Opportunity cost can only be evaluated when there are 2 or more alternative choices. If you are layed off, opportunity cost becomes non-measureable or you get a div/0! error on the calculator. I tend to think investing in employment capacity for the future, is a great insurance policy, that can be deducted from any other life-disability insurance cost that you are already paying (think of life-insurance in broader terms -everybody hedges or expends energy to protect their future from harm, and only through education can your insurance premiums be lowered).
We go through periods of economic expansion and contraction, which cycles tend to be dynamically unstable (remember popping realestate bubbles, debt bubbles etc). If society can't create sufficient active dampnening mechanism to reduce the magnitude of economic ups and downs, then people WILL find their own way to dampen the affects on them and their smaller community of family and friends using more passive means like: sharing the cost of shelter, going on a diet, etc.
Slashdot Mirror
Opportunity cost can only be evaluated when there are 2 or more alternative choices. If you are layed off, opportunity cost becomes non-measureable or you get a div/0! error on the calculator. I tend to think investing in employment capacity for the future, is a great insurance policy, that can be deducted from any other life-disability insurance cost that you are already paying (think of life-insurance in broader terms -everybody hedges or expends energy to protect their future from harm, and only through education can your insurance premiums be lowered).
We go through periods of economic expansion and contraction, which cycles tend to be dynamically unstable (remember popping realestate bubbles, debt bubbles etc). If society can't create sufficient active dampnening mechanism to reduce the magnitude of economic ups and downs, then people WILL find their own way to dampen the affects on them and their smaller community of family and friends using more passive means like: sharing the cost of shelter, going on a diet, etc.
It looks like Edmund Scientific has some. Not sure which one is best though. http://www.scientificsonline.com/robotics.html/