Category Archives: Economics

Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society

Save The Planet

6 Comments

…cut back on the recycling.

…some national recycling experts have begun calling for government restraint in trash recycling, which can be more costly and environmentally damaging than dumping.

“We just assume recycling is always better,” said J. Winston Porter, president of the Waste Policy Center, an environmental consulting and policy organization. “But there’s a point at which you shouldn’t just recycle for recycling’s sake.”

I think we’re well past it. It’s become the new secular state religion.

My cynicism over it peaked a few years ago when (as I related in a blog post, but don’t want to look for it right now) I watched the recycling truck come by, and unceremoniously dump the contents of my yellow paper bin and my blue plastic and cans bin into the same repository on the truck, completely negating all of my entropy reduction efforts in sorting them. I do notice now, on my return to CA after five years, they’ve at least ended that fraud, and just have one big blue recycling bin.

Either way, give it up for Earth Day.

Business, Economics, Political Commentary

Going Galt

11 Comments

He’s probably not the first, and he won’t be the last:

In a subsequent interview with Bloomberg News, Wynn said much of his desire to leave Las Vegas was because of the country’s economic direction set by Obama.

“The governmental policies in the United States of America are a damper, a wet blanket,” Wynn said. “They retard investment; they retard job formation; they retard the creation of a better life for the citizens in spite of the rhetoric of the president.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, speaking at a press conference on banking reform, was asked about Wynn’ comments on Obama’s policies.

“I’m not going to get into a dispute with Mr. Wynn, somebody who has done so much for Las Vegas, but I will say that taxes are at an all-time low. The tax picture he complained about is just not there.”

Even if it were true that taxes are at an “all-time low” (does anyone really believe that?), Wynn’s not as stupid as Harry wants him to be. He, and we, can see the taxes coming down the road as a result of the insane spending.

[Update a few minutes later]

“Millions face tax increases under Dem’s budget plan.”

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space

Simplifying The Job

28 Comments

I’m working on a piece along these lines for PM or PJM, but Jim Oberg beat me to the punch:

The plan to reshape the Orion spaceship as a standby rescue vehicle for station crews has profound implications for the requirements of the commercial taxi and its cost. This strategy means the taxis won’t have to last for six months “parked” in space, like Russia’s Soyuz spaceships. The simplification of the taxi’s mission will allow its hardware to be significantly less expensive to build and to validate.

The crucial systems for the taxis have mostly already been built and are available as off-the-shelf technology — which means the spaceships could be much cheaper, much smaller and much more reliable.

The FUD being spread by defenders of the status quo has been almost palpable, and it’s all unjustified.

[Update a few minutes later]

I should add that I doubt very much if the commercial contractors are going to use the Orion abort system. It’s overkill, in both weight and cost. In fact, for a much lighter vehicle, as a taxi would be, it would probably kill the occupants from the acceleration.

Business, Economics, Humor, Political Commentary

Iceland

19 Comments

Here’s a joke that’s been going around the Intertubes — it was the Icelandic economy’s last wish that its ashes be scattered over the EU.

Speaking of which, here’s some cheery news. There may be a bigger eruption coming.

[Update a while later]

Here are some more. I liked this one:

Iceland goes bankrupt, then it manages to set itself on fire. This has insurance scam written all over it.

Heh.

Business, Economics

A Bleg For Corporate Accountants

10 Comments

Does anyone out there have any idea how much it costs to do the accounting necessary to complete a corporate return? That is, not the cost of preparing the return per se, but the costs of collecting and maintaining all of the needed data. Does having a corporate income tax impose additional costs on running a corporation that wouldn’t exist in its absence (that is, are some data tracked that the corporation wouldn’t care about in the absence of the need to file a return)? Also, how much do things like depreciation schedules skew capital purchase decisions?

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

IBD Weighs In On Space

11 Comments

Cluelessly, as with many:

Some would argue that in times of budget problems a robust space program is an unnecessary expense and that if we can’t cut there, where can we cut?

We aren’t cutting. The budget is increasing, and in particular it is increasing for things that we actually need to get beyond low earth orbit, which Mike Griffin’s NASA had eliminated funding for to pay for his expensive and unneeded new rocket.

“We’ve got to do it in a smart way,” Obama said, apparently preferring to pay the Russians $56 million a pop to send Americans to fix toilets on the International Space Station.

No, that’s not what he was referring to. That was the George Bush plan, in case you’ve been asleep for the past six years. It’s too late to fix that in the near term, but at least we now have hope of fixing it a lot sooner, for a lot less money, than Ares would have provided.

Why do all of these supposed free marketeers bash private enterprise when it comes to space?

[Update a couple minutes later]

Speaking of which, Falcon 9 is almost ready to launch.