JimO

I thank you for responding and I admire your provision of data to back up your perspective, but I still stand by all of my statements. -3.2% longterm growth is absolutely fantastic; there is conditional convergence of economic growth rates for the rich world, 3.2% is actually a little above the long term trend, so by that number we have done even better than I was thinking when I responded earlier. -The pessimistic bias is well documented in behavioral psychology, and is probably one reason everyone seems to think the sky is falling yet in almost every measurable way the world is improving. -The statement that luxury goods alone float the economy is vapid in my interpretation of the world as an economist. Even if it were true (which I doubt), it would be a good indication that most markets for older, non-luxury products had reached competitive equilibria and that growth was occurring in newer luxury markets were economic profits still exist due to low levels of competition. This would be a proxy for just how wealthy the country has become. We no longer see growth in necessity markets, instead luxury goods become a larger part of the economy because we can afford more of them. -Poverty can be whatever we want it to be depending on how poverty is defined. Poverty is continually redefined upwards in the US and many other places. What is undeniable is that nearly everyone in the United States is better off today than they were 20 years ago, and is a better off by an order of magnitude compared to 50 or 100 years ago. -Your quip about the geographical ignorance of the average person was not my point on the issue, but I apologize because I was vague. For instance, say we had laws that allowed companies to collect any piece of information on a person they could get their hands on, then we would see greater product specialization, more perfect price discrimination, and a reduction in dead weight loss in the economy. -I think its sad some people have very limited geographic knowledge, but I don't see how anyone could even interpret what I said as a claim that a stronger surveillance state would improve the ability of people to name places on a map. -I am familiar with the UK experiment with the surveillance society (and even the website you link to) as I have conducted research on crime deterrence. I think you make too strong of a claim that surveillance has no effect on crime. In many of the large studies this is the apparent result, but at the same time often these studies look at broad correlations across time and lack the statistical rigor to separate actual crime deterrence from cameras from larger crime fluctuations. There have been some micro level studies that show deterrence effect from various forms of surveillance (do you not believe that bank security cameras discourage bank robberies?) -Even if you are 100% correct about the effectiveness of cameras to prevent crime at this point, this does not mean that surveillance could never have a positive impact on safety. Imagine a world where everyone has a non-removable tracking chip implanted in them, so their movements and actions could be tracked should they be accused of committing a crime. I think this level of surveillance would clearly have a large crime deterrence effect (just to clarify, I don't support this idea, I am stressing that surveillance lowers the probably of successfully committing crime, and that rational people would then commit less crime because it is less profitable to be a criminal). Other methods of lowering the probability of successful crime (Lojack for instance) have been shown to be extremely effective in reducing crime. Is Lojack not a form of surveillance? -So I still stand by my statement that privacy and security/lawfulness are goods that are traded off against each other.

Mr. Glamazon: "ever stagnating economy?" Economic growth in the western world for the past two hundred years has been rigorous with very few interruptions. There has been a massive explosion in world and US wealth; aside from a few years in hundreds, every other year has from a wealth and output standpoint been better than previous years. Many signs point to increasing rates of economic growth in the future as technology continues to push marginal costs down towards zero and firms use data mining to better price discriminate, eliminating dead weight losses in the economy. You either have poor knowledge of the actual performance of the US economy over time or you suffer from a severe case of pessimistic bias, either way your claim is not correct. I also take a little issue with labeling privacy as vital. Privacy is one good that people undeniably enjoy, but it is certainly possible to live (physically at least) without it. Much of the negative reaction to decreases in privacy seems to me to stem from status quo bias. We are told privacy is good, so when it is lessened, we feel psychological pain. If we were not brought up to cherish privacy, losing privacy would not cause as much anguish. The actual effects of less or more privacy on outcome variables (like longevity, safety, quality of life, etc) may be identical in both cases, but the emotional reaction is wildly different. In a broader sense, I think privacy is a good that is often traded off against other goods, such as greater security, more wealth, greater levels of statistical knowledge concerning the world, or more opportunities. The optimal level of privacy is certainly not 100% privacy and 0% surveillance, just as the optimal level of pollution is not 0%. I am not making a defense of the police or surveillance state (I personally have no great love for these arrangements) but I think most of the dislike of privacy reductions is an irrational emotional response and not founded on expected decreases in objective outcomes.

Hey great CJ, I appreciate the realism and detail you have incorporated into your work here.

Some thoughts on the issue from an economist: China is communist in name only; the government is totalitarian but increasingly less so. Actual communism, ie state planning of the economy, has failed everywhere it has been implemented, and the Party members are fully aware of that. As an interesting side note: if you look at the human rights violations perpetrated under socialism or communism (55-100+ million dead, depending on estimate), its fair to say that it makes the Nazis look like Nobel Peace Prize winners. Environmental concerns will fade as China grows more wealthly, because enviromental quality is a good, and when wealth is greater people are able to consume more enviromental goods along with other goods. China is not over populated, in fact, like Japan, China may face a demographic crunch in a few decades and may need many new workers to help pay for an aging society. Overpopulation as a concern is continually bantered about by environmentalists but there is no evidence that there are actually too many humans on the planet. Increased demand for resources encourages the development of technology, conservation, and additional discovery of resouces. Biological models of carrying capacity omit the ability of humans to stretch their resources beyond previous expectations. In other words, population takes care of itself as long as the proper institutions exist (rule of law, private propety, free markets). An example: at the turn of the century there were many serious scientific claims that the world supply of hydrocarbons would be exhausted by 1950. Now it appears that every time an oil company conducts an exploratory mission, more, albeit more expensive to extract, oil is discovered. Humans are generally intelligent, and I fully expect them to solve demographic and environmental problems when they need to be solved. That time is not necessarily now. While China's GDP growth rate is encouragingly high, note that China is just beginning to approach the level of input to world commerce it had hundreds of years ago. That is, China used to be far more important to the world economic system hundreds of years ago, it languished badly, and is just now regaining the percentage of world commerce it was responsible for. Also note, that with the sad exception of Africa, that growth tends to revert to the mean. Thus China will grow quickly and become wealthier, then will grow slower and its growth rate will approach those of Western democracies. All signs point to China growing nicely in the future; its economic transformation has already pulled hundreds of millions of people out of poverty. Interestingly, the largest threat to the world economy is some sort of destabilizing event in China, althought experts and future markets don't arrive at consensus concerning exactly what would destabilize China. Many see China and the US as possible combatants, but I see two economies well connected. War would be very bad for either; it is really in no one's interest to fight when you could trade instead. And finally, a bit of monetary economics. The yuan needs to rise, but the US Congress is really foolish to apply direct pressure. Yes the yuan is deliberately undervalued, but it is not a massive problem in the short run (in my mind, it is a scapegoat of sorts and a diversion from the US's looming fiscal probems named Medicare, Medicade, and Social Security). I prefer a hands-off approach and a soft landing for the dollar, not some all-knowing Congressional committee that amazingly believes it knows the correct exchange rate.

Thanks but I know, and have porkie's library. I was referring to the large, squarish building in the very first photo of the cj, with a square housing block around it. It looks to be mid to high-rise. Also looking forward to any bats you may produce, as your city is quite impressive.

I love your cj; very realistic looking. What is the large, pinkish building in the very first photo back on page one?