Education is not free, and a good education is expensive. What is the right level and best way to allocate these resources? What is the best system for a bright child from a non-privileged family? A bureaucratic approach to select individuals? Subsidized education for some via State colleges? Or subsidized loans?
Between say 1950 to 2000 the answer was clear – America system of state colleges and subsidized loans worked better then Europe’s free colleges. Lower collation to class, higher collation to high school education.
Now, I am not saying our system is perfect. Class correlation is increasing which I find disturbing. But I do think it is better in principal.
I think the median tax rate (income, VAT, etc.) in Sweden is closer to 50%, which is not to say the mode is not 30%
And while schools are free in Sweden I suspect that there is a cost. Free goods are often rationed.
In France (a countries that I know better than Sweden) the free liberal arts colleges are divided into 2 categories, elite institutions and everything else. The elite schools can hold their own against the world. The other colleges? Less money is spent on a college student then a high school student. And because it is free and failure to pass classes can get one to be kicked out, too many student pile into the humanities and social sciences and too few in the harder subjects.
But at least it is free so everybody has got a short? Right? Maybe not. In theory entrance is based on impartial exams. In reality class background seems to be more important than prior academic records. Apparently the upper class knows the little tricks (right schools, right classes, right prep-course, etc. ) to take.
Well, he was temporary CEO for 6 months But yes – I do.
I hear Jobs was passionate about a lot of things but I never hear him speak about manufacturing. I am not sure he cared about so he may have delegated it without much though.
Now Cook – that a different story. Logistics and outsourcing manufacturing are his strong suits. Since he is very good I would suspect he has a strong opinion. Since he had Jobs confidence – as evidenced by his temporary CEO stint – I assume he could influence Jobs on this.
Where do you draw the line between artist and their assistance? Ask 5 designers to come up with something and you will get 6 proposals.
O.K., let’s say that Jobs had no vision and it was all the designers. Under Jobs had a specific style – expensive high end closed products with a high level of finish. You wanted a cheap knock off? Nope. You wanted a big external color monitor for you Macintosh? Had to wait 10 years for that. Was Apple the first to come out with a new product – rarely? But when they did it was polished and stable.
I can think of few other companies that maintained a specific high level of style for a long period of time. So, if the designers did all of the work, who hired and set the tone for all of them?
But I think he was involved. I think he knew how he wanted computers to work – and then give machining orders to the designers. I have heard that he delayed products because they did not meet his standards. The market wanted floppy drives but he tore them out because it did not meet Apple ‘s (his? The designers?) Forbid ports to hook up a big color monitor because it was not needed?
Sigh – I am not a fan boy and you can guess at one of my grips. However I will acknowledge that Jobs has a specific vision of how the future should look and stamped that vision into the culture of Apple.
I believe most of the outsourcing was done by Tim Cook, then head of production and now CEO.
But I think you kind of nailed it on the head inadvertently. Jobs strengths were about design and vision. Making sure the small things work and making sure all things fit together. Most CEOs claim to do this but few do.
I had a co-worker who got a year’s worth of severance after only working for 2 weeks.
As soon as he was hired the company sold his division to another company and the company offered a blanket severance package to everybody who would stay for the 9 months to close. His supervisor looked at him, looked at the 6 month training schedule, and everybody decided there were more profitable things to do.
If you are being fired for cause – that is you are no good at your job – the boss tends to sit down with you to remediate the problem – expectations and deadlines are set. So the sacking is usually not a surprise. Only gross / dangerous actions get you kicked out the door ASAP.
If you are being fired without cause – such as a company reorg – then yes, I have seen people escorted to the door – but almost always with a severance package of greater than 2 weeks.
I am so confused. In 1972 (that is as far back that I can easily go) it was 300 Yen to the dollar, before any large currency flows out of Japan. In 1980 is was 200. Today 125. Where is 800 coming from?
Also, the difference in real interest rates and purchasing parity explains most the change – not monetary policy.
Let me point out 2 examples of where you are wrong.
First, you are assuming that the products are being generated inside the economy. If you are borrowing money from China to buy Chinese goods this is no longer true.
Second, you need to learn a little about pension accounting. If I am working today but I am going to retire in a few years you have a huge liability to pay form my pension and medical costs. While no formal bond has been issued governments, it carries a similar or higher obligation. In this case you really are sending money back in time. (In the past, when countries have been faced with paying foreign creditors or defaulting on pension obligations they tend to shaft the foreigners.) Now, I don’t know how Europe includes this in the “official national debt” but the numbers are out there. (The US does not, which makes me sad.)
I think the summary is a bit skewed. Yes, Mr. Dell will be getting a 2b loan from Microsoft – which in the entire buy out thing is not a big deal. It’s a loan, so no equity, so no control. And it is not even the largest loan.
Well, for 2 reasons – and the reasons apply to all space guns – including mass drivers and Slingatron.
I am not a physicist, but I have been told that the orbital path for any projectile fired from a space gun will pass though earth – which is a fail. So you still need rockets in space to get to a viable orbit, and rockets are fragile things.
The applied engineering is thin on the ground and the upfront costs are massive. There is a large gap between theatrically possible verse practical applications.
I am not sure if the Slingatron is less complex then a mass driver. You do point out some good issues – but it has the virtue of being smaller and less expensive to build. There are a lot of unknown unknowns which would be easier to correct in something like this.
That is a fair question and trying to figure out if a stock is undervalued / overvalued is subjective. However, when the bond was issued Apple’s stock was higher – now it lower - so the general consensus of the stock market has spoken – Apple’s stock was overvalued.
Specifically, if Apple’s had bought stock at $600 that is now worth $425 – that would have been a bad move for Apple’s shareholders. Now, we do have the benefit of hindsight which is kind of cheating, but still – by definition it was overvalued.
And as a aside, you need to dig into the P/E ratios a bit. When the bond was issued it was closer to 13 or 15. Also when you are comparing 2 different companies – or a company to a index – you need to consider leverage. The higher the leverage the lower the P/E ratio should be. Apple’s cash balance was anti-leverage pushing up its P/E ratio higher.
Why the hate for iBonds? Is it a general dislike of debt or is there something specific?
Apple did need to return cash to its shareholders. Apple was basically borrowed at the bottom of the market for next to nothing. If inflation gets back to something normally then less than nothing. (as an aside, Apple should not have done a stock buyback – it’s stock was overvalued.)
No – but elitist do expect that freshmen have glittering high school prep backgrounds – they expect formal training in math, English, etc.
I know a lot of smart people who come from unconventional backgrounds and lacked a decent high school education. Bad family life, bad high school. Good family but liked weed too much. Whatever. Then something clicks in their 20s or 30s and they hit their stride.
So no, for somebody starting their education I would not expect them to know algebra. Now, coming out of college – different story.
It depends by what you mean by college and how elitist you are.
A good chunk of what universities do is to retrain middle age students for a new career. Think 30ish year old trying to become a nurse and has not had to touch a math textbook for 15 years. Capable students but they need this as their first step.
Because a remedial math class is NOT designed to filter people out.
And since the College is shutting it down I would speculate that it was because of poor course design, not because of the students. (For the classes described I am assuming they are not getting the best and brightest and were expecting a low pass rate, but maybe something higher than 20 to 44 - and no – I have not RTFA)
Classic correlation does not equal causation. From what I have read, there were 2 major factors. Technology / Internet and Tax Policy / Increase of the Financial sector (and its assets) – f these 2 things have had huge effects on our economy and both really started in the 80s..
Now, how much credit do we want to give Reagan? He had help from Democrats every step of the way. Clinton also pushed through legislation that was the same order of magnitude (but maybe not the same level of effect).
Read the link – It’s a 2008 article which asserts higher profits but does not bother to cite numbers or sources. If that is not hype.
I prefer audited finical statements myself and the past has been bleak. Can you count the number of record labels that have bankrupt in the past 10 years? It is the end of the day for me so I am going to be lazy – here is wiki with sources and numbers. Revenue is down by 20% in the last 8 years. Now wonderful. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_industry#Total_revenue_by_year
Is the current trend bad for big artists? Possibly - people are no longer forced to buy 10 crap songs to get the 1 good song.
Like I said, technology in this case is favoring the consumers and I am for that. As for the artist, I can count 9 bad things.
Is the current trend bad for new artists? Can't see how it could be.
. Let’s see – The internet is making music distribution more efficient for both consumers so revenue is declining. Good for society – no longer have to by 9 crap songs – bad for artist – les revenue. Such is progress. But wait – maybe technology can save the day by increasing the margins of the artists? Yes, that is happening – but as of today slower than the fall of revenue.
Being able to publish around the world is good for producers – but that is not my point.
As a consumer I can now spend less on music and get more enjoyment because I can fine tune my purchases – people buy tracks not albums. People use streaming music services instead of normal radio.
Because of this there is less revenue – people are spending less on music. Technology and the Internet have lowered costs but not as fast as the falling revenue. So what if smaller acts get more exposure because of the Internet? For the small, struggling artist its cold comfort that their income is falling at a slower rate than the major acts.
And I am not trying to say Spotify and their ilk are evil. When progress happens there are winners and losers and, sadly, right now, progress is not being kind to artists.
I would like to see your numbers – this is not the impression that I have. Revenues have been dropping for the past 20 years for all sources except live performances.
I keep reading about media companies spinning out their music divisions, the independent music divisions declaring bankruptcy, being acquired by another record company – that goes bankrupt. Then it gets acquired by a private equity firm which fires everybody and just lives off the music catalog. (which is a good way to make money but does not produce any new music.)
Now, if you want to talk about corporations in general verse specifically record labels – well yes – but that is a different story.
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Ok – but what is your point? He is mine.
Education is not free, and a good education is expensive. What is the right level and best way to allocate these resources? What is the best system for a bright child from a non-privileged family? A bureaucratic approach to select individuals? Subsidized education for some via State colleges? Or subsidized loans?
Between say 1950 to 2000 the answer was clear – America system of state colleges and subsidized loans worked better then Europe’s free colleges. Lower collation to class, higher collation to high school education.
Now, I am not saying our system is perfect. Class correlation is increasing which I find disturbing. But I do think it is better in principal.
I think the median tax rate (income, VAT, etc.) in Sweden is closer to 50%, which is not to say the mode is not 30%
And while schools are free in Sweden I suspect that there is a cost. Free goods are often rationed.
In France (a countries that I know better than Sweden) the free liberal arts colleges are divided into 2 categories, elite institutions and everything else. The elite schools can hold their own against the world. The other colleges? Less money is spent on a college student then a high school student. And because it is free and failure to pass classes can get one to be kicked out, too many student pile into the humanities and social sciences and too few in the harder subjects.
But at least it is free so everybody has got a short? Right? Maybe not. In theory entrance is based on impartial exams. In reality class background seems to be more important than prior academic records. Apparently the upper class knows the little tricks (right schools, right classes, right prep-course, etc. ) to take.
Well, he was temporary CEO for 6 months But yes – I do.
I hear Jobs was passionate about a lot of things but I never hear him speak about manufacturing. I am not sure he cared about so he may have delegated it without much though.
Now Cook – that a different story. Logistics and outsourcing manufacturing are his strong suits. Since he is very good I would suspect he has a strong opinion. Since he had Jobs confidence – as evidenced by his temporary CEO stint – I assume he could influence Jobs on this.
Where do you draw the line between artist and their assistance? Ask 5 designers to come up with something and you will get 6 proposals.
O.K., let’s say that Jobs had no vision and it was all the designers. Under Jobs had a specific style – expensive high end closed products with a high level of finish. You wanted a cheap knock off? Nope. You wanted a big external color monitor for you Macintosh? Had to wait 10 years for that. Was Apple the first to come out with a new product – rarely? But when they did it was polished and stable.
I can think of few other companies that maintained a specific high level of style for a long period of time. So, if the designers did all of the work, who hired and set the tone for all of them?
But I think he was involved. I think he knew how he wanted computers to work – and then give machining orders to the designers. I have heard that he delayed products because they did not meet his standards. The market wanted floppy drives but he tore them out because it did not meet Apple ‘s (his? The designers?) Forbid ports to hook up a big color monitor because it was not needed?
Sigh – I am not a fan boy and you can guess at one of my grips. However I will acknowledge that Jobs has a specific vision of how the future should look and stamped that vision into the culture of Apple.
I believe most of the outsourcing was done by Tim Cook, then head of production and now CEO.
But I think you kind of nailed it on the head inadvertently. Jobs strengths were about design and vision. Making sure the small things work and making sure all things fit together. Most CEOs claim to do this but few do.
As they say, always give the devil his due.
I work with a lot of sensitive and propriety information, so it works slightly differently. One of two things happen when I give 2 weeks’ notice.
If there are key man dependences then I stay for 2 weeks are train my replacement.
If there are no key man dependences then I am escorted off the premise with a check for 2 weeks.
Which, overall, I think is a fair and correct way to handle things.
Where is "Over here"? - I want to know.
There is a big difference between verification and references.
Verification is just facts – Did person X work at Y for Z period. You can’t be sued for liable for stating facts.
References – the subjective evaluation of a person’s work – that is a whole different ball of wax.
I had a co-worker who got a year’s worth of severance after only working for 2 weeks.
As soon as he was hired the company sold his division to another company and the company offered a blanket severance package to everybody who would stay for the 9 months to close. His supervisor looked at him, looked at the 6 month training schedule, and everybody decided there were more profitable things to do.
Almost always.
If you are being fired for cause – that is you are no good at your job – the boss tends to sit down with you to remediate the problem – expectations and deadlines are set. So the sacking is usually not a surprise. Only gross / dangerous actions get you kicked out the door ASAP.
If you are being fired without cause – such as a company reorg – then yes, I have seen people escorted to the door – but almost always with a severance package of greater than 2 weeks.
I am so confused. In 1972 (that is as far back that I can easily go) it was 300 Yen to the dollar, before any large currency flows out of Japan. In 1980 is was 200. Today 125. Where is 800 coming from?
Also, the difference in real interest rates and purchasing parity explains most the change – not monetary policy.
Let me point out 2 examples of where you are wrong.
First, you are assuming that the products are being generated inside the economy. If you are borrowing money from China to buy Chinese goods this is no longer true.
Second, you need to learn a little about pension accounting. If I am working today but I am going to retire in a few years you have a huge liability to pay form my pension and medical costs. While no formal bond has been issued governments, it carries a similar or higher obligation. In this case you really are sending money back in time. (In the past, when countries have been faced with paying foreign creditors or defaulting on pension obligations they tend to shaft the foreigners.) Now, I don’t know how Europe includes this in the “official national debt” but the numbers are out there. (The US does not, which makes me sad.)
I would agree and be a bit more general.
Before he became the showrunner, I loved every episode that he wrote – and most things he did.
Since he became showrunner, there has only been 2 or 3 epsiode that I felt were great.
I think the summary is a bit skewed. Yes, Mr. Dell will be getting a 2b loan from Microsoft – which in the entire buy out thing is not a big deal. It’s a loan, so no equity, so no control. And it is not even the largest loan.
You might want to double check your numbers. Yahoo says it has 10,746,000,000 in cash. Yahoo reports in thousands of dolllars.
Which is 10% of Intel's market cap. Nothing to sneeze at, but still
Well, for 2 reasons – and the reasons apply to all space guns – including mass drivers and Slingatron.
I am not a physicist, but I have been told that the orbital path for any projectile fired from a space gun will pass though earth – which is a fail. So you still need rockets in space to get to a viable orbit, and rockets are fragile things.
The applied engineering is thin on the ground and the upfront costs are massive. There is a large gap between theatrically possible verse practical applications.
I am not sure if the Slingatron is less complex then a mass driver. You do point out some good issues – but it has the virtue of being smaller and less expensive to build. There are a lot of unknown unknowns which would be easier to correct in something like this.
That is a fair question and trying to figure out if a stock is undervalued / overvalued is subjective. However, when the bond was issued Apple’s stock was higher – now it lower - so the general consensus of the stock market has spoken – Apple’s stock was overvalued.
Specifically, if Apple’s had bought stock at $600 that is now worth $425 – that would have been a bad move for Apple’s shareholders. Now, we do have the benefit of hindsight which is kind of cheating, but still – by definition it was overvalued.
And as a aside, you need to dig into the P/E ratios a bit. When the bond was issued it was closer to 13 or 15. Also when you are comparing 2 different companies – or a company to a index – you need to consider leverage. The higher the leverage the lower the P/E ratio should be. Apple’s cash balance was anti-leverage pushing up its P/E ratio higher.
Why the hate for iBonds? Is it a general dislike of debt or is there something specific?
Apple did need to return cash to its shareholders. Apple was basically borrowed at the bottom of the market for next to nothing. If inflation gets back to something normally then less than nothing. (as an aside, Apple should not have done a stock buyback – it’s stock was overvalued.)
No – but elitist do expect that freshmen have glittering high school prep backgrounds – they expect formal training in math, English, etc.
I know a lot of smart people who come from unconventional backgrounds and lacked a decent high school education. Bad family life, bad high school. Good family but liked weed too much. Whatever. Then something clicks in their 20s or 30s and they hit their stride.
So no, for somebody starting their education I would not expect them to know algebra. Now, coming out of college – different story.
It depends by what you mean by college and how elitist you are.
A good chunk of what universities do is to retrain middle age students for a new career. Think 30ish year old trying to become a nurse and has not had to touch a math textbook for 15 years. Capable students but they need this as their first step.
Because a remedial math class is NOT designed to filter people out.
And since the College is shutting it down I would speculate that it was because of poor course design, not because of the students. (For the classes described I am assuming they are not getting the best and brightest and were expecting a low pass rate, but maybe something higher than 20 to 44 - and no – I have not RTFA)
Classic correlation does not equal causation. From what I have read, there were 2 major factors. Technology / Internet and Tax Policy / Increase of the Financial sector (and its assets) – f these 2 things have had huge effects on our economy and both really started in the 80s..
Now, how much credit do we want to give Reagan? He had help from Democrats every step of the way. Clinton also pushed through legislation that was the same order of magnitude (but maybe not the same level of effect).
Read the link – It’s a 2008 article which asserts higher profits but does not bother to cite numbers or sources. If that is not hype.
I prefer audited finical statements myself and the past has been bleak. Can you count the number of record labels that have bankrupt in the past 10 years? It is the end of the day for me so I am going to be lazy – here is wiki with sources and numbers. Revenue is down by 20% in the last 8 years. Now wonderful.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_industry#Total_revenue_by_year
Is the current trend bad for big artists? Possibly - people are no longer forced to buy 10 crap songs to get the 1 good song.
Like I said, technology in this case is favoring the consumers and I am for that. As for the artist, I can count 9 bad things.
Is the current trend bad for new artists? Can't see how it could be.
.
Let’s see – The internet is making music distribution more efficient for both consumers so revenue is declining. Good for society – no longer have to by 9 crap songs – bad for artist – les revenue. Such is progress. But wait – maybe technology can save the day by increasing the margins of the artists? Yes, that is happening – but as of today slower than the fall of revenue.
Being able to publish around the world is good for producers – but that is not my point.
As a consumer I can now spend less on music and get more enjoyment because I can fine tune my purchases – people buy tracks not albums. People use streaming music services instead of normal radio.
Because of this there is less revenue – people are spending less on music. Technology and the Internet have lowered costs but not as fast as the falling revenue. So what if smaller acts get more exposure because of the Internet? For the small, struggling artist its cold comfort that their income is falling at a slower rate than the major acts.
And I am not trying to say Spotify and their ilk are evil. When progress happens there are winners and losers and, sadly, right now, progress is not being kind to artists.
I would like to see your numbers – this is not the impression that I have. Revenues have been dropping for the past 20 years for all sources except live performances.
I keep reading about media companies spinning out their music divisions, the independent music divisions declaring bankruptcy, being acquired by another record company – that goes bankrupt. Then it gets acquired by a private equity firm which fires everybody and just lives off the music catalog. (which is a good way to make money but does not produce any new music.)
Now, if you want to talk about corporations in general verse specifically record labels – well yes – but that is a different story.