Disqus - Latest Comments for DWAnderson

Re: My Personal Windows 7 Upgrade Experience

DWAnderson — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:13:16 -0000

I upgraded 6 PCs at our house from Vista to Windwos 7. All upgrades went smoothly: five in-place upgrades and one from Vista Ultimate to Windows 7 Pro that required a reformat and reinstall. Details of the upgrade to our Media Center PC are here: http://thunor.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!71C238B5... All but the latter were completed in about two hours each.

Re: Unholy Trinity

DWAnderson — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 11:52:02 -0000

I think the main reason my scenario is flawed has to do with the magnitude of soem of the effects I have posited, e.g. (as simon alludes to) if fines are high enough (although it is hard to see how they could exceed the cost of coverage and be politically paletable) people will just get even really expensive insurance that would now seem like a bad deal.

What is interesting to me about my scenario is that the practical effects of a given "reform" plan have more to do with things like the magnitude of fines and other smaller features than the features of the system that much of the debate focusses on. But perhaps that is inevitable with 1000+ page bills.

Re: Unholy Trinity

mike_k — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 20:38:06 -0000

Two reasons why this won't happen:

1) Cost control is the second step of this two-step reform of health care. Cost control won't happen for another 3-4 years, probably. (Sure there are some baby steps in this iteration of reform, but only baby steps). The system has to be about to break. Then, citizens will say "don't take my health care away!", politicians will say "we must fix this system" etc.

2) Liberals believe that subsidized preventative care is crucial to improving health outcomes. That is in tension with the notion that citizens should be exposed to non-catastrophic health costs.

The tension is not irresolvable. In particular, if "excessive" non-catastrophic care can be left up to the wallets of citizens, but things like physicals and other useful preventative care can be subsidized, liberals will probably be happy. But that is not your scenario, it is just a scenario describing a particular kind of permanent insurance coverage.

Re: Unholy Trinity

simonkinahan — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 18:07:55 -0000

Probably won't happen for a few reasons:

1. The final bill will almost certainly include subsidies for those who can't afford coverage out of their own pocket but aren't covered by medicare or SCHIP, but obviously won't include subsidies for paying fines.

2. Whether premiums will rise or not is debatable, contrary to what Kevin Grier says. The whole point of the individual mandate is to keep average premiums down by pulling more people into the system. This doesn't obviously mean the young and healthy would pay more than they would for invidually purchase insurance now, because the individual mandate prevents adverse selection, whereas under the current system the very fact that you choose to purchase insurance implies that you think you'll need it.

3. The health insurance industry, which is currently under far more stress than most people realise, will benefit hugely from the mandate. Even if premiums rise, they will keep up the pressure in Washington to maintain the fines at a higher level than premiums in order to keep their businesses healthy.

Re: Unholy Trinity

DWAnderson — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 16:56:27 -0000

All this depends on the magnitude of the various incentives of course, but here's a best case scenario: insurance becomes so expensive that no one purchases it until they have a catastrophic illness, but everyone who has such an illness is able to and purchases the insurance for the duration of the illness. Everyone else becomes uninsured and ends up paying the fines to be uninsured. The net result is a system where all insurance becomes defacto catastophic coverage and people pay for most medical costs out of their own pocket. The fines serve to subsidize this catastophic insurance. The high cost of insurance effectively acts as a deductible. So you end up with some redistribution to pay for guaranteed catastophic care, but the end of insurance as a means to pay for less than catastrophic conditions.

This seems like a pretty decent result. Where is my scenario flawed.

Re: Learning from Milton Friedman’s Rhetoric

DWAnderson — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 17:12:33 -0000

The distinction Friedman and "conservatives today" is really one between academics and politicians. I'm sure there (i) were plenty of rude conservatives invested in political outcomes at the time of this talk and (ii) are now plenty of academic conservatives who speak similarly persuasively now.

Re: Urban[ism] Legend: Gas Taxes and Fees Cover All Costs of Road Use

MarketUrbanism — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 09:56:14 -0000

DWAnderson:

is there any evidence or calculations that show roads to be the least subsidized form of transportation?

Well, I think that's a pretty easy question to answer without vast compilations of data. Overall, the total dollars that have gone to subsidize roads is certainly many times greater than the total for other forms of transportation, while on a percentage of total dollars spent, other forms probably far exceed the percent of road subsidy per total spending.

This doesn't mean we shouldn't use more market mechanisms, merely that we shouldn't be surprised if the results in a more market based world were at least as car-centric as those in the current one.

I wouldn't be surprised either. But, I also wouldn't be surprised if the transaction costs associated with private roads in a free society encouraged innovations that would have made the car obsolete. But, all other variables held constant, I think it's safe to bet that development patterns would be more compact and diverse without the heavy subsidies to transportation since the progressive era.

Please don't mistake me for someone who is advocating one form of transportation over another. This is where I think O'Toole and I diverge. He says, "let's not criticize roads because transit it more subsidized." I say, "I don't care what type of transportation it is, it's all heavily subsidized." So, my overall objective isn't to advocate one form of transportation over another, but to show that present land use patterns are a reflection of the vast subsidies to transportation, in general.

First, you raise some interesting negative externalities of highways that are not included in cost discussions, but there are also positive externalities (e.g. more commerce). Is there any strong reason to believe either of these effects dominates?

I tried to be careful not to push the externalities angle to hard, but if I wrote it over I think I would downplay the externalities even further since the case can be pretty clearly made with explicit and implicit costs. It's too hard to quantify externalities and I find the concept of "costs to society" highly subjective. So, you could be right - you could be wrong.

Second, your use of opportunity costs with respect to tax revenue is one that as best is not unique to transportation, but rather is an argument that the economic cost of taxes always exceeds the nominal amount of such taxes-- even apart from any efficiency losses with respect to the activity/item being taxed. It is probably correct, but it is hard to measure the effect of this loss because the subsidized project might generate value in excess of the nominal cost. This is unlikely to be true overall given all of the ways in which government resource allocation is inferior to private resource allocation, but I think your post overstates the negative effect rhetorically by not mentioning the value that projects might have in excess of their costs.

My main point here (perhaps the wording could be improved) is that a private road owner/operator would face the additional burden of taxes on revenue, land, and financing. Whereas the public sector can ignore this. So, to claim something "pays for itself" that benefits from reliefs that private businesses cannot take advantage of, significantly distorts the truth. Either we should examine all private businesses on a pre-tax basis, or we should apply a comparative burden when analyzing public endeavors to see if they "pay for themselves."

Given that this seems like a hard area in which to make calculations, I guess I am more inclined than you to cut Randal O'Toole some slack.

Slack for what? OK, let's completely ignore externalities. I think that it's quite clear that roads don't even pay for themselves when only looking at explicit costs. Throw in implicit costs, which is necessary and proper when asking "does x pay for itself?", and roads don't even come close to paying for themselves except maybe a few cases. If they paid for themselves, we would have a vastly competitive private road market - and we don't.

Re: Urban[ism] Legend: Gas Taxes and Fees Cover All Costs of Road Use

DWAnderson — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 18:25:56 -0000

I'm all for more market oriented transportation, but is there any evidence or calculations that show roads to be the least subsidized form of transportation? This doesn't mean we shouldn't use more market mechanisms, merely that we shouldn't be surprised if the results in a more market based world were at least as car-centric as those in the current one.

With respect to a couple of specific points:

First, you raise some interesting negative externalities of highways that are not included in cost discussions, but there are also positive externalities (e.g. more commerce). Is there any strong reason to believe either of these effects dominates?

Second, your use of opportunity costs with respect to tax revenue is one that as best is not unique to transportation, but rather is an argument that the economic cost of taxes always exceeds the nominal amount of such taxes-- even apart from any efficiency losses with respect to the activity/item being taxed. It is probably correct, but it is hard to measure the effect of this loss because the subsidzied project might generate value in excess of the nominal cost. This is unlikely to be true overall given all of the ways in which government resource allocation is inferior to private resource allocation, but I think your post overstates the negative effect rhetorically by not mentioning the value that projects might have in excess of their costs.

Given that this seems like a hard area in which to make calculations, I guess I am nore inclined than you to cut Randal O'Toole some slack.

Re: The Gender Politics of Mad Men

DWAnderson — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 15:01:59 -0000

Re Ken, I'm not sure Ken is naive, but he does seem like an optimist.

Re Cooper, he doesn't seem befuddled so much as disarmingly wise, but I grant you we really don't know whether he is happy.

Re Don, he definitely has some strange characteristics, but I can't decide if that make him unrealistic of just unusual.

Re: The Gender Politics of Mad Men

mghertner — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 13:44:39 -0000

Hmm... I considered Ken Cosgrove, but then remembered that his happiness is dependent on naiveté. Compare his reaction to promotion to Co-Head of Accounts to Pete Campbell's, for example. At best, Ken demonstrates that happiness can be achieved, but only by remaining blissfully ignorant. Cooper doesn't strike me as happy so much as eternally befuddled. We don't get to see much of him (or Cosgrove), his motivations and feelings, compared to the more major characters.

Don is interesting, but it frustrates me how unrealistic his character is. Were it not for a team of talented writers (in real life, not in the show) feeding him his lines and reactions, I can't actually picture a person like him existing in the way I can picture all of the other characters. Don is superhuman and artificial in a way the others are not.

Re: The Gender Politics of Mad Men

DWAnderson — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 12:06:05 -0000

Nice post. A few thoughts:

I don't think Micha is correct that nobody is happy on the show. How about Burt Cooper and Ken Cosgrove?

I see Don as being comfortable with Peggy for a less abstract reason: because she is really competent (and discreet). Don also seems to have a greater capacity for self-examinination and change that I suspect would prevent Peggy from threatening Don in the sense you describe. Nevertheless your explanation of Don is also a plausible one.

That, BTW is why I think that the show really is centered on Don: he's such an interesting character. People identify with him (at least in part), but he's really hard to understand definitively.

Re: Housing, Transportation, and the Politics of Path Dependency

digamma — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 13:08:35 -0000

Houston has no zoning, but it's got plenty of requirements about minimum setback and parking.

Re: Housing, Transportation, and the Politics of Path Dependency

DWAnderson — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 11:12:32 -0000

I agree that zoning has probably led to sub-optimal land use in the suburbs, but it is hard to believe eliminating zoning would eliminate sprawl, see, e.g. Houston where there are private alternatives to zoning.

The subsidies to cars are greatly exagerated and are far lower than any other form of transportation, see, e.g. Randal O'Toole's work on this subject at http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2007/03/19/ten-b...

Re: Poisoned Well of Blood Guilt by Association: A Very Special Full Disclosure

damirmarusic — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 16:30:16 -0000

Who, me or Ames?

Re: Poisoned Well of Blood Guilt by Association: A Very Special Full Disclosure

DWAnderson — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 16:20:30 -0000

Was that intentionally ironic?

Re: More on Declining Marginal Utility: Reply to Yglesias and Clarke

willwilkinson — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 19:23:13 -0000

Maybe. But cutting defense would probably be just as feasible as taxing the rich if liberal opinion leaders spent as much time arguing for cutting defense spending as they do arguing for tax increases on the rich. To Matt's credit, he argues for cutting defense spending a lot. I wish more mainstream liberals would follow his example.

Re: More on Declining Marginal Utility: Reply to Yglesias and Clarke

DWAnderson — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 17:19:37 -0000

Excellent post until the last paragraph: Wouldn't Matt prefer cutting defense as a means to finance a new program, but argue that it is not in the set of politically feasible solutions?

Re: Response to Jonathan Chait on Inequality

Thorfinn — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 16:10:53 -0000

Exactly what sort of "deeper problem" does Latin America have, other than the fact that economic resources are inequitably distributed? It encourages the propertied to hijack the political system through lobbying and rent-seeking (even if the electoral outcome is democratic), while encouraging the poor to revolt. Even from a free-market point of view, these societies tend to have low levels of trust, especially in market institutions. With a poor mass base, the rich find few domestic productive uses of their money, and either purchase monopolies or stash cash elsewhere. Crime tends to be high.

I suppose one could attack crime, trust, investment, poverty, etc. all separately, but these efforts themselves tend to be hampered by the dysfunctional institutions and political organizations that inequality is found with.

But even if inequality had no causal role with these problems, if interventions (land reform as in Taiwan, Kashmir, South Korea, Japan) that reduce inequality have positive outcomes, they might be worthwhile. Many Asian successes are built on an egalitarian base negotiated on policy, and the resulting gains in growth may make redistribution a pareto improvement for all (so, even for the rich).

Re: Response to Jonathan Chait on Inequality

DWAnderson — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 15:54:45 -0000

The response is that where inequlaity is correlated with other problems it is a symptom of other, deeper problems rather than a cause of the problems. Better to address the deeper problems that worry about the inequality, which is probably unimportant in and of itself.

Re: Classical Liberalism Is Not Colorblind

DWAnderson — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 10:24:51 -0000

Isn't this post just an attempt to win the top Hayekian Public Intellectual contest, by attacking the competition?

Re: The Meaning Dodge

DWAnderson — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 13:28:44 -0000

It is an argument not a bet. If one were to bet, they might discount based on p<1 of the argument being valid, but why do that in ordinary discourse, especially when (i) it's hard to quantify what you think p might be, and (ii) it doesn't affect the validity of the argument.

Re: Hello? Excuse Me! Brrrring… Anybody Home?

alphie — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 16:39:02 -0000

Despite all the professional whiners trying to tear down Obama, he remains about as popular with the American public as when he took office:

http://www.gallup.com/poll/113980/Gallup-Daily-...

Re: Hello? Excuse Me! Brrrring… Anybody Home?

DWAnderson — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 16:02:13 -0000

I think Will is right that Obama risks looking bad for not doing more with respect to things like Treasury appointments if things get worse. But it is hard for me to believe that anything Obama, might actually do would help matters, so it is hard for me to get excited about it. I can think of good things someone might do, e,g. a two-year regulatory holiday, payroll tax cuts that might do some good, but these are not within the realm of options being considered by this administration.

I suspect that Obama really believes that the economy will eventually recover fully on its own and is willing to sacrifice it taking an extra year or so to entrench his other policy priorities that are more important to him than economic growth.

Re: Hungry for Howley? Try Slate’s XX Factor!

DWAnderson — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 15:50:28 -0000

I thought this post was pretty funny. My wife thought it was a bad precedent to set while still engaged.

Re: Let’s Keep Our Eye On the Ball

odograph — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 16:39:30 -0000

OK, maybe I've been reading different things (Calculated Risk, Barry Ritholtz' Big Picture, Naked Capitalism). They lead me to believe there is very much more in the offing (or quietly agreed between Treasury and the big banks), than the $700B TARP.

The continuing AIG bailouts, as one example, have been a channel to bank-like entities and banks overseas. I see some trillion dollar shoes left to drop.