Eat those mofo CEOs! Or maybe not.
For me the ”Eat the Mofo CEOs!” argument, aka “CEO pay is an outrageous inequitable violation of human rights”, etc, etc. isn’t necessarily wrong, it’s just very incomplete.
What we DO KNOW is that most folks are a lot better off here in USA than in most of the alternative economies. This is particularly true for those of us making more than a modest amount per year, but I think it’s hard to make a case that even welfare folks here are not better off than in, say, any of the other top 10 populated countries with perhaps Japan as an exception.
What has generated that prosperity for so many? Certainly “high CEO pay” is at best only a small factor in this, but I’m not clear how you can start modifying things like “maximum CEO benefits” without running into some complications with innovation and productivity.
One can reasonably note that there’s not a correlation between CEO pay and corporate productivity (at least I think this is indicated by several studies). However a better question is really “is there a correlation between the lack of intervention in economies and productivity?”. This has been tested now for many centuries across many countries, and we generally find that lack of intervention seems to create more total wealth and massive intervention as in old school communist crazy stuff tends to bring a sh**storm of economic trouble.
However US style ALSO seems to push the distribution more to the rich. Of course it would be better to have more equal distribution IF you could keep all that productivity, but how do you arrange that?
It’s the biggest question of our lives. I don’t have the answer, but when I look around the USA (where distribution is NOT equitable even after heavily progressive taxing of the rich) I see a LOT better standard for pretty much everybody than when I look around places that don’t have vibrant capitalistic economies (or have only had them a short time).
One can offer up Scandinavia as the “alternative model” and I’d agree that if we could duplicate Scandanavian standards of living at US scale we should do so. but I don’t think you could apply that model effectively to a country the size of the USA. These countries have some major advantages that have to do with oil wealth and demographics and history. They are smaller than many US states and thus not really comparable if you are talking about global economic architecture, as you must do when trying to “fix” the many problems the world is facing after the boom and recent mini-bust of the post WWII era.
It seems to me that the *first* line of discussion with respect to any economy needs to be “how do we create wealth?” rather than “how do we distribute he wealth we have created?”
This point is completely obvious to pretty much anybody I talk to from the right or in business, and seems to be completely opaque to many on the left side of the political equation, especially the wall street occupation forces. Many of those folks seem out of touch with basic business economics and hell bent on the destruction of capitalism – naively assuming that massive productivity will continue under all scenarios, so the only thing we should focus on is making sure the rich don’t get … richer, because then we’ll see all that prosperity flow more equitably to … usually… their causes or even to them.
But be careful what you wish for because when taking a global perspective on things redistribution will not necessarily flow in your direction! Folks in China and India are living at much lower levels than almost anybody here in the states, so as we work for equitable distribution (as we should), we’ll need to work to get THEM more involved in the economy so they can raise their standards to a fraction of ours! Globalization is taking care of this right now in the sloppy form capitalism usually takes, but it’s ironic to me that occupiers seem to think the wealth of the super rich should be heading back to mainstreet USA rather than to the truly needy. Rich or poor, pretty much everybody seems to think they are the underpaid and overworked folks. Take out a map folks and put your finger on your location. If it’s in USA then equitable distribution is likely to flow AWAY from you.
I’m all for more equitable distribution IF you can do it without hurting productivity, though I also would like to see that prosperity flow to those who really need it rather than simply bloating the bureaucracy as we tend to do when taxes go up.
Ray Dalio of Bridgewater Capital – the world’s largest Hedge Fund – both makes a ton of money and pays a ton of taxes. Like most of the rich he pays both a greater total amount and a greater percentage of his income to federal taxes. His point on Charlie Rose the other night was direct and simple. Like Gates, Buffett, and legions of other super-wealthy folks Dalio is going to be giving most of his billion dollar fortune away to the poor. He’d be happy to give it to the government IF they’d spend it wisely, but he knows that they will NOT.
USA Debt Rating Downgrade to AA+ is from our failure to cut defense and entitlements
S&P’s decision to downgrade the US debt rating from AAA to AA+ is very unwelcome news but it should not surprise anybody, especially in Washington where neither party has been willing to tackle the deficit or the debt in a responsible manner.
It’s time to cut the only two things in the budget that really matter – the bloated portions of Defense and Entitlements. Even estimating (and then cutting back) the bloat at 10% – absurdly low given how recklessly this money is spent – we could solve all deficit and debt problems in less than a decade. DO IT, DAMN IT!
The Tea Party’s was right that debt and deficit are major concerns, but their approach to solving the problem has been almost infantile, lacking in strategy as well as substance. They won’t cut defense – clearly required to solve this problem unless you raise taxes which as they correctly note brings a host of other problems into the mix. Defense spending is so high it’s become counterproductive, creating blowback and international tension which is mostly a function of our own reckless big spending in hostile territory.
One does not have to be an isolationist to see that it’s time for a much more strategic spending focus. Troops can be paid well and protected – these portions need no cuts, but operations and maintenance budgets in each of the services are where the big money lies, and where the big cuts won’t create trouble for policy or troops.
The solution is pretty obvious to many of us out here in the real world, where two things are crystal clear: 1. Entitlements are out of control. The prosperity the USA has enjoyed for over a century as the kingpin of the industrialized world is winding down in favor of spreading the wealth around the globe, especially to the developing countries of China and India. This prosperity allowed us (and by “us” I mean everybody – from poor to rich) to enjoy health, welfare, education, and retirement benefits the rest of the world could only dream about. Liberal middle class folks are whining too much about how they might lose benefits they never paid for – much of this in the form of “defined benefits” where their contributions won’t match their benefit so it’ll have to come from future taxpayers. Social Security has this problem, but it’s easy to solve by lifting retirement age a few years for those who can afford the wait OR doing a ” means test” OR taxing higher income beneficiaries. If we do nothing the Social Security trust fund will run out in under 20 years according to most estimates. The fund is actually growing now but demographics in the form of fewer workers and more recipients will soon overwhelm the system. Unlike a well managed system, Social Security has promised more benefits than incoming payments can support.
Summary: Simple solution is to cut bloat in the two big ticket items of defense and entitlements. Problem solved, AAA restored. DO IT.
Rulers of England
Rulers of England
In honor of the upcoming English Royal Wedding and the fact I’m watching “The Tudors” on Netflix right now, I thought it would be fun to post a list of the rulers of England.
This is a list of the generally recognized kings and queens of England from 1066 to the present day.
Norman Kings:
William I (1066-1087)
William II (1087-1100)
Henry I (1100-1135)
Stephen (1135-1154)
Plantagenets
Henry II (1154-1189)
Richard I (Richard the Lion-Hearted) (1189-1199)
John (1199-1216)
Henry III (1216-1272)
Edward I (1272-1307)
Edward II (1307-1327)
Edward III (1327-1377)
Richard II (1377-1399)
House of Lancaster
Henry IV (1399-1413)
Henry V (1413-1422)
Henry VI (1422-1461)
House of York
Edward IV (1461-1483)
Edward V (April-June 1483)
Richard III (1483-1485)
Tudors
Henry VII (1485-1509)
Henry VIII (1509-1547)
Edward VI (1547-1553)
Mary (1553-1558)
Elizabeth (1558-1603)
Stuarts
James I (1603-1625)
Charles I (1625-1649)
1649-1660 – Commonwelath Interregnum: England is briefly ruled by Parliament. Oliver Cromwell and son Richard Cromwell are the “Lord Protectors of the Commonwealth”. This time is often referred to as “the Protectorate”
Stuarts Restored to the Crown in 1660
Charles II (1660-1685)
James II (1685-1688)
The Bloodless Revolution 1688. Also known as “The Glorious Revolution”.
William (of Orange) and Mary (1689-1702)
Anne (1702-1714)
Hanovers
George I (1714-1727)
George II (1727-1760)
George III (1760-1820)
George IV (1820-1830)
William IV (1830-1837)
Victoria (1837-1901)
Saxe-Coburg-Gotha
Edward VII (1901-1910)
Windsors (George V-Elizabeth II)
(George V changed family name Wettin to Windsor)
George V (1910-1936)
Edward VIII (1936)
George VI (1936-1952)
Elizabeth II (1952- )
Yes, of course there is a fancy website for the upcoming Royal Wedding between Prince William and Catherine Middleton. It is the Royal Wedding website.
Stop calling me a climate skeptic just because I don’t believe in alarmism!
*scroll DOWN to skip to the summary*
I’m REALLY getting tired of so many friends and family calling me a global warming skeptic because 1. I am NOT a global warming skeptic and 2. It distracts from the important debate over warming which is how much it will impact our lives. There are really only two kinds of Global Warming Skeptics. The first challenge the fact that the earth, on average, has been warming up a bit. These folks are generally just stupid or stupidly adhering to the rants of people who are stupid, like Glenn Beck. The earth is, on average over the last century, warming up. Not much mind you – most estimates put the warming in the range of a degree C over the last century, but clearly the earth is warming up a bit.
There is a second kind of global warming skeptic who believes that humans are not the cause of the observed warming. FYI my misguided friends … I am NOT in that camp either! However a lot of bright folks are in that camp and are often scientifically challenging the idea that the observed warming of the last century is caused by human generated greenhouse gasses or “GHCs”. CO2 is usually cited as the main GHC culprit but there are several others like methane that are likely to play a role in observed warming. GHCs are considered the main cause of the small observed warming if, like me, you believe the warming is caused by human activity. So, I’m not THAT kind of skeptic either! Some excellent skeptical discussion of warming is at Climate Audit, the smartest of the “skeptic” blogs, and the counterpoint to Real Climate, the smartest of the blogs that discuss the science behind global warming. Several key players in the Climate Debate post at RealClimate, many are distinuished NASA scientists. I’d urge caution interpreting information from other places and even from these “very smart” blogs. The comments at all blogs tend to be much more biased (often to the point of blatant stupidity) than the posts, which even at advocacy blogs are often somewhat informative if you keep away from the personal or ego-driven junk.
Many blogs in the warming discussion take the form of advocating either for alarmism or skepticism rather than trying to review the science and the logical actions suggested by that science. I’m particularly not fond of Joe Romm’s ridiculous ”Climate Progress” which is mostly a constant attack on even well-informed skepticism and dissent from the climate alarmist “party line”. He seems to immediately ban even well reasoned dissenters from the comments, leaving … a fools pool of alarmist nonsense and political advocacy. Anthony Watts “Watts Up With That” is, IMHO, smarter and far more balanced than Climate Progress but is still pretty darn “skeptical”, tending to feature information that supports a skeptical view rather than promoting a more balanced perspective.
Summary: I AM NOT A DAMN Climate SKEPTIC! However I am not worried much about global warming. It’s impact so far has been trivial and it appears it will remain trivial, especially when we compare the likely impacts with current ongoing catastrophic conditions in much of the developing world, where water, disease, and poverty run rampant. Let’s fix that stuff first, since we can actually have an impact in that arena, and fast.
P.S. No, I have NOT changed my view about this, you just weren’t listening … See?
Never attribute to conspiracy that which can be adequately explained by stupidity
A clever but mildly alarming cartoon movie is making it’s viral rounds on the interwebs. I think it’s a Tea Party hit piece. My son asked my to watch and comment. As usual, you get more than you asked for when you ask me to do that. Like Mike Moore movies it’s a garden path of some honest and good points mixed in with exaggerations and half-truths, leading to unsupported and questionable conclusions.
The most alarming is how the film advocates violence against public servants. This is intolerable, and the makers of this kind of film should be ashamed that they abuse their right to free speech to incite people to violent acts against people they have unfairly villified.
The “film” http://www.youtube.com/user/theamericandreamfilm#p/u/1/kx7HDTDDopA
No. No Conspiracy. But the misleading notions are buried in several good points and a clever simplification of the systems that drive our remarkable, successful economy. Have you noticed your lifestyle lately? Where do you *actually see* evidence of the claimed “jackboot” of evil corrupt bankers? This is, FYI, a tea party hit piece and I think it’s support of violence against people is very alarming.
Interestingly many right and left wing folks will probably like this piece even though they hold opposite views of how the economy should and does work. Both think the sinister, poorly defined super rich “bad guys” are screwing it up for all us regular folks when in fact, like it or not, “we’re all in this together”.
Good points: Debt is very dangerous and it’s getting passed to your generation at an alarming rate. But not by bankers, it’s by … umm… your parents aka “me and mom” and their accomplices, namely your friend’s parents and everybody else including you. This is in the form of massive government borrowing to sustain massive Government spending, mostly on only TWO things. Military (US spend is half the global total) and “entitlements” like social security and govt health care programs. Another growing expense and implied (good) point in the film is that we pay huge and growing *interest* on this massive debt.
However lost in the cartoon’s simplicity is the complexity of money printing, inflation, and how the Federal Reserve, under Bernanke’s brilliant guidance, appears to have prevented a global economic meltdown. It’s odd to me they are raising alarms about things that worked, like the coordination of the global banking systems to prevent catastrophe. A global depression would have crushed the hopes and dreams of *billions of people* and this has not happened. Rather we’ve had some troubles but nothing catastrophic. Many believe this is because both Bush and Obama’s monetary policies under Paulson, Bernanke, and Geithner have been excellent, even brilliant, and effective in creating a “soft landing” for a troubled, overheated global economy. You can’t focus on the economic slowdown without also noting the huge surge in productivity and goods and wealth that led up to the trouble. Many of us were … in short … living too large and unsustainably. That led to trouble and the national and global economies are still fragile and debt is a huge concern. On that the film is correct in my view.
The real “Federal Banking System” story:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Reserve_System
The real “Red Shield” story:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rothschild_family
How much debt? YIKES!
http://www.usdebtclock.org/
Point ONE: Note how there are many countries without the strong banking and taxation systems this piece says are destroying our country. Examples abound, some are: Sudan, North Korea, Pakistan. I’d prefer living here… wouldn’t you? Both right and left wing propaganda folks don’t like real world examples of the things they advocate because the complexities often get in the way of what seem like nice clean relationships.
Point TWO: Why do so many powerful-but-not-rich-non-bankers work so hard to keep the system working? e.g. Bernanke, Obama, Gheitner are the *architects* of the systema and the policies the film hates. All these guys could make 10x current salaries outside of Government. They are super smart and competent and they believe the system serves the public good. In general, it does. Bill Gates is a beneficiary of the system as well as an architect of the new economy.
He’s wealthier than most *groups* of “Red Shield” folks, but runs a massive charity for extremely poor. They fight hard to bring our system to others, not to kill the goose that keeps laying the golden eggs. Or let’s take a look at a real live “rich banking” guy. Wells Fargo’s biggest owner Warren Buffett. Richest human in 2008, second in 2009, third now. What’s he doing with all that money he took from “Pile” in the film? Giving over 95% of his wealth it to the world’s poorest people and another few percent to other charities. Pretty greedy, eh?
Point THREE: What exactly is the film advocating as a solution? Correct to challenge us to spend less, but where is the call to massively cut defense, effectively required to balance the US budget? Tea Party is very much hypocritical on this point, thinking that govt waste does not extend to military, and also that you can cut significantly by cutting things like welfare. Both these ideas are simply foolish and naive. Defense is huge and therefore must be cut to cut the deficit and welfare is too small to matter much, cut or not.
Summary (the film would actually agree with much of this I think, but does not support the good news about USA in the film – they are fearmongering to try to get Tea Party people elected): There are problems but the US economic experiment remains the most successful in history and remains a powerful example of how to bring prosperity to hundreds of millions mostly within a framework of freedom and fairness. For every legitimate criticism (and there are many), there are many positive aspects to the entrepreneurial innovation and personal responsibility model. Let’s keep it.
Climate Change Projected Impacts from IPCC 4
As the climate debates continue we see an interesting – and familiar – pattern. Even as most now claim to accept the premise that “disaster is looming”, few are willing to take the steps needed to prevent that disaster. Although in my opinion disaster is NOT looming and many climate claims are either exaggerated or unscientific nonsense, it’s certainly clear that the planet is warming and that we’re going to experience changes – mostly negative – from that warming.
The challenges we may face that are listed below are should help shape efforts to mitigate the negative changes that are coming. They also should serve as a yardstick of how much the climate alarmists are justified in their concerns about climate catastrophe. Despite many decades of “global warming alarm” we have seen very few examples of trouble so far unless you attribute to global warming things like the Australian Wildfires (cause: arson) or Hurricane Katrina (cause: nature, faulty dikes).
Mitigation of problems is likely to be a lot more productive and less costly than trying to stop the warming, which would be hard to do even if we had the resolve to do it. And of course we do NOT have the resolve to mitigate CO2 in more than very modest and largely inconsequential ways. This should be pretty darn obvious to all by now given that even those who claim they are willing to make the needed lifestyle changes to mitigate CO2 are not making those changes, such as advocating for massive nuclear power deployment, cutting personal energy use by 80% or so, etc.
So, let’s actually do something productive by addressing water shortages *NOW* when they will do a lot more good than in the future. Millions are currently in peril from human and natural catastrophic conditions in many areas – especially in the developing world. Why fret over conditions that might threaten us in 2100 when we can easily mitigate water and crop shortages RIGHT NOW. Let’s get to work people!
Examples of some projected impacts for different regions are given in Table SPM.2.
| Africa |
|
|---|---|
| Asia |
|
| Australia and New Zealand |
|
| Europe |
|
| Latin America |
|
| North America |
|
| Polar Regions |
|
| Small Islands |
|
COOL IT: The Movie
Climatic clear thinker Bjorn Lomborg strikes again with a new film, “COOL IT”, based on his book of the same name. Blog post: coolit-themovie.com
Lomborg’s points, which suggest we need to address problems like global warming and global poverty more rationally, are so obvious as to defy intelligent objection, yet he remains one of the most controversial activists on earth, especially after offending the sensibilities of many with his remarkable book “The Skeptical Environmentalist”.
Lomborg’s views are slowly gaining the respect they deserve as alarmism about environmental issues falls prey to the facts and to common sense observations. Clearly there’s global warming, and clearly it’s not likely to be catastrophic. Dealing with massive current problems like global poverty, health, and economic issues will have a much greater return on our time and money investments than expensive and politicized mitigation programs, many of which will at best delay the effects of carbon emissions for only a few years at a staggering cost.
COOL IT serves as a counterpoint to the alarmism and denial that have characterized the climate debate for too long.
Feeling Good vs Doing Good
It seems these days I’m often pissing off friends and family for suggesting something that, frankly, is pretty obvious. Most of what passes as “doing good” these days are activities that make the feel-gooders feel good about themselves, their community, and life in general (that’s fine of course), but don’t do much to make the world a better place. It’s fine to engage in things that you enjoy that do not contribute to the greater good, but it is very important to recognize the difference, and not to conflate feel-good stuff with actual do-good stuff.
Real good comes in many forms, and thank goodness their are a LOT of people doing real good all around us. Friends and neighbors working and volunteering in health care, teaching, law enforcement, and hundreds of other public service jobs, NGOs building schools all over, Church groups teaching, etc, etc. Many of the folks doing that stuff are heroic, braving all kinds of bad conditions to bring health care, education, food, and good will to those who need it most.
But without even pointing out those obvious ‘feel good’ activities I’m going to hope we make better progress than we seem to be *re-defining* what it means to “do good”.
Those of us in the middle and up classes here in the USA enjoy historically unprecedented standards of living, and even those on welfare here in the USA live well by any reasonable global standards. Bringing this higher *standard of living* to the small numbers in the US and the huge numbers in other countries who do not benefit from our system is the greatest moral challenge of our time, yet I can’t help but think that the many “feel gooders” (and even worse – the political spenders on both sides of the political aisle) are distracting us and redirecting resources very inefficiently to projects that will have little significant positive impact.
As always, hoping folks chime in with their views about this, and for what it’s worse I’d agree that blogging is probably NOT an example of doing much if any good! Maybe I’m my own best example of the problem?
Misplaced compassion … kills
One of the most obvious things I assert is also the thing that bothers people the most. It’s that most of us tend to fret or show compassion over trivial or questionable things while we ignore the catastrophic circumstances that plague so many people around the world.
A great recent example is the effort to “find Paco”, a dog that was “lost” by Delta Airlines during a trip back to (the UK?) from Mexico. As with most stories like this, the perception at first glance is heart wrenching. But then the facts clear up why this story is ridiculously overblown.
Paco was a stray, picked up by a tourist couple, who then had him shipped home. It appears he escaped from his cage while on the tarmac in Mexico City and (I’m speculating here) headed back to the places where he’s more comfortable living. Sad for the couple, but hardly all that newsworthy, especially given the apparent outrage against Delta.
Delta’s offer to credit the couple only $200 for a lost pet was obviously a stupid move on their part, but I resent that people don’t get all the facts out there when trying to push these stories to a gullible public. If you are a compassionate person you MUST IGNORE PACO and spend your time thinking about the daily deaths of thousands from Malaria, rotovirus, and lack of clean water. Yes that task is more than overwhelming, but the whimpy “Find Paco” sentiment that people think makes them a “compassionate person” does nothing of the kind – it hardens them to the plight of millions who live in conditions we could largely fix if people would pay as much attention to that as they pay to missing stray dogs in Mexico. (How? If the developed world cut defense and entitlement spending by about 10% we could rebuild most of the developing world’s infrastructure IN ONLY A FEW YEARS. The strategic benefits alone would be staggering, but military enthusiasts are too blinded by irrational post-cold-war thinking while entitlement enthusiasts are too busy sending subsidies to the American lower and middle class, who contrary to our constant whining cost far more in bureaucracies and benefits than we pay for (can you say “National Debt”?)
The millions spent sending poor Free Willie back into the wild also comes to mind (he died soon after, lacking the skills needed to survive). Did people seriously think Willie would be happier in the wild? It was as if their *need* to fight against captivity programs trumped the animal’s own well being.
So instead of fretting over things that don’t matter much, why not pick your favorite extreme poverty charity and help out – then you can feel good…. AND actually do some good too! Here’s a start: http://twitter.com/charitywater
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