No Trans Fats Mean We Eat More Calories?

John Tierney has found that, despite increased attention to nutrition, Americans are still over eating partly due to what he calls the "health halo." He and a colleague conducted an experiment where people were shown a picture of a meal (Applebee's Oriental Chicken Salad and a 20 ounce Pepsi if you're curious) and asked to estimate the calories. On average, the number of calories were overestimated. Another group of people were shown the same meal and two crackers labeled "Trans Fat Free." This meal had more calories than the original meal, but this group underestimated the calories in this meal due to the "Trans Fat Free" label.

So in effect, Americans are fooled into thinking anything that has "Fat Free" on it is healthier and therefore consume more calories! It is the classic case of "Coke Classic has too many calories; I'll have a Diet Coke. Oh yeah, and a brownie!"

Unintended Consequences

The owners of buildings that have been tagged by New York City's Landmarks Preservation Commission are either altering or demolishing buildings before they can be classified as a landmark. Read the story here.

I'm not going to take the time to dig through the fine print of New York City's Landmark Preservation Commission, but if it is like other such commissions and boards around the country, once a piece of property has been designated as historical, the owner is prevented from using the property in any way not approved by the commission. A very strong case can be made that this is a taking.

The commission would be better off buying the property from the owner and preserving the desired building itself. But then that would get in the way of a free lunch.

NIMBY: Big Box Edition

No Big Box on Issaqueena!

Some South Carolina residents don't want a Lowe's in a certain part of town. Two observations:

1. If people want it, it will come and it has to go somewhere.
2. If the developer is getting special treatment, you've got an argument. Fight that.

Who Says Economists Don't Have a Sense of Humor

From George Stigler's famous The Theory of Price, Third Edition.

Again, those enterprises requiring very close coordination of skills of men are seldom large scale: no novel can be written by more than two persons (and of these at most one can be a woman), no orchestra can have 300 members and still be called symphonic.

Two of my female colleagues didn't find this as funny as I did.

Voting Schmoting

An excellent video starring economist Gordon Tullock explaining why he doesn't vote. It is also an outstanding 5 minute, cute introduction to economic analysis.

Election Day

"Freedom is not measured by the ability to vote. It is measured by the breadth of those things on which we do not vote."

John Wenders

I'm Thankful...

That the most vile time of American life is about to end; for a while. There are only 7 left in the national pissing contest we Americans call a Presidential election. Thankfully the 2010 election cycle doesn't begin until February 2009, so we have a few months off! Every day seems to bring some piece of news about the race that is absolutely sickening. (Just go to Drudge Report at any random time and look around.) What confuses me to no end is that people for some reason expect the process to be civil and polite. Politics is a blood sport. It is a zero sum game where to the victor go the spoils and the loser is left in the cold. Given those conditions, why politics should be anything more than a dog fight (insert your own Michael Vick joke here) is beyond me.

As for who wins, I could care less. I will not be voting and may never vote again. I fully second Don Boudreaux's reasons for not voting. To them I would add my own ignorance. Every time I learn something, I realize how much I don't know, and this semester has convinced that there is a lot I don't know! Whenever most topics are being discussed I remind myself that unless I know enough to make an informed and thorough analysis of the topic, I tread lightly with my comments lest I increase the world's supply of nonsense via my ignorance. I take the same approach to voting. Given how little I know about practically every topic on the public agenda, how can I make an informed decision about a candidate who doesn't understand very much about any given topic either?

(By the way, I don't care what Obama, McCain, Biden, Palin or any other candidate for any office says, given the grand totality of human knowledge, not to mention the things we don't know yet, the candidates, just like me, know practically NOTHING!)

In addition, I'm convinced that many people shouldn't vote (pick a college student at random) and I like to lead by example.

The one reform that might get me to vote again is a "None of the Above" option for each and every political race. It would be great fun to see "None of the Above" get more votes than any candidate. The candidate with the highest number of votes would still win the office, but I can't help but think they would tread a little lighter once in office given that "no one" got more votes than they did.