It's only more expensive if you discount the costs to the environment, which will be borne by future generations.
As opposed to the debt incurred that will be paid (with interest) by future generations? I have no firm convictions one way or another about the debate on global warming, but I do know that the usual government insiders will be making boat loads of cash - cash borrowed by said governments. I can't think of any industrialized nation that isn't up to it's eyeballs in debt. My son owed $175,000 the second he hit atmo, and it is a lot more seven months later. That is just a shameful legacy to leave our children, IMHO.
It's not like environmentalists have not been saying for years that fossil fuels are artificially cheap because some of the cost is externalized.
The funny part is that you don't even need to turn to charging for externalized costs (more taxes) to take away the artificial cheapness of energy. All that needs to happen is to stop subsidizing security in the Middle East. I guarantee if oil was $500+ a barrel you'd see the largest explosion of green energy EVER without one new "green" subsidy handout or law on the books. Heck, just look at the energy projects started at $140 per barrel oil! It would also be immensely cheaper in the mid and long term, even with just the cost savings on interest payments alone.
First, there is necessity. They need to pay somehow for the materials for educating the kids. Selling ads on tests is a bandage solution to stop the bleeding.
They just raised the property taxes about 22% in my district "for the kids". In addition, they borrowed a crapfest of funds as well that will decrease the amount of funds available in future years. What did it go for? Keeping staffing levels current even though student count has been falling for years, increasing benefits and pensions for teachers and administration, and some new windows.
I'm all for educating kids, but this was almost enough stupidity to make me move. Unfortunately the rest of the country is just as happy throwing ever increasing piles of money at anything "for the kids" - even if they have to push the elderly and others on fixed incomes out of their homes to do it. Kinda makes you wonder what lessons we are REALLY teaching kids.
Well, perhaps force was the wrong word. In my mind they forced a solution, even if they didn't hold a gun to someone's head. How about provide artificial incentives to produce an outcome that was unlikely to happen on its own?
Still, the question is valid - Is government stepping in beneficial in the long term? Is short term benefits "good enough" of an outcome?
Now this is something that I've been thinking about recently. Was the decision to force electrification actually beneficial for the long term? Short term - yes, hands down. However, who's to say what other solutions those small communities would have come up with. If people want something bad enough, they will get it. Would renewable energy be more common today if we didn't push for the current energy infrastructure? Would our thirst for watts be less? Would the current infrastructure be as overloaded with X communities with point of use generation?
Largely unknowable, but still something to think about.
Bah, that's only true if you believe Verisign, et al, don't actually perform proper diligence to validate that the owner of the certificate is who they say they are.
Last time I bought a cert, the only diligence performed was to make sure they could charge my credit card. That is hardly inspiring verification that I'm actually who I say I am.
A proper certificate is around 10 bucks per year and although they issue it to anyone, it is security at a much higher level than using a self-signed crutch.
Currently the only difference between a self signed cert and a $10 one is that the latter leaves you $10 poorer. There is no practical difference between the two. As a matter of fact, the current methodology of including certain CAs in browsers provides a false sense of security - which decreases the value of the system as a whole.
There are criteria to what makes a good money:
1) durability - will it last?
2) store of value - is it desired?
3) homogeneous and divisible - can it be divided (think change)?
4) luxury - Seashells might not be a good choice
Like it or not, gold fits all of these criteria and a loaf of bread does not. (Although there are scenarios where a loaf of bread has more intrinsic worth than a truckload of gold bars. Google Time Value of Money Theory for more infos on that topic.) The USD has most of these qualities, but 2 is determined by law and 2 by the printing press speed. 1 is even under attack these days on the Forex.
My primary beef with a gold standard is that it leads to unrest, as it tends to be deflationary. There were issues with workers taking a pay cut, even though the purchasing power of that smaller sum was as great as the higher wage was originally. On the flip side, 3% raise in a 5% inflationary environment is easier for the worker bees to swallow since it is much more subtle loss.
A couple Austrian economists were quoted as saying there would be a "crash", but one thing they could not predict was the keynesian economic policy would prevent recessions from spiraling into depressions ever again, which used to happen regularly and has not happened even once since.
And the sacrificed the value of the dollar, along with any benefit to saving, to get it.
What about the previous couple hundred years with several different countries under the gold standard? Sure there were booms and busts, but nothing even remotely close to the Great Depression and the boom of the Roaring Twenties that preceded it. Both of those events were, in part, caused by the Federal Reserve. The depth and breadth of the event was complicated by the Gold standard (Which was originally intended to prevent the monetary gymnastics required by a fiat currency. In that case semi-fiat, as it wasn't convertible except to other central banks.), but one of the primary causes was too much credit. And the root of all credit is the Federal Reserve.
Part of the blog you cite (based on a 30 year old paper) is "A gold standard only works when everybody believes in the overall fiscal and monetary responsibility of the major world governments and the relative price of gold is fairly stable." IOW, is it believed that governments are printing currency units in excess of gold to back it, which would cause the currency unit to sink relative to gold? No duh, and the primary criticism for the current dollar price of gold by groups such as GATA.
I personally believe in letting the market decide what store of value to use in transactions, and that means several competing models. I'm not "for" a gold/silver/fiat standard, I just despise one size fits all approaches. That mode of thinking discounts all possibility there may be a better way to go.
Do you know why we got away from the gold standard? Because it was one of the major causes of the Great Depression.
??? There are many downsides to re-implementing the gold standard, but *causing* the Great Depression isn't one of them. That can be laid at the feet of several key items, not least of which was the third national bank of the US - The Federal Reserve.
Slashdot Mirror
You are correct:
http://discovermagazine.com/2004/oct/seeding-the-universe/article_view?b_start:int=2&-C=
As opposed to the debt incurred that will be paid (with interest) by future generations? I have no firm convictions one way or another about the debate on global warming, but I do know that the usual government insiders will be making boat loads of cash - cash borrowed by said governments. I can't think of any industrialized nation that isn't up to it's eyeballs in debt. My son owed $175,000 the second he hit atmo, and it is a lot more seven months later. That is just a shameful legacy to leave our children, IMHO.
The funny part is that you don't even need to turn to charging for externalized costs (more taxes) to take away the artificial cheapness of energy. All that needs to happen is to stop subsidizing security in the Middle East. I guarantee if oil was $500+ a barrel you'd see the largest explosion of green energy EVER without one new "green" subsidy handout or law on the books. Heck, just look at the energy projects started at $140 per barrel oil! It would also be immensely cheaper in the mid and long term, even with just the cost savings on interest payments alone.
Already is - just ask Emiliano Gonzolez.
Yeah, and the Democratic party majority sure put a stop to the abuses and saved us. Two factions of the same Oligarchy if you ask me.
They just raised the property taxes about 22% in my district "for the kids". In addition, they borrowed a crapfest of funds as well that will decrease the amount of funds available in future years. What did it go for? Keeping staffing levels current even though student count has been falling for years, increasing benefits and pensions for teachers and administration, and some new windows.
I'm all for educating kids, but this was almost enough stupidity to make me move. Unfortunately the rest of the country is just as happy throwing ever increasing piles of money at anything "for the kids" - even if they have to push the elderly and others on fixed incomes out of their homes to do it. Kinda makes you wonder what lessons we are REALLY teaching kids.
Well, perhaps force was the wrong word. In my mind they forced a solution, even if they didn't hold a gun to someone's head. How about provide artificial incentives to produce an outcome that was unlikely to happen on its own?
Still, the question is valid - Is government stepping in beneficial in the long term? Is short term benefits "good enough" of an outcome?
Now this is something that I've been thinking about recently. Was the decision to force electrification actually beneficial for the long term? Short term - yes, hands down. However, who's to say what other solutions those small communities would have come up with. If people want something bad enough, they will get it. Would renewable energy be more common today if we didn't push for the current energy infrastructure? Would our thirst for watts be less? Would the current infrastructure be as overloaded with X communities with point of use generation?
Largely unknowable, but still something to think about.
Actually it was the widespread adoption of heating and refrigeration that contributed the most to longevity.
Last time I bought a cert, the only diligence performed was to make sure they could charge my credit card. That is hardly inspiring verification that I'm actually who I say I am.
Currently the only difference between a self signed cert and a $10 one is that the latter leaves you $10 poorer. There is no practical difference between the two. As a matter of fact, the current methodology of including certain CAs in browsers provides a false sense of security - which decreases the value of the system as a whole.
Not even then. They don't call it "pound me in the ass" prison for nothing.
1) edit the vmware config file to include the line:
host.cpukHz = XXXXX
Where XXXXXis your CPU in kilohertz
2) enable time sync via vmware tools
3) modify Type in HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\W32Time\Parameters from "Nt5DS" to "NoSync"
That's always taken care of clock skew issues on DCs for me.
My wife craved McDonald's breakfast sandwiches. If your theory holds true, I wonder wtf deficiency THAT was about.
(She even made me wait until the drive-thru opened up to take her to the hospital!)
Meh. I thought the impression of intelligence was directly proportional to discussing things you agree with. This is /. after all!
That's because the entire Internets are now broken!
It was as if millions of p0rn sites cried out in terror, and were suddenly silenced.
Well that solves that then! Back to P0r. . . er, PBS!
Seriously, when did we turn into a society that paces in front of the microwave?
"You can't just open the book of my life and jump in the middle." -Mal (Firefly)
;)
I ordered some salmiakki once due to my love of licorice. I had been warned it's an acquired taste, but I thought what the heck.
For the rest of the day my mouth tasted like a cat's piss. Vile stuff.
I have sat inet at home (wildblue) and routinely see 1200-1800ms ping times.
There are criteria to what makes a good money: 1) durability - will it last? 2) store of value - is it desired? 3) homogeneous and divisible - can it be divided (think change)? 4) luxury - Seashells might not be a good choice Like it or not, gold fits all of these criteria and a loaf of bread does not. (Although there are scenarios where a loaf of bread has more intrinsic worth than a truckload of gold bars. Google Time Value of Money Theory for more infos on that topic.) The USD has most of these qualities, but 2 is determined by law and 2 by the printing press speed. 1 is even under attack these days on the Forex. My primary beef with a gold standard is that it leads to unrest, as it tends to be deflationary. There were issues with workers taking a pay cut, even though the purchasing power of that smaller sum was as great as the higher wage was originally. On the flip side, 3% raise in a 5% inflationary environment is easier for the worker bees to swallow since it is much more subtle loss.
What about the previous couple hundred years with several different countries under the gold standard? Sure there were booms and busts, but nothing even remotely close to the Great Depression and the boom of the Roaring Twenties that preceded it. Both of those events were, in part, caused by the Federal Reserve. The depth and breadth of the event was complicated by the Gold standard (Which was originally intended to prevent the monetary gymnastics required by a fiat currency. In that case semi-fiat, as it wasn't convertible except to other central banks.), but one of the primary causes was too much credit. And the root of all credit is the Federal Reserve.
Part of the blog you cite (based on a 30 year old paper) is "A gold standard only works when everybody believes in the overall fiscal and monetary responsibility of the major world governments and the relative price of gold is fairly stable." IOW, is it believed that governments are printing currency units in excess of gold to back it, which would cause the currency unit to sink relative to gold? No duh, and the primary criticism for the current dollar price of gold by groups such as GATA.
I personally believe in letting the market decide what store of value to use in transactions, and that means several competing models. I'm not "for" a gold/silver/fiat standard, I just despise one size fits all approaches. That mode of thinking discounts all possibility there may be a better way to go.
The word "militia" must be read in the context of when the document was written. The modern day definition is quite different.
http://www.guncite.com/gc2ndpur.html