September 2009

Can a Keynesian Beauty Contest Improve Obama’s Suggestion Box for Federal Employees?

3 Comments / Economics, Politics / By

Michael Giberson President Obama has created the “SAVE Award,” a process by which federal employees can submit ideas for “how their agency can save money and perform better.”  A committee of OMB officials will review the submissions and submit a short list to the President, and the President will pick the winner.  The federal employee …

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Power Prices Work Best to Support Reliability when Prices Are Locational

Economics, Electricity, Energy markets / By

Michael Giberson From a reliability perspective, the crucial aspect of the real-time wholesale prices is that they result from the security-constrained economic dispatch, which is based on a real-time assessment of grid capabilities. Experience has shown that market prices work best to support reliability when prices are locational, because locational prices that are consistent with …

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Paternalistic Regulation and the Knowledge Problem

2 Comments / Economics / By

Lynne Kiesling A recent essay from legal scholars Todd Zywicki and Josh Wright analyzes the proposed Consumer Financial Protection Agency, and over at Volokh, Ilya Somin adds to their analysis based on his own research. Both pieces are founded on an important core idea — paternalistic regulation that is grounded in the desire to mitigate …

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More on Michael Sandel, Justice and Price Gouging

4 Comments / Economics, Liberty, Politics / By

Michael Giberson Yesterday I commented on Michael Sandel’s book, Justice, and on his discussion of price gouging.  I hoped that Sandel would go deeper into his ideas about justice and price gouging, but the book’s index suggests that the introductory chapter is all he has to offer specifically on price gouging. In re-reading parts of …

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Energy Secretary Steven Chu: Not Exactly Making Friends and Influencing People

4 Comments / Complexity, Economics, Liberty, Politics / By

Michael Giberson From WSJ Environmental Capital: When it comes to greenhouse-gas emissions, Energy Secretary Steven Chu sees Americans as unruly teenagers and the Administration as the parent that will have to teach them a few lessons. Speaking on the sidelines of a smart grid conference in Washington, Dr. Chu said he didn’t think average folks …

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Life Imitates Art: Nissan to Give Electric Car a “Beautiful and Futuristic” Noise

5 Comments / Music, Technology / By

Michael Giberson From the LA Times car culture blog Up to Speed: A campaign backed by automakers and some lawmakers to make electric or hybrid cars noisier in a bid to increase safety for pedestrians and cyclists has taken a strange, “Blade Runner”-type twist. Nissan sound engineers have announced that the Leaf electric car set …

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Grant Mccracken: Concatenating Capitalism

Complexity, Economics / By

Lynne Kiesling Grant McCracken always has insightful interpretations of various human/social phenomena, and in this recent post he offers one that he calls “concatenating capitalism“. In discussing “eco-entrepreneur” Joshua Onysko and his work developing his Pangea Organics products, Grant makes a decidedly beyond-Schumpeterian observation about the role of entrepreneurs in transforming the economy and the …

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Iea: Recession => Lower Carbon Emissions

3 Comments / Economics, Environmental policy / By

Lynne Kiesling The International Energy Agency has put a quantitative estimate on an effect that we all suspected — this year’s economic recession is contributing to a reduction in global carbon emissions. They estimate that 2009 carbon emissions will be 2 percent lower than 2008, with 75% of the reduction attributable to the economic slowdown …

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