Michael Giberson
Robert Rapier asks what is likely the least frequently asked question ever: “What if I’m wrong?“
Rapier explores that question with respect to his beliefs on peak oil and global warming, but it is good, all-around, general purpose question that should be put to more frequent use.
Michael Giberson
A few years ago I attended a free concert in the park in Arlington, Virginia by The Grandsons. Between songs lead guitarist Alan MacEwen observed that the bass player had a gig in Atlantic City, New Jersey the night before and had barely arrived at the park moments before the concert was to begin. The bass player – I don’t recall who it was at the time – offered an explanation that ran something like this:
I haven’t actually had any sleep yet, so I hope I can keep up. But it was a lot of fun to play with [name of band leader since forgotten]. Actually we played the early show at [casino name forgotten], we opened for [band name forgotten] and were done by 10:30 or so last night. But [other person's name] and I decided to gamble, and had a few drinks. Then we met [members of some other band] and drank some more and gambled some more. This continued until we got hungry, and went for breakfast. It was light outside and I said, “Hey, I’ve got to be back in Virginia by noon,” so we grabbed some food and hopped in the car and drove like madmen down I-95. And [musicians name] was in the back feeling sick, and I’m saying to hold it in because I got to get back to Virginia, and …
At this point the bass player stops the story and looks out at the crowd. It is a sunny Sunday afternoon, a few clouds in an otherwise bright blue sky. Families have picnic blankets spread out. Kids are frolicking.
He blinks a few times, and then sums up:
So, kids, remember: [with emphasis] stay in school, take your vitamins, and always listen to your parents!
Okay, so I wasn’t taking notes, the story might not be exactly as depicted. Given the bass player’s demeanor that day, I’m not sure his account was reliable in the first place. But I remembered the moral of the story.
I was reminded of the episode by Derek Thompson’s post at the Atlantic Business Channel, Go to college, in which he makes his point by reference to unemployment statistics.
Probably a better argument, even if less memorable.
Michael Giberson
Mankiw speculates on the differences between Econ department economists and business school economists. Among his suggestions, self-selection by the faculty member, the kind of research rewarded in each place, and this remark about the focus of students:
Faculty who teach PhD students are used to being asked, “How did you derive that first-order condition? How can you prove that the equilibrium exists and is unique?” Faculty who teach MBA students are used to being asked, “Is that really how it works?”
I wonder how economists in law schools differ from economists in Econ departments and business schools?
Michael Giberson
Tomorrow is the annual “Lowrider/Dream bike” parade on the Texas Tech University campus. The event is part of program in which TTU art students and science and engineering students mentor middle schoolers who assemble and customize a bicycle. There are a lot of very sound pedagogical reasons to think that such hands-on activities are powerful ways to teach abstract problem-solving skills.
Strikes me as a very cool project.
But listen to the video, produced by the TTU communications and marketing department, and what is the primary selling point? Here’s the opening:
For a group of nearly 50 kids at Adkins Middle School, getting a free bike was cool in itself, having the chance to trick it out was even better, but – don’t tell them – they are also acquiring problem solving skills that just could help them on standardized testing ….
Great. The big goal of Texas public education, acquire problem solving skills that “just could help … on standardized testing.” Continue listening and you realize that the standardized testing angle is not just the video producer’s framing, it seems pretty important to the middle school teachers too.
The next four words in the video are “…and in real life.” Oh, real life skills, too, once the standardized testing is taken care of?
That is a relief.
(The post title is a nod to the very stylin’ Copenhagen Cycle Chic.)
Michael Giberson
At The Atlantic‘s business blog, Reiham Salam invokes sci-fi author Vernor Vinge as he contemplates the meaning of what he saw at the SXSW Interactive Festival, but his post put me more in mind of these famous opening lines:
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by
madness, starving hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn
looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly
connection to the starry dynamo in the machin-
ery of night
Except, you know, in a good way.
Salam said one company’s offering suggested to him a kind of “hipster Second Life that involves dancing alone” and he was “reminded of the anomic dystopia vividly described in Allan Bloom’s The Closing of the American Mind.” Maybe it was his use of the word “hipster” so near the phrase “anomic dystopia vividly described” that put me in mind of Ginsberg’s Howl.
Nonetheless, Salam finds reasons to hope for the future, reasons to think that the Austin-gathered angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient wireless connection to the starry dynamo will produce something fantanstic, something capable of enabling the further flourishing of human civilization in all of its diverse manifestations. (Salam also cites Will Wilkinson, another writer I’m a fan of; the ‘enabling the flourishing … diverse manifestations’ phrase is my mangled nod to Wilkinsonian themes.)
Ginsberg and Bloom may have been pessimistic in the face of all the diverse manifestations of the world, but I’m going with Salam and the future on this one.
Michael Giberson
Carbon tax and cap-and-trade fun, courtesy of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and bloggers at Common Tragedies.
In brief: on Monday the WSJ lead editorial complained about the distributional effects of cap-and-trade, correctly noting that the effect of pricing carbon would depend on consumption but misleadingly illustrated with a chart based on carbon-emitting production by state. Two economists at Resources for the Future sent a letter to the editor pointing out the problem, and after the WSJ said it would not run the letter, one of the economists – Rich Sweeney – posted it on his blog at Common Tragedies.
Subtlety being the soul of blogging, he headlined the post: “The Wall Street Journal is an idiot.”
This morning at CT, Sweeney is back with, “Write a letter to the editor, and nobody cares. Call someone an idiot on the internet and…….”
The answer is: get your letter published in the WSJ. Nearby on the editorial page is a rejoinder, where the editorialists, in their words, “try to take their [the RFF economists'] argument seriously.” [What? Does this mean the first editorial was done without considering recently published work by the mainstream-if-slightly-staid folks at the pre-eminient environmental policy think tank? I guess for the second editorial, the difference was that the WSJ editors were actually wearing their thinking caps.]
Elsewhere in the house of WSJ, Environmental Capital blogger Keith Johnson pulls up a chair ringside, “Knockdown, Dragout: Think Tank v. WSJ Edit Page on Cap-and-Trade.”
Johnson concluded:
The RFF guys responded this morning: “Now the question is whether the WSJ really cares about the true net effect of carbon policy on households in states like Michigan and Pennsylvania, or if they’re simply clinging to any story that will allow them to politically undermine cap and trade.”
It’s certainly fodder for a lively debate. The only thing that would make it better would be moving it to Comedy Central.
I’m all for getting this debate onto Comedy Central. We will be talking about cap-and-trade and carbon taxes in a few weeks in the Energy Economics class.
Students here are leaving for Spring Break this afternoon. I figure Comedy Central is about the only chance I have got to get a serious energy econ idea entertained by even a handful of students for the next 9 days.
[Note to Jon Stewart: Call me. I can play straight man.]
Michael Giberson
The post title is drawn from the conclusion of Roland Horne’s essay, “The future of petroleum — and of petroleum education.” The essay runs through a peak oil explanation – citing advocates and critics of the concept – and offers a sort of mild endorsement of peak oil theories. However, Horne suggests that peak oil would be good news, not bad news, for students now studying in petroleum-oriented university programs (from petroleum engineering, geology, and land management programs to energy finance and energy economics). As oil becomes harder to find, as remaining reservoirs become harder to develop, the return on an investment in related human capital will increase.
Horne’s conclusion:
Students of energy subjects in universities today will find themselves in a new world tomorrow. Oil demand will outstrip supply, probably within a few years and certainly within a few decades. Oil will not ‘run out’, but the cheap ‘easy oil’ of the twentieth century has already been replaced with resources that require huge investments, advanced technology and high levels of expertise from its industrial workforce. These challenges should be an incentive rather than a deterrent, as in fact they represent tremendous opportunities for young professionals. To capitalize on these opportunities, today’s graduates need to attain technical abilities that are both flexible and advanced. Professionals in the oil industry will work in a global context, and will need to master understanding of other cultures and other languages. Finally, students who begin their careers now as petroleum professionals will probably retire in 40 or 50 years as energy professionals. [Emphasis added.]
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