Category Archives: Business

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

The End Is Near

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…and it’s going to be awesome:

…government-dominated systems are inherently defective. Not because the people who run them aren’t smart and well-intentioned — though they are by no means universally smart and well-intentioned — but because it is the nature of political institutions to be insulated from the information-feedback that characterizes marketplace activity.

Simply put, when Coca-Cola introduces New Coke or McDonald’s introduces the McGratin Croquette (shrimp, mashed potatoes and deep-fried macaroni) and hordes of people don’t show up to buy them, those products go away, and if a company makes enough such unwanted products, it goes away, too. But if you live in The Bronx and your local elementary school is terrible, it does not go bankrupt, and you probably don’t have even 20 other options, though there are 900 kinds of shampoo on the shelves. There are many good ways to invest 12% of your income for retirement, but that’s harder to do when you first have to put 12% into a bad investment, Social Security.

The decline or dismantling of these programs will prevent us from pouring a great deal of good money into bad investments. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and related entitlements make up the largest part of federal spending; combine those with national defense and interest on the debt, and you are talking about nearly the entire federal budget — about 81%, with the rest of it comprising that piddling non-defense discretionary spending that President Obama goes on about.

But where we’re not going to be putting our money is not nearly as important as where we are going to be putting it: into productive enterprises, into the creation of actual goods and services in the real economy.

Here’s the new book, which comes out today.

Business, Economics, Political Commentary

Money Wasted On Advertising

2 Comments

…by New York State:

You can’t make major changes like these in a state like New York without attracting lots of free attention and publicity. Do the job well and you won’t have to spend a penny on publicity. If New York state became a genuine leader in business-friendly reform, headlines everywhere would blare the news out for free. Every sentient business leader in America would know that New York state was open for business again.

But other states have nothing to worry about. The corruptocrats in Albany and in the City aren’t going to change their ways any time soon.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Social Commentary

African Goats

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…and American exceptionalism:

American exceptionalism — to the extent it remains — is not the product of some sort of genetic superiority. The settlers who made something of Jamestown after Dale’s reforms were the same ones who were bowling in the streets instead of working when he arrived.

What is exceptional about America — at least, what’s been exceptional up to now — is the extent to which individuals were allowed to keep the fruits of their own labor instead of having them seized by people in power for their own purposes. The insight behind American exceptionalism is that people work harder and better for themselves, as free people, than they do as servants for some alleged communal good.

But maybe Shapiro’s right, and this insight isn’t as exceptional as I make out. After all, it’s also contained in a West African proverb, to the effect that “The goat owned in common dies of hunger.”

Human nature isn’t so different, whether you’re in 17th century North America, 19th century Africa or the 21st century United States.

What’s striking isn’t that human nature is the same, but that so many want to pretend that it’s not.

The primary project of the left, since Rousseau, has been about the denial of human nature or, if they conceded that it exists, to force it into a different Procrustean mold, and build the New Soviet Man. All in the name of fairness and compassion, of course.

Business, Economics, Political Commentary

Dollar Jobs

44 Comments

A thought experiment.

If I were an employer, I wouldn’t want “free” labor of that nature, because it can consume too many resources just trying to manage it, when you’d have no authority because it could just walk away with no penalty. It’s the same problem that people have with volunteer organizations.

I have a better, and slightly less controversial proposal. Just let the market work, and eliminate the minimum wage. It would do wonders for youth unemployment in the inner city.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Technology and Society

Oil And Gas

4 Comments

The new green energy:

…as profits from wind, solar, biofuels and other alternatives consistently fell short of expectations — and as the fossil fuel business boomed — things got complicated. Venture capitalists and other investment funds started stretching the definition of clean technology almost beyond recognition in an effort to make money while clinging to their environmental ideals.

Today, clean technology investment funds are not trying to replace the fossil fuel industry, they’re trying to help it by financing companies that can make mining and drilling less dirty. The people running these funds acknowledge the apparent hypocrisy, but defend a more liberal definition of clean technology.

“Oil and gas will be with us for a long time. If we can clean that up we will do the world a great service,” says Wal van Lierop, CEO of Chrysalix, a Vancouver, Canada-based venture capital firm founded in 2001.

Shat a shock, that profits “consistently fell short of expectations.” Perhaps, like the president and his campaign-donating cronies, they had unrealistic expectations. Or more likely for the latter, they just expected the taxpayer to make up the difference.

Business, Economics, Education, Mathematics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society

Fifty To One

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A new climate education project:

50 to 1 cuts across all the noise and fury surrounding the ‘climate debate’ and gets right to the point: Even if the IPCC is right, and even if climate change IS happening and it IS caused by man, we are STILL better off adapting to it as it happens than we are trying to ‘stop’ it. ‘Action’ is 50 times more expensive than ‘adaptation’, and that’s a conclusion which is derived directly from the IPCC’s own predictions and formulae!

Here’s a link to the Indiegogo site.

Business, Economics, Health, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

ObamaCare

3 Comments

Just how ignorant is its namesake about it?

Well, to be fair, he could be just lying.

[Update a while later]

Unravel it, and you get a train wreck.

Actually, you get a train wreck just in trying to implement it:

Baucus isn’t the only Capitol Hill Democrat worried about a “train wreck,” according to The Hill. Even those not yet on Capitol Hill have distanced themselves from the unpopular program. Elizabeth Colbert Busch, a Democrat running for a House seat in a South Carolina special election, called the ACA “extremely problematic.”

As 2014 draws ever closer, and the true scale of the problems of ObamaCare become apparent, expect more Democratic incumbents to commiserate with their constituents about the “extremely problematic” “train wreck” they imposed on them. They had better not expect the voters to let them off the hook, however, no matter how many times Obama tells them they have nothing to worry about.

Everyone running next year against an opponent who voted for this monstrosity should make it a focus of their campaign. Even if the opponent renounces their own vote to attempt to save their seat (that’s the polite word…), their judgment should be called into question.

Business, Culinary, Health, Science And Society

The Bee Mystery

9 Comments

I hadn’t known about this:

Researchers are making headway in mapping the genes that help bees overcome these obstacles, including which genes help them safely break down pesticides. Now researchers have identified several compounds that help turn on those genes. They’re present in honey, something commercial bees don’t get to keep–their food supply is taken for human use, and bees are feed sweet substitutes like corn syrup.

Wenfu Mao and colleagues found three compounds in honey that increase the expression of a gene that helps bees metabolize pesticides. The most important chemical is something called p-coumaric acid, which is found in pollen cells. By eating honey, which contains pollen, the bees are exposed to a compound that basically boosts their ability to break down dangerous chemicals. So honey substitutes like high-fructose corn syrup may compromise their health.

You don’t say. Corn syrup isn’t good for anyone. No reason to think it would keep a bee healthy, but apparently the industry fooled themselves into thinking so.

Now that they understand this, maybe there’s something they can do about it, and still harvest honey.