RE: Republican Reversal
--- Michael Etchison [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: CongressCritter does is to decide what to do not about, say, farm subsidies generally, but about SB1234, sponsored by Sen. This and Sen. That, which goes through specific committees with specific members... So the farm bill never went to the floor for a vote? While it is possible that the general public would approve of a bill that would cost the average family $4,377 over the next decade in order to give increased subsidies to a population whose average net worth is $546,000 and who's net income was ALREADY 21% gov't handouts--handouts which are causing massive problems for some of the world's truly poor--it seems hard to believe. Certainly believeable, but hard to believe. This bill certainly must have went to the floor of both houses, where it must have passed by a majority of votes. This seems a pretty good example of a real world event. Yes, it is certain that Senator Somesuch gets bogged down in the specifics, and it is certainly true that the act of governing is ALOT more complicated than outsiders would like to believe, but none of that changes the fact that an outrageous bill was passed. While I certainly do not wish to minimize the truth of your remarks--they seem quite insightful to me--I am nevertheless skeptical that an American public that is less [insert your perjorative here] would be more resistant to such legislation. Best wishes, jsh __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Autos - Get free new car price quotes http://autos.yahoo.com
Re: Republican Reversal
Fred Foldvary wrote: Does the typical American agree, for example, that it is good policy to spend billions on farm subsidies, or are they just ignorant and apathetic? I don't know of any survey evidence on this exact question, but protection and industrial policy to save jobs are very popular. My interaction with most Americans suggests that they support farm subsidies. I even remember being five years old and getting a lecture from my mom in the grocery store on the necessity of farm price supports - You see, little Bryan, that these supports seem to keep prices up. But if you got rid of them prices would soon be even higher. It made sense at the time. And no, we were not farmers! -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] He lives in deadly terror of agreeing; 'Twould make him seem an ordinary being. Indeed, he's so in love with contradiction, He'll turn against his most profound conviction And with a furious eloquence deplore it, If only someone else is speaking for it. Moliere, *The Misanthrope*
RE: Republican Reversal
In the real world we have almost 600 in Congress, dealing with innumerable matters more or less simultaneously. One of the things each CongressCritter does is to decide what to do not about, say, farm subsidies generally, but about SB1234, sponsored by Sen. This and Sen. That, which goes through specific committees with specific members, at specific times, during which times specific other things are happening, and other things are reasonably foreseeable (to happen or to avoid). Let me add a very non-economic note to this discussion. The economic approach to studying policy outcomes is essentially some combination of median voter theorem and public choice - ie, how much can the politician screw the voter before getting fired? Some political scientists have taken the approach outlined the above post. They understand policy outcomes as the result of institutions, networks of politicians,lobbyists and gov't bureaucrats and exogenous events (Ie, the terrorist attacks, Enron) that frame policy. The focus here is on the stuff that happens between the voter and the politicians. I don't think these approaches are really in conflict but what they do is capture different parts of the political procss. The median voter thing seems to capture the broad outlines of politics. America won't turn into Sweden just cause Tom Hayden read Robert's Rules of Order one day. Public opinion and honest elections set the broad paramters for what politicians can accomplish. OTOH, the gov't does so much stuff that politicians have to depend on committees, lobbiests (sp?) and gov't agencies to get anything passed. How can a semi-comprehensible law on uranium mining or Alaskan fishing rights be passed without consulting a million committess, the GAO or affeced parties? Furhtermore, all sort of random events may abruptly change how people percieve a law and add to this mix ths interactions between politicans and voters. Remember, you can do anything you want - if you can convince the median voter it was ok! If you buy this second story, then it's quite easy to see how individual policies may deviate greatly from the median voter. Fabio
Re: Quantity/Bulk discounts
Hi, I have now had opportunity to go through your mail thoroughly, and I would just like to say thank you. I'm trying to flesh out an idea for a further function bulk discounts may serve in illegal markets, and I really appreciate your help. Your mail was most useful. Ole At 21:37 08.07.2002 +0100, you wrote: The industrial organization textbook by Carlton and Perloff is good on issues of price discrimination, quantity discounts etc. Alex Sadly, I find Advanced Industrial Economics, by Stephen Martin (Blackwell 1993) a much better book in many ways. Although Carlton is a hugely talented economist (also hugely successful consultant; he recently endowed a chair at MIT), Carlton and Perloff is a talk-talk book. Too much it can be shown that with a citation, rather than actually showing, plus lots of summaries. Useful, but not a very good text. Martin is much better at showing how the models actually work. Lest I find myself in the middle of an antitrust dispute, I will happily stipulate for the libertarians on the list that Martin's antitrust views seem to assume that the government is different from everyone else by being benevolent and all-wise. His text is still better than Carlton and Perloff. The literature on bundling is huge. One place to start is by looking at John Lott and Russell Roberts, A Guide to the Pitfalls of Identifying Price Discrimination Economic Inquiry (January 1991) 29, 14-23, an important critique of empirical work on price discrimination. They point to the difficulties of separating cost explanations from price discrimination explanations. Since then, empirical papers have to confront the Lott-Roberts critique, so a citation search on Lott and Roberts is a good way to begin. Because the literature is so large, it is worth asking what sort of applications you are looking for. For example, Carl Shapiro and Hal Varian's Information Rules (the book's website is www.inforules.com) has a lot of interesting non-technical material on bundling in information goods. The references (mostly in the website, not the book) go back to the technical material. Bill Sjostrom + William Sjostrom Senior Lecturer Department of Economics National University of Ireland, Cork Cork, Ireland +353-21-490-2091 (work) +353-21-427-3920 (fax) +353-21-463-4056 (home) [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.ucc.ie/~sjostrom/
Re: Republican Reversal
Yes, I believe that the majority of the American public supports farm subsidies. The rational ignorance assumption fails to explain this - it's not like the information that governments spends billions on the farmers is hard to find. Some combination of Bryan's rational irrationality and just plain irrationality explains the results much better. Forty four percent of the American public thinks that God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so. (November 1997, Gallup Poll) so why should we be surprised that many Americans also support farm subsidies? Alex -- Dr. Alexander Tabarrok Vice President and Director of Research The Independent Institute 100 Swan Way Oakland, CA, 94621-1428 Tel. 510-632-1366, FAX: 510-568-6040 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Interview with Gary Becker
Carl Close wrote: Here's an interesting interview that may prompt some discussion Next time could you put it in plain text so that the mail client treats it as a link? Or, if you must send HTML mail, make it a proper link yourself? Or refrain from putting the meat in size -3? -- Anton Sherwood, http://www.ogre.nu/
Re: Republican Reversal
You mean He didn't? Rodney Weiher Alex Tabarrok wrote: Yes, I believe that the majority of the American public supports farm subsidies. The rational ignorance assumption fails to explain this - it's not like the information that governments spends billions on the farmers is hard to find. Some combination of Bryan's rational irrationality and just plain irrationality explains the results much better. Forty four percent of the American public thinks that God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so. (November 1997, Gallup Poll) so why should we be surprised that many Americans also support farm subsidies? Alex -- Dr. Alexander Tabarrok Vice President and Director of Research The Independent Institute 100 Swan Way Oakland, CA, 94621-1428 Tel. 510-632-1366, FAX: 510-568-6040 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Republican Reversal
fabio guillermo rojas wrote: . . . lobbiests (sp?) . . . Since you ask: lobbyists. `y' changes to `i' before `-est' (superlative) and `-(e)th' (ordinal) but not before `-ist' (agent). -- Anton Sherwood, http://www.ogre.nu/ athier than thou
RE: Republican Reversal
The implication that those who believe in the historical accuracy of the Bible are ignorant was inappropriate, Alex. Lynn -Original Message- From: Alex Tabarrok [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Wednesday, July 17, 2002 11:30 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Republican Reversal Yes, I believe that the majority of the American public supports farm subsidies. The rational ignorance assumption fails to explain this - it's not like the information that governments spends billions on the farmers is hard to find. Some combination of Bryan's rational irrationality and just plain irrationality explains the results much better. Forty four percent of the American public thinks that God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so. (November 1997, Gallup Poll) so why should we be surprised that many Americans also support farm subsidies? Alex -- Dr. Alexander Tabarrok Vice President and Director of Research The Independent Institute 100 Swan Way Oakland, CA, 94621-1428 Tel. 510-632-1366, FAX: 510-568-6040 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
TANSTAFB
I tried to send the to the list earlier, but it has not gone through according to my records. If this is a repeat message, I apologize. "There is no such thing as free blood." See this story below from The Charlotte Observer. Apparently, the Red Cross's "free" blood is too expensive for hospitals. http://www.charlotte.com/mld/charlotte/3673996.htm So what's going on? Is all this altruism simply a transfer to the Red Cross bureacracy? 10 hospitals plan to open blood center to compete with Red CrossMIKE STOBBEStaff Writer Ten local hospitals plan to open a new blood center by early next year. The plan, announced Tuesday, sets the stage for an unusual new battle for blood donations in the Charlotte area. The hospitals say they are reacting to price increases by the American Red Cross, the predominant blood collector and supplier in the area. Hospitals in other North Carolina communities have grumbled, too, but Charlotte hospitals are the first to move forward with concrete plans. The participating hospitals will provide loan guarantees to cover the more than $3 million in start-up costs for the center, which will operates as an independent, non-profit organization. But participating, together, the hospitals expect to see savings of $3 million once the center is up and running. Participating hospitals include Gaston Memorial Hospital, NorthEast Medical Center, Piedmont Medical Center, Carolinas Medical Center, Carolinas Medical Center -- Mercy, Carolinas Medical Center -- Pineville, Carolinas Medical Center -- University, Presbyterian Hospital, Presbyterian Hospital Matthews and Presbyterian Orthopaedic Hospital. A Red Cross spokeswoman said her organization is in favor of any efforts to increase blood donations in the area, but would be concerned if it results in a competition between blood collection agencies that might leave donors confused. _John-Charles Bradbury, Ph.D.Department of EconomicsThe University of the South735 University Ave.Sewanee, TN 37383 -1000Phone: (931) 598-1721Fax: (931) 598-1145E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]http://bradbury.sewanee.edu topstory_fromthe_txt.gif Description: GIF image spacer.gif Description: GIF image
RE: Republican Reversal
Lynn Gray wrote: The implication that those who believe in the historical accuracy of the Bible are ignorant was inappropriate, Alex. Forty four percent of the American public thinks that God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so. (November 1997, Gallup Poll) so why should we be surprised that many Americans also support farm subsidies? Why is this inappropriate? Don't we have far more reason to believe that humankind is more than 10,000 years old than we have to believe that farm subsidies don't work? Robin Hanson [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://hanson.gmu.edu Asst. Prof. Economics, George Mason University MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030- 703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323
Re: Republican Reversal
--- Alex wrote: Yes, I believe that the majority of the American public supports farm subsidies. Why do corporations, lawyers, unions, and other interests provide candidates and elected representatives with millions of dollars of funds and favors if they just vote to satisfy the median voter? Is the literature on rent seeking empirically irrelevant? For example, if the typical American favors subsidies to sugar farmers and does not mind if the domestic price is over twice the world price, and does not care much if candy-making jobs are moving to Canada, why do sugar farmers contribute funds to candidates if the representatives would vote for the subsidy anyway? Fred Foldvary = [EMAIL PROTECTED] __ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Autos - Get free new car price quotes http://autos.yahoo.com
Re: Republican Reversal
Actually, if you read closely, you will see that I implied that Americans who believe that God created human beings pretty much the way they are now about 10,000 years ago are *not* ignorant. The remarks were appropriate because they address the issue under discussion. As economists, we are often surprised that government policy differs so dramatically from what we think is efficient (and also equitable). Sometimes we like to think, as Fred put it, that the reason for this is that the public is ignorant and fooled by the government/special interests etc. We like to think that if only the public were informed they would denounce farm subsidies as many of us do. But why should we think this when information about, for example, the farm subsidy program is widely available? The evidence is even stronger in other fields that information per-se often does not change people's minds. The scientific consensus in favor of evolution is far stronger than the economic consensus against farm subsidies and the scientists have the advantage of support from the public school system and the media and yet, in America, they have not managed to convince a large segment of the population about the most important and fundamental fact of biology. If information doesn't change people's minds - what does? Or, at least, what causes people to have the beliefs that they have? This is where Bryan's important work comes in. Understanding these sorts of questions will give us a much better understanding of social change. Alex Gray, Lynn wrote: The implication that those who believe in the historical accuracy of the Bible are ignorant was inappropriate, Alex. Lynn -Original Message- From: Alex Tabarrok [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Wednesday, July 17, 2002 11:30 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Republican Reversal Yes, I believe that the majority of the American public supports farm subsidies. The rational ignorance assumption fails to explain this - it's not like the information that governments spends billions on the farmers is hard to find. Some combination of Bryan's rational irrationality and just plain irrationality explains the results much better. Forty four percent of the American public thinks that God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so. (November 1997, Gallup Poll) so why should we be surprised that many Americans also support farm subsidies? Alex -- Dr. Alexander Tabarrok Vice President and Director of Research The Independent Institute 100 Swan Way Oakland, CA, 94621-1428 Tel. 510-632-1366, FAX: 510-568-6040 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- Dr. Alexander Tabarrok Vice President and Director of Research The Independent Institute 100 Swan Way Oakland, CA, 94621-1428 Tel. 510-632-1366, FAX: 510-568-6040 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
RE: Republican Reversal
By saying it was inappropriate I meant it was rude. I am aware of the weight of the evidence in regard to human evolution. However, to say that those who believe in Biblical creation are dumb/ignorant is at the very least less than good manners. Lynn -Original Message- From: Robin Hanson [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Wednesday, July 17, 2002 2:56 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: Republican Reversal Lynn Gray wrote: The implication that those who believe in the historical accuracy of the Bible are ignorant was inappropriate, Alex. Forty four percent of the American public thinks that God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so. (November 1997, Gallup Poll) so why should we be surprised that many Americans also support farm subsidies? Why is this inappropriate? Don't we have far more reason to believe that humankind is more than 10,000 years old than we have to believe that farm subsidies don't work? Robin Hanson [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://hanson.gmu.edu Asst. Prof. Economics, George Mason University MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030- 703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323
Re: Republican Reversal
Fred Foldvary wrote: ...if the typical American favors subsidies to sugar farmers and does not mind if the domestic price is over twice the world price, and does not care much if candy-making jobs are moving to Canada, why do sugar farmers contribute funds to candidates if the representatives would vote for the subsidy anyway? The public supports farm subsidies in general. The politicians and special interests joust over the details. This is a long way from saying that government policies can be explained by rational ignorance and/or rent seeking. I will certainly grant that these ideas explain some things such as details of the tax code but if you look at the budget the vast majority of it goes to programs that the public supports in large numbers. Alex -- Dr. Alexander Tabarrok Vice President and Director of Research The Independent Institute 100 Swan Way Oakland, CA, 94621-1428 Tel. 510-632-1366, FAX: 510-568-6040 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Republican Reversal
Gray, Lynn wrote: By saying it was inappropriate I meant it was rude. I am aware of the weight of the evidence in regard to human evolution. However, to say that those who believe in Biblical creation are dumb/ignorant is at the very least less than good manners. Worse than saying the same of people with wrong ideas about economics? -- Anton Sherwood, http://www.ogre.nu/
RE: Republican Reversal
--- Alex wrote: Yes, I believe that the majority of the American public supports farm subsidies. to which Fred Foldvary replied: Why do corporations, lawyers, unions, and other interests provide candidates and elected representatives with millions of dollars of funds and favors if they just vote to satisfy the median voter? Is the literature on rent seeking empirically irrelevant? There is a difference between supporting farm subsidies and supporting a particular pattern of subsidies, and that is no doubt worth fighting over. It remains possible both to think American generally support farm support, and to have reservations about particular aspects (such as the support of all the mohair grown in my area, or sugar). Of course, as a practical political matter, a whole bunch of logs have to get rolled for a farm-support bill to pass, so the question is, again, whether the representative American voter (or eligible voter) thinks that overall he is better served by something like the rent-ridden present system or by a system in which there is no rent -- and _his_ favored projects are not supported. Michael Michael E. Etchison Texas Wholesale Power Report MLE Consulting www.mleconsulting.com 1423 Jackson Road Kerrville, TX 78028 (830) 895-4005
Why are the simple folk so wrong WAS Republican Reversal
Alex Tabarrok: The evidence is even stronger in other fields that information per-se often does not change people's minds. . . . If information doesn't change people's minds - what does? You do notice, I trust, that just as there are those, including some who appear to be well-educated and otherwise civilized, but who doubt that Darwin had the whole story, there are those -- no doubt all uncouth shoeless gap-toothed mouthbreathers -- who do not think that the prevailing economic theories are information. Michael Michael E. Etchison Texas Wholesale Power Report MLE Consulting www.mleconsulting.com 1423 Jackson Road Kerrville, TX 78028 (830) 895-4005
Re: Why are the simple folk so wrong WAS Republican Reversal
Yes, this is precisely my point. Alex Michael Etchison wrote: Alex Tabarrok: The evidence is even stronger in other fields that information per-se often does not change people's minds. . . . If information doesn't change people's minds - what does? You do notice, I trust, that just as there are those, including some who appear to be well-educated and otherwise civilized, but who doubt that Darwin had the whole story, there are those -- no doubt all uncouth shoeless gap-toothed mouthbreathers -- who do not think that the prevailing economic theories are information. Michael Michael E. Etchison Texas Wholesale Power Report MLE Consulting www.mleconsulting.com 1423 Jackson Road Kerrville, TX 78028 (830) 895-4005
