18 Comments

On Martin Sandbu's article -

The world just went through a few years of experiencing what happens when you only value efficiency and you totally devalue redundancy. Our inflationary episode was largely caused by supply chain problems, which is short for "we cut away so much fat that there's only one source in the world we rely on for our raw materials/supplies/sub-assemblies/etc. and we can't operate if something happens to them".

Maybe a little more redundancy isn't a bad idea in a world that keeps throwing up various types of natural and man made crises.

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An optimal amount of redundancy is part of the efficiency calculation.

Perhaps you mean that redundancy is partially a positive externality, that each firm individually does not consider the beneficial effects of its redundancy on other firms and so there is theoretical argument for a Pigou subsidy to redundancy/tax on single sourcing. If you and figure out a way to do that, let me know.

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Yes...

Brad

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My impression, from the observations of a non-economist, is that when businesses had to make a choice between efficiency or redundancy in their operations there was a big thumb on the scales in favor of efficiency and higher short term profits. Let someone else worry about it down the road, after bonuses get handed out.

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Fascism and poverty.

As with so many movements, fascism was started by the well-off and then ginned up the general resentments against "others" to build the movement.

There have been groups opposed to each other throughout history. Race, religion, something else. Any social/economic stress can be used to allow a group permission to act out their anger or resentments. Fascism is a branch of authoritarian rule that in effect states that the natural order of things is for a social pyramid with a single leader at the top. As that has been the social state for most of history, is it any wonder why it is so easy to get a population to support it?

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Ford pickup truck evolution.

It shows that they are now just symbols for "manliness" and not work horses as originally designed. Some years ago, my wife bought a Chevy pickup and was considered an anomaly by the dealership: "only men buy these trucks".

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6 and 7 seem somewhat at odds.

Kerr's explanation of "cancel culture" is very, well, academic, as Orin tends to be. That academic approach of taking something seriously and then analyzing it works some of the time but it ignores the underlying emotion and reality: the phrase is really just a replacement for "political correctness" as another club for the right (and pseudo-centrists) to beat up the left.

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"another club for the right (and pseudo-centrists) to beat up the left" or "a rhetorical flourish by which 'the right and pseudo [sic] centrists' attempt to persuade the left of certain excesses." :)

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If it were the latter, (1) the focus would not be on rhetoric but on acts; and (2) the focus would be on officeholders rather than college students. And for "centrists" (3) there would be equal or greater focus on the right -- the left is far more sinned against than sinning.

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Why waste any electrons on Megan McArdle? She lost the thread of things some years ago. Why the WaPo keeps her on is one of the eternal mysteries of out time.

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Hornbeck Logan: Duh ...

"... substantial potential for aggregate economic gains in the presence of severe misallocation…"

That's aways where the potential for gains is greatest. No little triangles in equilibrium.

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Sandbu: Three of these things are not like the others.

"Fragmentation" is a policy to be optimized.

"Volatility" is exogenous and has to be managed.

The “supply side” is … ??? Governments have always been “shaping the structure of the economy and the direction of growth.” Some of these ways are better than others, but what else is new?

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Berlatsly: Maybe, but when arguing with a swing voter, it's better to emphasize that your set of policies is more likely to achieve the objectives you share with him than those of the other party rather than that you are morally superior.

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Austerity: Needed a control group in which "fiscal consolidation" was achieved principally by tax increases.

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Ezra Klein : Gen. 18: 16-33 :)

In Economics this is called the "can opener assumption."

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Marshall: There was a time when being a member of a political party in Congress did not mean being a member of the party "caucus."

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Ford Pickups: If they were subsect to the same mpg standards as automobiles, who cares?

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Kerr: Two additional considerations. 1) Who is in the culture that is potentially doing the cancellation. Do I, should I count in the discussion over whether quantum "supremacy" is acceptable usage? 2) What are the consequences of the "cancellation."

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