Wouldn't it be horrible if our American suburbs starting turning into slums? It's already happening, according to this article from The Atlantic: "The Next Slum?" For 60 years, Americans have pushed steadily into the suburbs, transforming the landscape and (until recently) leaving cities behind. But today the pendulum is swinging…
In an earlier post, I argued that people need to better appreciate that dollars are fungible (see here and here). Why is it important to understand that dollars are fungible? A case in point is the new American enthusiasm for turning food into fuel. Consider this report from Fortune Magazine:…
“The free market–the invisible hand–will take care of everything.”
I’ve addressed this topic of the free market as alleged panacea several times before. I’ve referred to this blind faith in the market as unsubstantiated. I’ve mockingly referred to the common belief in the wisdom of the invisible hand as a belief in the Fouth Person in the Holy Quartet. Why mock? Because stark shortages of critically important natural resources loom in every direction. And yet we’re in denial. You deny the denial? Then how is it that we tolerate, this year, big U.S. metropolitan areas like Raleigh-Durham and Atlanta had only a few weeks left of their municipal water supplies? We tolerate that we are drawing down unreplenishable water sources throughout the desert southwest. Intelligent civilizations don’t deny such dangers. They consciously deal with their problems.
I’ve just read a well-phrased description of why the modern version of the free market can’t save us from our problems regarding impending shortages of essential natural resources. The following quote is from a new book available free on-line from Population Connection: PLAN B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization, by environmental analyist, Lester R. Brown (2008).
…Now with the economy as large as it is, the indirect costs of burning coal—the costs of air pollution, acid rain, devastated ecosystems, and climate change—can exceed the direct costs, those of mining the coal and transporting it to the power plant. As a result of neglecting to account for these indirect costs, the market is undervaluing
Those guys who send out spam by the bucket-load are really busy these days. In the past month alone they have tried to sneak more than 9,000 of their fake comments onto this site. These "comments" are attached to links to various sites selling drugs, loans, pornography and you name it. …
I love being a recruiter as a way to make a living. It is a fantastic mix of detective work, rapport building, conflict resolution, understanding and differentiation. In our new information age I can do it from anywhere, and that is just cool as it can be. My career fits me well, and I find it immensely rewarding when things go well, and probably learn even more when they do not. I left my company and went out on my own because I felt like like my life was terribly out of balance. Yes part of it was the oppressive and abusive atmosphere coupled with the rampant disrespect, but all of that negativity really just made me more aware that I was following a path that wasn't consistent with how I wanted to live. I found myself dreaming of a life where where kindness, compassion, and mutual respect formed the ground rules and, ultimately, where I could feel like I "made a difference" to the world as a whole. That life looked so far away from what I was living that it seemed like a fairy tale. When I stopped and looked at the distance between the life I was living and the life I wanted, I got scared. I also got busy figuring out a way to escape. It is not that I am against working smart and making money. I had that discussion with myself years and years ago, and I decided then that I can do more for the world with some cash than without it. But the truth was I was exhausted mentally, physically and emotionally from an environment that had become combative and very dark. I wasn't doing anything for myself, not to mention anyone else.