A Little Ludwig Goes A Long Way » Economics

Amazon vs Macmillan vs You

john — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 18:15:58 +0000

OK so Amazon’s move against Macmillan was seriously ham-handed and Amazon is still caught up in their own undershorts. Some Amazonians deserve some serious reprimands, this is just not the way these things are handled. Now Amazon has created even more problems for itself.

That said — we are talking about 4-5 days of inconvenience Amazon has caused readers and authors. Stupid but fixable.

As Charles points out, Macmillan is trying to put the screws to all of us big time and for the long run. They are grabbing for more dollars out of out pockets at a time when book costs are heading down. Now, if Macmillan was passing all this on to authors, I might be OK with it, but I suspect it is being absorbed by a bunch of corporate suits.

Who is our real friend here? Shame on Amazon for being so clumsy, but greater shame on Macmillan.

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Grabbag of interesting articles on math, econ, science, design, web

john — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 18:03:30 +0000

No theme here other than “stuff I happened across recently”

Terry Tao math blog. Brain stretching.
How Goldman profited on housing crash. Don’t know how reliable this source is but disturbing.
Controversy about whether there is or is not a giant magma chamber under the state of Washington.Â Probably not but a great disaster movie in the making.
Thread on design versus iteration.
Automated sports writing. Amazingly readable. (Thanks Phil).
The Billion Dollar Gram. Another one via Phil.
Gravitational Corridors. Cool.
Nowhere are we more honest than the search box.
NASA dollars pissed away on 2012 nutballs
Why it is harder than ever to get into some colleges. Interesting question about whether this applies to other markets.

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Interesting reads

john — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 20:20:47 +0000

World’s busiest ports
Fractal Nature of Legal Systems. Human systems/societies/cultures are capable of pretty much unbounded complexity. It is not just legal systems.
Kid solves rubik’s cube while playing guitar hero. Ah, youth.
Why are cheap airlines so cheap. Love the “passengers per employee” stat.

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The big picture — VC Math, Life Threats, Rhythms

john — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 18:08:31 +0000

Random posts that have caught my eye recently:

The VC Math Problem — excellent discussion of the “macroeconomics” of the VC asset class.
What to fear. The truth about what is going to kill you. The sensationalist news stories every night on random acts of violence and tragedy are scary, but they aren’t the threat.
The Rhythms of My Life. One guy’s methodology for examining his life and how he lives it. Not the right methodology for everyone, but everyone probably needs some methodology.

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Buying Risky Assets | The Big Picture

john — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 14:17:52 +0000

Buying Risky Assets | The Big Picture. — cogent picture explaining the program.

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Bernanke Pushes the Button | The Big Picture

john — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 03:52:58 +0000

Bernanke Pushes the Button | The Big Picture.

“The prospect of hundreds of billions of newly minted dollars coursing through the global financial system caused currency traders to thrash the greenback by almost 3%.”
” The Fed is â��now bringing out all the ammo in its arsenalâ��, according to Rosenberg.”
“And, for those who think the time is ripe for upping their equity allocations, Mr. Rosenberg would like to remind them of what happened to buyers of the Nikkei 225 after Quantitative Easing was tried in Japan. Longs were treated to a 20% rally that lasted six weeks before stocks set new lows just four months later. Ultimately, predicts Rosenberg, QE helps bond buyers more than stock buyers.”
“But since I doubt dollar holders will sit idly by as the paper they hold shrinks in value, I see a quick and happy resolution as being a low probability event. Then again, other central banks (the BOE & SNB) are engaging in the same currency-busting policies, so itâ��s not altogether clear whether the worldâ��s fiat currency system can survive a war of attrition.”
“Weâ��ve arrived at this unfortunate juncture in our nationâ��s financial history because of reckless behavior in both New York and Washington D.C.“
“Let us all hope the U.S. experiment with pushing the button on Quantitative Easing is more successful for us than it was for the Japanese. But given all the behavior that brought us to this point, we will need to be both lucky and good from this point forward.”

Hard to feel good about nearterm prospects for anything. Betting on volatility seems to be the smartest thing. Holding any asset seems risky.

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Scott Loftesness: The AIG Firestorm Spreads

john — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 20:22:22 +0000

“It’s time to let the sun shine in on this mess.” via Scott Loftesness: The AIG Firestorm Spreads.

Hear hear.

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Captain Asphalt

john — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 17:56:58 +0000

Quotation of the Day: “I’m Captain Asphalt.” TIMOTHY J. GILCHRIST, newly appointed stimulus czar for New York State.

via Today’s Paper – New York Times.

Love this. Is civil engineering going to become cool again?

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Interesting econ data via Ritzholtz

john — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 18:12:26 +0000

Force Structure FY09 Beyond. — the armed forces wrestling with massive budget cuts. And the global manufacturing collapse — not a pretty picture. It is hard to see how we are not going to have significant unemployment issues for years.

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Marginal Revolution: GM fact of the day

john — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 19:19:05 +0000

Marginal Revolution: GM fact of the day. Wow. Market cap 1/3 of bed bath and beyond. Worth 10% of apple’s cash. 96K employees but paying benefits for 1M people. Some of the numbers are a little misleading but still.

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