Foundation for Economic Education
Published on 11 Sep 2018Believe it or not, parallel parking is not an impossible task. Meet Blake Garrett, the entrepreneur who is using VR to teach people how to drive, without actually getting behind the wheel.
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Produced & Directed by Michael Angelo Zervos
Executive Produced by Sean W. Malone
Hosted by Andrew Heaton
Original Music by Ben B. Goss
Featuring Blake Garrett
September 13, 2018
Mind Your Business Ep. 2: Aceable in the Hole
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September 6, 2018
Trans-partisan planning
At Coyote Blog, Warren Meyer offers a plan to address man-made climate change, pitched to avoid being dismissed as “typical” of one or the other side:
While I am not deeply worried about man-made climate change, I am appalled at all the absolutely stupid, counter-productive things the government has implemented in the name of climate change, all of which have costly distorting effects on the economy while doing extremely little to affect man-made greenhouse gas production. For example:
- Corn ethanol mandates and subsidies, which study after study have shown to have zero net effect on CO2 emissions, and which likely still exist only because the first Presidential primary is in Iowa. Even Koch Industries, who is one of the largest beneficiaries of this corporate welfare, has called for their abolition
- Electric car subsidies, 90% of which go to the wealthy to help subsidize their virtue signalling, and which require more fossil fuels to power than an unsubsidized Prius or even than a SUV.
- Wind subsidies, which are promoting the stupidist form for power ever, whose unpredictabilty means fossil fuel plants still have to be kept running on hot backup and whose blades are the single largest threat to endangered bird species.
- Bad government technology bets like the massive public subsidies of failed Solyndra
Even when government programs do likely have an impact of CO2, they are seldom managed intelligently. For example, the government subsidizes solar panel installations, presumably to reduce their cost to consumers, but then imposes duties on imported panels to raise their price (indicating that the program has become more of a crony subsidy for US solar panel makers, which is typical of these types of government interventions). Obama’s coal power plan, also known as his war on coal, will certainly reduce some CO2 from electricity generation but at a very high cost to consumers and industries. Steps like this are taken without any idea of whether this is the lowest cost approach to reducing CO2 production — likely it is not given the arbitrary aspects of the program.
These policy mess is also an opportunity — it affords us the ability to substantially reduce CO2 production at almost no cost.
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July 23, 2018
Jeremy Clarkson is a maniac
Ove Bakken
Published on 19 Oct 2017
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July 11, 2018
QotD: Measuring consumer surplus
Consumer surplus is one of those things which is really, really, difficult to measure. This paper is one of the few that’s able to give us a hard number. But what it is is, really, “how much I would have been willing to pay but didn’t have to?” Say that we’re out and you’re thirsty and I’m not very. You suggest we have a Coke. You’re really interested in this, you’d pay $2 for one, I’m, well, meh, I’d only pay $1 for one. Obviously, the Coke seller (no, not the coke one, that’s different) doesn’t know this so he charges us the same price – $1 each. I’ve gained no consumer surplus I paid a buck for something I value at a buck, you gain $1 of surplus because you would have paid $2 but only paid that buck.
In one manner the consumer surplus is a result of mass manufacturing and marketing. We’re pumping out millions of whatever it is, we’ve got to have a “market price” and some people will value it, whatever it is, at more than that. That greater valuation is that consumer surplus. Without a producer knowing what your individual demand curve is they cannot charge you the full value you ascribe to it.
Of course, they try as hard as they can to do so. This is what brands and product differentiation are all about. VW and car brands for example – there’re SUV models built on roughly the same platform in the Skoda, VW, Audi and Bentley ranges. Oh yes, they’re different cars alright. But perhaps not $300,000 different, which is the price gap between the top and bottom there. Some of this (but please note, only some of this) is because there are people who will pay a fortune to swank around in a Bentley and there are many more who will not, thinking a Skoda is just fine (I do a little work for the company and the new Skoda SUV is indeed very fine but then I would say that, wouldn’t I?). That’s product differentiation.
Another example is what used to happen in old fashioned English pubs – in the public bar and the saloon. The latter had carpets and comfy chairs, the former very definitely not. Beer was 10% more expensive if you wanted the comfy chair experience – very simple and remarkably successful product differentiation. Being able to charge different prices to different groups for much the same thing. Or as it often used to work out, different prices to the same person on different occasions. Dates were in the saloon bar….
Tim Worstall, “Freakonomics’ Steven Levitt On How Inefficient Uber Really Is”, Forbes, 2016-09-20.
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June 22, 2018
A Brief History of the Jeep
KnowledgeHub
Published on 30 May 2018Jeeps are the original military vehicle that everybody loved so much, it became a civilian. So whats the history of these? Do you care? I mean you clicked on this video bub.
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June 11, 2018
Jay Currie says it’s time to light the Bat Signal for … Brian Mulroney?
I find it hard to believe that things have gotten to the point that anyone, let alone Jay Currie, is looking to former PM Brian Mulroney to pull Justin’s chestnuts out of the Trumpian fire:
In Canada, more specifically Ontario, the destruction of the auto industry would be a full scale, all hands on deck, disaster. Realistically, the auto sector is Ontario’s largest private sector employer and the largest manufacturing sector. Being priced out of the US market would kill tens of thousands of well-paid jobs.
Trump has taken the measure of Trudeau and his tiny, annoying, Minister of External Affairs, Chrystia Freeland and concluded they are featherweights. Which means that Canada is potentially screwed because Trump has no faith in our leadership. You don’t call people dishonest publicly if you plan to do business with them.
It is unlikely that Trudeau will be aware of just how badly he has failed for a few days. The Canadian media are heavily invested in a narrative which has Justin standing up to the big, bad, Trump. Trudeau’s tone-deaf advisors are, no doubt, revelling in the fact they got lots of “gender” language into the communique.
It will take a few days for the more sober side of the media to realize what peril Trudeau has put us in. And a few more for the geniuses in the PMO to figure out that Trump is not playing the same game as they are.
When they do figure it out the question will arise, “What the fuck do we do now?”
As I am quite sure Butz and his posse read this blog I have a simple suggestion.
Normally, I would have suggested they get in touch with Simon Reisman who negotiated both the Auto-Pact and NAFTA. Alas, Reisman is dead.
Second best by a long shot? Brian Mulroney. A man I have next to no time for but who a) managed to get Canadians onboard for NAFTA, b) was a quite successful Canadian Prime Minister, c) is wired into both Trump World and broad swaths of corporate America.
If Trudeau could get Mulroney to do it Mulroney would be going into the US with a serious, well thought out, everything on the table, pitch. Likely starting with first principles – no tariffs, no subsidies, no non-tariff barriers. Be prepared to dump dairy and end transhipment of Chinese steel. And pitch it to the Trump people as the template for the deals which could be made with the EU, Japan, India and so on. (China is a whole other thing.)
The key point here is that Canada has to move, and move quickly, away from the finger-wagging politics of gender inclusion and climate change to a hard-nosed business approach to getting the best deal we can with an America which is now willing to put its own interests first.
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May 4, 2018
Tesla’s tipping point?
Robert Tracinski on the amazingly long run Elon Musk and crew have had in the electric car business without (yet) turning a profit:
Elon Musk may finally be running out of other people’s money. That’s the upshot of a report on how Tesla is burning so much cash it may run out by the end of the year. This is a company that has raised more than $5 billion from its investors so far, and it is still going to need many billions more — if it can get them. What is more interesting is how Tesla got to the point where it is still bleeding cash, just when it was finally supposed to be making good on its extravagant promises.
The company has always been a triumph of PR hype and political messaging over reality. Why invest in Tesla? Why buy a Tesla? Because you’re not just buying a car — you’re participating in a social and technological revolution. You are the leading edge of the new era of electric cars and the obsolescence of the gasoline engine — which will literally save the planet, or so the story goes.
But it’s not just about global warming. You’re also helping Elon Musk revolutionize the entire manufacturing process by building super-automated, hyper-roboticized factories. He’s on the leading edge of the self-driving car revolution, already introducing a feature he calls “Autopilot.” If we don’t manage to save this planet, don’t worry. By boosting Musk, you’re helping him find us another planet to colonize.
In actuality, what has Tesla produced? A very nice car — for $100,000. There are a lot of very nice cars you can buy for $100,000, if you’re the sort of person who thinks this is a reasonable amount of money to spend on a car, as opposed to a house. More to the point, there are a lot of very nice cars you can buy for $50,000. But Tesla has been able to charge an irrationally high premium for sleek design, technological glamour, and what a Tesla-owning friend of mine describes as “happy tree-hugger feelings.”
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April 22, 2018
How to begin solving the common problems of big cities
Vladimir “Zeev” Vinokurov is writing about Australian cities in particular, but the same general analysis applies to many Canadian, American, and British urban areas as well:
… our economy and population are growing, and the resulting congestion is costing us thousands of dollars per year individually, and billions to the economy. It isolates us from family, friends and work. But cities can still grow without getting us stuck in traffic, missing increasingly overcrowded and delayed trains, or left unable to afford property. All this is happening because workplaces are too far from residents living in the suburbs, which effectively funnels residents into the inner city for work. It must change.
First, we must unwind planning laws that prevent offices, homes and apartments from being constructed alongside each other and throughout the city. These laws also raise housing prices by hundreds of thousands of dollars. Second, instead of banning cars, charge commuters for using congested roads and trains. Third, stop supporting taxpayer funded ‘road to nowhere’ infrastructure projects. These reforms will cut congestion, grow the economy, cut living costs and reconnect us to family, friends and local communities.
Planning laws cause congestion and social isolation by preventing people from building apartments and commercial offices throughout our city. As a result, rents and property prices become dearer because not enough housing is built to accommodate demand from population growth. Indeed, Reserve Bank economists estimate that planning laws increase average property prices by hundreds of thousands of dollars. This drives residents into the outer suburbs to look for cheaper housing, even as they commute into the inner city for work. If more people lived close-by to their workplaces, commutes would be shorter.
We need multiple CBDs, not just one. Unwinding planning laws that prevent commercial growth outside the CBD will cut housing costs and rents, cut congestion and promote tightly knit, thriving urban communities.
Congestion also occurs because we pay for using roads and public transport with thousands of dollars of time every year, rather than money. Congested public roads or trains cost us no more money to use in peak times, and busier routes cost no more to use than empty ones. As a result, the Grattan Institute think tank estimates that the average Melbournian’s commute to the city is twice as long in peak time. By contrast, Sydney’s trains are less congested, but are used more widely compared to Melbourne’s because its tickets are dearer in rush hour. Congestion charges that reflect market demand for infrastructure will also encourage businesses to open in commercial districts outside the CBD. Reconnecting local commuters with local workplaces will save us time and money overall.
Congestion charges are also a fairer and cheaper way of funding infrastructure projects compared to taxes like fuel tax or stamp duty. Scrapping these two taxes could save property purchasers tens of thousands of dollars or more, and reduce petrol bills by at least a third. If we pay for congested roads and trains with money rather than time and taxes, we may end up paying less.
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April 7, 2018
Car rental agencies look to government to quash upstart “personal vehicle sharing” companies
Steven Greenhut discusses yet another entrenched industry trying to get the government to protect them from disruptive competitors:
Real capitalism is a tough sport where entrepreneurs risk their capital in hopes of winning customers.
The “crony” version of it involves politicians rigging the rules to assure that the “right” people are winners. We see this ugly process on high-profile national issues, such as when Donald Trump promotes tariffs to boost steel makers at the expense of companies that use steel products. But most of this nonsense proceeds quietly in legislative committees, without garnering any headlines or vocal opposition.
One awful but illustrative example popped up recently in the California state Capitol. Assembly Bill 2246, by Assemblywoman Laura Friedman, D-Glendale, apparently is part of a national effort by rental-car companies to snuff out a burgeoning industry that just happens to be threatening its business model. The bill would redefine “personal vehicle sharing” companies as “car rental companies” — and then slam them with reams of new regulations. Similar measures have been proposed in Idaho, New Hampshire, Maryland and Maine.
Rental-car companies are facing the same challenges as other established business models in this internet and app-based age. Capitalism — the real sort — is defined by “creative destruction,” as economist Joseph Schumpeter called it. New companies are free to offer better products and services that appeal to customers. This is creative as new ideas flourish and consumers get a broader choice and lower prices thanks to competition. But it’s also destructive. Complacent old companies suddenly are forced to improve their offerings or shut their doors. The consumer is king.
For example, I recently grabbed a taxicab rather than my usual Uber and noticed the oddest thing. The cabbie had a modern app-based system for taking my credit-card payment. Until recently, paying by credit card was a hassle because cab services didn’t really want to take your card. I’ve also noticed a fleet of nice new cabs around my city. And the cab I took even sent an email with a receipt and a rating system. Sound familiar?
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April 1, 2018
German Armored Cars in WW1 I THE GREAT WAR On The Road
The Great War
Published on 31 Mar 2018The German Tank Museum on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/daspanzermuseum
Germany only fielded 20-40 armored cars in World War 1, mostly on the Eastern Front. Not much about their operational history is known but they did play an important role in the German Civil War and the Weimar Republic.
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March 25, 2018
The appearance of wealth
Victor Davis Hanson on how the wealthy once were eager to appear as distinct from the common herd as possible:
Even in the mostly egalitarian city-states of relatively poor classical Greece, the wealthy were readily identifiable. A man of privilege was easy to spot by his remarkable possession of a horse, the fine quality of his tunic, or by his mastery of Greek syntax and vocabulary.
An anonymous and irascible Athenian author — dubbed “The Old Oligarch” by the nineteenth-century British classicist Gilbert Murray — wrote a bitter diatribe known as “The Constitution of the Athenians.” The harangue, composed in the late fifth century B.C., blasted the liberal politics and culture of Athens. The grouchy elitist complained that poor people in Athens don’t get out of the way of rich people. He was angry that only in radically democratic imperial Athens was it hard to calibrate a man by his mere appearance: “You would often hit an Athenian citizen by mistake on the assumption that he was a slave. For the people there are no better dressed than the slaves and metics, nor are they any more handsome.”
The Old Oligarch’s essay reveals an ancient truth about privilege and status. Throughout history, the elite in most of the Western world were easy to distinguish. Visible class distinctions characterized ancient Rome, Renaissance Florence, the Paris of the nineteenth century, and the major cities of twentieth century America.
A variety of recent social trends and revolutionary economic breakthroughs have blurred the line separating the elite from the masses.
First, the cultural revolution of the 1960s made it cool for everyone to dress sloppily and to talk with slang and profanity. Levis, T-shirts, and sneakers became the hip American uniform, a way of superficially equalizing the unequal. Contrived informality radiated the veneer of class solidarity. Multimillionaires like Bruce Springsteen and Bono appear indistinguishable from welders on the street.
The locus classicus is perhaps Facebook owner Mark Zuckerberg, who wears T-shirts, jeans, and flip flops to work. His reported wealth of $71 billion makes him the world’s fifth-richest man. The median net worth of Americans is about $45,000. Zuckerberg is worth more than the collective wealth of about 1.5 million Americans — or about all the household wealth in Philadelphia put together. And yet, he looks perfectly ordinary. When I walk the Stanford campus — where many of the world’s wealthiest send their children — the son of a Silicon Valley billionaire looks no different from a machinist’s daughter on full support from Akron.
Second, technology has done its part to dilute superficial class distinctions. The nineteenth-century gap between a rich man in his fine carriage — with footman and driver — and someone walking three miles to work has disappeared. The driving experience between a $20,000 Kia bought on credit with $1,000 down and a $80,0000 Mercedes paid in cash is mostly reduced to the superficial logo on the hood and trunk. An alien from Mars could not easily distinguish, at least by sight, between the two cars. Even after a ten-minute ride, an alien might be puzzled: What exactly did that extra $60,000 buy?
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March 18, 2018
The Truth About Wireless Charging
Real Engineering
Published on 23 Feb 2018
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March 4, 2018
Why Is The Porsche 911 Rear-Engine?
Engineering Explained
Published on 11 Feb 2018Why Does The Porsche 911 Carrera Put The Engine In The Back?
When you’re sitting at the drawing board, one of the most critical decisions you’ll make in designing a vehicle is where you place the engine. The engine’s placement will have a huge impact on passenger space, practicality, acceleration, braking, weight distribution, and overall driving dynamics.
Porsche decided to put the 911’s engine in the back, behind the rear axle, way back in the day when the 911 was first designed. Since then, that engine has remained there, and while some might say it’s out of stubbornness, there are legitimately wonderful reasons for having a rear-engine car. In this video, we’ll discuss five different scenarios, and how a rear engine makes a lot of sense for each.
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February 15, 2018
The Volkswagen Thing Is Slow, Old, Unsafe… and Amazing
Doug DeMuro
Published on Oct 13, 2016GO READ MY COLUMN! http://autotradr.co/Oversteer
Thank you to Morrie’s Heritage Car Connection for letting me borrow your Thing!!
http://morriesheritage.com/
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February 13, 2018
The Grand Tour: Legally Tesla
The Grand Tour
Published on 12 Feb 2018In a test of the Tesla Model X, Jeremy Clarkson is joined by lawyers in this legally perilous task.
****These observations about the Tesla Model X are made in Clarkson’s personal capacity and should not be regarded as any statement or opinion by any other person or entity about the general safety, road worthiness, mechanical effectiveness, or any other standards of the vehicle about this specific model or any other Tesla vehicle.
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