Here's the one that worries me: Interest payments on the debt are projected to grow to 6.7 percent of GDP in thirty years (right now they're 1.9 percent and Social Security outlays are 4.9 percent).
Deficits are projected to be 10 percent of GDP then, meaning 2/3rds of our borrowing will be done to pay off existing borrowing. That's not good.
It’s not like the latter division is an obviously stable way to analyze the issue.
If we just ran a larger deficit, say 27% of GDP, that ratio would be (temporarily) much lower at only 25% of new borrowing. But that wouldn’t be obviously “better”.
1) The text box for answers should already be clicked and ready to type in. So when you submit your answer, you don't need to click again to get the next question.
2) To move things along, the correct / incorrect response should pop up on the next page with the next question, text box ready to start typing.
3) Choosing difficulty would be helpful. Multiplication thrown in with addition would be discouraging for a kid who only knows addition.
4) If you'd like to stop, clicking Home at the top should pause the timer. I completed a few questions then wanted to go to home and click around. But the timer kept going, which if I didn't notice would run out and then subtract a kid's progress.
5) In the about section, it'd probably be helpful to explain to non-tech savvy parents that this browser keeps track of your progress with cookies. As long as you're signed in on the same web browser on the same account/computer, your progress will be saved.
Thanks for the thoughtful feedback and encouragement. I love your points. I will make the suggested improvements. Top of mind is to solve for difficult level (and of course the auto-advance without having to click next and keeping focus on text input).
"The Housing: San Francisco has deeply conservative tendencies for such a liberal city. Its housing supply isn't growing fast enough to keep up with rising demand."
Restrictive housing is more of a liberal phenomenon than a conservative one, wouldn't you say?
The author gives a shoutout to Palladium mag, whose EIC has some "heterodox" opinions on certain ethnic groups[1], as a cool SF philanthropy project. If the author is a liberal, strange bedfellows indeed.
"Everyone is conservative about what he knows best." - Robert Conquest, apocryphal.
I would guess that the overwhelming majority of SF homeowners would self-identify as liberal / Democrat voters. But on the topic of local housing policy, they would like to conserve the status quo.
Yes, and from what I can see, the desire to conserve the status quo has little to do with political conservatism and everything to do with ordinary self-interest.
I don’t think you can really personally blame someone for wanting maintain the character of their neighborhood (and inflate the value of their home). It’s perfectly rational behavior. The problem is that the preferences of this relatively small cohort are overriding the social and economic health of the city as a whole. Ideally, a democratic majority would overrule these narrowly self-interested concerns and force more development, more homeless shelters, etc., but for whatever reason this doesn’t seem to be happening in SF.
I don't think of this as a matter of politics in the traditional "left vs. right" sense. Merely that a lot of homeowners in SF have an "I got mine, screw you" attitude that extends into policy decisions in order to protect and increase the value of their property. It's conservative only in the literal meaning of the term, that they're resistant to any change that they fear could cause their home values to decrease. I expect this phenomenon is quite bipartisan in general, but yes, obviously there are more people on the left than right in SF, so likely many "liberal" people are "conservative on housing".
I think the author is using conservative in the more direct sense: the people are fighting to keep things the way they are in terms of housing. This is at odds with the way the city is normally thought of in terms of being "liberal" (more accepting of change).
I don't think it's a statement on whether or not left or right wing policies contribute more to the issue.
If you go back far enough, it's where the term comes from, but it doesn't make sense today. That would nominally make it an oxymoron for a "conservative" party to ever propose any kind of change, but clearly they do.
It's a fairly common outcome for political words to get stuck to changing movements rather than identifying unique positions and policies over the course of decades and centuries.
Restrictive housing is literally people trying to keep things the same. That seems like a definition of "conservative" if I have ever seen one.
You can argue that "Conservatives" (note the capital letter, denoting that his means an actual group) would be against rules on housing, but if you actually look at the rules in Republican leaning highly urban areas I bet you will find similar rules.
People dislike dealing with the effects of large scale changes. That really is not a Liberal or Conservative thing (note the capital letters).
Yes, the 0.7% of "rent controlled" units of NYC's available inventory that's shrinking by 2.5%/yr is totally stifling new supply.
Feel free to tell us about how the rent stabilized units, which do compromise 1/3 of the inventory but in 3/4 of cases are within spitting distance (10%, and see 4% rent increases every 2 years) of market rate are keeping down supply though. Tell us about about how luxury condos in places like East New York, Edenwald, Brownsville, Morrisania & Crotona, and Hunts Point are going to increase affordable housing in NYC. I am very interested in learning about this.
Or instead, how about I tell you about my time working for a real estate tax certiorari firm in NYC and how landlords with multiple properties will deliberately underutilize their buildings for tax advantages.
Occupancy maximums of 90% and one or multiple buildings deliberately at 0% occupancy (usually the primary residence of the landlords' extended family members for undeclared income) is the norm.
>"Or instead, how about I tell you about my time working for a real estate tax certiorari firm in NYC and how landlords with multiple properties will deliberately underutilize their buildings for tax advantages."
When in the 1980s? Was Ed Koch the mayor?
Market rate on a modest(500 sq foot plus) apartment is worth close to $3K a month or 36K a year. Please provide a citation this tax break which is worth more than 36K a year in 2018 for leaving a unit unoccupied?
Nice cherry picked data. That's a HUD report. Try checking the NYC Rent Guidelines Report for accurate data:
Manhattan 2.57 and Queens 2.11 [1]
That's from page 2. It also shows a -25% and -35% change for vacancy rates from 3 years prior for those two boroughs.
And you can't seem to produce any citation for your assertion about a piece of the tax code that allows landlords to make more money from empty apartments than renting them at market rate.
While the full article is gated at WSJ, John Cochrane and David Henderson write about the lack of quantifying economic costs when it comes to addressing climate change. Their last paragraph:
Climate policy advocates’ apocalyptic vision demands serious analysis, and mushy thinking undermines their case. If carbon emissions pose the greatest threat to humanity, it follows that the costs of nuclear power—waste disposal and the occasional meltdown—might be bearable. It follows that the costs of genetically modified foods and modern pesticides, which can feed us with less land and lower carbon emissions, might be bearable. It follows that if the future of civilization is really at stake, adaptation or geo-engineering should not be unmentionable. And it follows that symbolic, ineffective, political grab-bag policies should be intolerable.
I mostly agree with his paragraph above. But from your link,
"No. Healthy societies do not fall apart over slow, widely predicted, relatively small economic adjustments of the sort painted by climate analysis. Societies do fall apart from war, disease or chaos. Climate policy must compete with other long-term threats for always-scarce resources."
"Small economic adjustments?" How many large scale resources does preventing war or pandemics require? Is chaos a real threat?
Most of what he lists are effects, not causes. Here's an economic question for him: what happens when the area between the Mississippi and the Rockies returns to being an unusable semidesert? (That's not an if. It is all irrigated.)
And I'll just leave this comment here: "As I favor a uniform VAT in place of the idiotically complex income and corporate tax system."
what happens when the area between the Mississippi and the Rockies returns to being an unusable semidesert? (That's not an if. It is all irrigated.)
Here in Missouri, there is actually fairly little irrigation. There's a 1.5 hour drive through rural farmland I take regularly, and I see one irrigation setup on the whole trip. The other irrigation I can think of off the top of my head is just north of Jefferson City, 100 yards from the Missouri River, and that's for a sod factory that turns its fields over every couple of months.
This year the rain has been fantastic. We put up more hay than we ever have. July was hot, as July often is, but the first week of August will be our coolest in memory. If this is climate change, I vote for more of it. b^)
But a large part of that region was known as the Great American Desert before the invention of suitable irrigation. And water is being removed from the aquifer much faster than it is being replaced.
Yes, things that can't continue forever, won't. Eventually much of the Great Plains will be native grassland again. That is its natural condition. The parts of Arizona and California that currently host alfalfa fields will be actual desert again, and the dairy industry will return to the Midwest where it belongs.
Even when being hyperbolic, however, you could move your border west a whole state. I doubt Minnesota, Iowa, Arkansas, or Louisiana are any more worried about the next Dust Bowl than we are. My impression is that Missouri is the driest of the states on our longitude.
His argument is almost tautological, because it is conditional on the basis that the society is healthy.
Societies fall apart over slow, widely predicted economic adjustments all the time, because healthy societies have buffering homeostatic functions.
Once the adjustment exceeds the ability of the society to buffer, the adjustment rapidly moves from the 'slow and widely predicted' bucket to the 'war, disease and chaos' bucket. One might note that this process leaves the society looking healthy until the moment when suddenly it isn't.
Relatively small. Compared to "war, disease or chaos", keeping "the area between the Mississippi and the Rockies" irrigated will be (is) expensive, but it's a relatively small expense.
Decent government. Stable institutions and mostly fair and equitable justice and law enforcement. The US and Europe have their challenges, to put it mildly, but have been fairly successful in averting chaos, and things are going pretty damn well, judging by even relatively recent historical standards.
> But how much do you spend to prevent war? How much do you dump into the CDC?
A lot. So that means that things can be very expensive and still be relatively cheap.
> And how do you irrigate the Midwest once the aquifers get low? Piping desalination water from the Gulf?
I don't know. Perhaps. Or perhaps redirecting water from the Hudson Bay drainage basin. Human ingenuity is pretty great.
> It follows that if the future of civilization is really at stake, adaptation or geo-engineering should not be unmentionable.
Problem: the balance of the planet has been seriously disturbed in largely unexpected ways due to very complex processes.
Solving this problem by a method other than reversing out changes is an extremely risky proposition and is virtually guaranteed to produce unanticipated fallout. Even at the small scale when we try simple solutions to complex problems, they are fraught with effects that are often worse than the problem was.
Climate policy advocates’ apocalyptic vision demands serious analysis, and mushy thinking undermines their case. If carbon emissions pose the greatest threat to humanity, it follows that the costs of nuclear power—waste disposal and the occasional meltdown—might be bearable.
I agree, but I'd also consider myself to be a "Climate policy advocate" with an "apocalyptic vision" so maybe he's conflating different groups for the purpose of argument?
What is the cost of genetically modified foods and modern pesticides? Sure you can imagine B-movies plots of bad things that we can do, but in the real world none of them have happened yet, and even if they do it would be a mad scientist who already has all the knowledge needed to do his evil scheme so this has no bearing on real uses.
> Climate policy advocates’ apocalyptic vision demands serious analysis, and mushy thinking undermines their case. If carbon emissions pose the greatest threat to humanity, it follows that the costs of nuclear power—waste disposal and the occasional meltdown—might be bearable. It follows that the costs of genetically modified foods and modern pesticides, which can feed us with less land and lower carbon emissions, might be bearable. It follows that if the future of civilization is really at stake, adaptation or geo-engineering should not be unmentionable. And it follows that symbolic, ineffective, political grab-bag policies should be intolerable.
If climate change alarmists truly believed what they were saying, they wouldn't be using smartphones, internet or driving SUVs.
The climate change movement is nothing but globalists and the "clean" energy industry exploiting the environmental fanatics to get more grants/money for themselves.
The climate change movement is really the globalist "carbon energy/tax movement". It's a way for the political elite to control world energy use and energy production.
Just like the "priests" of olden times used the threat of "earthquakes/natural disasters" to dupe the masses into doing their bidding ( virgin sacrifices, building monuments, etc ), the globalists are using climate change as a scare mongering tactic to put the world's energy/industry/etc under their control.
If truly the crazy climate predictions are true and humanity's existence was at stake, would we stop mass production of trucks, SUVs? Wouldn't we immediately stop international trade and air travel. After all, container ships are the largest producers of carbon pollution.
>If climate change alarmists truly believed what they were saying, they wouldn't be using smartphones, internet or driving SUVs.
Nearly all CO2 emissions in the US come from heat, electricity, and transportation. "Climate alarmists" drive hybrids or electric cars and have solar panels and
heat pumps. The internet and smartphones are totally besides the point. Not to mention that you're inventing a strawman.
>The climate change movement is nothing but globalists and the "clean" energy industry exploiting the environmental fanatics to get more grants/money for themselves.
ugh, just... fuck off. "globalists". You're a fucking conspiracy hound.
>The climate change movement is really the globalist "carbon energy/tax movement". It's a way for the political elite to control world energy use and energy production.
idiot
>Just like the "priests" of olden times used the threat of "earthquakes/natural disasters" to dupe the masses into doing their bidding ( virgin sacrifices, building monuments, etc ), the globalists are using climate change as a scare mongering tactic to put the world's energy/industry/etc under their control.
go away
>If truly the crazy climate predictions are true and humanity's existence was at stake, would we stop mass production of trucks, SUVs? Wouldn't we immediately stop international trade and air travel.
truth has very little to do with what people believe. I'm sure you agree with that
>After all, container ships are the largest producers of carbon pollution.
You seriously have no idea what the fuck you're talking about at any level. You have made your conclusions and taken zero steps to verify them. Start here: http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg2/
> "Climate alarmists" drive hybrids or electric cars and have solar panels and heat pumps.
Except that hybrids, electric cars requires tons of CO2 pollution to create. Not to mention that climate alarmists like dicaprio fly on private jets and have huge mansions/yachts/etc.
But that's not my point? If truly, we are at a human extinction level, why are climate alarmists even driving hybrids/electic cars? Why are they even using solar panels? Shouldn't they give up all these luxuries to save the human species?
No need for that. If you want to discuss this, then fine. If you are going to toss around insults, then I won't respond any further. And it isn't a "conspiracy". It is a FACT. To put the entire carbon/energy system under global centralized control.
> truth has very little to do with what people believe. I'm sure you agree with that
Yes. And the truth is that the alarmists have been proven wrong OVER AND OVER again. The climate change people are no different than the peak oil fanatics.
> Idiot. It's 2.2% of carbon emissions:
The fact that you have to resort to ad hominems shows you have no argument. And 2.2% ANNUAL emission is significant.
> You seriously have no idea what the fuck you're talking about at any level. You have made your conclusions and taken zero steps to verify them.
I'm sure you do. Feel free to run around screaming that the world is going to end. Why are you using the internet or a computer? The world is going to end right? Shouldn't you do your part and try to prevent it?
Except that hybrids, electric cars requires tons of CO2 pollution to create.
As do regular cars. If you're asserting that hybrids require far more emissions to create than gas-powered equivalents, and that that this excess exceeds the pollution saving over their operating lifetime, then cite your sources. Because otherwise it would still be a good idea.
"Comparing an average midsize midrange BEV with an average midsize gasoline-powered car, it takes just 4,900 miles of driving to “pay back”—i.e., offset—the extra
global warming emissions from producing the BEV. Similarly, it takes 19,000 miles with the full-size long-range BEV compared with a similar gasoline car."
Again, do some fucking research before making claims that you know nothing about.
>Not to mention that climate alarmists like dicaprio fly on private jets and have huge mansions/yachts/etc.
He drives a Prius, a Tesla Roadster, and a Fisker Karma. Big houses don't produce more CO2 unless they use more electricity, and he has solar. Flying produces less CO2 than driving, and is required for his job, so he can spend money on things that globally reduce CO2: http://www.businessinsider.com/leonardo-dicaprio-eco-resort-...
And note that there are no subsidies to be gained in Belize from using solar.
>But that's not my point? If truly, we are at a human extinction level, why are climate alarmists even driving hybrids/electic cars? Why are they even using solar panels? Shouldn't they give up all these luxuries to save the human species?
You have two choices if you believe in climate change, and one is much more attractive than the other:
1: Live an awful, shitty life as an ascetic. The majority of the world continues polluting and your suffering is without purpose. Hope that enough of the world embraces asceticism to reduce climate change.
2: Try to convince everyone else to pay just a little more for cars and electricity, because a small sacrifice will totally avert global warming. Your suffering is small, and more likely to attract others to do the same.
>No need for that. If you want to discuss this, then fine. If you are going to toss around insults, then I won't respond any further. And it isn't a "conspiracy". It is a FACT. To put the entire carbon/energy system under global centralized control.
The cognitive gymnastics required to come to that conclusion are incredible. The carbon/energy cycle is under centralized control, because it's attached to the grid. Solar power lets you detach from the grid. All global climate change agreements have been completely distributed and countries are in charge of meeting their own goals. Basically, what the hell are you talking about?
>Yes. And the truth is that the alarmists have been proven wrong OVER AND OVER again. The climate change people are no different than the peak oil fanatics.
Right... could you link me to some proof? Because I already linked a 5000 page report of proof, and I've got plenty more where that came from. The temperature of the earth has changed and is changing. There's no controversy over that.
>The fact that you have to resort to ad hominems shows you have no argument. And 2.2% ANNUAL emission is significant.
Of transport-related CO2, 74% is from road transport. 12% is from airplanes[1]. 2.2% is from all ships. Oceangoing ships are literally the smallest source of concern with transport related greenhouse gases. You are totally wrong.
>I'm sure you do. Feel free to run around screaming that the world is going to end. Why are you using the internet or a computer? The world is going to end right? Shouldn't you do your part and try to prevent it?
My computer, running 24/365, uses 1,300 kWh, about as much as a car driving 1500 miles. The average American drives ten times that. If I can convince one person every six years that they should buy an electric car, I've made up for using my computer. Go buy an electric car.
> Again, do some fucking research before making claims that you know nothing about.
You might want to learn instead. My point was that BUILDING Hybrids/EVs cause pollution. Not that gas powered cars as less polluting. What you are doing right now is building a straw man.
> He drives a Prius, a Tesla Roadster, and a Fisker Karma. Big houses don't produce more CO2 unless they use more electricity, and he has solar. Flying produces less CO2 than driving, and is required for his job, so he can spend money on things that globally reduce CO2
Everything you listed produced CO2. You need fossil fuel to BUILD prius, Tesla, etc. The housing material was made via producing carbon. The trucks/etc used to transport and build the mansions used carbon.
I can't believe you used di caprio's resort as an example of being "green". Wonder how much pollution is generated just to visit the resort.
> 2: Try to convince everyone else to pay just a little more for cars and electricity, because a small sacrifice will totally avert global warming. Your suffering is small, and more likely to attract others to do the same.
I thought we aren't using that word "global warming" and using "climate change"? Also, I thought alarmists have said it is already too late.
>Right... could you link me to some proof? Because I already linked a 5000 page report of proof
You haven't link anything other than a straw man and a silly PR piece about dicaprio.
> The carbon/energy cycle is under centralized control, because it's attached to the grid.
You can't be like this. That's not what I mean by "centralized control".
> My computer, running 24/365, uses 1,300 kWh, about as much as a car driving 1500 miles. The average American drives ten times that. If I can convince one person every six years that they should buy an electric car, I've made up for using my computer.
No you haven't. The pollution is STILL there.
It's funny how you alarmist can't even get your stories straight. "It's too late". "It's not too late". "We need a complete overhaul". "We can do this incrementally". "We need to reduce carbon emissions". "We just need to maintain it at this level".
Listen. I know you "googled" and want to push your agenda. I get that people like you need a religion and it's difficult to accept old religions like christianity. So you cling to "climate change" and it's "revelations" and end of the world nonsense.
Your religion isn't any more valid than christianity. I know you are going to be upset because the truth hurts. I used to be exactly like you. A global warming fanatic. But I eventually matured and left my teenage years behind me.
So worship Elon, pray to him everyday and read the scriptures of the climate change bible. Life will go on. And you will grow out of this silly phase.
Right. You are having some real difficulty with a coherent argument and I'm pretty sure there's something wrong with your ability to... process reality, or something. You remind me a lot of schizophrenics I've met over the years, so I'm done.
Here's the other thing about administrative costs: Medicare's patients cost a lot more per person than private insurance.
In other words, if it costs you $500 in administration costs and one patient has care that totals $5,000 and another has care that totals $10,000, then their administrative costs are 10% and 20%.
And yet we think that if we shifted more people onto a Medicare-like system, we'd save money.
Medicare patients are more expensive because of who it currently covers: elderly and disabled people, two groups that use more services than the general population. The whole point of a single payer AKA Medicare for all system is to cover the entire population, which would (because math) bring down the average cost per person.
I've always read that the problem with Medicare is that it's unfair to hospitals because they pay lower than the average rate (but can't negotiate on medicine). Do the savings from lower care costs not balance out the higher drug costs? (From a steady state of 1 surgery can lead to a lifetime of drugs, I'd guess the balance isn't great)
Medicare is also currently prevented by law from negotiating for drug prices. If we shift more people onto Medicare, we need to fix that problem too. The overall structure of a single payer/administrator is most likely to save money, but we need to be vigilant about the specific rules it is imposed with too.
Incredible catharsis. Love it.