Discuss: Finding Time

Dear Badmommy,

You report,

“...... in America, we have particularly made a God of Mammon.”

What more is there to say?

Sincerely,

Steve

Interesting article on time constraints in life.

Dear Steve Salmony,

You obviously do not understand the “positive feedback loop” I am referring to. The inability to understand this is common to most “Green” believers I encounter. Their mindset appears to be akin to that of the religious faithful who oppose scientific concepts on religious grounds. Economic-technological-scientific progress is as much “science” as stem cell research.

It is interesting that “the god of mammon” is something that both Puritans and Greens obsess about.

Geographical-economic science has calculated a possible limit to food production under current technology, that would restrict us to a maximum of 47 billion people on earth. (Colin Clark, “Population Growth and Land Use”). That is “science”. Having a screaming fit about 9 billion people is “religion”. Furthermore, populations are actually in the process of collapsing in most parts of the world due to culture and economics and science.

Jesse Ausubel has written plenty of scientific assessment of the REDUCING carbon intensity of the world economy. Prins et al have written a disturbing paper or two that show that Kyoto regulations have resulted in this natural trend being reversed, because of the displacement of economic activity away from the developed world to the developing world.

Matt Ridley: “The Rational Optimist” is the ONE book that I would advise everyone to read. You can follow up his abundant references if you want to.

There is another area where efficiency is our enemy.
As an accountant I have read much on the GFC in the hope of learning some kind of Macro wisdom. Apart from the obvious “Don’t get yourself into things you cannot personally understand” there is one other. Somebody (I am ashamed that I do not remember who)pointed out that efficiency is often the enemy of stability. Redundant and duplicated systems must be stripped out in the name of efficiency but when things go wrong you are in serious trouble with no alternative to fall back on.

If the “number of regulators” and the budgets of regulatory departments DID have any bearing on outcomes, the Wall Street crash would never have happened.

There were dozens if not hundreds of commentators who warned what was happening. The small handful of staff at regulatory agencies who took any notice, got sacked or moved sideways.

The number of people devoted to “regulation” and oversight is no guarantee of usefulness or freedom from corruption. The founding fathers of the USA would have been clear that “caveat emptor” is ultimately the only safeguard. Otherwise, you breed indifference and ignorance, with more and more people assuming that “I don’t need to do due diligence, the government will take care of me”.

Wow, excellent article. Making space for the “free” things in life has an extremely high return on investment!