you want price to reflect costs. This is not what the unhealthy want when they buy health insurance.
• Every country is good at something, even if that something isn't good [graphic] (earlier).

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Remembering Makes You Forget

Right now, think about one of your favorite childhood memories. Did you do it? Chances are your brain just changed what you think happened. In a recent article from the Smithsonian Magazine, the act of trying to remember something actually changes the memory. Each time we recall something from the past, the connections between the neurons in our brain adjust. So the memory you think of the most is probably the most inaccurate. This is frightening when you consider you can't trust your own memory. Imagine the implications this has for witnesses in a criminal trial. However, the silver lining is that those witnesses could actually help themselves get over what they saw by misremembering it. Researchers have even used this "memory reconsolidation" to help patients suffering from Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It may also help the rest of us live in the present, not in the past. So hurry and comment on this post now before your brain tricks you into thinking you thought something else.

Comment on Comments

It's well known that commenting on blogs brings readers to your own site, but there are better reasons to comment. One of the things I most enjoy about blogging is the conservation and accountability. I know that I can take chances with ideas, trusting that if I'm off base my readers will kindly correct me. I intentionally do not pre-moderate any comments in order to keep the discussion in real-time. For my regular commenters thank you. For all you lurkers out there, let me assure you that all bloggers love comments. Whether positive or negative, whether I know you, I don't know or I used to know you, your thoughts are appreciated. I will as honor the conversation by not deleting comments, unless they are unusually obscene, cruel, or spam. In my whole history, I have only deleted one comment, and that was more to protect personal privacy. I will also vow to respond to all comments if called for. Finally, just a friendly reminder, all comments within this blog are the responsibility of the commenter, not the blog author. Look forward to hearing from you, yeah you.

Empowered by Inadequacy

I recently came across this very interesting article on marriage. The main point is in the first sentence:

A sure way to improve your marriage is to admit that you don't know what the hell you're doing when it comes to making an intimate relationship work.

This advice is not only Biblical, as the author describes, it's practical. The whole article is worth reading, especially the part on how men and women both have unique challenges in love relationships.

Economics of Vehicle Safety

With all the news of Toyota's safety concerns, Washington has decided to step in, even to the point of demanding the president of the company appear before Congress. Not surprisingly the meeting looked less like concern for public safety and more like a political circus. The Chicago Tribune recently published a great article on how the federal government's response ignores customer response:

Then there was the reaction from customers, the very people whose lives and safety are at stake every time they get in a car. In the first four months of this year, Toyota's U.S. sales did not fall, as you might expect. They rose by 12 percent.

and previous private sector success:

"automakers have developed many of today's significant safety innovations without a government mandate, including anti-lock brakes, electronic stability control, adaptive headlights, side airbags and curtains, front passenger safety belt reminder systems and advanced collision avoidance features like lane departure warning, blind spot monitors and adaptive cruise control."

Those improvements are among the reasons that last year, the number of traffic deaths was the lowest since 1954 — even though there are twice as many drivers, traveling four times as many miles, as there were back then.

and possible public sector failure:

What they are inclined to forget is that mandatory vehicle improvements don't come free. Those black boxes, for example, could cost hundreds or thousands of dollars apiece.

New cars have more safety features than older ones, so someone who trades in an old vehicle is likely to increase her life expectancy. Regulations that raise the price of a new car shut some buyers out of the market. So tougher federal rules may have the perverse effect of leading to more traffic fatalities.

If so, don't expect Congress to hold a hearing.

Evaluating Our Government's Debt

This year Social Security will pay out more than it collects. This is sign of the rising public debt, mostly from entitlement programs (Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, etc). This graphic perfectly explains just how large these expenses will be in 2020. They are especially dangerous because their cost varies with who qualifies, a group that has been growing since the Great Depression. I've discussed the danger of looking at gross debt, instead debt as a percentage of national income. Even though US government debt is not at its highest level ever, it is increasing faster than ever. Like the issue of trade deficit, government debt can be both a good and bad signal. Nations with a debt too large, risk defaulting on loans. However, some nations may have a small debt because they are not seen as reliable sources for investment. The European Union's problems with Greece (and Spain and Portugal), show that those two problems can make national bankruptcy is a real concern. So let's look at how the US government debt compares to the rest of the world.

In a list of national debt as a percentage of GDP, the US ranks somewhere in the middle. In 2008 US debt was 39.7%, but in 2009 it rose to 52.9%. This compared to 108.1% by Greece and 75.2% by Portugal. Surprisingly Japan, the third largest economy in the world, also has the high level of debt at 192.1%. Something that not only worries me, but one of the most successful news magazines the Economist is also worried. Italy, Belgium, France, Germany, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway, India and a whole host of other nations all have higher debt percentages than the United States. Government spending here is a problem, but less than around the world. In a democracy, the buck stops with the voters. Luckily it seems Americans have less patience for taxing our children.

The other good news is that the real solution to government spending is economic growth. Just like regular borrowers, nations pay back loans with income. Because of the hard work of generations of Americans we are ranked second in global competitiveness by the World Economic Forum. It is for this reason I'm more worried about nations like Japan and Greece than I am about the United States. In a globalized world, we may benefit from the hard work of others, but we also pay for the mistakes of other nations. At least we didn't put ourselves on the hook like the highly interconnected European Union did. If anything this shows how dangerous a global government can be. Small nations making small mistakes and then taking the small punishment is better than having a global structure for supporting failing economies. Just like how the bailout of Fannie Mae didn't solve the problem, it seems that by the reaction of Greek citizens to spending cuts,they haven't learned their lesson either.

I'm not very worried about our debt problem. Neither is Nobel Prize Economist Paul Krugman. Our federal debt has only been zero once, and that was only for a short time. My guess is we'll never see that again. It's too politically tempting for politicians to borrow from non-voters, meaning future generations. And there may even be some rationality for current generations to take from future generations. Since we're richer than our parents, our kids will probably be richer than us. Not saying I like the idea, but at least it's progressive, which counts for something. We also shouldn't worry too much about other nations holding our debt. If one day they decide we aren't a good investment, it just means it will be harder for our government to borrow so much, which is okay by me. I'll close by saying that any spending cuts that don't deal with entitlements is only political pandering. Focus on economic growth (and maybe population growth). These the keys to a better, more stable life. And if you're still worried, feel free to donate.

Most Repeated Advice

Over at the Freakonomics blog, Stephen Dubner asks his readers, "what is the best advice you ever got"? His own response to the question involves a fishing story from his childhood. He caught a small fish, but was forced to throw it back in and they moved to another spot. In the deep water they didn't catch any fish, but he did learn an important lesson:

Even though we returned home empty-handed, we went for the big fish. In the short run, this kind of thinking might not be as much fun. But it’s the long run you should be thinking about — the big goals, the ones that require a lot of failure along the way. They might be worth it (of course, they might not be, too). It’s a lesson in opportunity cost: if you spend all your time catching the little fish, you won’t have time — or develop the technique, or the patience — to ever catch the big ones.

Like many of the commenters I had a hard time coming up with the "best" advice ever. So instead I went with my most often repeated. It's certainly not as life changing, but it sure has helped me navigate otherwise awkward situations:

If someone offers you something and you want it, take it. They either really want you to have it or need to learn to stop offering things they don’t want people to take.

Here are some other interesting answers:

Your brain works very hard to fool you into believing that you are smart, wise, and that you always make good decisions. Your brain is very skilled at this.

So whenever you are trying to make a difficult decision or solve a difficult problem and the evidence points to a conclusion that pleases you, be especially skeptical.

As an educator and an economist, I appreciated this one:

Invest in your mind, no on can take it away from you.

This one gave me quite an emotional response, though I'm not sure if I agree:

Just because someone doesn’t love you the way that you want them to doesn’t mean that they don’t love you with all that they have

I wish more people followed this one:

No use complaining about things you can’t control.

and here's one from the character Dwight Schrute:

Whenever I am about to do something, I stop and ask myself: ‘Would an idiot do this?’ If the answer is ‘yes,’ I don’t do it.

Of course I'd love to know what your best or most often repeated advice is.

Social Networking Won't Kill Email

Penelope Trunk recently stated that she believes email is on its last leg. Her three reasons were 1) email is inefficient, 2) email's intimacy is overrated, and 3) internet privacy is a thing of the past. I usually avoid disagreements on the direction of technology, because I'm far from an expert. However on this topic, I can't stay quiet. Although I agree that the one to one communication of email makes group messaging a pain, it seems Google Wave will solve that problem. I also agree that email as a tool of intimacy is limited. It's helpful for keeping in touch trivially, but text is rarely a way to improve communication. I also agree that there is too many complaints about online privacy in social networking. This graphic is helpful in showing how Facebook has consistently changed its privacy settings, much to the chagrin of many users. Though I think these changes will hurt Facebook, they don't hurt me. A long time ago I decided to never post anything online that I don't want everyone to read. I'm willing to give up control of my personal information in exchange for a lot free stuff online, but I guess not everyone is.

As much as I agree with Penelope on the problems with email, I don't think we've seen its killer just yet. Even though I don't post things on my Facebook, my blog, my shared bookmarks, or my photo album that I don't want people to see, that is not true for my email. Email is a helpful tool between talking and social networking. It's faster than a telephone and a letter, but more private than a Facebook wall. This is why I disabled my Facebook wall. Sure it confuses people on my birthday, but if someone has something to say to me, message me. There is no reason to clutter others' feeds. It is for this reason I believe email, or some other type of private messaging service, will always exist. Maybe one day texting and email will be there same thing. Or maybe I'm already behind the times. Perhaps internet users only want to interact if they know people are watching. If so, I may have to go all Andy Rooney on the internet.

Economics of Tall, Dark, and Handsome

As kids we were told to judge people by the way they acted, not by the way they looked. As wonderful as that might sound, it's not reality:

Looking at records from the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries, they have found evidence that shorter men are 20 to 30 percent more likely to end up in prison than their taller counterparts, and that obesity and physical [un]attractiveness are linked to crime.

So why are short, overweight, unattractive people more likely to commit crimes? Possibly because the job market is not very kind:

very inch of additional height is associated with a nearly 2 percent increase in earnings; that employees rated beautiful tended to earn 5 percent more an hour than an average-looking person, while those rated as plain earned 9 percent less; that obesity can cause a drop in white women’s earnings.

So how tall is tall and is it also true for women?

women who are shorter than average and men who are somewhat taller than average, but not among the tallest, enjoy significant wage advantages.

It matters so much that people on dating websites lie about it:

Height matters so much to people that the majority of both men and women who use online dating sites lie about it ( 1 in 1.81 (55%) men, 1 in 1.95 (51%) women).

Apparently, for a good reason:

Taller men tend to be higher achievers. Malcolm Gladwell reported in his book Blink that CEOs of Fortune 500 companies averaged 6 feet tall, more than 2 inches higher than the national average for American men. This same select set of power brokers would rather be bald than short, according to an unscientific USA Today survey. Only two US Presidents have been below average in height.

So is the increased income and success due to just employer bias for the attractive? No. Sadly teacher bias exists as well:

Including personality and grooming, the effect of physical attractiveness turns negative for both groups, but is only statistically significant for males. For male and female students, being very well groomed is associated with a statistically significant GPA premium.

Higher grades, better pay, and yes there is even evidence this can make you less jealous. As I'm sure you've already put together, this has a pretty significant impact on happiness:

The Gallup data suggest it would take a 29% increase in income to have the same effect on men's life satisfaction as moving from below-average to above-average height. Alternatively, each additional inch of height has the same effect on reported life satisfaction as a 4% increase in family income.

It gets even more surprising:

Taller people are happier, at least on average. According to recent data from the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index study, taller people are more satisfied with their lives than shorter people are; are more likely to report experiencing several positive emotions such as enjoyment and happiness; and are less likely to report experiencing negative emotions such as anger, sadness, stress, and worry. Taller people are also less likely to report experiencing physical pain.

And even more surprising:

Taller people have "better" marital outcomes

These effects are so significant, that my previous post on an efficient height tax seems a little less ridiculous. Especially when you consider why employers and teachers seem to be bias towards the tall and attractive:

Since biologists believe that 80 percent of height is determined by genetics and 20 percent by environmental conditions, height — and sometimes weight — can be an index of childhood nutrition, health care and exposure to disease. Thus smaller stature may be a sign of an impoverished upbringing.

It's well known that the poor and sick tend to do worse in school and in the workplace. It seems the reason for this correlation is partly human preference for the attractive. Mostly however, being tall, dark, and handsome tends correlate with other important factors like upbringing, health, and even marital satisfaction. All of these factors are fairly useful measures of productivity. So even though this is a small factor, it's still a factor. This is why I even though I'm 5' 10 and 1/4", I round up to 5' 11". The fact that I am thin makes for a helpful optical illusion. Also good news, thanks to my supermodel wife, my children will be the ideal height.

Libertarianism: Abortion, Zoos, and Civil Rights

That's Jeffrey Miron, blogger, and the author of Libertarianism, from A to Z.