Things That Used To Be Legal

Courtesy BrandChannel.com

The New York Times has the report:

Seeking to reduce runaway obesity rates, the New York City Board of Health on Thursday approved a ban on the sale of large sodas and other sugary drinks at restaurants, street carts and movie theaters, the first restriction of its kind in the country.

As I argued in a previous installment, once something is illegal somewhere, it is only a matter of time before it is illegal elsewhere. New York City's ban on soda is, therefore, merely the first instance of what will soon become a widespread phenomenon.

There has been a huge public relations effort up to this point. We have been talking about it for a very long time. There have been scholarly journal articles arguing for the ban, doctors' associations arguing for the ban, politicians arguing for the ban.

From every angle, the discussion has always centered around the following argument: (a) The US is experiencing an "obesity epidemic" and a "diabetes epidemic," (b) All other things being equal, drinking large amounts of soda increases one's risk for obesity and diabetes, (c) Therefore, soda should be banned.

QED.

Well, what's to be argued with? That soda - especially in large quantities - is unhealthy is an objective fact. That there are rising rates of obesity and diabetes prevalence in the United States is simply and plainly true. On these things, there can be no dispute.

Opponents of the ban have always argued that a ban on soda is the epitome of the Nanny State. It used to be a joke, you know. People used to say things like, "What's next, a ban on soda?" The belief had been, until recently, that people should be persuaded not to do stupid, unhealthy things, rather than forced to conform to medical standards. The broader context here, though, is that we Americans are progressively becoming total wards of the state, and that means that if we engage in activities that cost the state money, the state will get angry at us and force us to stop.

Who is the state? Who is the government? There seems to be a vague impression that "we all are," but specifically who do we mean? Whose idea is it to force us to conform to a soda quota, and how did that person gain greater access to the corridors of power than the rest of us, who are more than happy to leave each other alone?

More importantly, if we really are a society that believes in the principle of "my body, my decision" then how is a ban like this even remotely tenable?

The answers to questions like these are irrelevant. In a short while, no one will remember what it was like to have the ability to purchase large quantities of the controlled substance known as soda pop. Coffee shops will experience a huge windfall as people spend their dollars on substitute goods that come in smaller sizes, and in time we will become a more coffee-oriented society than a softdrink-oriented society. The next generation will not know about Big Gulps. All will be forgotten.

Well, almost all. I will still remember, and I will have made note of how things used to be, right here on my blog.

Some Links

It is not unusual to see in city squares or outside shops in Benghazi the American flag along with that of France and Turkey and Qatar, countries that, albeit almost never without ulterior motives, helped Libya’s revolution. Yet notwithstanding that sincere gratitude, many Libyans continue to associate America, because of its actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, and its defense of Israeli policy, with violent imperial pursuits and double standards.

-- Hisham Matar, in The New Yorker.

Yevgeny Y. Satanovsky, president of the Institute of the Middle East in Moscow, said American leaders should not expect “one word of sympathy” from their Russian counterparts.

“It is a tragedy to the family of the poor ambassador, but his blood is on the hands of Hillary Clinton personally and Barack Obama personally,” Mr. Satanovsky said. He said Russian warnings against intervention in the Middle East came from the bitter experience of the Soviets in Afghanistan.

“You are the Soviet Union now, guys, and you pay the price,” he said. “You are trying to distribute democracy the way we tried to distribute socialism. You do it the Western way. They hate both.” He said dictators were preferable to the constellation of armed forces that emerges when they are unseated.

-- From this New York Times article (HT: Anti-Gnostic)

-- The notorious NYC large-sized soda ban is up for a vote today. (Things that will soon be illegal?)

-- Another great day in a very good year for Sanofi investors.

This little vignette from the always-fabulous Best of the Web Today is too good not to quote in full:

Aloha, Red Ink
"Washington [D.C.]-area consumers have the second highest average credit card balances in the nation, and mortgages that rank in the top 10, according to credit monitoring service Credit Karma," reports the Washington Business Journal:

Nationally, consumers currently have outstanding credit card balances averaging $5,403. In Washington, the average outstanding balance is $6,439, second only to Honolulu, at $6,846.

That's nothing. We know this guy who was born in Honolulu and moved to Washington a few years ago, and you'll never believe how much debt he ran up!

Last Post On This Topic For A While

I don't want to beat a dead horse.

My journey on this Austrian School of Economic Thought trolley has been about six years long. From the beginning, it was racked by controversy, most notably the epistemological controversy I caused at the Ludwig von Mises Institute of Canada. What readers don't know is that the views I expressed in that article lead one Austrian School insider to tattle on me, running to the well-heeled guardians of Austrian (read: Rothbardian) thought and proclaiming me essentially evil.

I have never played well with in-groups. My personal view of in-groups is that they are more about excluding other people than they are about taking pride in commonalities. I have over three decades of personal experience to back me up on that.

Frankly, I refuse to belong to any group that attempts to force me to tow the party line. That goes for politics, religion, and ideas in general. It also goes for social groups, clubs, workplaces, and anything else. To me, life is about individual happiness, not about inclusion. If the majority of people dislike what I think, do, or say, I can still be a happy, satisfied person. My life does not hang on the words of an in-group.

George Selgin does not go nearly as far as I do when he makes a case this morning for being a good economist, not just a good Austrian economist:

Here it is: search for the word "Austrian" in your research papers, delete it, and rewrite where necessary. Next ask yourself whether what's left can stand on its own merits. Would your fellow Austrians find it interesting and persuasive without the help of all the winking, nodding, and fraternal handshaking aimed at declaring yourself one of the team, and at thereby evading friendly fire? Would they find the conclusions firmly attached by a series of solid links to some indisputable premises, as they should if you are really a competent praxeologist? Are they likely to find the evidence you supply persuasive, should you be so bold as to offer such? Would they, in short, find merit in what you've written even if they had no reason to suspect that you are one of the gang, or even a fellow traveler? If not, then your paper is good for nothing but joining a club that is, face it, all too willing to have you as a member.

Recall that I also quoted Selgin yesterday with regard to the recent Austrian School identity crises occurring out there in Austrian-Land.

Ideas should not be subject to group approval. Ideas are simply sparks of individual thought, brought out into the world by people who believe the world might benefit from knowing them. We can disagree with another person's ideas on the merits or demerits of the ideas themselves.

But when we start believing things merely because those things are attached to our favorite in-group, we are no longer thinking for ourselves.

In light of recent mob-behavior tragedies this past week, it is particularly important to remind my readers and Austrian-adherents in general that in the realm of ideas one can score points with the general public by appealing to their groupthink; but one cannot score points with the truth except by appealing to truth.

I now depart the "shortcomings of orthodox Austrianism" themes. In the future, I intend to take on themes involving groupthink, social pressure discouraging individuality, and the institutions that make it all happen.

I also intend to blog a bit more about fitness.

Austrian Identity Crisis

This month's Cato Unbound is all about Austrian School economics, what it is, what it is not, and who thinks so. Cato Unbound is always interesting, and this month is no exception.

It is particularly interesting to me, in light of my oddball Austrianism. I have previously argued that Rothbard was not just wrong, but incredibly wrong to reject mathematical reasoning in economics. The thrust of my argument is that deductive logic itself is nothing other than a different language used in the application of verbal logic. Mathematics is a condensed language that enables us to express quantitative and logical ideas more concisely than verbal logic. Changing the symbols doesn't invalidate the logic, far from it. And, as my previous post on the topic points out, Mises himself didn't feel the same way Rothbard did about it.

Fortunately for me (considering my limited readership), George Selgin makes my broader point for me in his recent contribution to Cato Unbound. He writes (emphases his):

For Mises and Rothbard, and for many other Austrian economists, the term “economics” means what is elsewhere referred to as theoretical economics, at least when they use it in the course of a methodological pronunciamiento. That is, it means (as Mises indicates in one of the passages quoted above) the set of extant economic theorems. Understood this way, the claim that “economics” is a purely deductive undertaking ought not to strike even the most mainstream of economists, or anyone who has worked through a standard graduate microeconomics text, as particularly controversial, let alone absurd.

Then, the coup de grace: Selgin states, "But for most of us, Steve included, 'economics' doesn’t just mean pure economic theory or analytical economics. It also means applied economics, which includes everything from economic history to economic policy appraisal to econometrics."

This is the key point. Mises didn't reject applied economics. He conducted applied economics for the Vienna Chamber of Commerce, for heaven's sake! Rather, when Mises wrote essays and books on theoretical economics, he made clear that "praxeology" is economic theory.

In those works, he often referred to applied economics as "accounting." Take, for example, the following excerpt from Human Action, which for my money (no pun intended) is the best showpiece of Mises' advocacy of applied economics, including math:

Monetary calculation reaches its full perfection in capital accounting. It establishes the money prices of the available means and confronts this total with the changes brought about by action and by the operation of other factors. This confrontation shows what changes occurred in the state of the acting men's affairs and the magnitude of those changes; it makes success and failure, profit and loss ascertainable.

Here Mises isn't just lauding the profession of accounting and its ability to estimate costs, he's describing comparative statics, i.e. the bread-and-butter of microeconomic analysis. These are not words uttered by a man who rejected mathematics or applied economics.

Instead, these are the words of a man who used a specific term - praxeology - for economic theory (as Selgin rightly argues), and another specific term - accounting - for applied economics.

On this point, we can concede that Danny Sanchez is technically correct with respect to Mises' views when he (Sanchez) writes (emphasis his):

Mises wrote, "There are two main branches of the sciences of human action: praxeology and history." For Mises, praxeology is one of the sciences of human action, and history is another science of human action.  Praxeology does not include “all” of the sciences of human action.

Yes, Mises' terminology specifically differentiates between praxeology, economic history, and accounting.

Where Sanchez goes astray, however (and I mean, besides his tremendously uncharitable language regarding Steve Horwitz), is when he fails to realize that this is not the question posed by Cato Unbound at all. The question is not, "What, according to Mises' terminology, is the exact definition of praxeology." No, the question is, as the folks at Cato themselves put it:

In his lead essay [Horwitz] argues that logical deduction has a strictly limited role to play in economics, and that Austrian economists are indeed making important empirical contributions to the field. Further, he argues that the Austrian school stands to teach mainstream economics a good deal about how to conduct empirical observations and interpret them properly.

In fact, the title of this edition of Cato Unbound is Theory and Practice in the Austrian School. Mr. Sanchez would do us all a favor if he took time to understand that the purpose of this series is not to quibble over what can be properly understood as "praxeology," but rather in the Austrian School of economic thought, what is "theory" and what is "practice?"

For my money, Horwitz does an admirable job of pointing out both the importance of praxeology and its unique method for elucidating economic theory and the importance of embracing quantitative analysis in applied economics of the Austrian variety, which - if we are to use Mises' terminology - includes both "economic history" and "accounting."

A broader issue here might be whether there is any benefit to be gained by quixotically clinging to Misesian terminology to the point that one can no longer have a productive conversation with non-Austrian School economists. I would argue no. I would argue that such dogmatism is precisely what keeps Austrian School theories out of the mainstream, and furthermore puts many people off of the Ludwig von Mises Institute in general.

Start Two-A-Days

Here's an easy way to phase twice-daily exercise into your daily workout routine:

Start by getting up early every day for a week. Don't exercise, just stretch. You'll feel alert and more agile, and you'll have an easier time waking up and getting ready for your day. Best of all, you won't necessarily feel like you're "exercising," even though you are!

Woolley On Carbon Taxes

Over at Worthwhile Canadian Initiatives, Frances Woolley suggests that carbon taxes would be more politically palatable if they were re-branded as "atmospheric user fees." She writes:

When faced with political opposition and image problems, there are three possible courses of action. The first is to argue ones point logically, hoping to change people's minds through reason and evidence.

A second is to admit defeat.

The third is to rebrand, and change the image. For example, Canada's bitumen deposits were once called the tar sands, a name that conjures up a (fairly accurate) image of a thick, sticky, black tar-like substance. They have been successfully rebranded as the oil sands, which sounds like clean sparkling oil, with just a bit of sand mixed in. 

Given how well economists have been doing with the first strategy, and that the second strategy gets us no where, I think it's time carbon taxes got a rebranding.

In contrast, my position is that even the re-branding of carbon taxes fail to address the reason such taxes are unpalatable, namely, people have other things to worry about, too.

Set aside all issues of climate science and instead focus on the fact that nations consist of individuals with limited resources.

First, I take it for granted that it is possible to tax a population to the point that they experience diminished economic welfare. That is, there exists some tax rate x at which (x + y) results in inferior economic growth nationwide for all positive y and superior economic growth nationwide for all negative y. (Note that we need not invoke the Laffer Curve here, even though I have essentially described a point at the apex of that curve.)

Second, I take it for granted that every tax increase or new tax makes every individual who pays it worse off, at least with respect to personal income. That is, while we can argue about whether a new government tax or policy improves our lives, we cannot argue about whether new costs restrict our incomes. In all cases, ceteris paribus, higher costs impede our personal wealth, regardless of what non-wealth benefits we may obtain from a new policy or tax.

From these two very defensible assumptions, it is obvious that the economic cost-benefit analysis of any new carbon tax must address the actual economic utility experienced by real people.

In other words, although we can assume that cleaner air increases our utility, we cannot assume that this increase in utility must automatically be sufficiently large an increase to offset the disutility of having to pay a new tax.

For some, the new carbon tax will certainly be "worth it." For others, the new tax will certainly not be "worth it." The difference between these two groups is how urgent "carbon reduction" is in their personal set of values and desires.

So, to sum up: If Prof. Woolley's objective is to promote a carbon tax, she must address the economic issues that actually matter to people. She must promote the tax as something that produces such a large utility increase for individuals that each of them believes he/she will be better off despite the disutility of a tax increase. Failing that, she must describe air pollution in such a way that people begin to believe that a marginal increase in CO2 emissions makes each individual worse off than the disutility of a corrective tax increase. Clearly, climate scientists have taken the second approach. I am unaware of anyone who has taken the first approach. Therefore, I suggest Prof. Woolley start there.

Instead, Woolley merely assumes that everyone who opposes a carbon tax is a global warming denier. Indeed, she follows up with a comment:

The case for an atmospheric user fee is based on three assumptions: (a) carbon emissions contribute to climate change (b) Canadian carbon emissions contribute, on the margin, to the amount of climate change (c) there are some low-benefit activities for which the cost of emissions exceeds the benefits (e.g. using heaters in the summer because the air conditioning is turned on so high). If one rejects these assumptions, there is no case for an atmospheric user fee, and no point in taking the argument further. End of discussion.

If one simply assumes that one's objective is a noble and worthy cause, then there is little to convince anyone of. It is tantamount to saying, "Assume I am correct. Then, re-branding a tax to be more palatable to people who don't believe me is a good idea."

But what if people who don't want to pay additional carbon taxes have no beef with global warming? What if, for these individuals, the disutility of a tax increase is greater than the perceived benefits of marginally cleaner air and higher prices for carbon-related goods and services? In that case, Woolley would be completely mistaken. Rebranding won't work, because people have already made the correct assessment of their personal values and preferences.

Is it possible to convince people that carbon taxes come with a non-income utility increase that offsets the income utility decrease associated with the tax? That is the real question.

Killer Cell Phones

Way back in May of 2010, I argued that Ontario's ban on cell phone use while driving made little rational sense. To this day, I believe what I wrote then. Here in Texas, using a cellular phone while driving is not against the law. People seem to do it about as often as they do in Ontario. I don't have any accident statistics to report, but a little perspective goes a long way: Both in Texas and Ontario, people use cellular phones while driving all the time, and while some accidents can be attributed to cell phone use, so too can a vast number of safe, uneventful automobile rides be attributed to instances of cell phone use.

That is, when we see a few accidents caused by cellular phone use, we are quick to condemn cell phones. When we see no such accident, we seldom go back and revise our perspective on the relative safety of talking on the phone while driving.

Similarly, Daniel Simons and Christopher Chabris argue in The Wall Street Journal that it is time to re-visit the ban on cellular phone and personal electronic use on airline flights:

Why has the regulation remained in force for so long despite the lack of solid evidence to support it? Human minds are notoriously overzealous "cause detectors." When two events occur close in time, and one plausibly might have caused the other, we tend to assume it did. There is no reason to doubt the anecdotes told by airline personnel about glitches that have occurred on flights when they also have discovered someone illicitly using a device.

But when thinking about these anecdotes, we don't consider that glitches also occur in the absence of illicit gadget use. More important, we don't consider how often gadgets have been in use when flights have been completed without a hitch. Our survey strongly suggests that there are multiple gadget violators on almost every flight.

Considering cell phone bans both while driving and while riding in a passenger plane, it is fair to say that humans fear cell phones.

But wait - there's more! In the hilariously titled blog post "Ur Cellphone Asplode?" rjfrankenberger debunks yet another cell phone fear-mongering urban legend: the notion that answering your cell phone while pumping gas will trigger a massive explosion. He/she concludes:

The moral of this story? Just because it’s on a sign, doesn’t mean it’s true. Oh… and make sure that you touch the frame of your car and discharge those e-fields before the next time you pump gas. Especially if your pumping gas next to me. I’m not in the mood for being exploded.

So why do we humans let cellular phones scare us so much? Any ideas?

This Week In Exercise

It has been a little too long since I scheduled my last personal training session. It's not that I didn't want to go, it's just that I have been incredibly busy lately, both professionally and during the process of purchasing new property. So I have been forgetting to schedule a training session.

I have not, however, neglected my workouts. I have been doing the same brutal workout my trainer gave me the last time, every other day, for approximately two weeks. It is an extremely difficult workout that has done very good things for me, but I'm ready for something new.

Furthermore, as I noted last week, I have a little over a month to build an endurance base if I want to be serious about running a marathon in the near future. To that end, I plan on building my endurance base for sure, and then making a more informed assessment as to my marathon readiness once it's time to either put up or shut up. I'd like to do it, but of course it is a big commitment.

So, I have my next PT session on Wednesday, but my mail objective this week is to attempt to run 40 miles. It will be tough, but do-able. The goal, as I just said, is to start increasing my endurance base. Part of that will be a return to twice-daily exercise. However, unlike my previous two-a-days, I will not simply be doing strength training in the AM and cardio in the PM. Instead, I will simply attempt to phase-in morning cardio workouts in addition to my regular fitness routine.

The result of this should be a deepening cardiovascual base and an overall increase in my activity level, built up week-by-week until I'm perhaps in the 60-80 mile/week range by the end of October. It's an ambitious plan, let's see where it takes me. Here's the plan for the week:

• Mon: 5 miles easy
• Tue: 5 miles tempo + 0:30/mile
• Wed: Strength training + 5 miles easy
• Thu: 7 miles easy
• Fri: Strength training + 5 miles easy
• Sat: 8 miles long run
• Sun: 5 miles easy

Let's see if I can do it.

Politics & Religion

Today, I'm going to break from tradition and lead-in with my thesis statement: There is a clear implication in my definition of faith that the sphere of politics is quasi-religious. That is, it's not "politics and religion," it's "politics is religion." Anyone who feels otherwise simply isn't paying attention.

Those of us who grew up around a lot of religion know the routine very well. The mass assembles in a large, fancy building. There are refreshments, suits, conversation, networking, and laughter. A few key opinion leaders stand up and make speeches about what "we're" supposed to do, and what "they" are trying to get us to do instead. They urge us to resist this terrible temptation, because it is a folly that strikes at the heart of what it means to be a human being. Songs are sung. The rabble is roused. People slowly filter out and go home, feeling an uplifting of the spirits that stays with them as they embark on a path toward changing the world.

Never are the similarities more obvious than during national convention season. The religious themes are omnipresent, of course. Even the Democrats have joined in the over-indulgence of the phrase "God bless America," and "God bless you all," and so on. Then there is the commentary. One CNN correspondent I saw used the phrase "Teach, baby, teach," a reference to Southern Baptist terminology, to describe Bill Clinton's speech. The convention crowds are shown in glowing rapture, hanging on the words of their Masters with baited breath and tears in their eyes.

I'm telling you, I come from a highly religious community, and I have seen all this before. This isn't politics, this is religion.

And, as I previously wrote, faith is the act of favoring what you wish were true over what you know to be true. Deep down, we all understand that we are only pretending to believe. We know that electing Obamney won't change the course of the country. We know that our false saviors don't really offer us salvation.

Deep down, we understand that politics offers us nothing more than a common language by which to express our wishes about the way things ought to work. Wouldn't it be great if rich people gave poor people all their money, if poverty and natural disaster could be eliminated by simply writing it down on a piece of paper, if jobs could be distributed to anyone who wants them simply by act of Congerss.

It would be great, wouldn't it? Wouldn't it be great? These wishes are so terribly, tragically, heart-breakingly juvenile. There is no hope in politics. We are fooling ourselves.

For the most part, I have avoided commenting on the conventions because I still believe what other people seem to forget when the conventions are happening: politicians are all liars.

There is no doubt about this, no uncertainty. One need only compare a candidate's pre-election promises to their actual behavior once in office. Here I choose not to cite specific examples because I want the reader to fully understand that this is a pan-partisan fact. It is no "more true" of one group of people than it is of another. The spin doctors like to call it "flip-flopping" and peg it to one or two politicians, but it is true of all of them. They were all for it before they were against it, and vice-versa.

When one party disavows them, these same people simply hop over to another party. The goal is not to represent a consituency, but rather to represent themselves. Their objective is winning office; once they have it, they don't need us anymore. Challengers appear, and they, too, have their own agendas. They try to convince us that this new agenda is better for us than the old one. But we're not electing people who represent our interests, we are bestowing corrupt people with positions of wealth and power, paid for out of our own pockets, in the format of a popularity contest.

This is how politics works.

Some of us are inclined to believe that the reason is that "power corrupts." But this is not true. Power does not corrupt. Those who seek power were already corrupt. The fact (fact) that they lie in order to achieve power is ample evidence.

One of the great ideas Ayn Rand expressed in her work was the concept of the sanction of the victim. That is, certain kinds of wrong-doing are only possible with the sanction of the victim. Government cronyism, corrupt politicians, hideous and bloated bureaucracy, etc. are the kinds of things that we wish upon ourselves. We wish them to be effective, desperatelly.

But it is a wish, nothing more. You cannot move mountains with a hand gesture, you cannot quell the tides with a wink, and you cannot achieve prosperity through the drafting of rules and regulations. When we dispell with the religious myths, we are left with the simple truth that the only way to improve our own lives is to make ourselves better, more productive people.

Stationary Waves is about exploring ways of making ourselves better, more productive people.

Good-Faith Discussion

As I previously indicated, there is a real need for someone to write about what I call "total interpersonal communication breakdown." You can find my previous explorations of the topic of communication here, here, and here; as well, to a lesser extent here and of course here.

(We now have no less than five lengthy Stationary Waves posts discussing the nature of effective communication, and why people seem to be failing at it these days. I suppose that means I need a new post label, Good-Faith Discussion. More on that in a moment.)

In the following post, I will explain why successful communication requires the following:

1. Mutual willingness to communicate
2. A charitable hearing of all thoughts being communicated
3. Consideration
4. Response

Communication Breakdown
Total interpersonal communication breakdown is characterized by the inability of any party within a relationship to convey meaning to any other party. Two people who speak completely different languages are an obvious example; there is no hope to communicate in such a situation. Two people who speak the same language but who disagree on the meaning of the terms being used is another example. (Why else do you think I maintain a lexicon?) In these cases, people would gladly and readily communicate with each other if they could actually do so. Communication cannot proceed until there is a viable medium through which it can occur, be it hand gestures, an interpreter, or any other communication bridge.

When two parties cannot say anything to each other without the other person consciously or unconsciously distorting the meaning of the message conveyed, that is also a communication breakdown.

A conscious distortion is any situation in which one party is motivated to disparage another party. One obvious example is partisan politics, in which every message delivered by one is deliberately turned against it by the other. Another example would be two people who cannot talk to each other without scoffing and arguing with each other.

In this case, both parties consist of normal, healthy individuals who, for lack of a better term, are simply being unreasonable with one another. Here, communication cannot proceed until both parties are willing to be reasonable with each other.

An unconscious distortion is any attempt to have a serious discussion with someone who has a mental illness. Someone with, say, body issues, will be unable to hold a conversation about diet and exercise without turning it into a discussion about weight-loss and body image. Someone with, say, depression will be unable to hold deep, meaningful conversations with anyone without feeling as though it is a personal attack against their private thoughts. Someone with severe paranoia will be unable to look at a conversation without getting the impression that someone else is out to get them.

In this case, one or more party is unable to communicate for lack of sufficient mental capacity, and I might add that it is not their fault. But whatever person or condition is to be faulted for this, the fact remains that communication cannot proceed until the core problem is addressed. One simply cannot communicate in good-faith with someone who is demonstrably incapable of receiving a message in the intended way, for reasons of psychology.

When Not To Communicate At All
It has been said that trust and communication are the bases of all relationships, and while I agree with that in a sense, I feel it is not specific enough. The real basis of all relationships is trust that good-faith communication will occur. If one party does not expect its thoughts to be taken seriously and seriously responded to, it has no basis on which to form a relationship with the other party.

The first thing that must be said about this is that, however unfortunate it may be, there are situations in which communication cannot be restored. In these situations, it is better not to communicate.

The best and most poignant example of this I can give is mental illness. A mentally healthy person simply cannot have meaningful communication with the mentally ill. Any attempt to do so will at best result in a misunderstanding, but in many other cases will actually make the mentally ill person upset. Here, communication does more harm than good.

Please note! I am not suggesting that we cease all interaction with the mentally ill! Of course not! What I am suggesting is that there are important, professional, psychological methods for treating mental illness, and that these are the proper prescription in the case of mental illness. No well-intentioned paladin can march in and restore another person's mental health. It takes a qualified professional to do that, and often over the course of many years.

In situations in which there is conscious distortion happening, it is also best to (temporarily) withdraw. Do not attempt to communicate with anyone who merely uses all attempted communication to feed additional animosity. The patience of Job could not overcome deliberate attempts to upset the communicating party. It is best to leave well enough alone until such time as the distorting party is ready to cease distortion.

Good-Faith Discussion
Real communication can only ever occur when both parties are receptive to it, and are furthermore capable of trusting the other party to reciprocate. As I just described, it is a non-starter to attempt to communicate when there is no good faith.

Therefore, the first requirement for successful, good-faith communication is mutual willingness; that is, everyone must agree that attempting to communicate is worthwhile. Without mutual willingness, either one party is communicating under duress, or one party is simply not communicating at all, by definition.

The second requirement is a charitable reception. That is, one must assume the best of the other person when one is communicating. Failing to do so risks distorting their meaning. If one assumes the worst in the other's message, then one is simply not building a common understanding of the situation.

 A third requirement is consideration. That is, we must not stop at simply hearing the other person out, and then taking our turn. We must not merely hear what is being said; we must also consider it. We must be willing to charitably interpret the message being conveyed and then build that message into our own perspective. Until you have considered the other party's message, you are not communicating, you are merely talking to yourself.

Finally, good-faith discussion demands a good-faith direct response. At the minimum, the other party must understand that communication is occurring, otherwise they will simply proceed as though it is not.

Conclusion
I certainly don't have all the answers in the universe. I am not an expert communicator, nor am I ever going to receive a Nobel Peace Prize for conflict resolution. But I have certainly been through enough failed attempts at communication to have identified what went wrong.

We don't always communicate as well as we intend to. We don't always deliver the best messages, and sometimes we let our pride or our emotions get the better of us in situations where we most desperately need to keep a cool head and show another person that we want to understand them and reach some common ground. Nobody always succeeds at anything, least of all something as fundamentally challenging as communication.

That said, I am reasonably confident that if any two parties wishes to communicate with each other in good-faith, they need to be willing and patient, and need to engage in proper consideration of ideas and respond to them directly. Absent these four things, it is difficult to conceive of what "communication" might even mean.

Got That Itch Again

The Cowtown Marathon will be held on February 24, 2013. The course is nice and flat, I am quite familiar with the neighborhoods through which the course runs, and the male record is just three minutes faster than my last marathon time.

It's too early to commit to anything just yet, but now might be a good time to brush up on what it takes to run a marathon.

Hey, you never know.

Book Review: "The Driver" by Garet Garrett

You will probably never find The Driver in your local library or book store, although I am surprised to find that you can purchase it at Amazon.com. This is a relatively obscure book written by an old journalist from The Saturday Evening Post, who died in the 1950s. It did not win any awards, and I am unsure whether or not it was a commercial success. It is about as obscure a book as one can find.

So, how did I find it? Somehow, the works of Garet Garrett were re-discovered by the folks at the Ludwig von Mises Institute. Having rediscovered them, they set to republish them and make them available for sale or (free) download on the LvMI website. They soon embarked on a modest publicity campaign to promote the works. (Take, for example, Jeffrey Tucker's Mises Daily entitled "Who Is Garet Garrett?")

Just before I moved from Ottawa, I loaded up my e-reader with a large number of free eBooks from the Mises Institute. I wanted to tackle a few more of Mises' own works, and I also wanted to dive deeper into some other aspects of Austrian School economics. I downloaded the important Rothbard works, some Nozick, some Bastiat...

By the time I had a virtual libertarian library sitting on my e-reader, I realized that I needed some lighter reading or else I'd either exhaust myself or go crazy. I recalled reading about Garrett's novels on the LvMI blog, so I figured, what the heck? I didn't expect much, but thought it wouldn't hurt to have some lighter reading around.

I was pleasantly stunned by just how good The Driver is.

The book tells the story of a political journalist who by chance finds work at a major railroad company, based in New York. While working there, he meets a man named Henry Galt, who hangs around the office a lot and wants to know every detail of the business, though he does not appear to have a formal role in the company. Eventually, the journalist - identified only by the nickname Galt gives him, "Coxey" - learns that Galt is a Wall Street speculator with dreams of buying and running a railroad. The remainder of the novel chronicles Galt's stunning ascent from being a speculator with a spotty financial record to being the most successful railroad magnate in the country, while Coxey plays the role of Galt's right-hand man and closest confidant.

Throughout the story, Garrett uses the historical backdrop of 1890s America to tell his tale. The struggle between silver- or gold-backed currency plays a central role in character development and plot setting. The late-90s economic recession is also a major plot device.

Garrett intersperses social commentary and political insight throughout the plot, but he does so free from polemics. His writing is so sharp and witty that any broader social points made throughout the novel lend themselves to painting a more in-depth picture of Coxey's character, an extremely intelligent and wise spectator riding the American political and economic tides. The effect is grand.

While the book is primarily available through libertarian websites, I feel its appeal is actually much broader than that. Rarely have I read fiction that is so eloquently written without disintegrating into "journalism words" and pretentiously floral oration. There is a strong and intelligent sense of humor throughout the novel the likes of which is seldom found in popular fiction.

All said, this is one of the best books I've read in a long time, and I highly recommend it to anyone with an interest in historical fiction.

Value In A Crowd

As I mentioned last week, I intend to spend more time blogging about the value of individuality over collectivism.

Last week, I discussed how the breakdown is a little bit askew. We're not really talking about competing world-views here, we're talking about a perception of value. To some, being surrounded by fellow human beings is inherently valuable. And inasmuch as we are all social creatures who crave social experiences, that is very true.

But we do not live every second of our lives in a crowd. We do not act as agents of a crowd. In life, when you get right down to it, you only really control and act on behalf of yourself. To the extent that you do, you must learn the value of individualism.

The Group Always Misses The Best Deal
I recently finished reading a book called The Driver, by Garet Garrett (review forthcoming on this blog). At one point, a character central to the story describes that he got rich by "buying things that nobody else wanted."

The story is fiction, but the method is a good one. The number one rule of the stock market is "buy low, sell high," and because we are all fans of economics, we all understand that a low price occurs when demand is low, and a high price occurs when demand is high. That is, the more "everybody" wants something, the higher the price will rise; the more "nobody else wants it," the lower the price will fall. Speculation is the entrepreneurial act of buying what nobody else wants under the belief that in the future, more people will want it, and you will be able to sell it for a profit.

But what successful speculators will actually tell you is that they buy things that are undervalued, wait for prices to reflect true value, and then sell them. What the rest of the world overlooks, speculators see; with this foresight, they make their money.

First, A Stationary Waves Principle Of Coming Out On Top
There is a principle by which I have lived my life, which runs something to the effect of, When you see a crowd of people all going one direction, that's your queue to go the opposite direction.

I conceived of this rule in my most individualistic days, when I considered anything that the crowd was doing to be vicious. As I have grown and matured, I have since realized that crowds usually do things for good reasons; and yet, that has not altered my rule to even the slightest extent. Why not?

One important reason is a priori: If you only ever do what everybody else does, then you will only ever be as well-off as everybody else. I'm not talking just about money. The general idea here is simply this: It seems incredibly unlikely to me that everything of value in "life, the universe, and everything" has already been discovered and vetted by everyone else.

I believe I can find good deals on products and services when I shop, so I do my research. As it turns out, I can indeed find better deals than the "average price," and so I am correct in this case: the crowd would be better off if they went in a different direction (mine).

I believe small, mom-and-pop Mexican restaurants offer better food at more reasonable prices than the most popular Tex-Mex restaurants in my area. When I see lots of cars at a "Mexican" restaurant, I keep driving. I drive all the way to the more sparsely populated side of town, where I see restaurants that don't appear to cater to the crowd (as in, sometimes the menus aren't even offered in English). And I am usually correct: My choice of Mexican restaurants offer more authentic Mexican food at more competitive prices; the crowd would be better off if they went in a different direction (assuming they actually want authentic Mexican food).

The Value Of Education
Steven Landsburg has a good post on his blog about the folly of offering higher education to everyone. Landsburg's point is sharp and perfectly accurate: There is a limited supply of university education in the form of too few seats to accommodate the entire population of the nation. If we dropped the price to zero, where would all those students sit? It's not a trivial problem. There is only so much space in schools. Public primary schools wrestle with this problem constantly, and they're not even really free!

But in the comments section, I added another point: This is the internet age. We can learn anything we want to at the mere touch of a button. Right now, right this very minute, if you are reading this post then you have met all the requirements needed to know any academic point you can think of, period. No exaggeration. Just think up a question, browse to a search engine, and start reading. You can easily develop a comprehensive expertise this way.

On the other hand, what do people actually use the internet for? They use it for Facebook, for gaming, for watching sports and reading the news... In short, they use it for entertainment. The vast majority of web traffic is nothing more than "meaningless" entertainment. (Here, I use the term "meaningless" very loosely - there is a huge value in entertainment, but when you stop to consider that every secret of the known universe is ready at your fingertips 24/7, Farmville becomes even more ludicrous than it is already considered to be.)

Conclusion
Here is a perfect case-in-point for what I was saying about value in a crowd. While the crowd utilizes the internet in a certain way, some of us prefer to maximize value. There is information on the internet that was once deemed so precious that kingdoms went to war over it. If you're able to get it for free, you're getting a deal.

So, when we discuss individuality versus collectivism, one of the things we need to understand is the fact that always betting on the popular play - always sticking with the crowd when it comes to value (again, I'm not talking about just money here) - in many cases leaves you worse off than you could be if you acted alone.

To do that, you need the courage to be able to disregard the ridicule of the majority, who will scoff at you for not marching their way. But in the opposite direction lies an undervalued item, which can be put to incredibly valuable use in the right hands, in your hands.

A Comment to Scott Sumner

There is some question as to whether Scott Sumner ever denied that food price inflation was happening circa-2010. I have been unable to post the following comment on his blog, so I am posting it here.

Here's the original post.

Here's my comment:

Where in commodity prices does it explain why my grocery bills keep going up every month, while package sizes continue to decrease?

And here's what Sumner said in reply:

Ryan, Are you the congressman? Seriously, inflation is quite low in the US. If you are paying more, maybe you are buying more expensive types of food. I’m not seeing much inflation, and I lived through the 1970s so I recall what high inflation was like.

He was missing my point. He thought I was stating that core or headline inflation were increasing. Really what I was saying is that I buy food, but I do not really buy commodities. So food price inflation hits me much harder than commodity price "disinflation."

This is what I (and others like me) mean when we say that money is non-neutral. NGDP targeting is good for people who buy lots of commodities and bad for people who predominantly buy food. Perhaps this is part of why Sumner has such a divergent view of China from Balding.