Transparency and Doctors

HHS has released data on Medicare payments to doctors, which are discussed here.  The Post had a good article this morning, discussing some of the reasons for variations in payments among specialties, etc.  Putting that story and the Wonkblog post together gives the usual conclusion: it's complicated.  Maybe I'm biased, but when I read articles about farm policy and the food movement that's my usual reaction: you're oversimplifying, it's more complicated than that.  I'd venture to state a general rule: the knowledge an insider has is more complicated than the knowledge an outsider can discover. 

Having said that, I have to go back 20 years when EWG was suing USDA for payments to farmers.  My reaction then, in discussions with an IT person, was reserved--it seemed to me that we treated farmers as persons under the Privacy Act, which meant their data should be private as well.  The Court of Appeals for the district disagreed with my opinion.  Over the years I've come to believe that government payments should be public.  Even though I've little faith in the ability of the media to get a good understanding of the issues, either with farm payments or doctors payments, more data is better than less.

50th Anniversaries: IBM 360

Here's a long piece on the IBM 360, which celebrates its 50th anniversary, at least of its announcement, this year.  This wikipedia article says there's no working 360 in existence. 

The trip down memory lane naturally led me to this wikipedia article on COBOL, which I see is still around and kicking.

Common Ag Policy

The EU used to have a CAP blog, but these days it only gets posted in German.  I may be half-German, but I don't read it so I haven't kept up with EU developments.  Today I got to this BBC article on the EU: 

According to my mental math, the EU is spending about $80 billion on its ag policy.  A couple paragraphs from the article shows some differences, and some commonalties with ours:

...greening targets have been watered down, environmentalists say: the requirement for arable farmers to grow at least three different crops, to promote biodiversity; for farmers to leave 7% of their land fallow, to encourage wildlife; and for farmers to maintain pasture land permanently, rather than ploughing it up.

The definition of an "active farmer" has also been contentious. The current payments system is largely based on land area and past subsidy levels, meaning that landowners like airports and sports clubs, which do not farm, have been getting subsidies based on their grasslands or other eligible land areas.

Mark Bittman and IPCC on Yield Changes

Mark Bittman writes in April 2 NYTImes about the IPCC report with the theme the effects of climate warming

"So yields of corn and wheat are down and falling while prices are going up."

From an NPR interview with an IPCC scientist, who didn't concur with the final report:

"Take crop yields, for example. The report says climate change will cause them to fall by a few percent per decade. But Tol says technological innovation will likely raise crop yields by 10 percent or more each decade.
"So it's not that crop yields are going to fall, but they're going to rise more slowly because of climate change," he says. "And then of course it doesn't sound as alarming."

From the IPCC report.

Current economic studies of climate change that include farm- and/or market-level adjustments suggest that the negative effects of climate change on agriculture probably have been overestimated by studies that do not account for adjustments that will be made. This may be caused by the ability of the agricultural production community to respond with great flexibility to a gradually changing climate. Typically, extreme weather poses a significant challenge to individual farming operations that may lack the spatial diversity and financial resources of large, integrated, corporate enterprises with production capabilities in one or more areas.

Simulation modeling using four GCM-based scenarios showed that U.S. cereal production decreases by 21-38% when farmers continue to do what they are now doing (i.e., no adaptation) (see Table 15-4). When scenarios that involve adaptation by farmers are used, decreases in cereal production are not as large and the adaptations are shown to offset the initial climate-induced reduction by 35-60% (Schimmelpfennig et al., 1996; Segerson and Dixon, 1999).

And

When autonomous agronomic adaptation is included, crop modeling assessments indicate, with medium to low confidence⁶, that climate change will lead to generally positive responses at less than a few °C warming and generally negative responses for more than a few °C in mid-latitude crop yields. 

Vilsack on FSA Offices

From Agweb, on Vilsack's Hill testimony:

Vilsack said he would like to see three types of FSA offices in the future: central offices with a supervisor and three or more employees, branch offices with at least three employees, but no supervisor, and satellite offices where people could obtain information by appointment.

Vilsack said he would like to see three types of FSA offices in the future: central offices with a supervisor and three or more employees, branch offices with at least three employees, but no supervisor, and satellite offices where people could obtain information by appointment. He emphasized the restructuring effort is not about saving money, but modernizing the system, and that he would like to see the FSA offices “provide additional information above and beyond what they traditionally do.

 “Part of this modernization effort is really designed to make them a one-stop shop for farmers who are looking for information on rural development programs, how they might enter into the local regional food system opportunities, how they might take advantage of conservation programs, and have the FSA offices act as a bridge or connector with those other opportunities,” Vilsack said.


 Vilsack said he would like to see three types of FSA offices in the future: central offices with a supervisor and three or more employees, branch offices with at least three employees, but no supervisor, and satellite offices where people could obtain information by appointment.
He emphasized the restructuring effort is not about saving money, but modernizing the system, and that he would like to see the FSA offices “provide additional information above and beyond what they traditionally do.” “Part of this modernization effort is really designed to make them a one-stop shop for farmers who are looking for information on rural development programs, how they might enter into the local regional food system opportunities, how they might take advantage of conservation programs, and have the FSA offices act as a bridge or connector with those other opportunities,” Vilsack said.

See more at: http://www.agweek.com/event/article/id/23006/#sthash.WO6wSuZD.dpuf

College and Smoking

Some recent research found that growing up in college towns was strongly correlated with becoming famous (as in rating a Wikipedia entry).  (Urban areas and immigrants were also correlated.)

That was on my mind when I saw this map. 
Why?  Because I know where Tompkins county, NY is, which is where Ithaca, NY is.  It stands out on the map of smoking rates by county--the dark blue dot in upstate NY, meaning it has one of the lowest smoking rates in the country. (I suspect the other dark blue areas are also college towns or rich urban areas (Charlottesville, VA is one guess.)

Now I don't know there's a correlation between becoming famous and not smoking, but inquiring minds want to know. (Particularly as I started to smoke in Ithaca, NY and am not famous.)

Inequality: on the Misuse of Statistics

Prof. Mankiw of Harvard linked to this Brookings study on inequality.  It's interesting, and makes the valid, I think, point that our tax/safety net system means lower income people are protected against volatility.  But it fails, at least in my quick reading, to note that figures based on the 2000-2010 period, as its are, will give misleading results.

Why?  Because 2000 was the peak of the dot com bubble in the stock market, while 2010 was early in the recovery from the Great Recession.  The net effect is to understate the income gains of the top 1 percent, and .1 percent and .01 percent.  

Thailand Has Satellites?

The most surprising factoid from all the coverage of the MH370 plane disaster is that Thailand has satellites.  Turns out they've had at least one for over 20 years!!

The world is moving much too fast for this geezer.

What's Wrong with "Industrial"?

I've been doing some reading in 19th century documents--at that time "industrial education" seems to mean something like teaching students to work (in various trades and crafts, even in agriculture). Even earlier, "industry" was one of Ben Franklin's favorite words.

When I was growing up "industrial"  was often attached to "production", meaning stuff factories made, the more they made the better things were.

But since 1980 the use of "industrial" has declined while a bit more recently the use of "industrial agriculture" has exploded.  In this usage, "industrial" is pejorative.  Apparently it's interchangeable with "factory farms".  (Again, when I was young factories were good things; they provided jobs, made stuff, were a symbol of modernity.)

I understand, I think, the thinking behind the pejorative use of "industrial agriculture" and "factory farms", but I'm a bit amazed at the transformation of good to bad over the last 30 years.

The Push and Pull of the Bureaucracy

From NASCOE:

"Items discussed with DAFO include the need for more Key PT’s. One state was able to hire more than the national notice allowed. I encourage each state to get with your SED and figure out a plan to request more."

The budget proposal to cut positions and close county offices is the big issue.  I've already noticed Sen. Gillibrand voicing opposition to closing offices in NY, and I assume that's happening elsewhere.  Since I'm retired, I shouldn't really comment, but the two sentences I quote struck me.  It's an example of how the field can out-maneuver the DC bureaucrats.  For a political scientist, it might be an instance of "rational choice", the idea that people in the bureaucracies look out for the interests of the bureaucracy, not the public.  But applying the idea of the free market to such issues, you could say the "interests of the public" are the result of the interplay of the struggle of various interests.  I think Madison's Federalist #10 might be an example of that.

There's been a long but sporadic effort in USDA to rationalize the county office structure, going back to 1976, an effort having two thrusts: establishing service centers, with multiple agencies in one location, and closing offices which no longer serve a lot of farmers.   There's been a lot of resistance to the effort, so the result has been less consolidation and fewer offices closed than the DC planners hoped to achieve but more than county employees and farmers wanted.

In the broader view, a similar process has been going on for over a century.  The rural population has dwindled in parts of the country ever since 1900 or so.  Reformers, possibly including my grandfather, thought the rural church needed to consolidate--rather than Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, etc. small churches in small towns, why not get together into one which could afford better ministers, support more Sunday schools and other amenities.  Don't think it worked out.

Just recently I saw a blog post on the closing of rural hospitals in Georgia--similar idea I'd think. (Greene, NY, which was our market town, used to have a hospital but it closed in the early 60's, I believe.)