My Awesome Beard

Whenever my beard gets a little more than a little scruffy Gwen nags me to shave. "You need to dress for the job you want, not the job you have" she reasons. The real motive that she has, however, isn't my professional success, she just knows that that is the right button for her to push to get me to shave my facial hair. Really, she just jealous that I can grow such an awesome beard and she can't. This winter break gave me a whole month that I wouldn't have to go to work--a window of opportunity that would allow me to express my masculinity, a whole month to grow out my beard. Any objection Gwen raised was immediately shot down by my undefeatable logic, "I don't have work for a whole month! I can do whatever I want!". As the month went by and my beard got awesomer and awesomer I began to dream of the numerous ways I could shape my facial fur to express myself. I decided when I got home I would not shave, but rather simply groom myself and walk the fine line between professional and casual. This is what came of it.



Unfortunately, this picture is the only record of my achieving such an epic look. Within five minutes I was forced to shave it all off. If I had refused any longer, I think Gwen would have wrestled me down and taken it off herself.

Renouncing Market Capitalism

After deep thought and profound soul searching I have decided to renounce market capitalism. It has become clear from the past year that under regulation in every industry led the economy to the brink of collapse, with unemployment in the US surpassing 10%--almost the highest it has been since the great depression. I confess that I, as a recovering neo-classical, spent too much time advocating that policy should be geared towards increased productivity and efficiency and not enough time focusing on how it should be geared towards increasing jobs. I no longer believe the labor market is intrinsically stable without serious government intervention. I propose three policies that I believe will bring the unemployment rate close to zero basically overnight without the government incurring huge expenses.

Policy number 1: Set a maximum on the percentage of media you can buy online.

When I was a heartless capitalist, I thought of amazon.com and other giant online retailers as a godsend. They increased public good by decreasing the real price of books, CDs and basically everything by cutting out the middle man (the retailer) and thus decreasing overall overhead and labor costs embodied within the product. I unemotionally witnessed retail book stores and media outlets go out of business (The Bookshelf anyone?). “If people valued retail book stores they would continue to shop at them and they wouldn’t go out of business”, I argued. That seems so cold now. To remedy the problem and increase the number of jobs in the media retail sector I propose a regulation on the amount of media each person can purchase online, say 50%. Every time you buy a book or DVD, you must provide your social security number, whether online or in the store. A central database tracks your individual purchases and anytime you go over your online allotment you get hit with a huge fine, or perhaps it just doesn’t let you make the purchase. This would create so many jobs! Firstly, there would be more bookstores constructed, therefore construction jobs would increase. Jobs would be increased in the media retail industry as more people are hired to service the demand for media not online. Several high paying IT jobs would be created as a giant tracking database is set up and then privacy is maintained. People would have to get out more to buy media so you can expect increases in the transportation sector—more bikes, cars and busses produced, more gasoline consumed etc.

Policy number 2: Make all retail stores hire a welcome person.

As a capitalist I used to shop at Walmart. Whenever I walked into the store and was greeted by a welcome person I thought to myself ‘man I don’t want to be doing that when I’m retired’ and ‘what an inefficient use of labor’. Surely if Walmart didn’t hire people to greet their customers they could save the $6 an hour they pay them and pass those savings onto their customers and shareholders. Such inefficiencies drove me crazy! Now, however, I realize that this is what we need in our country, more workers that are basically unproductive. I propose that every retail store and restaurant be required to hire a greeter. Overnight you would create the number of jobs equal to the number of stores in existence multiplied by the number of shifts each store is open.

Policy number 3: Require all cars that are being driven on the roads be no older than 5 years.

I saw a Toyota advertisement the other day that said something to the effect that the majority of Toyota cars sold in 1990 are still on the road today—19 years later. At the time I thought to myself how great that was. By making reliable long lasting cars, Toyota has reduced the number of cars people have to buy saving them tons of money in their lives. But isn’t our auto manufacturing industry hurting from this? Wouldn’t Ford and GM sell a lot more cars if none of the cars sold in 1990 were still on the road today? I propose a law requiring that all cars driven on public roads be newer than five year old. Think of the jobs this would create! Not only would it create thousands, perhaps millions, of auto manufacturing jobs, steel production jobs, ore mining jobs and plastic manufacturing jobs, it would increase auto dealer jobs. There would need to be more factories and dealerships built so there would be an increase in construction jobs. The new cars have to be transported so there would be an increase in transportation jobs—more truckers, more truck manufacturing, more barge manufacturing etc. The law would need to be enforced so there would need to be more police patrolling the streets for old cars. The justice system would see higher traffic so there would be more jobs for judges, lawyers and clerks. The old cars would have to go somewhere so there would be huge job increases in waste management. Surely nonprofit environmental groups would be outraged by such waste and excess use, so they would hire more people. Because many unemployed people would now have jobs, they could spend more money eating out and on entertainment so these industries would also see boosts in employment. I actually can’t think of a single industry that wouldn’t see an increase in jobs.

These are my first thee ideas. If after these have been implemented the unemployment rate isn’t at below say 3%, just let me know, I can come up with these ideas all day long.

-Andrew, the job creation think tank

Fall of 2009

So far this fall we have done exactly three fun things. Here are some pictures:

1) At the end of the summer we took a two day one night trip to New York. I had never been in New york except for the airport. We took a bus there early on a Thursday Morning and returned home on Friday night.

2) We went to Montreal Canada on a last minute midnight trip with some of our friends.

3) For Gwen's Birthday we had a vampiresque themed party. She was Gwen from Buffy and I was Xander with an eye patch.

Also I wanted to congradulate Gwen on her new Job! She will working for the National Bureau of Economic Research -- working with the top economists on projects that pretain to retirement savings. It is going to be a sweet job that will utilize Gwen's many skills. Now I can quit my job and school and focus on my promising music career.

My New Favorite Frenchman and Free Trader

Frederic Bastiat wrote the following in response to new legislation in the 1840s on higher duties on all foreign goods in order to protect French Industry:

Petition of the Manufacturers of Candles, Wax-Lights, Lamps, Candlesticks, Street Lamps, Snuffers, Extinguishers, and of the Producers of Oil, Tallow, Resin, Alcohol, and Generally, of Everything Connected with Lighting." To messieurs the members of the Chamber of Deputies.

We are suffering from the intolerable competition of a foreign rival, placed, it would seem, in a condition so far superior to ours for the production of light that he absolutely inundates our national market with it at a price fabulously reduced. The moment he shows himself our trade leaves us— all consumers apply to him; and a branch of native industry, having countless ramifications, is all at once rendered completely stagnant. This rival, who is no other than the sun ....

What we pray for is, that it may please you to pass a law ordering the shutting up of all windows, skylights, dormer-windows, outside and inside shutters, curtains, blinds, bull’s- eyes, in a word, of all openings, holes, chinks, clefts, and fissures...

...if you shut up as much as possible all access to natural light, and create a demand for artificial light, which of our French manufacturers will not be encouraged by it?

... If more tallow is consumed, then there must be more oxen and sheep ... if more oil is consumed, then we shall have extended cultivation of the poppy, of the olive... our hearhs will be covered with resinous trees.

Make your choice, but be logical; for as long as you exclude, as you do, iron, corn, foreign fabrics, in proportion as their prices approximate to zero, what inconsisency it will be to admit the light of the sun, the price of which is already at zero durring the entire day!


And on a lighter note, I thougt this was pretty disturbing.

Offer to my admirable vegetarian friends

I have several vegetarian friends (and even two vegan friends). Though I am an omnivore, I would like to say just how impressed I am with their will and dedication. I imagine it is not easy, in a society where eating animals is central to most meals and where eating is an important part of culture, to abstain from eating meat. Be that as it may, there are several reasons to be vegetarian. Here are a few of those reasons.

The Environment
Animal grazing destroys natural habitats, riparian areas and emits large amounts of greenhouse gasses. It is a wonder to me that with so many negative externalities, the government (in an attempt to save jobs) subsidizes the meat industry with underpriced grazing access to federal lands and import limits on meat exporting nations. Instead, there should be a higher tax imposed on meat (in particular beef) to price in the whole cost of meat consumption.

Health
I’m no nutritionist but I don’t think I’ve ever heard a health expert suggest that we should eat more hormone injected red meat.

Cost
Eating meat is expensive. Thanks to my parents, I have been indoctrinated with a from-the-farm Idaho Mormon passion for frugality. While meat tastes great and can make one satisfying meal, it can also double the cost. Too rich for my blood (who says that?).

Animal Cruelty
The way the meat industry raises and slaughters the animals we eat can be less than humane at best. Nobody likes to see a living being suffer.

Whatever your reason for being vegetarian, I believe it is a noble one. That being said I would like to offer a standing invitation. If ever any of you vegetarians have an unquenchable hunger for meat and need moral support to bring yourself to temporarily lapse on your animal friendly commitment, I stand at the ready. We could go out for rodízio or I could fry up some steaks on my grill. If you want your indulgence to remain a secret, I won’t tell anyone—not your spouse, not even my wife.

Your judgment free pork chop awaits.

-Andrew

Recipe for Idiocy

As many of you have noticed I’ve been on a taxation kick recently. A few days ago, to bring my temporary obsession with taxation to an end I decided to write one more taxation blog—one that would solve the fiscal budgetary crisis, rising health care costs and the American obesity problem all at once. The title of this blog was “Fat Tax—Solving the Health Care Problem One Pound at a Time”. Upon completion, I forwarded the draft to Gwen to look over and post. She rightfully informed me that despite my minimal effort to keep it tasteful, the blog was outrageously offensive. She told me I could post it when I got home if I still wanted to. When I got home I still wanted to post the blog but realized that my sarcastic piece of satire could possibly be misinterpreted. Plus it was kind of mean. I then decided to shift my blogging attention away from taxation (and economics in general) to a less polarizing topic—recipe websites.

If you or your spouse is anything like my wife, no meal can be prepared without extensively researching several cookbook websites and blogs. Online recipes are a prime example of how technology has allowed us to collaborate and connect with a large number of people for the betterment of life (more specifically in this case, our meals). This, like the democratization of technology in general, has some unavoidable and interesting side effects. One such side effect, which I would like to comment on today, is the ridiculously irrelevant comments posted on some of these sites.

Most of these sites and blogs allow the general viewers to post comments on the recipes posted. This can be very beneficial. A small adjustment stumbled upon by an end user, when shared with the greater community, can increase the utility of everyone. This is an example of how collaborative innovation can be a magnificent method of creation. The down side of this technological democratization is that for every one thoughtful commenter and beneficial comment there are x number of dense commenters and ridiculous comments (where x>1).

Here are a few “has nothing to do with the recipe” comments I found online (or rather I made up, but they probably exist):

Woman, age 42 from Dallas writes:

“Thanks for the tuna casserole recipe. My husband doesn’t like tuna or casserole but I decided to make this anyways. He works really long days selling stuff he stole on ebay and generally prefers to eat frozen corndogs dipped in a strange sauce of ketchup, mustard, mayonnaise and butter. One day we ran out of ketchup so he sent me to buy some. I ran into an old friend of mine who also reads your blog. I don’t think she’s tried your tuna casserole recipe yet.”

Justin a bachelor age 33 from Georgia writes:

Title: beter by gold
“I made these here smoothies last nite. Last nite their was a meaten about the health care barak hoo-in-sane obama is gonna shuv down our throts. He is such a moran. It’s communism! He is gonna take away our wrights. I herd he is also gonna raise gas prices and send our jobs to Africa, like in china.”

There are also the “change the recipe until it is no longer even remotely the same” comments. Here are a few examples:

Tara, age 28 from Philadelphia comments on a chicken noodle soup recipe:

“This was absolutely disgusting! It didn’t taste at all like the chicken noodle soup I remember my grandmother making. I did exactly what the instructions said to except I didn’t have any salt so I just added a little extra pepper to compensate. I also was out of carrots and onions so I put in a little garlic for flavor. I accidentally doubled the amount of water so I let it boil for 10 extra minutes so that it would evaporate out. My fiancé and I only ate a few bites and then we had to throw the rest away. Do not make!”

John, age 23 from Oregon comments on a vegetarian taco recipe:

“These were the best tacos I have ever had! Thanks for the recipe. I did make a few adjustments that I think improved it just a bit. For example, instead of using black beans I used re fried beans. Instead of 1 cup yellow onions I used ½ cup red onions. Instead of using taco seasoning I used spaghetti sauce. I quadrupled the amount of cheese and added a package of bacon. Instead of frying the ingredients and putting them on tacos, I decided to bake them on a pizza crust. They turned out awesome."

The list of examples could go on for the length of several encyclopedia sets. Feel free to post a comment of your favorite ridiculous recipe comments.


-Andrew

I really love the color

yellow.


--Gwen