bobdapunk
08-15-2008, 12:40 AM
First off, I believe everyone should add freakonomics (http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/) to their list of sites to browse daily.
I found this an interesting read: http://harpers.org/archive/2008/06/0082042
I'd like to see what anyone has to say.
Distortion
08-15-2008, 01:03 AM
(i only read the first half, i'll read the rest later)
Thats the big joke right there, we have all these companies doing all these things, not just our economy in all areas of government business. And when we have a congressional hearing to figue out just what the hell these people are doing, all they do is blow smoke up the committee's poverbial ass. Have you ever watched a congressional hearing? It's a fuckin joke. So we'll continue to get screwed time and time again because the people suppose to be oversighting these types of things are coincidentally the ones who run it.
didn't really understand what freakonomics site is about
satandole666
08-15-2008, 02:04 AM
Interesting read.
I find it interesting that the entire article was focused on one of the tenets of economics, externalities, but didn't mention the word once. For those that don't know, an externality is any benefit of an economic action, positive or negative, that can't be measure by money.
Two examples come to mind. First is the positive externality of higher education. Even if you don't go to college, you benefit because other people do. Without their education numerous aspects of our standard of living wouldn't be possible. Because of this, the government subsidizes (low interest loans, grants, scholarships, etc) tuition to make it easier to go. The other example is the EPA and pollution control. The government has to step in and control pollution (a negative externality) because it effects everyone, not just the producer and consumer of whatever good causes pollution.
So...why does all this matter? For the exact reason he stated. Not all things can be measured with money. In fact, some of the most important things can't be.
I didn't catch anything revolutionary out of this though, but it was a good read either way.