Lynne Kiesling Today’s word from A Word A Day is one of my favorites: execrable (EK-si-kruh-buhl) adjective Detestable; wretched. [From Middle English, from Latin execrabilis (accursed), from execrari (to curse), from ex- + sacrare (to consecrate). Ultimately from Indo-European root sak- (to sanctify) that is also the source of other words such as saint, consecrate, …
Lynne Kiesling Russ Roberts was just on NPR with Barry Schwartz, the “choice is debilitating” Swarthmore psychologist. In his gentle, intellectual, nonconfrontational way, Russ spanked him. Russ’s arguments were a powerful combination of focus on the positive and focus on the core, essential point: individuals should always ask themselves “who gets to choose for me?” …
Lynne Kiesling Many thanks to Tyler Cowen for pointing out this Entertainment Weekly list of top-20 Monty Python skits. I agree that the Argument Clinic belongs a lot higher than #20; it’s easily in my top 5. I don’t think the Kilimanjaro skit deserves to be in the top 20. And as a little nit …
Lynne Kiesling Through Fey Accompli I found Peridot Capital, who had a post yesterday on fuel costs that hits some of the same themes as I mentioned earlier this morning. Amazingly, American Airlines has hedged only 15% of its fuel costs for the first quarter of 2005. With oil futures hitting a record $57 per …
Lynne Kiesling I’ve found a new read that I really enjoy, Fey Accompli. A wry play on words. She’s a very eloquent writer on a variety of topics that are of great interest to me, and she takes a very dynamic, forward looking approach. I’ll take one example: Monday’s post on Stella McCartney’s new line …
Lynne Kiesling On Monday Stumbling and Mumbling had a post on truckers in the UK complaining about high fuel prices. I really like his suggestion: instead of whingeing and bleating for a political solution, why does their trade association not offer price insurance? The fact is, though, that high oil prices are a danger that …
Hedging Fuel Prices: Using Politics Or Using Markets? Read More »
Lynne Kiesling Wednesday’s Wall Street Journal had an interesting front-page article (subscription required) by Rebecca Smith on TXU, the legacy Texas utility that is following unconventional utility strategies in its approach to Texas’s restructured retail electricity market. Smith’s article focuses extensively on TXU’s changes to its customer disconnection policies. TXU follows a 26-day late payment …
Wsj Article On Txu’s Feather Ruffling, But That’s Not What Bothers Me Read More »
Lynne Kiesling One of the most fascinating phenomena to be analyzed using industrial organization is the clustering of competing retailers. Ask yourself: why do Oriental rug stores all cluster in the same block? And what about car dealers? Don’t you want to be farther away from your competitors? Enter Harold Hotelling, who developed a simple …
Hotelling Behavior: Chocolate On Michigan Avenue Read More »
Lynne Kiesling Today Tech Central Station has an article from Amity Shlaes, an author whose writing I enjoy, on the selection of Paul Wolfowitz and John Bolton for the World Bank and UN, respectively. Her comments are consistent with my observations, although she does not point out that one thing that’s at stake is the …
Lynne Kiesling On Sunday Radley Balko had a disturbing, if not surprising, note about possible regulation of cable and satellite channels. He quotes a column in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: A U.S. Senate bill authorizing government censorship of cable and satellite TV channels references children 44 times and the First Amendment not at all. His post …
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