The Pin Factory Blog

Clever politicians like Margaret Thatcher and Vaclav Klaus sensed it early on, comparing the mitigation schemes to halt global warming with state socialism of old. The unfolding US Senate debate on 'cap and trade' legislation proves them right, for it reveals what’s really all about: the largest income redistribution since the introduction of the income tax.

The two bills for carbon regulation currently under discussion will generate windfall revenue of $6.7 trillion by 2050, which is half the present US economy's output. Half of that, $3.32 trillion, will come from auctioning carbon allowances to polluters. The other half will be handed out free to favoured supplicants such as Indian tribes or 'green' states such as California, which coincidently is represented by Senator Barbara Boxer who also happens to be a sponsor of the more radical bill. As an editorial in the Wall Street Journal put it:

In the Boxer plan, revenues are allocated down to the last dime over the next half-century. Thus $802 billion would go for ‘relief’ for low-income taxpayers, to offset the higher cost of lighting homes or driving cars. Ms. Boxer will judge if you earn too much to qualify.

Another $190 billion is earmarked for 'green collar-jobs', and on it goes with pork barrelling all over the place. What one now gathers is this: the failure of 'cap and trade' to achieve its stated objectives appears to be well anticipated, with 'social justice' as the fall back position. By the time the greenhouse gas bubble bursts, the gigantic redistribution of wealth will be irreversible – or so the stratagem goes – and government will be permanently bigger.

Perhaps that explains the hurry politicians are in to 'do something' about climate change.

An attack of the funnies over at the BBC with them claiming that this year’s Euro 2008 could be the last one watched on “free-to-air" TV. Now call me obtuse but I’m shelling out £139.50 per year so I can watch everything but the BBC. To me that’s not free TV. I suppose there are pockets of the population that watch TV for free, something I will not begrudge the elderly, but for the BBC to claim that they are “free-to-air" really does take the biscuit.

I sincerely hope that UEFA does indeed win its petition to the EU Commission and are then able to sell the rights to future Euro Championships. They already sell the rights to the European Champions League and these are shared between ITV and Sky Sports in the UK.

It is time to end the listing of protected sports events and  force the BBC to face up to the fact they do not have a monopoly over these sporting events; and nor do they belong, “to the people". They are the property of the organizing body and should be respected as such. If the BBC wishes to air them they should be made to compete for them in the open market, paying a fair price.

But then would that be a fair use of the licence fee tax we are all forced to pay?
 

NHS patient: "The metal bars are on me"

Now here's an interesting snippet from the credit crisis. The Government cannot find anyone willing to take on the job of valuing the shares of Northern Rock.

Now that we're in the Great Moderation the definition of "a recession" doesn't really mean very much.

Ruminations on Caroliine Spelman's problems. Possibly the most intruiging point is that if there wasn't anything wrong then why did she terminate the arrangement upon advice?

The problem with PCSOs. Indeed, such a problem that perhaps we should just hire more police officers?

The Guardian and economics: never the twain shall meet. Apparently money not spent on booze ceases to exist.

More journamalism. A photo shoot about the problems of underage drinking led to the photojournalist purchasing alcohol for the young to drink....

And finally, tornados cause wealth.

It's a common enough trope: x causes problems so we've got to do something about x. Fair enough you might say, but it does rather depend upon how much of a problem x actually is and how many other problems (of what magnitude) there will be with the solutions. One example might be the vexing issue of food miles. To hear some talk the very idea of eating food from a field you couldn't walk to is what is killing Gaia: more rationally, yes, of course the transport of food creates emissions and yes, there's some reason to think that this might cause problems.

However, we're also aware (Adam Smith pointed out in 1776 that you can grow grapes and make wine in Scotland but why bother when Bourdeaux will happily do it better and more cheaply for you?) that different methods and modes of food production have different emissions patterns as well. So what we really might want to know is what is the relative damage done by the transport and or the growing?

A new paper has been doing the rounds of the American blogs on exactly this subject. Here, here, here and here. Just how much (or not) do food miles matter?

We find that although food is transported long distances in general (1640 km delivery and 6760 km life-cycle supply chain on average) the GHG emissions associated with food are dominated by the production phase, contributing 83% of the average U.S. household’s 8.1 t CO2e/yr footprint for food consumption. Transportation as a whole represents only 11% of life-cycle GHG emissions, and final delivery from producer to retail contributes only 4%.

Not a lot is the answer. In fact, they're a trivial contributor. If a method of production has lower emissions (as, for example, we've found out that Spanish tomatoes as against UK hothouse ones, or New Zealand lamb as against UK grown), even if only slightly lower, then consumption of those transported and even imported foods lowers total emissions.

Good, so that's the end of food miles as a measurement of the sanctity or not of consumption habits. There's really only one thing left for the locovores to insist upon, which is that we should eat only those items which are grown locally and in season: no hothouses, no artificial conditions and no imports. I can't see that catching on to be honest (does anyone know of anywhere in the UK that you can raise tofus? And what do they graze upon anyway?) but if it does I'm going to write a recipe book.

"101 Exciting Things to do with Turnips", because for months of the year on our damp and chilly islands, that's all there is to eat that's local and not hothoused.

On Tuesday, the Rector of a top UK university announced a new entrance test may be used to distinguish between applicants with high marks. Sir Richard Sykes, of Imperial College London, informed the Independent Schools Council’s annual conference that while applicants have four or five A-levels, "grade inflation" had "destroyed" the intended role A-levels have in measuring undergraduate acceptance. Surprisingly, 40% of those applicants receive private schooling, from a mere 7% of UK schools.

“We are doing this not because we don't believe in A-level but we cannot use A-levels any more as a discriminatory factor." –Sir Richard Sykes

A-levels have received much criticism over the past few years, and rightly so. From the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA)’s website, the Q&A section answers ‘How are A level grades set?’ with this:

“With great care. Criteria are set across particular grade boundaries and it is important that these criteria are met each year. Up until the mid-80s there were fixed percentages of students awarded grades with little variation from year to year… Whereas the system used since that time, called ‘criteria referencing’ is a much fairer system and it measures standards of achievement rather than fixed percentages."

In the US, specialised postgraduate schools require an entry test based upon percentages. For example, the LSAT, and MCAT results state this percentage to distinguish the pupil’s rank in relation to their competition. Though undergraduate course quality will vary, individuals applying are expected to undertake a set coursework (pre-med, etc) and the tests. Furthermore, a report has been recently released by Reform demonstrating a significant decline in the standard of maths testing, with the steepest change since 1990.

Frankly, it’s about time a UK university started requiring entrance tests. Universities should not be forced to lower their expectations, nor bear any unnecessary risk for students whom are incapable of completing the coursework. The UK education system needs radical reform, including an open access scheme, much like the one proposed here. Until the government stops interfering and allows a rigorous school exaxmination system to develop independently, it will become increasingly common for applicants to be tested.

It appears McCain might now supports warrant-less wiretaps on US citizens such as those undertaken by the Bush administration. This contrasts with previous comments he’s made on the subject, when he said that he would consider himself obligated to obey the 1978 statute that calls for court oversight of federal surveillance.

When McCain is called upon to clarify his position, who knows which side he will come down on. He has historically distanced himself from Bush’s stances on torture and interrogation. Yet since the primaries are over, it is hard to pass this off as a simple political move to get hawkish Republican supporters; if anything, he should be wooing independents, libertarians, and those on the right who have been increasingly disturbed by this kind of hubris from President Bush.

The idea that only “trial lawyers and the ACLU" oppose the idea of federal agents listening in on American citizens is absurd. The last thing America needs is a president who maintains or even furthers the unprecedented expansion of presidential power that has occurred in the last eight years in spite of explicit laws.

McCain’s economic positions have largely been very sensible so far, and his break with the Republican field on torture and interrogation methods was refreshing. Let’s hope he retracts this statement and that we’ll soon hear the limited-government candidate supporting limitations on his own power as president.
 

Is climate change actually the world's current greatest problem (quite apart from the questions of whether it is immediate or catastrophic)? No seems to be the answer.

If we're going to continue to discover dodginess in the numbers which support the whole climate change things itself then perhaps it isn't a problem at all?

What might be the best mechanism if it is indeed a problem? Governments or markets?

One of those other problems, food for the poor. How not to solve it.

A completely different problem: the recent jump in the US unemployment rate, was it caused by the recent rise in the minimum wage?

That state school/ private school problem. Is it actually worth spending the money on those fees?

And finally, how you don't make people happy by giving them money.

....But Martin Kettle has written a very good column indeed on the influence newspapers have on the opinions of the populace and the way that they vote.

The big error of politicians is to believe that newspapers change the way people vote.(...)Newspapers exist for many purposes. An important one is to sell papers. By and large they aim to satisfy their readers, not alienate them..(....) The Ipsos Mori evidence actually suggests the very opposite. It sits comfortably with current fashionable notions of voting as a cultural choice rather than as a choice based on supposed rational self-interest. People choose a newspaper that suits and reflects them culturally. One of the ways it reflects them is political stance - though it is by no means the only one, as politicians like to believe.

Quite simply, newspapers reflect the already extant thoughts, opinions and prejudices of their readers rather than shape them: that's why people buy a particular newspaper in the first place. The academic research does seem to back this up (at least on the grand scale, there is of course a little bit of movement, as Kettle says, around the margins):

Consistent with their theory that media bias is mainly driven by customer tastes, they find that reader ideology explains significantly more of the variation in media bias than the identity of its owner. This finding holds up even when they take account of the possibility of reverse causality. Places with more churchgoers (a trait unlikely to be affected by newspaper bias) tend to have more right-wing newspapers. Conversely, cities with fewer churchgoers tend to have more left-wing newspapers.

Now this isn't really all that new, it's a confirmation of something that many have thought for some time. But what does make it interesting is that we might finally be able to put to bed this contention of Polly Toynbee's:

The malevelovence of the media is underestimated by social researchers. Historians leave its deformations to footnotes. But it helps explain why an ever more prosperous, secure and healthy country is so unhappy and fearful.

Here's an example of its influence: an overwhelmingly rightwing bias helps explain why Eurobarometer finds the British the least sympathetic of EU nations towards the poor, more likely to blame them for laziness.

Of course, we have to translate Polly's "rightwing bias" to "vaguely not social democratic" given her own stance on the political spectrum but once we've done that we can go on to point out the error in her thinking.

We're not all raving right wingers (ie, not social democrats) because we've been mesmerised by the press into not understanding how much better off we would be if ruled by La Toynbee's latest enthusiasms. The British press is ravingly right wing (ie not social democrat) because the British people are ravingly right wing (ie, not social democrats) and thus unlikely to be enthused by whatever is today's arrogantly paternalist plan and thus there's no way to sell newspapers trying to tell people about it.