Saturday, June 19, 2004
The Best of Times
Would you rather spend $100 at Sears (or a comparable store) today or spend the same $100 on items in the 100-year old Sears catalogue? It's an old econ exam question but I happen to be holding a facsimile (with an introduction by Cleveland Amory) of the 1902 edition (#111) in my hand. It is published by Grammercy Books (New York) and is a treasure of entertainment.There are thousands of products listed and described, many with accompanying illustrations. Practically each one makes food for thought.
After some time with the catalogue, I thought I would have trouble writing a concise answer to the question. It might be easier to get to the point and admit that all the ways we use to make inter-temporal comparisons of well-offness are rough.
Would you want their best 1902 camera for $7.90? Probably not. High-end cutlery for 6 for $1.79? Why not? A great western saddle for $8.95? Sure.
It's the Sears "Drug Department" that is the real eye opener. "Fat Folks, Take Rose's Obesity Powders and Watch the Result ... $4.20 per dozen boxes." Herb laxative teas for 16 cents a box may be OK. Dr. Rose's Arsenic Complexion Wafers 35 cents a box may have few takers today. Vin Vitae for 69 cents ("Not a Medicine ... Not Merely a Tonic"). The "White Ribbon Secret Liquor Cure" went for $2.50 a box. The list goes on and does focus the mind.
At the celebration of the last millennium, the NY Times assembled various intellectuals and had each write a short essay on which century they would have preferred to live in and why.
I do not recall that any preferred the present century. The no-brainer response is, of course, to live in the present (preferably in the U.S., in my view) because the no-brainer "why" can be answered in just two words: medical science.
Friday, June 18, 2004
Progressives' Environmental Legacy
Fred L. Smith ("The Progressive Era's Derailment of Classical-Liberal Evolution" in The Freeman of June 2004)offers the most cogent summary I have seen lately of the problems that go with the environmentalist view and the politics it prompts. He concludes, "We must repair the impoverished state of our instititutional framework for addressing the environmental concerns that we all share. To fail in this task is to risk further losses to economic liberty. Eco-socialism is even more complex than traditional socialism. It will fail. Our challenge is to ensure that as this occurs, a free-market alternative is available and is understood. There is much work to do."Smith reviews the policies of the Progressive era that set aside reliance on the accumulated common law of trespass and nuisance in favor of abridged property rights, statutory law and regulation. He notes that, at the time, this was quite acceptable as economic growth was a priority and environmental priorities secondary -- and much was simply misunderstood.
With Progressivism and the like, we put aside the evolutionary mechanisms whereby we had managed to innovate ways to bring what had been common properties into the exchange economy. Smith notes that underground oil rights were sorted out pre-Progressivism while underground water rights were not. "The result of those different treatments of comparable underground liquid resources is striking: The relatively scarce commodity (petroleum) has become ever-more abundant, while the relatively abundant commodity (water) has become ever scarcer."
Thursday, June 17, 2004
Branding and Community
Economics textbooks (and lots of highbrow economics) bemoan the efficiency losses from "monopolistic" and "oligopolistic" industry organization. It is not until information asymmetries are examined that successful product differentiation is seen as having two sides: consumers are willing to pay for reputable goods and services and sellers can earn profits by maintaining that reputation. Both sides benefit. Reviewing The Culting of Brands (by Douglas Atkin; WSJ 6/16), Daniel Akst notes that it often goes much further. Akst quotes Atkin: "People today pay for meaning more than they pray for it."
The reviewer notes that,"... Atkin has written an unusually readable book that focuses on how a cultlike devotion to products and brands arises from the human needs for belonging and satisfaction -- needs that may be especially acute in today's free-wheeling culture, in which ties to family, church, community and workplace are looser than ever. Cult brands such as Macintosh, answer some of these needs by helping people recognize who they are and form communities of their own kind. He observes that BMW motorcycle riders, whose cult is even more mysterious than that of Harley-Davidson, published a directory of 12,000 BMW owners ... willing to help other BMW owners who are hurt, lost or just have a flat tire far from home. This network is reminiscent of such fraternal groups as the Masons or Orthodox Jews who take in observant wayfarers on the Sabbath."
Again, what's not to like?
Wednesday, June 16, 2004
Cool Cities
In democracies, it is unlikely that governments (politicians) can actually live up to the ideal of doing few things and doing them well. The opposite usually occurs. Most big cities end up being badly managed and declining and/or loosing market share to powerful decentralizing forces.Most big-city governments in the U.S. respond to their plight by committing to Economic Development campaigns, signing on special staff and really extending the reach of politics -- and, thereby, often making things worse. It is hard to find an Economic Development success. When areas do bounce back, it is often for reasons that have nothing to do with city hall's programs or it is after outlandish time and money have been invested. When advocates claim "success", it is never in cost-effectiveness terms. It's not their money, after all.
"Lonely Town Seeks Hip Young Professionals ... To Combat Brain Drain, Cities Boost Efforts to Court Graduates ... As college students and recent graduates ponder what to do next, a range of midsize and smaller cities -- and even some larger ones -- are launching new programs designed to lure them there ... Cleveland's program, which started last year, now offers 55 interns 10 weeks of living, working and schmoozing with civic leaders ... Other cities are looking into everything from building museums and art spaces to encouraging the development of loft apartments ... Michigan has even embarked on a statewide 'Cool Cities' initiative that hopes to remake overlooked communities into hip neighborhoods ..." reports yesterday's WSJ.
Very cool ... and much less boring than lowering taxes, cutting regulation, politics and bureaucracy (including the economic development staff), improving schools by offering choice to parents, etc.
Tuesday, June 15, 2004
Fat City
My colleague Harry Richardson is working on a piece on the sprawl-makes-you-fat silliness which he will call Fat City. People whom Tom Sowell likes to call "The Anointed" have never been happy with the choices that real people make, especially their lifestyle choices. So, these scholars throw caution (and all sensibility) to the wind and conjure attention-getting connections. Lawrence Frank of the University of British Columbia goes so far as to conclude that every extra minute spent commuting by auto makes us so much fatter. Wendell Cox (www.publicpurpose.com/pp77-fatubc.pdf) offers us a preview of this work.I do my own research in this field on an almost daily basis. In Los Angeles, I notice that transit use also makes people (how can I say this?) un-svelte and, in growing proportions, it also makes them short!
I had once written off the field of commuting mode choice but am only now realizing that it is much deeper than I had ever thought.
Monday, June 14, 2004
Pessimists
Where do I line up to claim just $1 for every printed discussion of equitable distributions that focuses on statics and eschews the good news that comes from a dynamic analysis?Donald Krueckeberg, writing in Housing Policy Debate ("The Lessons of John Locke or Hernando de Soto: What if Your Dreams Come True?"), offers an interesting summary of the Locke-deSoto position but worries that, "This theory lacks any criteria governing equity, limits, and balance." And (you guessed it) more homeownership in the U.S, would contribute to more, "urban sprawl and its inefficiency, waste, individual excesses and inequity in access to employment." (I have to quickly pull out David Brooks' "On Paradise Drive" if I want to balance the gloom that quotes like this bring on.)
Going back to yesterday's post, how is it that most Americans retain any optimisim? Are they fools? Or is Krueckeberg and company's focus on statics just plain misleading?
Sunday, June 13, 2004
Optimism
On the heels of the week's discussions of Ronald Reagan's optimistic attitude, today's NY Times shows some of the evidence from a Pew Research Center 2002 international poll. Responding to the statement, "Success in life is pretty much determined outside our control," Americans were most likely to disagree. (Canadians and Japanese were among the few groups with a majority disagreeing; Britons were not, being apparently less optimistic than Venezuelans(!) but more optimistic than the French.) Americans are more likely to aspire than to envy. This is why class-warfare politics is less successful here. Equality and liberty are less likely to be in conflict when people have reason to be optimistic about their future -- when they expect that their destiny is substantially under their control -- when they focus on dynamics and the future. Steve Hayward and Kevin Starr explain further in the thoughtful article.
In this setting, politics becomes less important and political participation is less attractive. The bad news is that interest groups are more likely to thrive when the rest of us have bigger fish to fry. There are always good news and bad news
