Ray, when I was a kid I was going to become the world's greatest artist, driving fast cars, dating fast women and living on the Riviara. Failing that, I took a very long step down and became an economist.
Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: Ray Harrell To: 'RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION,EDUCATION' Sent: Tuesday, September 20, 2011 9:37 PM Subject: Re: [Futurework] Professional Ethics (of economists) I should start reading from the top. I come in after teaching a class until nine and find that Ed commented on bedbugs first. Either he's an artist or I'm an economist. REH From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Ed Weick Sent: Tuesday, September 20, 2011 3:18 PM To: [email protected]; RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION Subject: Re: [Futurework] Professional Ethics (of economists) Rat farming? How about bedbugs? They're making a comeback. Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mike Spencer" <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Tuesday, September 20, 2011 2:30 PM Subject: [Futurework] Re: Professional Ethics (of economists) > > Last night, I commented on Tom's reference: > >>> http://ecologicalheadstand.blogspot.com/2011/09/professional-ethics.html >> >> Over the past 30 years, the economics discipline has been >> systematically subverted....Many of the most prominent economists >> in America are now paid to testify in Congress, to serve on boards >> of directors, testify in antitrust cases and regulatory >> proceedings, and to give speeches to the companies and industries >> they study and write about with supposed objectivity. This is not >> a marginal activity; it is now an industry, run by a half dozen >> large companies. >> >> I didn't know that. Why does that remind me somehow of the privatized >> prison industry? > > Saw this on Slash/dot: > > How Bug Bounties Are Like Rat Farming 104 > > Posted by timothy on Tuesday September 20, @11:00AM > from the first-we-hypothesize-a-problem dept. > > Gunkerty Jeb writes "In a keynote speech at the United Security > Summit, Stephen Dubner, co-author of Freakonomics, drew parallels > between the increasingly popular (and successful) practice of > software vendors offering bug bounties and a new industry > springing up in Johannesburg, South Africa, where the population > has recently found itself beset with a growing rat problem. In > order to help mitigate their rodent problem, officials in > Johannesburg began offering a small monetary rewards for each dead > rat turned in. It was wildly successful, and it didn't take long > for fresh batch of entrepreneurs to pop up and exploit the > situation. Of course, I'm talking about rat farming. Evidently, > business minded individuals have taken to breeding rats, only to > kill them and turn them in for rewards. Obviously, rat farming is > somewhat unscrupulous, but security researchers are doing the same > thing: breeding bugs in the lab, then leading them to the > slaughter for a nice payday. And it's a good thing." > > Which probably isn't a totally new thing [1] but a reminder about how > that works with prisons, weapon systems and (allegedly) economists. > > The way it works out for (software-) bug hunting -- the relevance for > Slash-dotters -- seems to be free of the malignancy/fraudulence of rat > farming: > > http://threatpost.com/en_us/blogs/how-bug-bounties-are-rat-farming-092011 > > as one commenter there (somewhat intemperately) observes. > > So the question is: how do you structure privatization of prisons, > corporatized for-fee economics consulting or any such activity so that > it works like bug-hunting and not like rat-farming? Do we need to > somehow extract or sequester such activities completely from > capitalist incentives? > > > - Mike > > > [1] The Paris rat-catcher of circa 1689 in Stephenson's _Quicksilver_ > was already (and quite entertainingly) into rat farming. > > -- > Michael Spencer Nova Scotia, Canada .~. > /V\ > [email protected] /( )\ > http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/ ^^-^^ > > _______________________________________________ > Futurework mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
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