The Past Under Our Feet

The NY Times has an article about Egypt, the hook being the recent discovery of another pyramid, the foundations of which were buried under yards of sand. Given Egypt's long history, the people seem haunted by the past.

Mr. Amin mused: “This deep conviction, ‘Leave it to time, leave it to God, God will resolve it, don’t worry too much, everything will be all right in the end’ — can’t this also be the result of the length of history? When you have a short amount of time, you can’t rely on bad things to be corrected or mistakes to be corrected. But in the long run, things are bound to be all right at the end.”

There's a contrast with our consciousness of history (see my recent post), or lack thereof. Certainly with the election of Obama we think we're progressing, ever onward and upward.

[Added] Strange Maps has a comparison of the Obama vote and the 1860 cotton production--for an example of how the past influences the present.

Combining Institutions

Some while back my local Safeway store installed a Starbucks counter. One would think it's good for everyone--Safeway customers get their caffeine fix, Safeway gets more traffic and profits from the counter--everyone profits.

But, as is often the case with people and institutions, it's not that simple. For one thing, the Starbucks employees are actually Safeway employees, subject to their rules. In the wider world, Starbuck stores have a tip jar at the register, which tends to fill up rather quickly. But Safeway employees aren't supposed to take tips. And I'd suspect manning Starbucks counters is probably less desirable work than being a Safeway clerk, and probably gets paid a lower starting salary.

So over time there's been a big turnover of employees. And there's been attempts to put out a tip jar, which Safeway management at my local store seemed to cast a blind eye on, for a while. But in the last weeks, the jar has vanished, along with the woman who was the best (IMHO) employee, and the one who handled the Starbucks paperwork.

(Having lived through attempts to consolidate USDA agencies, I'm sensitized to these sorts of conflicts and problems.)

Grade Inflation and Grade Deflation

It's a commonplace to observe that average grades at some colleges and high schools have increased over the years, to the point that A is average and 4.5 on a scale of 1-4 is good. I think humans have problems telling the truth, so it's easier to shade the grades slightly, which over the years becomes more than slight.

But I just started to read a review of a history of girl's scouting in which the author talked of summer camps as being "middle class". Without being too nitpicky about it, seems to me that's "grade deflation". Surely if you had enough money to send your kids to camp in the first part of the 20th century, you were probably upper class, or at least upper middle class.

I think the logic of this deflation is the same as for inflation--making people feel good by calling them something they aren't. In America, "upper class" is bad, so we deflate the term.

Changing Times--History

Walter Jeffries at Sugar Mountain Farm has a post about the ruins to be found on the mountain--not Indian but the remnants of life from the 19th century. It's all too easy to assume that history is a linear progress (there were even paintings from the 19th century showing the "march of progress", from wilderness to settled civilization). But, at least in the U.S., it's an ebb and flow.

Markets, Revisited

Ann Althouse provides a set of Fox News videos, showing the wisdom of the mavens of the financial markets (as compared to one Peter Shiff).

Competition and Free Markets and Rationality

Two pieces in the NY Times today relating to a market-based economy.

Robert FRank writes on whether competition in free markets does away with discrimination. He argues, it doesn't, except in cases where the markets are very good and very competitive. That may have been the case in the 2008 election. He cites Jackie Robinson as a case

"During Mr. Robinson’s 10-year career with the team, the Dodgers went to six World Series and he was voted to the National League All-Star team six times. In retirement, he was elected to Baseball’s Hall of Fame on the first ballot. Shortly after Mr. Robinson’s arrival in the major leagues, it became clear to all that failure to field the best possible team, irrespective of color, was a sure recipe for failure."

As a youthful Yankees fan (who only knew his older sister rooted for the Dodgers), I beg to differ--the Yankees mostly beat the Dodgers, despite Jackie (and Roy, and Junior, and Newk, et. al) in the Series throughout the 40's and 50's, even though they were very late to integrate their team. So it wasn't "clear to all" at the time. And irrational prejudice overrode reason.

And in the Week in Review, there's an article discussing research on the role of testosterone and cortisol (i.e., maleness) in the ups and downs of market. An academic believes "raging hormones might explain why the men who rule the global markets send them rocketing up when they’re on a roll, and swooping down when they get scared, exhibiting judgment that can remind you of the guys in an Adam Sandler movie."

Makes sense to me.

Transparency in Government II

John Dickerson of Slate is dubious over Obama's transparency promises, particularly his Saturday video broadcast.

The bottom line is few people (outside of the relevant bureaucrats and lobbyists and interest groups) are really interested in the nitty-gritty of government. I'm not aware C-Span puts up high ratings. In terms of feeding the beast, any government has to hope to catch the attention of filters, whether a news media type, or now a blogger type, which can start to amplify the information.

FSA Is Better Than EU

At administering farm program payments and getting them accurate. At least, that's a possible conclusion from this quote:

As Wyn Grant has observed, the Court of Auditors annual report on the 2007 EU budget published on Monday identified a clutch of weaknesses associated with the controls on spending on EU farm policies. The Court observes that “Some 20 percent of payments audited at final beneficiary level and revealed incorrect payments, a limited number of which had a high financial impact.” It concludes that farm subsidies remained “affected by a material level of error of legality and/or regularity”.

In its worst days, FSA never had that high a rate of erroneous payments (and even that was partially a matter of definition).

On Whole Foods

My investment in Whole Foods looks sicker by the moment. And the idea that as times become harder people will pay a premium for better food is foolish as well. But there's a straw of hope, in this post from Treehugger

Transparency in Government

Slate has a good post summarizing 10 ways in which Obama can make government more transparent (drawn from various think-tank proposals), and the drawbacks of each. Because I've blogged in the past about transparency, I feel an obligation to comment on some of Slate's comments.

2. Lobbyist disclosure. I favor disclosure, but not prohibitions. (There was a piece in the paper, perhaps the Post, this week reporting academic research that said lobbyists gave the most money to the committee members who asked the best (i.e., not grandstanding) questions in committee hearings.

3. Broadcast cabinet meetings. That's idiotic. Not broadcasting, but the idea of having cabinet meetings. The meetings which matter are not formal meetings of the full cabinet, but the meetings the cabinet member has with the director of OMB at budget time, the meetings the President has with his staff, with maybe one or two Cabinet secretaries.

5. Get rid of pseudo classifications. I agree. Each piece of paper should have two attributes: its bureaucratic distribution (i.e., Eye-only, etc.) and its classification level.

6 Make all filings electronic. Yes. Also all documents.