Why I'm Not a Conservative

The New Yorker had an article last week by Atul Gawande concerning the costs of health care. He uses McAllen, TX with its high costs to compare with other cities with lower costs. His analysis, in brief: Some treatments clearly work, others are more uncertain and some carry both possible gains and risks. But most treatments cost money. Some physicians care about money, some don't. It's partially a personal trait, but also a result of the culture in a city. American culture and social institutions particularly encourage thinking about money (as opposed, for example, to worrying about risks and the patients' overall health) and activity ("do something, don't just stand there").

My stereotypical conservative would argue that following the money always conduces to better health care, but not so.

Gawande is always interesting. In this case, I think he could have mentioned the specialization of care a bit more.

A Different View

Cafe Hayek alerted me to this article by Brink Lindsey from Reason discussing the reasons for the growing disparity between rich and poor. The writer may be using a strawman in arguing against Paul Krugman: " We have to back up to the 1930s and ’40s—when, he contends, the “norms and institutions” that shaped a more egalitarian society were created."

I'm not a conservative so I resist the argument, but he does remind of the bad side of that society--racism, discrimination, sexism, and nationalism. The "Greatest Generation" it wasn't, IMHO.

The Wikipedia Revolution and Culture

Just finished "The Wikipedia Revolution", by Andrew Lih. Before I get to the most interesting part of it, let me complain. The type face used is a sans serif one which I found particularly bothersome. Way back in the early 70's I was researching replacements for our IBM MT/ST word processors, which got me into CRT displays and legibility which, since I tend to digress, surprising as that may be to, got me into reading about type faces. This was way before Postscript and other computer-generated fonts. It seems the function of "serifs" is to help guide the eye, and the older you get the more guidance you need.

Anyhow, the book is good, although I was vaguely aware of some of the history. What was most interesting was his discussion of the way culture and history impact the structure and operations of the Japanese (lots more anonymity), German (more rule-oriented and concerned with quality, not quantity), and Chinese (although the spoken languages differ, there's one written language, except there's actually three systems) wikipedias.

ERS and Locavore

ERS is doing a conference on locavore. It's not true USDA is in thrall to big ag--it's better to view agencies like ERS and Extension as bureaucratic entrepreneuts--willing to follow the crowd whereever it wants to go because that's the way to get the right people on the Hill to support your appropriations.

On Cooking

In today's Times Amanda Hesser has an op-ed criticizing Michelle Obama for saying cooking isn't her favorite thing, etc. I'm not impressed with the column, particularly this paragraph:

The twist, of course, is that convenience foods save neither money nor time. As Marion Nestle pointed out in her 2006 book “What to Eat,” prewashed romaine hearts cost at least $1.50 a pound more than romaine heads. And the 2006 U.C.L.A. study found that families saved little or no cooking time when they built their meals around frozen entrees and jarred pasta sauce.

Ms. Hesser neglects the critical saving, at least for the old geezers and the lazy: effort. And most convenience foods save effort, if not money.

On a sidenote, have we had any spouses in the White House who enjoyed cooking to the extent they sat the chefs down? (If I remember, Calvin Coolidge did some of his cooking, at least according to Backstairs at the White House.)

Kristof Versus Shakespeare

I remember we read Julius Caesar in high school (9th grade maybe?). I vaguely remember someone, maybe Caesar, saying not to trust skinny men (like me) who are hungry and discontented.

But today in the Times Nicholas Kristof has a list of 15 things to do to stay safe in the sorts of countries he visits and in number 9 he disagrees with the great Will:

9. When you arrive in a new city, don’t take an airport taxi unless you know it is safe. If you do take a cab, choose a scrawny driver and lock ALL the doors — thieves may pull open the doors at a red light and run off with a bag.

I'm glad to know skinny is getting some respect.

Czars and Bureaucracies

This article at Government Executive argues that Obama's "czars" reflect and counter a bureaucracy's resistance to cooperating with other bureaucracies. Makes sense, but what happens when the bureaucracies in conflict are the Navy, Marines, Army, Air Force in DOD or NRCS, FSA, RD, APHIS, etc. in USDA? (Though it seems Secretary Gates is reasonably effective in managing DOD.)

Motorcycle Babe for Justice?

I don't like motorcycles. When I was young, occasionally a motorcyclist would come bombing up NY route 369 to the corner (it was a reasonably flat and quiet ride from Binghamton, or maybe from the Chenango Valley State Park). The noise would carry across the valley to our farm, disrupting the rural tranquility. To a young boy it represented the intrusion of urban aliens into our agrarian paradise. No, I don't like motorcycles.

But, given this sentence from the Times profile on Judge Sotomayor, I'm ready for her to be on the Court: "One incident that figures largely in firm lore was a seizure in Chinatown, where the counterfeiters ran away, and Ms. Sotomayor got on a motorcycle and gave chase."

This was when she was with a law firm that was trying to protect trademarks from counterfeiters, particularly high-end pocketbooks. It's the urban equivalent of Justice O'Connor's youth on her Arizona ranch.

Unpleasant Report for Bureaucracies

It seems bureaucrats are better at paying their bills timely than the bureaucracies they run--from a Government Executive article on a Congressional Research Service report:

According to the most recent data from the Office of Management and Budget, in January 2009, governmentwide delinquency rate for centrally billed card accounts -- those paid by an agency rather than an employee -- was 19.23 percent. The average delinquency rate for individually billed cards was 6.25 percent, data showed.

USDA was one of the worst agencies, though apparently DOD distorts the picture.

Boom Over for Organic Dairy?

That's the theme of this NYTimes article, describing farms which went organic in 2005 or 6, and now are having problems. I never got into the business details of our farm, so I'm not sure who we shipped our milk to and whether there was a contract. I suspect not. Apparently organic dairies have contracts with their processor, presumably to ensure compliance with organic standards?

One of the problems the organic people run into is the math of a niche market. Generally speaking, the bigger the market, the more fluctuations will damp themselves out. (Unless, that is, you have a bubble like the subprime or dot-com ones--then the bigger the market the harder the fall.) So the article mentions the possibility of selling milk into the conventional milk market, or trying to sell locavore/raw milk.

One result of the problems will be the less efficient organic producers will fail, meaning the average size will increase, moving organic dairy further away from the organic ideal.

[Updated: Of course things aren't good for conventional dairy either, as this LA Times story says.]

[Updated II: John Phipps comments on the same article. I'm struck by the fact that even for organic dairies the cost of [bought, I assume] feed is 50 percent or more of total costs.]