Hear, hear! This is the message I have been banging on about since forever!
It costs us (that is the UK, Canada, and the USA) huge amounts not being
properly metric - not just things like dual inventories, but things like
lost export business, extra costs in buying things that have to be specially
made for the non-metric world, and so on.
It is a message that will take a lot of hammering home to make an
impression - but maybe some sort of study that can quantify, as far as that
is possible, the lost economic opportunities in not being fully metric might
help.
One cost at a personal level that is not always appreciated is the cost of
modifying cars. Every Canadian who chooses to buy a car in the US and import
it into Canada has (among other things) to change the speedometer and
odometer instruments, simply because the US is not metric on its roads, and
Canada is. I don't know what this costs, but it must be in the many hundreds
of dollars.
Conversely, a good friend of mine recently decided to move back to the UK
after living for almost 40 years in South Africa (being held up with a gun
to his head and robbed while his wife and kids looked on made him come to
that decision - South Africa is not the country it was say 30 years ago). He
brought with him a top of the line VW Golf - which of course was all metric
in terms of its speedometer and odometer. It cost him over £500 ($800) to
convert to an mph speedometer and an odometer reading in miles. Total waste
of money.
While this was a personal expense for him, similar costs must be occurring
throughout industry and commerce in dealing with two sets of measurement
units - and those countries not fully metric will be bearing the brunt of
them. Time to eliminate this wastage.
John F-L
-----Original Message-----
From: c...@traditio.com
Sent: Saturday, January 12, 2013 7:37 PM
To: U.S. Metric Association
Subject: [USMA:52156] Metrication of Yogurt and a New Metric Theme
I noticed today in the grocery store that Dannon, a leading producer (with
Yoplait) of yogurt, has introduced a new metricated container for its
Greek yogurt. Greek yogurt seems to be the "in thing" these days. It has
a thicker consistency than regular commercial yogurt, has about half the
sugar, and twice the protein.
USC-based yogurt containers are either 4 oz. or 6 oz. This new Dannon
container is 150 grams, marked also 5.3 oz. Obviously, the packaging is
metric-based, with a USC conversion added, not the other way around.
This, together with other observations, leads me to emphasize my new
theme: "complete our metric conversion." I think that we need to stop
talking about the US as being one of only two or three countries that are
not metric.
In fact, the US is already about half metric. What we need to do, I
think, is to talk about "completing" the metrication to achieve its full
benefits. We are in the same situation as Canada, Britain, and several
other countries in being on the way to complete metrication. We are just
in different stages.
The US is certainly moving toward more metric use, even though it may not
be so obvious as on road signs. But the grocery story is a powerful
component of metrication. Consumers here by metricated wine, metricated
pills, metricated soft drinks, and many other commodities. You don't hear
consumers objecting; it just happens. This type of conversion actually
has benefits. It doesn't rouse the anti-metric faction.
I don't think that it does our cause any service to keep describing the US
as "not metric." It would make our point better to bring our fellow
citizens to a realization that we are already half way there. We just
need to complete the process to reap the full benefits and cost savings.
That is why I have a problem with the phraseology of the metric petition
that is being talked about here. It stresses the rationality of the
metric system, being easier to use and teach, once learned. While this is
certainly true, I think that our cause would be better served by stressing
the economic benefits: international commerce, saving companies the not-
insignificant costs of maintaining dual inventories, the cost in time and
money of teaching our students two systems of measurement. Idealism is
fine, but it doesn't sell as well in a political environment. It is
dollars that count there.
-----
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