Michael Giberson Congress asked the National Research Council to evaluate the economics and environmental effects of the advanced biofuels mandate in the Renewable Fuels Standard (“RFS2”). The result? It isn’t pretty: barring unforeseen technological advances that dramatically reduce costs or oil prices consistently in the neighborhood of $190 a barrel or higher, RFS2 just doesn’t …
Michael Giberson In the process of explaining why Steve Jobs, though talented, is no Thomas Edison, Vaclav Smil name-drops a “brief list of the pioneering creators of electric systems”: This fundamental innovation [the electric power system] was created during a remarkably short period of time—most of it between the late 1870s and the beginning of …
Smil’s Brief List of the Pioneering Creators of Electric Systems Read More »
Michael Giberson The story in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal on the link between gasoline prices and crude oil prices was a bit frustrating. The article does a reasonable job explaining key pieces of the puzzle, but then fails to assemble the puzzle into something resembling reality. The story is headlined, “Gas Stays High as Oil …
The Wsj’s Confused Story on Gasoline Prices and Crude Oil Prices Read More »
Michael Giberson In a post at the Master Resource blog I point out another problem with anti-price gouging laws: during actual emergency conditions both state governments and consumers likely have much more important things to do that worry about whether particular price increases are unconscionable under the state’s understanding of that term. Among other points, …
Price Gouging Laws Wasted Resources During the Hurricane Irene Emergency Read More »
Lynne Kiesling Today I offer a break in my usual loathing of politics to compliment a politician, not for his political work, but for an intellectually engaging and erudite essay. In Saturday’s Wall Street Journal, Paul Ryan reviewed The Price of Civilization, the new book from Jeffrey Sachs. Sachs is something of a bête noire …
Lynne Kiesling UPDATE: I’ve had a report that the link to the slides is not working, but I can’t get it not to work … so if you are having trouble please let me know in the comments and I’ll go bug-stomping. UPDATED UPDATE: mischief managed, I think! On Saturday I was honored to be …
Students for Liberty Talk: Economics and Complexity Read More »
Michael Giberson A working paper from the UC-Berkeley Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics says that the demand for gasoline is more price-inelastic than typically thought. Here is the abstract, which points to publication selection bias as the culprit: One of the most frequently examined statistical relationships in energy economics has been the price elasticity …
Demand for Gasoline is More Price-inelastic Than Commonly Thought Read More »
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