EclecticLip

(posted Oct 9) 

As this article (a longer preview is available here) from the Boston Globe points out, urban planners in some American cities are trying to figure out how to retrench – often because a declining population and economic hardship have shrunk the tax base. 

This WSJ article here — subtitled “asphalt is replaced by cheaper grave; back to the stone age” (my emphasis) — describes how some states have deliberately moved back to gravel roads. 

To my knowledge, the same hasn’t happened in Canada, perhaps because severe income inequality hasn’t spurred a generation of plutocrat-friendly legislation… yet.  (Income inequality tends to make the impoverished vote conservative — perhaps out of a sense that an “other” is keeping them from breaking into the “haves” class?) 

This seems vaguely analogous to the Byzantine Empire’s decision during the Macedonian Revival, to keep its borders manageable and not overextend itself.  It must’ve been tempting for the Emperors to keep more modest borders than were achieved under the dynamic duo of Justinian and Belisarius, but they were ultimately better off for it. 

Right now, cities and states are having to retrench their infrastructure — a more realistic scenario under their current constraints, which must nevertheless be gnashingly frustrating for all parties involved.  Just as it must’ve been for the Macedonian Emperors…

(originally written Sept 14, posted Oct 9)

Despite cruise ships being the ‘tar sands’ of tourism, we’ll be heading to San Diego next week on one of them.  I remember something about us having visited both Whitehorse and Yellowknife, a travel deal, and “quid pro quo”, but it’s a bit of a blur really. 

The boat ride will, however, give me a chance to do battle with Edward Gibbon’s The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, a second time.  Back in my university summer-job days — lackey to a post-doc lackey of a tenured professor — I started the book, figuring my encyclopedic ignorance of Roman history would be an overcomeable hurdle.  After all, that’s why I was going to read the book, right?  To learn history!

__(’Read the rest of this entry »’)

According to Wiki, Rorschach tests (inkblot tests) are used by some psychologists to:

“examine a person’s personality characteristics and emotional functioning”.

Given the diversity of opinion religious texts can engender, I wonder if these might also qualify.  Literalist Christians (”fundamentalists”) certainly derive different meaning from the Bible than progressive Christians (”liberals”) — on account of each group focusing on different portions of the scripture.  No doubt the same phenomenon occurs in other faiths.  And one can probably draw considerable inferences on a person’s tendencies, based on the category they fit in…

To a classical studies aficionado, one-time richest man in the world Bill Gates triggers thoughts of Alexander the Great.  Both men straddled the world with then-unparalleled might.  And both are arguably less accomplished than their parents.

Philip of Macedon came out of nowhere to make Macedon the leading power of Greece.  Sure, Alexander took things to the next level — but he had the advantage of all the legwork dad Philip had done, to put his son in such an enviable position.

Bill Gates III, software baron, was the son of Bill Gates*, corporate lawyer, whose hard work made it possible for Bill III to attend an exclusive prep school which was privileged enough to have a chunk of time on a GE computer.  He was able to capitalize on that head start in life, to great effect — and good for him.  But his accomplishment might pale in comparison to what his father (and other forebears) made of less-privileged beginnings.
- - - - - -

* in one of those stranger than fiction scenarios, Bill Gates (the lawyer) was the son of Bill Gates II.  But since the lawyer didn’t use the affectation “III”, this passed to his son (the software baron).  As such, Bill Gates III is the son of Bill Gates, the son of Bill Gates II.  So weird, it could come out of The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy…

Joseph Heath’s economics primer Filthy Lucre was chosen as the club’s 23rd book summary.  This choice was spurred by the seemingly-unprecedented furore about the implementation of the HST in British Columbia.  In light of this, it was felt appropriate to do a book on economics; and this tome, which critiques fallacious right-wing and left-wing ideas, seemed a good, neutral choice.

The HST — which harmonized provincial and federal taxes (hence its initials, which stand for Harmonized Sales Tax) — seems to be sensible policy, from my reading; Canada’s most populous province, Ontario, implemented one at the same time without nearly as much rancour.  I imagine the backlash in BC stems from the governing Liberal Party (by Canadian standards a far-right-wing party, despite its name) committing during the recent election campaign that it wouldn’t implement an HST — then reversing its position several weeks after the election.

As always, if you enjoyed the book summary, please consider supporting the author by purchasing a copy of the book. 

- - - - - -

Filthy Lucre - summary 

I’d written previously about how blitzkrieg tactics were devised around Europe after World War I, but only implemented in Germany (because the Allies won — so innovators were ignored).

W. Edwards Deming — the father of Japanese quality — would be another case of an innovator being ignored at home, only to have their ideas flourish elsewhere.  American manufacturing was so strong, it created a crippling strength in North American business culture — an overconfidence which made it complacent enough that it largely stopped improving.

(image source: here)

Have been musing recently whether deliberate currency devaluation can be considered a “tragedy of the commons” situation.  In this case, the “commons” is the value of the unit of currency.

I don’t the analogy works perfectly, but it does seem to fit the theme that when times get tough, goverments which are loathe to cut back on spending rely instead on currency devaluation.  This creates a temporary competitive advantage — until the currency is debased enough to lose any meaningful value.

Admittedly, there are often reasons for not overtly cutting back on government spending, which we in the global north take for granted: Roman Emperors, for example, tended to die suddenly if they lost the support of the military.  And cutting social spending can cause extraordinary misery… so the slow bleeding of a currency gradually losing its value, may seem more palatable.  Especially if the diminished value of savings (primarily a concern of the wealthy) is countered by the arrival of new jobs, in light of the country’s newly-cheapened labour (primarily a concern of everyone else).

I’ll introduce a periodic kaizen suggestions category to the blog here, to capture, well, suggestions I send to companies and organizations when I see “low-hanging fruit” for improvement.  This somewhat plays to ideas found in book club selection The Toyota Way.

The first in the series is an email I sent in May 2010 to IKEA, relating to their particle-board furniture — which is not accepted at recycling depots in the Metro Vancouver area.

The email I sent IKEA is below the fold. 

__(’Read the rest of this entry »’)

Douglas McGregor’s monumental volume, The Human Side of Enterprise, was the book club’s 22nd selection.  Penetratively insightful even for today’s readers (who have the added benefit of the recent “empowerment” fad) it must’ve been an astonishing read to his contemporaries.  One of them — W.L. Gore — famously ingrained this thinking into his company’s culture.  Even the name W.L. Gore & Associates (the firm’s employees all have the nominal title “Associate”) reflects McGregor’s advice to eschew titles.

Striking in McGregor’s tome is its implied criticism of Taylorism (or at least its excesses) — which tended to separate a workforce into “brains” (management) and “brawn” (labour).  While Taylor’s (followers’) dualism would have made Descartes proud, it prevented most of the workforce from reaching its potential.  Besides, power corrupts, and the concentration of power in management probably didn’t do the company much good.

The Starfish And The Spider (book 9) is a particularly complementary book club selection.

- - - - - -

The Human Side of Enterprise - summary

The use of the herbicide Roundup… has resulted in weeds being genetically selected… for tolerance to Roundup.  A definite case of “cripping strength”, or biological blowback.

As they say in environmental circles, “mother nature always bats last”.

This doesn’t negate the fact that pesticides and herbicides can provide positive value in agriculture — but it may illustrate that for crop yield improvements to be long-term, they need to work with the realities of biology, instead of trying to fight it.  Sort of like how aikido is purported to use the attacker’s momentum against them — whereas in a tug-of-war, you need to create the most momentum.