[PEN-L:8155] Re: Request: Summers Memo
Ah, Jim ... bard of ages ... what luscious lustrous voluptuous vituperative vitriolic poetry! I'm off to get this one framed! You waxed thus: >I wanted it as it so >elegantly and succinctly sums up the essence, ugly nature behind the mask, >twisted logic--reducio ad absurdum/nauseum, disgusting sycophancy, sick >values, racism, imperialism and krypto-fascism inherent in the "logic", >paradigm and "calculus" of the Strangelovian pukes among the neoclassicals, >"neo-liberal globalists" and academic whores who work and theory/policy pimp >for the DemReps or RepDems.
[PEN-L:8158] California Green Party Assembly Representive requests help
Audie Bock, the new Green Assembly representative from Cal. has a question for us. She asked, about transit issues. She quotes: "I have the impression that mass transit and highway planning are treated as two separate and distinct issues. I believe that when planning our highways in California we could incorporate mass transit. What is the economic feasibility of providing genuine mass transit throughout California? Should we, as legislators view these items as interrelated from an economic standpoint?" -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
[PEN-L:8160] Re: U New Mex Econ query
Bill Waller the 'radical institutionalist' from Hobart and William Smith College, received his PhD from there, so he might know. His e-mail is: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Robert Naiman wrote: > Does anyone know if there are any progressive faculty in the Econ department at the >University of New Mexico? > > --- > Robert Naiman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Preamble Center > 1737 21st NW > Washington, DC 20009 > phone: 202-265-3263 > fax: 202-265-3647 > http://www.preamble.org/ > ---
[PEN-L:8161] Re: California Green Party Assembly Representiverequests help
Michael Perelman wrote: >Audie Bock, the new Green Assembly representative from Cal. has a >question for us. She asked, about transit issues. She quotes: "I have >the impression that mass transit and highway planning are treated as two >separate and distinct issues. I believe that when planning our highways >in California we could incorporate mass transit. What is the economic >feasibility of providing genuine mass transit throughout California? >Should we, as legislators view these items as interrelated from an >economic standpoint?" Isn't there like zero popular support for mass transit in California? How can you push a policy, however humane and rational, that no one wants? Doug
[PEN-L:8163] Re: Re: California Green Party AssemblyRepresentive requests help
Michael Perelman wrote: >>Audie Bock, the new Green Assembly representative from Cal. has a question for us. She asked, about transit issues. She quotes: "I have the impression that mass transit and highway planning are treated as two separate and distinct issues. I believe that when planning our highways in California we could incorporate mass transit. What is the economic feasibility of providing genuine mass transit throughout California? Should we, as legislators view these items as interrelated from an economic standpoint?"<< Brad writes: >How willing is she to promote the tear-down of blocks of bungalows in Berkeley and their replacement with five-story apartment buildings, or to promote the tear-down of large houses in Palo Alto and their replacement with townhouses? Mass transit seems to require much higher densities than we have at present in California--even largely-urban California, outside of a very few regions. And the currently chi-chi forms of mass transit--light rail a la BART--appear, as best I can judge, to suck down huge amounts of money that could be better spent on more busses and bus lanes.< This is a valid point. When Bock writes of "genuine mass transit throughout California" it seems to imply inter-urban train lines (along with other forms of mass transportation). If train lines are to be built for mass transit purposes (as opposed to shipping suckers to Vegas), it makes sense only where the population is _already_ very concentrated, as where they already built BART and the SF trolley system. So inter-urban lines don't seem relevant to the current agenda. The exception seems to be programs like MetroLink, which use existing Amtrac tracks to move exurbanites to work in the central city. (There is the building of some kind of inter-urban bullet train linking major California cities in the works. If it can't be scuttled, it _should_ be coordinated with the highway program. It should be built in the median strips of existing freeways and using existing railroad right-of-way.) But the quotation from Bock _also_ includes the possibility of _intra_urban bus lines and bus lanes. These make a lot of sense in a place like Los Angeles (where I live) which is spread out like crazy. In fact, it makes much more sense than the subway system that they started building here, which was gold-plated and thus extremely expensive, among other things having new tubes dug through areas having dangerous natural gas deposits. This subway was so costly that it drained funds from the existing bus system, lowering the quality of its service (especially for the working-class and "minority" communities) and spawning the Los Angeles Bus Riders' Union. (cf. http://www.igc.org/lctr/ -- Bock should consult these folks.) (San Jose seems to have built an effective light-rail system, but repeating that success seems impossible in LA.) As far as I am concerned, the building of bus lanes and investment in busses is the way to go. Every freeway should have a bus lane, not just a laughable car-pool lane. The stinky old diesel busses should be replaced by the cleaner (propane-burning) ones that are also much more accessable to the halt and the lame (as in Santa Monica and Culver City). As for "planning our highways in California," we shouldn't be building new highways in California unless they're absolutely necessary: the planning should be restricted to adding bus lanes to all of the existing urban freeways. Freeways take up too much space, encourage pollution, and they fill up with new traffic as soon as they're built. Because the rich folks have more clout, the highways destroy poor, working-class, and minority neighborhoods. (Gee, I wonder why they didn't continue the 2 Freeway through Beverly Hills.) They destroy a lot of the housing that Brad worries about. In fact, in LA, new freeways are currently completely off the agenda, simply because there's no room for them and their cost has sky-rocketed. (Our last freeway, the Century Freeway, also seems to have been built on a shaky foundation, despite the large amount of money that went into it. The very expensive project to add a second level to the 110 freeway has created one of the most concentrated strips of ugliness I've seen, in addition to disrupting traffic for years.) BTW, Brad, as the freeways become less and less free to traffic, the cities of California are slowly becoming more and more dense. Commuting by car is becoming more and more expensive in terms of time and aggravation. I see rising demand for bus service and eventually train service in the future. Doug writes: >Isn't there like zero popular support for mass transit in California? How can you push a policy, however humane and rational, that no one wants?< This assumes that we're all suburbanites and, more importantly, that all mass transit is by rail. I'd say that there's a lot of public support for busses in the urban areas. For some reason, there's a romantic attachment to trains (and
[PEN-L:8165] Re: information revolution?
Jim Devine wrote: >from SLATE magazine's "today's papers" round-up (by Scott Shuger): > >USA TODAY >leads with a Commerce Dept. study coming out today concluding >that digital business companies are driving the nation's economic growth. >The study states that computer and communication hardware, software, and >services, although only accounting for 8 percent of the U.S. economy, have >contributed more than a third of its growth since 1995. This sector, says >the study, is, thanks to its rising quality and falling prices, controlling >inflation too.< > >Lawrence Summers [or his ghostwriter] minimizes this stuff in the passage >exerpted by Doug. But it's been several years, so maybe the "inforev" is >kicking in? Are they using "real" growth here? Given the big drop in hardware prices, small nominal growth can turn into giant real growth when deflated (or, in this case, inflated). Doug
[PEN-L:8168] RE: Re: Request: Summers Memo
-Original Message- From: Rob Schaap [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Monday, June 21, 1999 8:32 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:8155] Re: Request: Summers Memo Ah, Jim ... bard of ages ... what luscious lustrous voluptuous vituperative vitriolic poetry! I'm off to get this one framed! You waxed thus: >I wanted it as it so >elegantly and succinctly sums up the essence, ugly nature behind the mask, >twisted logic--reducio ad absurdum/nauseum, disgusting sycophancy, sick >values, racism, imperialism and krypto-fascism inherent in the "logic", >paradigm and "calculus" of the Strangelovian pukes among the neoclassicals, >"neo-liberal globalists" and academic whores who work and theory/policy pimp >for the DemReps or RepDems. Hi Rob, Well for vitriolic "poetry" embodied in the "positivist and "free-of-'normative'-considerations calculus" of "rationality and optimality", I can't match: "I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest-wage country [or preferably Indian Reserve/Reservation] is impeccable and we should face up to that." I just loved the part about foregone earnings [opportunity costs] of people who die prematurely or fall ill from toxic wastes are less in low-wage than in high-wage countries and the poor have short lives anyway. or... Some countries, particularly "...in Africa are vastly under-polluted"...Consequently, the high air quality in these countries is "inefficiently low compared to Los Angeles or Mexico City." and... Because of their greater aesthetic sensitivity, rich people value clean air and water more than the poor. and... Therefore, by the logic of free-market economics, "human welfare" would be maximized by exporting the polluting industries and toxic wastes of rich countries [and regions] to poor countries [and regions]. This is basically from memory and I would appreciate someone publishing the whole memo. It is so timely especially with this Strangelovian toady and not-so-krypto racist, imperialist, fascist, and elitist up for Sec of Treasury. It is, shall we say, s neoclassical, neo-liberal and s revealing. I have a captured SS document on the costs/revenues and benefits--per prisoner--of genocide at Auschwitz (including uses of bones, ashes, hair, gold teeth etc) It is a neoclassical's wet dream--"This marginalist stuff really works" Jim C
[PEN-L:8169] RE: Re: Request: Summers Memo
Thanks to Doug H, Robert Naiman and Lisa and Ian Murray for sending materials. My class will thank you and benefit. BTW, I heard, but do not know, that for some time Summers did not deny having written that memo and then later claimed he did not write it but it was a memo of understanding to what was discussed and then the story changed again to "I didn't write it and had nothing to do with it and if I had had this discussion (If I had a dog), it was only speculative and/or intended as a little "dark humor." It then was left up to some entrepreneural journalist (seeking access for scoops for exposure for name recognition for more access for...) to write the new cover story. Thanks again. Any cites for the full memo? I can't find it at the Economist archive. Jim C -Original Message- From: Doug Henwood [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Monday, June 21, 1999 6:58 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:8152] Re: Request: Summers Memo Craven, Jim wrote: >I would appreciate it if anyone who has the original and infamous "Summers >Memo" at the World Bank would send it to me. Here's the relevant excerpt. The memo was actually written, according to John Cassidy in The New Yorker, by Lant Pritchett. Doug _Nuggets_ 3. _"Dirty" industries_ Just between you and me, shouldn't the World Bank be encouraging more migration of the dirty industries to the LDCs? I can think of three reasons: 1) The measurement of the costs of health impairing pollution depends on the foregone earnings from increased morbidity and mortality. From this point of view a given amount of health Impairing pollution should be done in the country with the lowest cost, which will be the country with the lowest wages. I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that. 2) The costs of pollution are likely to be non-linear as the initial Increments of pollution probably have very low cost. I've always thought that underpopulated countries in Africa are vastly _under_-polluted, their air quality is probably vastly inefficiently low compared to Los Angeles or Mexico City. Only the lamentable facts that so much pollution is generated by non-tradable industries (transport, electrical generation) and that the unit transport costs of solid waste are so high prevent world welfare enhancing trade in air pollution and waste. 3) The demand for a clean environment for aesthetic and health reasons Is likely to have very high income elasticity. The concern over an agent that causes a one in a million change In the adds of prostrate [sic] cancer is obviously going to be much higher in a country where people survive to got prostrate cancer than in a country where under 5 mortality is 200 per thousand. Also, much of the concern over industrial atmospheric discharge is about visibility impairing particulates. These discharges may have very little direct health impact. Clearly trade in goods that embody aesthetic pollution concerns could be welfare enhancing. While production is mobile the consumption of pretty air is a non-tradable. The problem with the arguments against all of these proposals for more pollution in LDCs (intrinsic rights to certain goods, moral reasons, social concerns, lack of adequate markets, etc.) could be turned around and used more or less effectively against every Bank proposal for liberalization.
[PEN-L:8170] Re: Re: information revolution?
Rod Hay wrote: >The real question of "Info Revolution" is not wheither it generates an >accelerated growth rate for a few years, but wheither it changes the >relations of production, or social relations. I think there is some evidence >in favour but that it is inconclusive. And certainly is something that can >only be judged in a longer time frame. I should stress that I don't see the InfoRev, if it is indeed happening, as an unmixed blessing. If it raises labor productivity, it could simply boost profits, causing a steep rise in the profit rate of the sort that hit the US in the 1920s, which made the economy ripe for a fall. (The 1920s were a period of a previous technical revolution, indicated by a "kink" in labor-productivity data in about 1919, with productivity growing faster afterwards, all the way into the 1960s.) Also, the change in social relations due to an InfoRev could easily be bad for workers, given the current weakness of labor and thus its inability to mold the rev. to serve its interest (at least in the US). Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:8171] Re: RE: Re: Request: Summers Memo
Craven, Jim wrote: >Well for vitriolic "poetry" embodied in the "positivist and >"free-of-'normative'-considerations calculus" of "rationality and >optimality", I can't match: > >"I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the >lowest-wage country [or preferably Indian Reserve/Reservation] is impeccable >and we should face up to that." The thing is that by the logic of neoclassical economics, Summers/Pritchett is absolutely right. It's an indictment of the discipline, not his/their personal evil. No one seems to have had the nerve to "face up to that." Doug
[PEN-L:8174] RE: Re: RE: Re: Request: Summers Memo
-Original Message- From: Doug Henwood [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 1999 10:14 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:8171] Re: RE: Re: Request: Summers Memo Craven, Jim wrote: >Well for vitriolic "poetry" embodied in the "positivist and >"free-of-'normative'-considerations calculus" of "rationality and >optimality", I can't match: > >"I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the >lowest-wage country [or preferably Indian Reserve/Reservation] is impeccable >and we should face up to that." The thing is that by the logic of neoclassical economics, Summers/Pritchett is absolutely right. It's an indictment of the discipline, not his/their personal evil. No one seems to have had the nerve to "face up to that." Doug Doug, That was precisely my point: the inexorable syllogism and reductionist logic" of the neoclassical/neo-liberal globalist/trickle-down paradigm. I would have to slightly and ever-so-respectfully disagree that it is not a reflection of their own personal evil in that, like Mein Kampf, many have been exposed to and trained in the neoclassical box (paradigm) and never bought it for a moment; we are responsible for the sides chosen and the consequences that inexorably flow from the logic and "mens rea" from any evils of the sides chosen--left or right. In any case, the only "equalizations" that will occur under the neo-liberal globalist and neoclassical "solutions" will be as Ross Perot put it: "That giant sucking sound." (Wealth/power sucked "upward", pollution/death/powerlessness trickling "downward"). The other giant sucking sound comes from some academic toadies, lined up and assuming the "Lewinsky position" as supplicants/applicants for their new positions as theory/policy/data pimps of the DemReps or RepDems. Jim C
[PEN-L:8176] RE: Re: RE: Re: Request: Summers Memo
-Original Message- From: Doug Henwood [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 1999 10:24 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:8173] Re: RE: Re: Request: Summers Memo Craven, Jim wrote: >BTW, I heard, but do not know, that for some time Summers did not deny >having written that memo and then later claimed he did not write it but it >was a memo of understanding to what was discussed and then the story changed >again to "I didn't write it and had nothing to do with it and if I had had >this discussion (If I had a dog), it was only speculative and/or intended as >a little "dark humor." It then was left up to some entrepreneural journalist >(seeking access for scoops for exposure for name recognition for more access >for...) to write the new cover story. According to Cassidy's article in The New Yorker, Pritchett was deeply grateful to Summers for taking the heat for the memo. Not that Summers has paid too dearly for it. The irony is that Pritchett has done some interesting work - e.g. a paper, "Divergence, Big Time," which argues that far from converging on common levels of prosperity, First and Third World countries are diverging, with the North-South gap widening, not narrowing, as predicted by theory. >Thanks again. Any cites for the full memo? I can't find it at the Economist >archive. I have a copy in a fading fax. It's pretty much unscannable, and I'm not about to type it in. Doug Thanks again Doug, hope all is OK at LBO. Jim
[PEN-L:8177] Re: Re: Re: California Green Party AssemblyRepresentiverequests help
At 11:50 AM 6/22/99 -0400, Henry Liu wrote: >of automobile configuration. Cars of course are air polluting. >Yet, the advantages of the highway/auto system are not insubstantial. It >serves effectively the spread-out existing urban patterns, albeit because the >pattern grew from it. >The car provides the driver with considerable freedom of movement and timing. >There is no need to wait for the next train which in off peak hours never >comes. The car is relatively more protective from urban crimes in empty >stations. It is imminently more comfortable than the best subway train. In >California, it is a common sight to see urban planners and economists who drive >their fancy cars to meetings to promote urban rail mass transit. >What is needed is a coordinate balance between peak hour concentration >transportation needs and non-peak freedom for each city according to its >historical conditions and special characteristics. >The cost efficiency issue is a red herring, at least on a national basis. Not so fast Henry! If there is a cost to an activity but nobody calculates it, does it still consitute a cost? You have been quite critical about Western mentality - yet your own writing displayes some of it worst characteristic - relativistic subjectivism. Your cost/benefit calculation takes into account only monetary costs (fees and subsidies) but ignores hidden costs. Suburban sprawl, which you mention as a disadvantage for "linear" rail transportation is a dirfect result autmobilie based transportation. Without individual autos sprawl would not be possible without substantially reducing mobility. Yet sprawl poses a tremendous social and political cost to a society - from the destruction of natural environment to social fragmentation and th eproblems it causes: anomia, crime and and th eloss of political control. Oh yes, suburbs wre cited by late 19th and 20th century social engineers and architects, such as Le Corbusier, as the "final solution" to the labor unrest problem. So the illusion of securty and comfort created by car is comprable to "protection" provided by gangsters - a protection from adverse results of their own existence. Somehow, in Europe people do need to lock themsleves in their car to "protect" themselves from "dangers" of public places - only in amerikkka. Anothe hidden cost is death toll. Car-based transportation is much more accident prone (by sheer law of probability) than rail-based transportation - but it is the people who pay the ultimate cost - it is them who die in accidents not the ratfucking urban planners. Add to it the animals killed on the roads - it would be very arrogant not to consider that factor. Finally the quality of life -it is very amerikkkan to consider isolation form other people car provide to be synonymous with freedom and comfort. I find it very depressing - i'd rather spend time in the company of people on a train. but hey, i was not born in this socially enginneered society (and proud of it) so i am not a big fan of privacy and security. FC - fuck cars (remember the unabomber) wojtek
[PEN-L:8179] Request for clarification - Ruling class economic theory
I would greatly appreciate it if someone could spend a few paragraphs to get me on the way to understanding what the current ruling class economic ideology is these days. I would hazard that Monetarism & supply side variants are relatively discredited, while on the other hand, one sees 'The Return of Keynes' in the press every now & then (but is this anything more than Japan's desperation and the idle hope of a few collaborationist labour leaders). Is there a governing theory or just micro-economics and finance regulation?
[PEN-L:8181] Re: Re: Re: information revolution?
I have a theory about the info-rev and the changing structure of firms. I won't go into the reasons (too long), but the main points are: 1. Firms exist primarily to internalize and utilize nonprice information. 2. Various administrative models have historically been used to carry out these functions. 3. Modern information technology has made it possible to assemble complex information in a distributed fashion. 4. Consequently firms are gravitating toward market models of internal structure. 5. This is having profound (and mostly negative) effects on workers--their pay, the jobs they do, the extent to which firms invest in them. It's a grand theory, with many elegant proofs but virtually no evidence. Peter Jim Devine wrote: > > Rod Hay wrote: > >The real question of "Info Revolution" is not wheither it generates an > >accelerated growth rate for a few years, but wheither it changes the > >relations of production, or social relations. I think there is some evidence > >in favour but that it is inconclusive. And certainly is something that can > >only be judged in a longer time frame. > > I should stress that I don't see the InfoRev, if it is indeed happening, as > an unmixed blessing. If it raises labor productivity, it could simply boost > profits, causing a steep rise in the profit rate of the sort that hit the > US in the 1920s, which made the economy ripe for a fall. (The 1920s were a > period of a previous technical revolution, indicated by a "kink" in > labor-productivity data in about 1919, with productivity growing faster > afterwards, all the way into the 1960s.) > > Also, the change in social relations due to an InfoRev could easily be bad > for workers, given the current weakness of labor and thus its inability to > mold the rev. to serve its interest (at least in the US). > > Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & > http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:8184] Re: Re: California Green Party AssemblyRepresentive requests help
Peter wrote: >There is evidence that General Motors conspired to destroy dozens of public transit systems in the 1930's and '40s, ...< I don't know about other cities, but GM and others definitely conspired to destroy the "Red Line" trolley system in Los Angeles. In fact, they succeeded in doing so, making LA into Car Heaven (complete with the Peterson Automobile Museum, a temple for worshipping cars). I have a map of the old Red Line system on my office wall: where once there were trolleys, there are now often freeways, often parallel to the Red Lines. Even though this conspiracy shows up in the film "who framed Roger Rabbit?," we should not rely on this conspiracy theory alone. In addition, the upper-class (and to a lesser extent, middle-class) whites who ran Los Angeles in those days had given up on the Red Cars. The trolley system needed a lot of investment in order to make up for normal wear and tear. In addition, investment was needed to deal with the fact that the trolleys conflicted with the cars at large number of crossings -- and the period after World War II was an era when people were in love with their cars (if they could afford them). In a period of pro-car and laissez-faire sentiment among those with political influence, this investment was not done. It wasn't just the GM conspiracy. It was also that the politically-relevant public rolled over and played dead. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:8185] RE: Request for clarification - Ruling class economic theory
-Original Message- From: Robert MacDiarmid [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 1999 1:13 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:8179] Request for clarification - Ruling class economic theory I would greatly appreciate it if someone could spend a few paragraphs to get me on the way to understanding what the current ruling class economic ideology is these days. I would hazard that Monetarism & supply side variants are relatively discredited, while on the other hand, one sees 'The Return of Keynes' in the press every now & then (but is this anything more than Japan's desperation and the idle hope of a few collaborationist labour leaders). Is there a governing theory or just micro-economics and finance regulation? Response: First, when you say "discredited", you have to indicate by whom and among whom. For example, the current ruling class ideology of neo-liberal globalism is basically supply-side/trickle down a bit warmed over and jazzed up--only a bit. The basic thesis is the same: wealth job, income creators (the rich) must be free to do their thing and the less constraints on them, the greater the use of nominally "free" markets, the greater the spread/trickle-down and ultimate equalization effects--nationally and globally. It would be a mistake to assume a totally homogeneous set of core "principles" beyond capitalism is the most efficient freedom-promoting system whose existence and expanded reproduction is to be assumed as given along with its concomitant power structures, class relations, core institutions (also dynamic), myths, traditions etc. There are variants of Homo Economicus central and necessary to the ideological and social capital structures of capitalism (greed, competition, egoism, individualism, materialism, acquisitiveness, "rationality" are good, natural, eternal, liberating, progressive etc). Racism, Sexism, Ageism etc are seen as anecdotal issues not flowing from or affecting the core logic, imperatives and dynamics of capitalism. The answer to any presumed "market failures" of capitalism is more and "freer" markets and more capitalism and any market failures are short-term bottlenecks and forms of friction that will be eliminated by the inner self-correcting equalizing balancing and equilibrating forces of markets. The US is the most efficient, decent, moral, progressive, wealthy, freedom-loving, dynamic, nation/system on earth and the answer to any problems of other countries is to become like the US on terms dictated by the US through systems/structures like/favorable to and for the US. Government intervention (except to socialize costs/risks for increasingly concentrated/centralized profits and capital accumulation) is the cause not the answer to any market failures. Naked despotism, the iron fist underneath the velvet glove, can and must be used but used sparingly and under cover of manipulated transcendent causes and "manufactured consent" and "necessary illusions." Just for openers. Jim C
[PEN-L:8186] Re: Re: Re: California Green Party AssemblyRepresentiverequests help
The locus classicus for all this GM conspiracy stuff is the Snell Report to the Senate Antitrust Committee from the mid 70s. Rumor has it that Bradford Snell has been working assiduously on a book-length version of this study, and that it is due to come out sooner rather than later. Peter Jim Devine wrote: > > Peter wrote: > >There is evidence that General Motors conspired to destroy dozens of > public transit systems in the 1930's and '40s, ...< > > I don't know about other cities, but GM and others definitely conspired to > destroy the "Red Line" trolley system in Los Angeles. In fact, they > succeeded in doing so, making LA into Car Heaven (complete with the > Peterson Automobile Museum, a temple for worshipping cars). I have a map of > the old Red Line system on my office wall: where once there were trolleys, > there are now often freeways, often parallel to the Red Lines. > > Even though this conspiracy shows up in the film "who framed Roger > Rabbit?," we should not rely on this conspiracy theory alone. In addition, > the upper-class (and to a lesser extent, middle-class) whites who ran Los > Angeles in those days had given up on the Red Cars. The trolley system > needed a lot of investment in order to make up for normal wear and tear. In > addition, investment was needed to deal with the fact that the trolleys > conflicted with the cars at large number of crossings -- and the period > after World War II was an era when people were in love with their cars (if > they could afford them). In a period of pro-car and laissez-faire sentiment > among those with political influence, this investment was not done. > > It wasn't just the GM conspiracy. It was also that the politically-relevant > public rolled over and played dead. > > Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & > http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:8187] Progressive Response: Kosovo
- The Progressive Response 22 June 1999 Vol. 3, No. 22 Editor: Martha Honey - The Progressive Response (PR) is a weekly service of Foreign Policy in Focus (FPIF), a joint project of the Interhemispheric Resource Center and the Institute for Policy Studies. We encourage responses to the opinions expressed in PR. - Table of Contents *** THE U.S. ROLE IN THE BALKANS *** by David Binder and Robert Hayden *** WORDS AS PROPAGANDA *** by Edward Herman *** WHERE THE MEDIA WENT WRONG COVERING KOSOVO *** by Jeff Cohen - (Editor's Note: Over the last several months the Foreign Policy in Focus project has solicited speakers and writers on the Kosovo war, all of whom are critics of the U.S.-led NATO bombing, but not all of whom concur in either their analysis of the history or the role and responsibility of the various actors in the Balkans wars. In their thoughtful essay, David Binder and Robert Hayden, two leading U.S. experts on the Balkans, present an interpretation that many may see as slanted toward Serbia. As Ed Herman and Jeff Cohen rightly note in their essays, in times of war lines get more sharply drawn, language gets distorted, and the government's interpretation of events is portrayed as the objective reality. Herman and Cohen spoke at a June 10 congressional forum on "The Rhetoric of War" chaired by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D/OH) and Rep. John Conyers (D/MI) and facilitated by Foreign Policy In Focus. (Available at: http://www.foreignpolicy-infocus.org/media/forums/congbrief05.html). Over the next few weeks, we are certain to learn more details about the atrocities by all forces involved in the Kosovo war, as well as about the false and misleading stories planted in the media. The Foreign Policy in Focus project will continue, through its public forums, briefs, and online postings and discussion forums, to help educate and stimulate debate about the U.S. role in the Balkans.) - *** THE U.S. ROLE IN THE BALKANS *** by David Binder and Robert Hayden The Balkans, a region popularly seen as synonymous with indigenous strife, is where four imperial powers came to grief in the 20th century: the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian empires, Mussolini's Italy, and Hitler's Germany. Now at the close of the century the United States, heading the NATO military alliance, has inserted itself deeply into the Balkans, first in Bosnia and then in Kosovo. The path leading to deepening American involvement in the region was long and tortuous, starting with President Wilson's sponsorship in World War I of a new entity to be called Yugoslavia. After 1948 when Josip Broz Tito's Communist regime was expelled from the Soviet Bloc, the United States supported the independence of Yugoslavia, the sole Communist country to become something of an economic and international political success during the cold war. A founder of the non-aligned movement, Yugoslavia thrived on its independent position between NATO and the Warsaw Pact during the cold war. When that era ended Yugoslavia suffered the most cataclysmic collapse of any communist state. Major factors leading to the disintegration of Yugoslavia were domestic. In the late 1980s, an economic crisis led to a political crisis in the socialist state. Political leaders stirred nationalist, separatist, passions to gain public support in the various republics. Slovenian and Serbian politicians were the first to do so, promoting the ideas that the Slovenes, on the one hand, and the Serbs, on the other, required independence from the joint state, and that these nations should dominate minorities within their nation-states. Serbia's Slobodan Milosevic was among the politicians who used nationalism most aggressively, alarming first the leaderships of other republics. In a context of rising tensions between the leaderships of Serbia on the one hand and Croatia and Slovenia on the other, international political actors contributed significantly to the subsequent civil wars either by neglect or by inept intervention. When Slovenia and Croatia threatened secession from the Yugoslav federation in 1990-91, the Bush Administration opposed them officially yet also warned the federal government not to try to keep the country together by force, a stance that only encouraged the secessionists. The European Union (EU) was at first divided over the Yugoslav dilemma, with Germany at first alone in encouraging the secession of Croatia and Slovenia, then persuading the other members to support it even though most other EU countries believed that this course would be catastrophic, especially in
[PEN-L:8190] California Green Party Ques
Interesting topic. Like Henry Liu, I am also a planner, a housing planner, but regionally, planners, designers, architects, land use lawyers and a lot of forward looking environmental thinkers of all hues of green are interested in trade-offs between land use densities, urban design strategies (the manner in which streets and land parcels are configured), transportation, and housing development (including low-income housing). As Henry and Brad point out this is difficult, but it is not impossible. Brad, as I recall, mentions a bit heavy-handedly that it would take "tearing down Berkeley bungalows" for dense apartment buildings. This is misleading as to the nature of creating density. Our draft General Plan is calling for major increases in downtown housing density, economies of scale from which can be used to internally subsidize affordable housing units. It is not necessary to raze whole neighborhoods to create the density transit needs, in order to improve matters in Berkeley. We have a BART station downtown and about a half dozen major AC Transit bus routes that converge on downtown. The key to making density work is to reduce parking for street-jamming cars in favor of increasing people's reliance on transit. The key to making transit work is to limit auto parking while encouraging people to live near where they shop and work. The wild card in all of this is UC Berkeley (which is exempt from local property taxes and zoning), which tore down a parking structure three blocks from campus and wants to rebuild it instead of putting in MORE HOUSING. More housing would not only help take pressure off the Berkeley housing market, it would take pressure off the city's street system because more students could live closer to campus, rather than commute in from surrounding suburbs of Berkeley. Doug, there are many people in California - north and south - who are interested in transit; I know, rhetorically and statistically the numbers are on your side, but the transportation snarls out here are bad going to worse (and beyond). Poll data out here indicate that Bay Area residents want something done about housing shortages and highway snarls. My response to Ms. Bock's inquiry is to suggest she look into the proposals coming out from groups that are advocating for "smart growth." These groups include Planners Network, California Futures Network , Urban Habitat Program (which produced a nice pair of volumes on regional inequities and tax base revenue sharing, and on transportation investment inequities), all of whom are interested in building a constituency for land use and property/sales tax reform to address sprawling suburban development (which DOES continue almost unabated). Even corporate Bay Area is getting interested in a regional approach to dealing with "sustainable development" of our cities here. I would also commend to Ms. Bock Myron Orfield's excellent report on the Bay Area (available from Urban Habitat) and his book METROPOLITICS for the Lincoln Institute on Land Policy (Cambridge, MA). More on this in an article I'm writing for Terrain magazine of the Berkeley Ecology Center, due out in August.
[PEN-L:8192] THE SOURCE AND REMEDY . . .
.. . . OF THE NATIONAL DIFFICULTIES, DEDUCED FROM PRINCIPLES OF POLITICAL ECONOMY, IN A LETTER TO LORD JOHN RUSSELL. "The leanness that affects us, the objects of our misery, is an inventory to particularise their abundance." -- Shakspeare "How to solder, how to stop a leak--that now is the deep design of a politician." -- Milton. London, February, 1821, MY LORD, I ADDRESS your Lordship because I believe you to be sincere and zealous in your public opinions and conduct; and because I know you to be a young man, and therefore less likely to have your understanding incrusted by established and received theories. I was confirmed in this intention by an Essay, in a work generally attributed to your Lordship, wherein you acknowledge the little satisfaction you have hitherto received from the contradictory opinions of writers on this subject. They are indeed, my Lord, contradictory, not only the one to the other, but to our best feelings and plainest sense. From all the works I have read on the subject, the richest nations in the world are those where the greatest revenue is or can be raised; as if the power of compelling or inducing men to labour twice as much at the mills of Gaza for the enjoyment of the Philistines, were proof of any thing but a tyranny or an ignorance twice as powerful. How far my own opinions will be conclusive with your Lordship's, I dare not hazard a conjecture; but as many of them are uncommon, they may, as Hume says, "repay some cost to understand them." But, my Lord, if they are true, they have most important consequences; I therefore earnestly intreat you not to reject them without a patient and attentive examination. Here then, my Lord, after having, for the interest of our suffering country, again respectfully solicited your attention throughout the progress of this inquiry, I leave off personally addressing you. In the consideration of this important question, we must advert to and reason from principles; I shall proceed therefore immediately to lay down such as are of immediate consequence to the argument and such as must, I presume, if the wording be not cavilled at, be universally admitted as true. First then, I hold, or rather I presume it is universally held, that LABOUR IS THE SOURCE OF ALL WEALTH AND REVENUE. It signifies not how our revenue may come to us, whether as interest of money-rent of houses, lands, mines, quarries --pensions -- profits of trade -- salary -- tithes: -- come what way it will, through what channel it will, it must be originally derived from labour, either our own labour, or the labour of others. If then, this first principle be admitted, it follows conclusively that THE WEALTH OF A NATION, as of an individual, CONSISTS IN ITS RESERVED LABOUR: the stores either of money, machinery, manufactures, or produce, &c. &c. that it may possess, being the evidences and representatives of that reserved labour. It is not my intention to clog this inquiry with an eternal reference to the opinions of other men -- I shall hereafter neither controvert nor advert to them; but it will be but honest to the uninitiated here to admit, that even this simple proposition has been objected to, and to state the nature of the objection, that he may be satisfied an endeavour to establish every principle against all possible objection, would require a folio rather than a letter. Thus it has been held by some "learned Thebans" to be erroneous, because we omit the powerful agency of nature: now this is strictly true; but then other and more "learned Thebans" come upon us with a distinction between "value in use" and "value in exchange" and show it is only true of "value in use;" this is still more accurate: but then it needs two more chapters, and, I ask, might not one chapter say to the others "we three are sophisticated?" Does not a plain man find his common interpretation of the language was perfectly correct? At the same time that I shall be scrupulously studious of brevity, to be clear and intelligible must be the first consideration; therefore I shall myself refine a little even upon this second principle, and, for the avoiding future explanation, add, that the WEALTH OF A NATION CONSISTS IN ITS RESERVED SURPLUS LABOUR by which I mean the reserved labour beyond its usual and necessary consumption; for without this distinction, which, though too indefinite and inaccurate, may serve my purpose, the wealth of a nation would vary with the seasons; before harvest and after harvest materially. Now, however, that I have been stayed by this literal accuracy, I may add that when I shall hereafter speak of the surplus labour of a man, I mean by it, the representative of all the labour of the individual beyond what is exclusively appropriated to the maintenance and enjoyment of himself and family, But once for all, as I profess to neither to be learned nor critical on this subject, I trust the reader will allow my langua
[PEN-L:8193] "Scandalize My Name"
So I'm sitting in the third row at the Brecht Forum last Thursday night waiting for Michael Yates to begin his talk on his new book "Why Unions Matter" and guess who I run into? None other than Red Jackman, the barfly and Shachtmanite I haven't seen since 1975 from Club 55 down on Christopher Street in the Village. The Club 55 was where Red held court. It was a hangout for beatniks and 1950s radicals, especially those with connections to the Trotskyist movement. I used to drink there with my friend Nelson, who was editor of the Trotskyist newspaper The Militant, whose offices were 5 blocks away on the Hudson. Red was a raconteur and a ne'er-do-well charmer, who was either being thrown out of his apartment by a girlfriend or wife, or out of the Club 55 by the bartender. After Michael's talk, Red went up to him and told him how much he appreciated it. He told a funny story about some Shachtmanites he knew who had ended up in the International Department of the AFL-CIO reporting to Jay Lovestone. When the Bolivian revolution broke out in 1953, these two ended up down there like Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern trying to promote AFL-CIO influence, even though they were still left-wingers. They ended up getting kidnapped by the miners, who took them back to their clandestine headquarters. They plead their case with the miners, in fear of their lives. Who could blame them for being scared, since the miners were fierce-looking Quechuans who carried around dynamite sticks to throw at the army. When the miners learned that the two Americans were Shachtmanites, the mood changed completely. Drinks were served and a convivial debate opened up which lasted through the night about the class nature of the Soviet Union, with half the miners insisting in orthodox Trotskyist fashion that it was a degenerated workers state and the other half defending Shachtman's "third camp" position. It turned out that the miners union was a Trotskyist stronghold. I was so surprised to see that Red was still alive after a lifetime of drinking that when I got home that evening I called Nelson to tell him the news. He was a big fan of Red's. The conversation soon turned to "Odds Against Tomorrow," as Nelson mentioned a New Yorker article by Skip Gates which claimed that Belafonte named names. This was supposedly what got him accepted as a guest on the Ed Sullivan show. I found this accusation disturbing. So when I returned to Lincoln Center last Saturday night for a showing of "Scandalize my Name: Stories from the Blacklist," a documentary about blacklisted African-Americans, I was gratified to discover that Belafonte--one of the featured interviewees--had an answer for Gates, and for Paul Robeson Jr., who had fed Gates this accusation. Here is Belafonte's defense. It was standard procedure for winners of Broadway's Tony Award to appear as a guest on Ed Sullivan's show. Since Belafonte had won in 1958, he expected to be called into Sullivan's office. What he didn't expect was that Sullivan would greet him with a dossier put together by Red Channels, a freelance blacklist outfit run by ex-FBI agents. Sullivan handed Belafonte the folder and asked him to explain himself. Belafonte browsed through it and told Sullivan, "Well, some things are true and some are false, but I am not going to tell you which is which. The only thing I am interested in defending is my record as an artist. If that's something you want to discuss, I'll be happy to return." Later that week Belafonte got the news that he was to be featured on the Sullivan show. According to Alexandra Isles, the director of "Scandalize My Name" who spoke after the filming, Paul Robeson Jr. surmised that Belafonte MUST have named names because that would be the only explanation for the invite. I'll take Belafonte's word that his talent is what chinched it. The film also paid close attention to the career of Paul Robeson who was the number one target of the witch-hunters. As another interviewee Ossie Davis put it, it was a fight and in a fight one side often goes after the biggest and most courageous person on the other side in order to break the spirit of the whole group. That certainly defined Robeson. Some of the other African-American actors were not so well-known as Robeson, but their loss was just as calamitous in some ways. Canada Lee was a major film star of the 1940s, who was one of the first African-American actors to transcend roles like railway porters, chauffeurs or tramps. He co-starred with Sidney Poitier in "Cry, the Beloved Country", a 1951 film made in South Africa about the struggle against apartheid. Lee's experience in South Africa was so galvanizing that when he was invited to speak at an NAACP convention in the early 1950s, he practically had to be dragged off the stage since his speech about South Africa went way beyond the allotted time. As fellow blacklistee Richard O'Neal put it, Lee just wanted to rouse everybody into action against apartheid. After being bla
[PEN-L:8195] Re: Re: information revolution?
>>Lawrence Summers [or his ghostwriter] minimizes this stuff in the passage >>exerpted by Doug. But it's been several years, so maybe the "inforev" is >>kicking in? I don't think so... That's Lant Pritchett in his anti-conventional-wisdom-rant mode. He is quite eloquent--and he certainly can make one think. But it has little relationship to what Summers believes (and, probably, little relationship to what Pritchett believes). > >Are they using "real" growth here? Given the big drop in hardware prices, >small nominal growth can turn into giant real growth when deflated (or, in >this case, inflated). > >Doug They are real numbers. But they are (or are supposed to be) chained to minimize this problem. Brad DeLong -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- "Now 'in the long run' this [way of summarizing the quantity theory of money] is probably true But this long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. **In the long run** we are all dead. Economists set themselves too easy, too useless a task if in tempestuous seasons they can only tell us that when the storm is long past the ocean is flat again." --J.M. Keynes -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- J. Bradford De Long; Professor of Economics, U.C. Berkeley; Co-Editor, Journal of Economic Perspectives. Dept. of Economics, U.C. Berkeley, #3880 Berkeley, CA 94720-3880 (510) 643-4027; (925) 283-2709 phones (510) 642-6615; (925) 283-3897 faxes http://econ161.berkeley.edu/ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
[PEN-L:8197] Re: Re: Re:Information revolution?
>Rod Hay wrote: > >>I don't doubt that these things are happening at least marginally, but does >>this constitute a "revolution" similar in importance as the industrial >>revolution in the 19th century or the corporate revolution in the 20th >>century. > >Computers are over 50 years old now; they're no longer some new kid on the >technological block. Also, radical and ceaseless technological change is as >old as capitalism; to argue that there's some qualitatively new aspect to >new technologies would require that you prove the rate of technical change >has accelerated. Why is the tech revo all that much more revolutionary than >the telegraph, the steamship, the telephone, or radio? > >Doug Because it requires new forms of property relations? Just as the British agricultural revolution could not be accomplished without the enclosure of the common lands and the destruction of feudal property relations in the countryside, and just as J.P. Morgan could not have created the Gilded Age oligopolies without the creation of limited liability, so the will not unless . I'm just asking. I don't know the answer. Unlike many who post here, I do not have the key to the riddle of history in my pocket... Brad DeLong -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- "Now 'in the long run' this [way of summarizing the quantity theory of money] is probably true But this long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. **In the long run** we are all dead. Economists set themselves too easy, too useless a task if in tempestuous seasons they can only tell us that when the storm is long past the ocean is flat again." --J.M. Keynes -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- J. Bradford De Long; Professor of Economics, U.C. Berkeley; Co-Editor, Journal of Economic Perspectives. Dept. of Economics, U.C. Berkeley, #3880 Berkeley, CA 94720-3880 (510) 643-4027; (925) 283-2709 phones (510) 642-6615; (925) 283-3897 faxes http://econ161.berkeley.edu/ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
[PEN-L:8199] Re: Re: California Green Party Assembly Representiverequests help
Re "popular support": Check out the film "Taken for a Ride" which details the destruction of the transit systems around the country by GM, Firestone, et. al. How can popular support be developed for something which doesn't exist. Can we "vote with our dollars" when there isn't something to vote for? THE WAy highways are funded is perpetual -- more concrete, and nobody gets to vote for that. There IS tremendous and wide appeal for an end to highway widening (pace, Jim Devine.) there are many anti-freeway groups around the country, blocking particular wideneings and new construction. Doug Henwood wrote: > Michael Perelman wrote: > > >Audie Bock, the new Green Assembly representative from Cal. has a > >question for us. She asked, about transit issues. She quotes: "I have > >the impression that mass transit and highway planning are treated as two > >separate and distinct issues. I believe that when planning our highways > >in California we could incorporate mass transit. What is the economic > >feasibility of providing genuine mass transit throughout California? > >Should we, as legislators view these items as interrelated from an > >economic standpoint?" > > Isn't there like zero popular support for mass transit in California? How > can you push a policy, however humane and rational, that no one wants? > > Doug
[PEN-L:8200] Re: Re: Re: California Green Party Assembly Representiverequests help
Wojtek Sokolowski wrote: > > > > If memory serves there was group in SF Bay area advocating "planned > congestion" and "market" (i.e. price) approach (increasing bridge tolls and > parking fees) to make cars less attractive for commuters - a very clever > way of using market ideology to fight the auto industry. > > wojtek There are two groups in the Bay Area pushing congestion pricing. I don't think it is that clever. the groups are the Environmental Defense Fund and the Union of Concerned Scientists -- Berkeley office. If we rely on congestion pricing, who is it that is going to drive? And what do the rest do, without transit? Gene Coyle
[PEN-L:8201] Re: Re: Re:Information revolution?
The information technology revolution is best compared to electricity, I think. Just as electricity permitted a truly distributed power supply, so the computer does this to information. It's hard to imagine the radical reorganization of work and space in the twentieth century without electricity. I think that we will see similar effects from the computer. Very imperfectly, this is what the "postfordism" literature has been trying to get at, at least in part. Of course, the larger context is equally important -- I'm not arguing for any sort of technological determinism. But different technologies also have qualitatively different effects on society. Peter ps: Electricity also had its failed utopias. See Kropotkin's interesting but false speculation in FIELDS, FACTORIES, AND WORKSHOPS OF TOMORROW. Doug Henwood wrote: > > Computers are over 50 years old now; they're no longer some new kid on the > technological block. Also, radical and ceaseless technological change is as > old as capitalism; to argue that there's some qualitatively new aspect to > new technologies would require that you prove the rate of technical change > has accelerated. Why is the tech revo all that much more revolutionary than > the telegraph, the steamship, the telephone, or radio? > > Doug
[PEN-L:8205] Re: Re: Re: California Green Party Assembly Representiverequests help
Doug, there is a fear of giving up the car with a loathing for the traffic jams. The preferred solution is better roads which just create more traffic. Because public transport is underfunded, most people associate public transport with inefficiency, poverty and bad government. But the disgust with traffic grows daily and people do not want freeways too near their cul de sacs. > Doug Henwood wrote: > >Isn't there like zero popular support for mass transit in California? How > >can you push a policy, however humane and rational, that no one wants? -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
[PEN-L:8207] The trouble with public education
This is from the guy that "proved" that more guns prevent crime. Olin
spends its money well:
"Public Schooling, Indoctrination, and Totalitarianism"
BY: JOHN R. LOTT, JR.
University of Chicago
Document: Available from the SSRN Electronic Paper Collection:
http://papers.ssrn.com/paper.taf?abstract_id=162791
Other Electronic Document Delivery:
http://www.law.uchicago.edu/Publications/Working/
SSRN only offers technical support for papers
downloaded from the SSRN Electronic Paper Collection
location. When URLs wrap, you must copy and paste
them into your browser eliminating all spaces.
Paper ID: University of Chicago Law School, John M. Olin Law &
Economics Working Paper No. 64
Date: December 1998
Contact: JOHN R. LOTT, JR.
Email: Mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Postal: University of Chicago
East 60th Street
Chicago, IL 60637 USA
Phone: (773)702-0424
Fax: (773)702-0730
Paper Requests:
Contact Fred Royall, Program Administrator and Discussion Paper
Coordinator, Olin Law and Economics Program, University of
Chicago Law School, E. 60th Street, Chicago, IL 60637.
Phone:(773)702-0220. Fax:(773)702-0730.
Mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
ABSTRACT:
Governments use public education and public ownership of schools
and the media to control the information that their citizens
receive. More totalitarian governments as well as those with
larger wealth transfers make greater investments in publicly
controlled information. This finding is borne out from cross
sectional time-series evidence across countries, and is
confirmed when specifically examining the recent fall of
communism. My results reject the standard public good's view
linking education and democracy, and I find evidence that public
educational expenditures vary in similar ways to government
ownership of television stations.
JEL Classification: I28
__
--
Michael Perelman
Economics Department
California State University
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Chico, CA 95929
530-898-5321
fax 530-898-5901
[PEN-L:8210] Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: California Green PartyAssemblyRepresentive requests help
That's in the Snell Report (70s) too. GM was reimbursed to the tune of $24M after WWII due to damage caused by the accidental allied bombing of a GM-owned Luftwaffe plant. Other GM plants in Germany turning out war material were purposefully unscathed. Lots of other nifty dirt. Peter Eugene Coyle wrote: > > Snell is working on a book which includes the GM conspiracy -- he is interviewed > on camera in the film I've mentioned. But the book always seems to be coming > out soon. Sort of like the stuff I write. > > I've heard (maybe here on PEN_L?) that the book now includes GM's > connections with the Nazis. > > Gene Coyle
[PEN-L:8215] Re: Re: Re: Re: California Green Party AssemblyRepresentive requests help
>Wojtek Sokolowski wrote: > >> > > > >> >> >> If memory serves there was group in SF Bay area advocating "planned >> congestion" and "market" (i.e. price) approach (increasing bridge tolls and >> parking fees) to make cars less attractive for commuters - a very clever >> way of using market ideology to fight the auto industry. >> >> wojtek > > There are two groups in the Bay Area pushing congestion pricing. I don't >think it is that clever. the groups are the Environmental Defense Fund and >the Union of Concerned Scientists -- Berkeley office. If we rely on >congestion pricing, who is it that is going to drive? And what do the rest >do, without transit? > >Gene Coyle The congestion pricing fees *are* there to fund mass transit (or anything else you want). Maybe you would be happier if you thought of it as a progressive tax on a polluting activity... Brad DeLong
[PEN-L:8211] Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:Information revolution?
But what does "important" mean? Much of the debate has been over productivity: people are looking for a Verdoorn's Law for computers. But this may be the wrong issue. The importance of computers could depend on their imposed and induced impact on social and economic organization, quite apart from productivity. In any event, that was the argument I was trying to make earlier (summarizing, really). Peter Doug Henwood wrote: > > Peter Dorman wrote: > > >The information technology revolution is best compared to electricity, I > >think. Just as electricity permitted a truly distributed power supply, > >so the computer does this to information. It's hard to imagine the > >radical reorganization of work and space in the twentieth century > >without electricity. I think that we will see similar effects from the > >computer. Very imperfectly, this is what the "postfordism" literature > >has been trying to get at, at least in part. > > > >Of course, the larger context is equally important -- I'm not arguing > >for any sort of technological determinism. But different technologies > >also have qualitatively different effects on society. > > No one is arguing that computers aren't really really important. The New > Economy types are arguing, explicitly or not, that they're unprecedentedly > important. And that case just isn't proved, to put it mildly. > > Doug
[PEN-L:8204] Re: Re: Re: Re: California Green Party AssemblyRepresentiverequests help
Snell is working on a book which includes the GM conspiracy -- he is interviewed on camera in the film I've mentioned. But the book always seems to be coming out soon. Sort of like the stuff I write. I've heard (maybe here on PEN_L?) that the book now includes GM's connections with the Nazis. Gene Coyle Peter Dorman wrote: > The locus classicus for all this GM conspiracy stuff is the Snell Report > to the Senate Antitrust Committee from the mid 70s. Rumor has it that > Bradford Snell has been working assiduously on a book-length version of > this study, and that it is due to come out sooner rather than later. > > Peter > > Jim Devine wrote: > > > > Peter wrote: > > >There is evidence that General Motors conspired to destroy dozens of > > public transit systems in the 1930's and '40s, ...< > > > > I don't know about other cities, but GM and others definitely conspired to > > destroy the "Red Line" trolley system in Los Angeles. In fact, they > > succeeded in doing so, making LA into Car Heaven (complete with the > > Peterson Automobile Museum, a temple for worshipping cars). I have a map of > > the old Red Line system on my office wall: where once there were trolleys, > > there are now often freeways, often parallel to the Red Lines. > > > > Even though this conspiracy shows up in the film "who framed Roger > > Rabbit?," we should not rely on this conspiracy theory alone. In addition, > > the upper-class (and to a lesser extent, middle-class) whites who ran Los > > Angeles in those days had given up on the Red Cars. The trolley system > > needed a lot of investment in order to make up for normal wear and tear. In > > addition, investment was needed to deal with the fact that the trolleys > > conflicted with the cars at large number of crossings -- and the period > > after World War II was an era when people were in love with their cars (if > > they could afford them). In a period of pro-car and laissez-faire sentiment > > among those with political influence, this investment was not done. > > > > It wasn't just the GM conspiracy. It was also that the politically-relevant > > public rolled over and played dead. > > > > Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & > > http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:8203] Re: Re: Re: California Green Party AssemblyRepresentive requests help
See the documentary -- Taken for A Ride -- shown on PBS a couple of years ago. There is an analogy in the disappearance of transit to the desire on the part of many in the electric de-regulation battle -- to "get off the grid" and away from the big bad monopolies. The grid is a community resource, as transit was, and as the more affluent left transit for the private auto, so too do many envision the affluent leaving the electric grid for private generation. Will the grid wither like transit? Gene Coyle Jim Devine wrote: > Peter wrote: > >There is evidence that General Motors conspired to destroy dozens of > public transit systems in the 1930's and '40s, ...< > > I don't know about other cities, but GM and others definitely conspired to > destroy the "Red Line" trolley system in Los Angeles. In fact, they > succeeded in doing so, making LA into Car Heaven (complete with the > Peterson Automobile Museum, a temple for worshipping cars). I have a map of > the old Red Line system on my office wall: where once there were trolleys, > there are now often freeways, often parallel to the Red Lines. > > Even though this conspiracy shows up in the film "who framed Roger > Rabbit?," we should not rely on this conspiracy theory alone. In addition, > the upper-class (and to a lesser extent, middle-class) whites who ran Los > Angeles in those days had given up on the Red Cars. The trolley system > needed a lot of investment in order to make up for normal wear and tear. In > addition, investment was needed to deal with the fact that the trolleys > conflicted with the cars at large number of crossings -- and the period > after World War II was an era when people were in love with their cars (if > they could afford them). In a period of pro-car and laissez-faire sentiment > among those with political influence, this investment was not done. > > It wasn't just the GM conspiracy. It was also that the politically-relevant > public rolled over and played dead. > > Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & > http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:8198] Re: Re: California Green Party Assembly Representiverequests help
There is an organization in Washington, D. C., the Surface Transportation Policy Project that is the source that Audie Bock should reach. sorry, i don't have a phone number. The federal highway money is now tied to provide a small bit for transit. There are groups in the Bay Area that work on transit issues, including Urban Habitat, located in the Presidio in San Francisco, (415) 561-. Cameron Yee is the person there. I find the post by Brad De Long, below, astonishing. First, don't freeways knock down massive amounts of urban housing? Including splitting what were nice neighorhoods in Oakland and Berkeley? And aren't new freeway lanes now being promoted by the highway lobby as car pool and bus lanes -- but are simply highway widening? Ever read about how the South Bronx was destroyed Brad? Freeways. Or do you think it was rent control that did that? Busses ARE mass transit, of course, and I'm glad to see you approve of them. There is a big move in LA to spend more on busses and less on the subway --- but that's a fight within mass transit, not against it. The Bay Area supported mass transit in the past -- and yes, rail -- at much lower population densities than we now have. Berkeley itself was a streetcar community -- ever driven through the Solano tunnel? Trains ran on the Bay Bridge until at least the mid 1950s. Old rail lines cover much of the area, including communter lines in the East Bay and Marin county =-- where, we are told, the current density can't support them. And aren't freeways massively subsidized Brad De Long wrote: > >Audie Bock, the new Green Assembly representative from Cal. has a > >question for us. She asked, about transit issues. She quotes: "I have > >the impression that mass transit and highway planning are treated as two > >separate and distinct issues. I believe that when planning our highways > >in California we could incorporate mass transit. What is the economic > >feasibility of providing genuine mass transit throughout California? > >Should we, as legislators view these items as interrelated from an > >economic standpoint?" > > > >-- > > > >Michael Perelman > >Economics Department > >California State University > >[EMAIL PROTECTED] > >Chico, CA 95929 > >530-898-5321 > >fax 530-898-5901 > > How willing is she to promote the tear-down of blocks of bungalows in > Berkeley and their replacement with five-story apartment buildings, or to > promote the tear-down of large houses in Palo Alto and their replacement > with townhouses? > > Mass transit seems to require much higher densities than we have at present > in California--even largely-urban California, outside of a very few > regions. And the currently chi-chi forms of mass transit--light rail a la > BART--appear, as best I can judge, to suck down huge amounts of money that > could be better spent on more busses and bus lanes. > > But it's not my field. And land-use and transit planning is genuinely very > hard... > > Brad DeLong > > -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- > "Now 'in the long run' this [way of summarizing the quantity theory of > money] is probably true But this long run is a misleading guide to > current affairs. **In the long run** we are all dead. Economists set > themselves too easy, too useless a task if in tempestuous seasons they can > only tell us that when the storm is long past the ocean is flat again." > > --J.M. Keynes > -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- > J. Bradford De Long; Professor of Economics, U.C. Berkeley; > Co-Editor, Journal of Economic Perspectives. > Dept. of Economics, U.C. Berkeley, #3880 > Berkeley, CA 94720-3880 > (510) 643-4027; (925) 283-2709 phones > (510) 642-6615; (925) 283-3897 faxes > http://econ161.berkeley.edu/ > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
[PEN-L:8196] Re: Re:Information revolution?
Rod Hay wrote: >I don't doubt that these things are happening at least marginally, but does >this constitute a "revolution" similar in importance as the industrial >revolution in the 19th century or the corporate revolution in the 20th >century. Computers are over 50 years old now; they're no longer some new kid on the technological block. Also, radical and ceaseless technological change is as old as capitalism; to argue that there's some qualitatively new aspect to new technologies would require that you prove the rate of technical change has accelerated. Why is the tech revo all that much more revolutionary than the telegraph, the steamship, the telephone, or radio? Doug
[PEN-L:8194] RE: Re: Re: Re: Re: information revolution?
they also kick the ecological/economic costs of making the machines onto the public... http://www.svtc.org/ ian > -Original Message- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Jim Devine > Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 1999 2:52 PM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: [PEN-L:8183] Re: Re: Re: Re: information revolution? > > > At 02:06 PM 6/22/99 -0700, you wrote: > >I have a theory about the info-rev and the changing structure of firms. > >I won't go into the reasons (too long), but the main points are: > > > >1. Firms exist primarily to internalize and utilize nonprice > >information. > > They also internalize other external benefits -- and they profit by find > ways of externalizing internal costs, as shown by recent shifts to > management techniques relying more and more on worker turnover (as opposed > to job security, tenure, etc.), so that workers bear more and more of the > risk. > > Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & > http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html >
[PEN-L:8191] Re: California Green Party Assembly Representive requests help
> Audie Bock, the new Green Assembly representative from Cal. has a > question for us. She asked, about transit issues. She quotes: "I have > the impression that mass transit and highway planning are treated as two > separate and distinct issues. I believe that when planning our highways > in California we could incorporate mass transit. What is the economic > feasibility of providing genuine mass transit throughout California? > Should we, as legislators view these items as interrelated from an > economic standpoint?" > Michael Perelman about 20% of US households do not own a car...about 33% of US population does not drive a car because of age, disability, and economic reasons...thus, a sizeable percentage of folks cannot take advantage of mobility offered by autos, roads, and freeways. ...of course, the majority who can do so pollute the air and congest existing roadways because of the imbalance between cars and other modes of transit... public transit 'renaissance' in 1970s resulted from growing disenchantment with freeways, available federal subsidies, and state/local government involvement..in general, inflated projections of benefits to flow from light rail, people movers, and rapid rail were not met... possible future options include: 1) expanded bus service/can use existing streets, can be used in various ways (such as special lane on freeways), has lowest capital costs of existing public transit...alleged disadvantages include labor-intensiveness (each bus must have a driver and drivers unionize) & high operating expenses for routes that do not attract many passengers... 2) light rail systems/generally run on separate railways rather than down middle of streets as old streetcars did...expensive to build and have yet to convince people to lessen auto use where operational (partial exceptions have been San Diego's 36 mile 'Tijuana Trolley' that carries almost 50,000 passengers per day & Portland's 15-mile system that carries about 25,000 per day)... 3) people movers/small cars carrying ten or so people running on fixed rail system, proponents claim that lines can be constructed on grid with numerous stations so that every resident of a city would be within walking distance...alleged advantages are lower capital costs than other rail systems and (for those who dig techno-fixes) computer-operation requiring no drivers, hence few 'labor problems'...Morgantown, WV and Detroit (is this correct Charles Brown?) have such a system... 4) rapid transit/electric driven trains can move largest number of people...works best in areas with large populations, high densities, lots of folks commuting into central business district (not well suited to much of multi-centered metropolis US where almost 50% of home to job commutes are suburb-to-suburb and only about 10% commute to jobs in CBD)... 5) multimodal bus rapid transit/buses on fixed guideways for speed and passenger volume that can also operate as regular buses on existing streets...much lower capital costs than rail...none currently operating in US as far as I know, but variations of system run in Australis, Brazil, England, & Germany (any lister experiences with this model?)... meanwhile, to the filling station... Michael Hoover
[PEN-L:8189] Re: Request for clarification - Ruling classeconomic theory
At 04:13 PM 6/22/99 -0400, you wrote: >I would greatly appreciate it if someone could spend a few paragraphs to get >me on the way to understanding what the current ruling class economic >ideology is these days. I would hazard that Monetarism & supply side >variants are relatively discredited, while on the other hand, one sees 'The >Return of Keynes' in the press every now & then (but is this anything more >than Japan's desperation and the idle hope of a few collaborationist labour >leaders). Is there a governing theory or just micro-economics and finance >regulation? > I'd say that the main ruling-class economic ideology is still free market uber alles. However, there's been a little bit of retreat, allowing for such things as capital controls (as in Chile or Malaysia). Paul Krugman, one of the more innovative of establishmentarian economic pundits, sees a return to Depression economics, but favors monetary policy. I'm pretty sure he used to have a copy of his FOREIGN RELATIONS (or is it FOREIGN AFFAIRS?) article on this on his web site, but now all I can find is links that help you buy his book from Amazon.com on it. If I remember the article's point it was that Japan and East Asia were facing something like a Keynesian liquidity trap. Needed, he says, is rapid increases in the money supply, which would increase inflation and inflationary expectations, and thus lower real interest rates, boosting spending and pulling the iron out of the fire. I was hoping that since he got all his ideas from me when we were roommates in college, he'd send me a free copy... ;-) Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:8188] Re:Information revolution?
I don't doubt that these things are happening at least marginally, but does this constitute a "revolution" similar in importance as the industrial revolution in the 19th century or the corporate revolution in the 20th century. If information is of economic value and the new technology allows firms to control that information and thus alter the structure of the firm and the subsequent social relations, it is still not clear where that is going. Shifting the risk on to the workers is not new. Sometimes it is easier to do that others. The problem is that if information is decentralised and readily accessable with the new technology what then is the basis of the firm. A monopoly on capital? a monopoly on information? Will Bill Gates and this peers succeed in controling the new technology or will it slip their grasps. Evidence can be marshalled for either tendency. Perhaps the development of Linux will prove to be a revolutionary act of significance. Perhaps not. Peter Dorman wrote: >I have a theory about the info-rev and the changing structure of firms. >I won't go into the reasons (too long), but the main points are: > >1. Firms exist primarily to internalize and utilize nonprice >information. Jim Devine wrote: They also internalize other external benefits -- and they profit by find ways of externalizing internal costs, as shown by recent shifts to management techniques relying more and more on worker turnover (as opposed to job security, tenure, etc.), so that workers bear more and more of the risk. Rod Hay [EMAIL PROTECTED] The History of Economic Thought Archives http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html Batoche Books http://www.abebooks.com/home/BATOCHEBOOKS/ __ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
[PEN-L:8183] Re: Re: Re: Re: information revolution?
At 02:06 PM 6/22/99 -0700, you wrote: >I have a theory about the info-rev and the changing structure of firms. >I won't go into the reasons (too long), but the main points are: > >1. Firms exist primarily to internalize and utilize nonprice >information. They also internalize other external benefits -- and they profit by find ways of externalizing internal costs, as shown by recent shifts to management techniques relying more and more on worker turnover (as opposed to job security, tenure, etc.), so that workers bear more and more of the risk. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:8182] Re: Re: Re: Re: California Green PartyAssemblyRepresentiverequests help
I am guilty as charged. It is my Harvard education. But I am talking about California, not the Third World, so an American attitude is not entirely out of place. Your statement about Corbu was not accurate; he was very critical of suburban sprawl and the American city. As for the cost issue, I think you misread me. I was trying to debunk the common myth that rail transit is more expensive than highways. Most of the points you make are reasonable though not conclusive. As I said in my previous post: "There are of course many other issues and unintended consequences, but this will suffice for now. The issue is not rail vs cars, because each of us will use both at different times if both are available." And it is good that you raise some other issues. Other will raise some more. I did suggest that, in the final analysis, transportaton is a political issue with which you post seemed to agree. Henry C.K. Liu Wojtek Sokolowski wrote: > At 11:50 AM 6/22/99 -0400, Henry Liu wrote: > >of automobile configuration. Cars of course are air polluting. > >Yet, the advantages of the highway/auto system are not insubstantial. It > >serves effectively the spread-out existing urban patterns, albeit because the > >pattern grew from it. > >The car provides the driver with considerable freedom of movement and timing. > >There is no need to wait for the next train which in off peak hours never > >comes. The car is relatively more protective from urban crimes in empty > >stations. It is imminently more comfortable than the best subway train. In > >California, it is a common sight to see urban planners and economists who > drive > >their fancy cars to meetings to promote urban rail mass transit. > >What is needed is a coordinate balance between peak hour concentration > >transportation needs and non-peak freedom for each city according to its > >historical conditions and special characteristics. > >The cost efficiency issue is a red herring, at least on a national basis. > > Not so fast Henry! If there is a cost to an activity but nobody calculates > it, does it still consitute a cost? > > You have been quite critical about Western mentality - yet your own writing > displayes some of it worst characteristic - relativistic subjectivism. > Your cost/benefit calculation takes into account only monetary costs (fees > and subsidies) but ignores hidden costs. > > Suburban sprawl, which you mention as a disadvantage for "linear" rail > transportation is a dirfect result autmobilie based transportation. > Without individual autos sprawl would not be possible without substantially > reducing mobility. Yet sprawl poses a tremendous social and political cost > to a society - from the destruction of natural environment to social > fragmentation and th eproblems it causes: anomia, crime and and th eloss of > political control. Oh yes, suburbs wre cited by late 19th and 20th century > social engineers and architects, such as Le Corbusier, as the "final > solution" to the labor unrest problem. > > So the illusion of securty and comfort created by car is comprable to > "protection" provided by gangsters - a protection from adverse results of > their own existence. Somehow, in Europe people do need to lock themsleves > in their car to "protect" themselves from "dangers" of public places - only > in amerikkka. > > Anothe hidden cost is death toll. Car-based transportation is much more > accident prone (by sheer law of probability) than rail-based transportation > - but it is the people who pay the ultimate cost - it is them who die in > accidents not the ratfucking urban planners. Add to it the animals killed > on the roads - it would be very arrogant not to consider that factor. > > Finally the quality of life -it is very amerikkkan to consider isolation > form other people car provide to be synonymous with freedom and comfort. I > find it very depressing - i'd rather spend time in the company of people on > a train. but hey, i was not born in this socially enginneered society (and > proud of it) so i am not a big fan of privacy and security. > > FC - fuck cars (remember the unabomber) > > wojtek
[PEN-L:8180] Re: California Green Party Assembly Representive requestshelp
This is a fascinating and important question. I use the transportation-housing-land use nexus as my main example of interaction effects (nonconvexities) when I teach this stuff. The main problem with the "economic feasibility" criterion is that incremental changes in the transportation system in the direction of mass transit may well be uneconomic, yet large-scale changes, in conjunction with housing and location policies, may be perfectly feasible. Here is the relevant quote from "Economics in Perspective", which I wrote for a course I used to teach at Michigan State: "Here is a simplified example, which is not intended to represent the full complexity of the issue. Individuals might live predominantly in dense urban areas in which systems of mass transit, such as busses and trains, will best serve their needs. Or most might live in spread-out, more sparsely-populated suburbs for which the private automobile is the vehicle of choice. Each situation may have associated with it a unique equilibrium which reflects the rational decisions of all individuals concerned. If housing is a little too decentralized in the first scenario, some people living far from the transit lines may decide to move back into the city, restoring equilibrium. In the second scenario, a family in the suburbs may decide it needs a second car, so that more family members can have access to the places they need to get to. That too may represent movement toward equilibrium. In both cases a system of markets in transportation, housing, and other goods can serve as an efficient mechanism for achieving outcomes that are better than any others sharing the same general characteristics the best allocation of consumer dollars to housing and transportation in either instance. But what about the more fundamental question of which scenario we will inhabit? Since each scenario has its own market equilibrium, markets are not sufficient to choose between them. Some other mechanism must be at work. Most likely, it is historical inertia: we will live in the urban/mass transit world if this is what we have inherited from the past, or the suburban/automobile world if this is the initial reality. It is also possible that a public or private group may make the decision for us, if they are powerful enough to impose their plan. (There is evidence that General Motors conspired to destroy dozens of public transit systems in the 1930's and '40s, and no one would doubt that the federal government made a concerted effort to promote the private automobile and dispersed housing through its post-WWII subsidy programs.) The unavoidable conclusion is that the market, in this example at least, fails to fulfill either its positive or its normative role: it does not offer a sufficient explanation of the what, how, and for whom of production, and it does not provide a mechanism for achieving socially rational outcomes. Note that this latter point holds irrespective of which scenario you think conforms to social rationality. "The culprit in the previous example, responsible for the multiplicity of equilibria, is nonmarket interaction. In fact, there are quite a few candidates for Most Important Nonmarket Interaction in the Field of Urban Development and Transportation. A short list would include the following: obligations (or the lack thereof) to remain close to family members, which can affect and be affected by where people choose to live; the role of neighborhood institutions, based on stable residential patterns, in making cities more liveable and desirable; and, of course, the effect that housing has on the demand for transit, along with the effect of transportation choices on the demand for housing (the possibility of complementarities). Each of these enter separately into individual market decisions about where to live and what to buy, but the effects they have on one another are not accounted for in markets. The result is a situation in which individuals can exercise individual rationality, but there can be no presumption that the combined outcome is collectively rational." Peter Michael Perelman wrote: > > Audie Bock, the new Green Assembly representative from Cal. has a > question for us. She asked, about transit issues. She quotes: "I have > the impression that mass transit and highway planning are treated as two > separate and distinct issues. I believe that when planning our highways > in California we could incorporate mass transit. What is the economic > feasibility of providing genuine mass transit throughout California? > Should we, as legislators view these items as interrelated from an > economic standpoint?" > > -- > > Michael Perelman > Economics Department > California State University > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Chico, CA 95929 > 530-898-5321 > fax 530-898-5901
[PEN-L:8178] Mumia at Evergreen Graduation
I wrote this for a forthcoming ZNET (www.znet.org) commentary and am posting it on PEN-L, peter bohmer. A Graduation Day to Remember by Peter Bohmer June 20, 1999 "Out of the many here assembled, it is the heart of he or she that I seek who looks at a life of vapid materialism, of capitalist excess, and finds it simply intolerable. It may be 100 of you, or 50, or even ten, or even one of you who makes that choice. I am here to honor and applaud that choice and to warn you that, though the suffering may indeed be great, it is nothing to the joy of doing the right thing." Mumia Abu-Jamal, at the Evergreen State College, Olympia, Washington, June 11, 1999 Mumia Abu-Jamal gave a memorable speech, recorded from Pennsylvania death row, to 8000 attendees, including more than 1200 graduating students, at the Evergreen State College graduation on June 11, 1999. During his 13 minute talk, you could have heard a pin drop, as almost everyone listened intently to Mumia's articulate voice. Drawing on the history of racist oppression in this country and the resistance to it, Mumia Abu-Jamal, in his taped address prepared for the graduating students, urged them to live their lives deliberately and join the revolutionary struggle. He pointed out that "race" is a social construct but also a social reality, and that whites had made and could and should make the choice to fight against white supremacy and the evils of capitalism, and for the liberation of all people. At the conclusion of his talk, a large majority of the audience gave him a loud standing ovation that could be heard all the way to his death row cell and hopefully to the U.S. Supreme Court, who will soon decide whether to consider the case. The attention paid by the graduating Evergreen students, their friends and relatives to Mumia's words, the interest in Mumia and the issues he raised, and the solidarity expressed by the applause, was very moving. The idea of Mumia being the graduation speaker had been put forward in the fall of 1997. Although not initially successful, the idea did not die. In the last year, a group of students, primarily seniors, with support from a small group of faculty, staff and alumni organized to promote Mumia Abu-Jamal as the speaker for the 1999 graduation at the Evergreen State College, a 4000 student state college in Olympia, Washington. Graduating students have usually had the primary say in selecting the speaker. Since it was announced in March, 1999 that Mumia was going to be a graduation speaker a furious, although ultimately unsuccessful campaign was launched to prevent this from happening. Friday, June 11th , 1999 was a great day, especially for those who had worked so hard to have Mumia Abu-Jamal's voice be heard. One result of the organizing and outreach to gain support for Mumia speaking, is an increased awareness at Evergreen about the unjust nature of his conviction. By hearing him speak at graduation, there is also a more personal connection to Mumia which will lead to increased efforts to gain a new trial and prevent his execution. The national publicity will also help. At the college and in Olympia, it has led to real discussion about the racism and injustice in all aspects of the criminal justice system: police brutality; inadequate legal representation for most defendants; unjust arrests and imprisonment of political activists (especially people of color); juries that are often not of ones peers; the imprisonment with longer sentences of almost two million people, disproportionately Black, Native American and Latino; and the death penalty. The Philadelphia Fraternal Order of Police, many other police associations and the "law and order" crowd do not only want to execute Mumia, they also are committed to silencing him. On June 11th, they failed. GRADUATION DAY APPROACHES Their campaign escalated in early June of this year. Less than a week before the scheduled graduation, on June 5th and June 6th, Maureen Faulkner, the widow of Daniel Faulkner, the cop whom Mumia was convicted of murdering in the deeply flawed 1982 trial, took out big ads in the local newspaper, the Gannett owned "The Olympian" with the headline, "A Convicted Cop Killer, Speaker at Evergreen State College Commencement?" In the ad, she announced she would be attending the commencement with a picture of her dead husband and asked people to walk out when Mumia's speech began. The pressure to prevent Abu-Jamal from speaking was intense. Editorials in "The Olympian" and other newspapers, repeatedly called him a cop killer; hundreds of letters and emails to the campus demanded he not be allowed to speak; a Washington State legislator demanded the same; and U.S. Congressman Tom DeLay, the Republican House whip from Texas, called for a moment of silence in the U.S. Congress on June 11th at 1 P.M. to protest Mumia's part
[PEN-L:8175] Re: Re: California Green Party Assembly Representiverequests help
At 10:35 AM 6/22/99 -0400, Doug Henwood wrote: >Isn't there like zero popular support for mass transit in California? How >can you push a policy, however humane and rational, that no one wants? Au contraire, in 1990 after the "Big Quake" (Loma Prieta 1989) there was a proposition on the referendum (I foreget the numnet but it must have been in 120s) to increase funding for public transportation through levies on car usage. Auto industry opposed it tooth and nail and a st ecounterbalance put their own "public transit alternative" - token funding for public transit. Guess what, bioth proposals passed. I worked as a "consultant" for Santa Clara County Board of Surpervisors at that time - and public support for public transit was quite substantial. wojtek
[PEN-L:8173] Re: RE: Re: Request: Summers Memo
Craven, Jim wrote: >BTW, I heard, but do not know, that for some time Summers did not deny >having written that memo and then later claimed he did not write it but it >was a memo of understanding to what was discussed and then the story changed >again to "I didn't write it and had nothing to do with it and if I had had >this discussion (If I had a dog), it was only speculative and/or intended as >a little "dark humor." It then was left up to some entrepreneural journalist >(seeking access for scoops for exposure for name recognition for more access >for...) to write the new cover story. According to Cassidy's article in The New Yorker, Pritchett was deeply grateful to Summers for taking the heat for the memo. Not that Summers has paid too dearly for it. The irony is that Pritchett has done some interesting work - e.g. a paper, "Divergence, Big Time," which argues that far from converging on common levels of prosperity, First and Third World countries are diverging, with the North-South gap widening, not narrowing, as predicted by theory. >Thanks again. Any cites for the full memo? I can't find it at the Economist >archive. I have a copy in a fading fax. It's pretty much unscannable, and I'm not about to type it in. Doug
[PEN-L:8172] RE: Re: Re: information revolution?
-Original Message- From: Jim Devine [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 1999 10:05 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:8170] Re: Re: information revolution? Rod Hay wrote: >The real question of "Info Revolution" is not wheither it generates an >accelerated growth rate for a few years, but wheither it changes the >relations of production, or social relations. I think there is some evidence >in favour but that it is inconclusive. And certainly is something that can >only be judged in a longer time frame. I should stress that I don't see the InfoRev, if it is indeed happening, as an unmixed blessing. If it raises labor productivity, it could simply boost profits, causing a steep rise in the profit rate of the sort that hit the US in the 1920s, which made the economy ripe for a fall. (The 1920s were a period of a previous technical revolution, indicated by a "kink" in labor-productivity data in about 1919, with productivity growing faster afterwards, all the way into the 1960s.) Also, the change in social relations due to an InfoRev could easily be bad for workers, given the current weakness of labor and thus its inability to mold the rev. to serve its interest (at least in the US). Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html Plus, possible "info overload" and lost productivity due to scanning porn sites, sending jokes etc while at work. You all know that my employer Clark College (actually the State of Washington) has summarily ruled that my missives (much more infrequent now) to pen-l are not related to my professional duties, are a waste of State resources, constitute some form of subversion and actually take me away from my real job and productivity--preparing future human and social capital cogs [inputs] for profitability and expanded reproduction of capital and capitalism. Then there is the social capital argument. The info "revolution" exposes to all sorts of information, debate, opinion etc that potentially undermine the requisite "social capital" of capitalism--the requisite myths, traditions, symbols, institutions, power relations/structures, mystifications, imperial power projections/justifications, etc of expanded reproduction. Jim C
[PEN-L:8167] Re: information revolution?
The real question of "Info Revolution" is not wheither it generates an accelerated growth rate for a few years, but wheither it changes the relations of production, or social relations. I think there is some evidence in favour but that it is inconclusive. And certainly is something that can only be judged in a longer time frame. Rod Hay [EMAIL PROTECTED] The History of Economic Thought Archives http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html Batoche Books http://www.abebooks.com/home/BATOCHEBOOKS/ Original Message Follows From: Doug Henwood <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:8165] Re: information revolution? Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 12:00:41 -0400 Jim Devine wrote: >from SLATE magazine's "today's papers" round-up (by Scott Shuger): > >USA TODAY >leads with a Commerce Dept. study coming out today concluding >that digital business companies are driving the nation's economic growth. >The study states that computer and communication hardware, software, and >services, although only accounting for 8 percent of the U.S. economy, have >contributed more than a third of its growth since 1995. This sector, says >the study, is, thanks to its rising quality and falling prices, controlling >inflation too.< > >Lawrence Summers [or his ghostwriter] minimizes this stuff in the passage >exerpted by Doug. But it's been several years, so maybe the "inforev" is >kicking in? Are they using "real" growth here? Given the big drop in hardware prices, small nominal growth can turn into giant real growth when deflated (or, in this case, inflated). Doug __ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
[PEN-L:8166] Re: Re: California Green Party Assembly Representiverequests help
At 07:13 AM 6/22/99 -0700, Brad DeLong wrote: >>Audie Bock, the new Green Assembly representative from Cal. has a >>question for us. She asked, about transit issues. She quotes: "I have >>the impression that mass transit and highway planning are treated as two >>separate and distinct issues. I believe that when planning our highways >>in California we could incorporate mass transit. What is the economic >>feasibility of providing genuine mass transit throughout California? >>Should we, as legislators view these items as interrelated from an >>economic standpoint?" >> >>-- >> >>Michael Perelman >>Economics Department >>California State University >>[EMAIL PROTECTED] >>Chico, CA 95929 >>530-898-5321 >>fax 530-898-5901 > >How willing is she to promote the tear-down of blocks of bungalows in >Berkeley and their replacement with five-story apartment buildings, or to >promote the tear-down of large houses in Palo Alto and their replacement >with townhouses? It is not density per se - commuter rail can be coordinated with ground transportation (buses) to overcome the low density problem. The real problem is the lack of political will. Suburbanites are scared shit of public transit because they think that it either (a) provides an easy access for "inner city people" who cannot wait to come and rob their suburban retreats (residential apartheid is precisely why these ratfuckers moved to the burbs in the first place) or (b) reduce ther property values. That, btw, was the main reason BART was not extended to San Mateo county and eventually Santa Clara County (there were talks about extending it via the east sied of SF Bay a few years ago for that particular reason, but I do not know what eventually came out of it). Add to it lobby of the auto industry that still calls the shots in departments of transportation throughout the nation - and you do not need any other explanation. btw, baltimore had always had a rather low density pattern of residence - but it did have a rather decent rail system until the Detroit Gang conspiracy dismantled it in 1940s and 1950s. so if the greens are serius about re-organizing transportation they need to start form organizing urban constituency that votes to counterbalance the influence of suburban fatheads - something along the lines of Proposition 103 that equalized insurance rates between cities and burbs. Ironically Prop 103 might have had an adverse effect on public transportation, because it made car cheaper for city dwellers. If memory serves there was group in SF Bay area advocating "planned congestion" and "market" (i.e. price) approach (increasing bridge tolls and parking fees) to make cars less attractive for commuters - a very clever way of using market ideology to fight the auto industry. wojtek
[PEN-L:8164] Re: Re: California Green Party AssemblyRepresentiverequests help
Urban and Transportation planning is my field. I was Chairman of the Graduate Urban Design Program at UCLA from 1964-69, although I have since moved on to international finance and economic policy analysis. The artificial dichotomy between mass transit and highways is misleading. Meaningful solutions cannot come from a poorly posed question. All transportation that moves large numbers of people are mass transit. In popular debate, what is meant is the pros and cons of railed transit and auto/highway transit. >From a technical point of view, railed transit is efficient in peak hour situations, its passenger load being limited only by the number of cars allowed by the length of loading platform and number of exits at stations. Another advantage is that it is relatively air pollution free. It main disadvantage is its linear geometry which does not serve most American cities effectively. Another disafavantage is that rial transit is generally considered only after concetrated devlopment has occurred, thus increasing the cost of its introduction through the need of land acquisition and complicated construction conditions. Pre-planned rail transit for new development are rare because of foresight requires intensive front-end investment. A fine book : Street Car Suburbs by Sam Warner, details the history of the development of Boston prior to the auto age. The highways/auto system is also a form of mass transit. The difference is that the individual basic unit is the car rather than the passenger. Its greatest disadvantage is its inability to handle concentration and peak hour loads. Each lane of highway can safely accommodate abut 400 vehicles flow per hour at a speed of 50 mph. Flow theory dictates that highest volume (800 vehicles/lane) will reduce speed to 18 mph and bottlenecks will result. Its secondary disadvantage is the need for parking. A parking sapce eats up 350 sf including circulation a compared to a working atation per employee of 150 sf. Already over 65% of of the urban land in Los Angeles is devoted to roads and parking, partly because city blocks in Los Angeles are too small for the needs of automobile configuration. Cars of course are air polluting. Yet, the advantages of the highway/auto system are not insubstantial. It serves effectively the spread-out existing urban patterns, albeit because the pattern grew from it. The car provides the driver with considerable freedom of movement and timing. There is no need to wait for the next train which in off peak hours never comes. The car is relatively more protective from urban crimes in empty stations. It is imminently more comfortable than the best subway train. In California, it is a common sight to see urban planners and economists who drive their fancy cars to meetings to promote urban rail mass transit. What is needed is a coordinate balance between peak hour concentration transportation needs and non-peak freedom for each city according to its historical conditions and special characteristics. The cost efficiency issue is a red herring, at least on a national basis. Both alternatives end up costing the same when subsidies and benefits are factored in. It is similar to the bogus issue of trying to increase the cost effectiveness of bath rooms in houses. The quickest way is to contract diarrhea if quality of life is not an issue. Rail transit has a hard time breaking into the existing financial system because the system has a great deal of invisible subsidies for highways, through gasoline taxes, etc. The battle is highly political because aside from the technical issue of efficiency, the real contention involves each alternative's impact on land value, which is determined by access capacity. In London, during the Labor 50's, there was a legislation to tax the surplus private land value created by public improvements in transportation. Mass rail transit subsidizes the down town office buildings, particularly when private parking becomes a profit center while public parking is shrinking. The cost of reducing worker commuting time to hard to get to locations is put on the general public rather than the employer. Employers should pay employees from the moment they leave their front door to the moment they return, not just from the moment the arrive at and leave the office. Lawyers get paid that way by their clients, why shouldn't office workers? There are of course many other issues and unintended consequences, but this will suffice for now. The issue is not rail vs cars, because each of us will use both at different times if both are available. The issue if to get those who advocate user fee to really pay up, such as urban land owners, car maunufacturers and owners. Put high taxes on downtown parking and use the revenue on underdeveloped economic ghettos. Make rail mass transit free and pay the cost from real estate taxes. Henry C.K. Liu Henry C.K. Liu Brad De Long wrote: > >Audie Bock, the new Green Assembly
[PEN-L:8162] information revolution?
from SLATE magazine's "today's papers" round-up (by Scott Shuger): USA TODAY >leads with a Commerce Dept. study coming out today concluding that digital business companies are driving the nation's economic growth. The study states that computer and communication hardware, software, and services, although only accounting for 8 percent of the U.S. economy, have contributed more than a third of its growth since 1995. This sector, says the study, is, thanks to its rising quality and falling prices, controlling inflation too.< Lawrence Summers [or his ghostwriter] minimizes this stuff in the passage exerpted by Doug. But it's been several years, so maybe the "inforev" is kicking in? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:8159] Re: California Green Party Assembly Representiverequests help
>Audie Bock, the new Green Assembly representative from Cal. has a >question for us. She asked, about transit issues. She quotes: "I have >the impression that mass transit and highway planning are treated as two >separate and distinct issues. I believe that when planning our highways >in California we could incorporate mass transit. What is the economic >feasibility of providing genuine mass transit throughout California? >Should we, as legislators view these items as interrelated from an >economic standpoint?" > >-- > >Michael Perelman >Economics Department >California State University >[EMAIL PROTECTED] >Chico, CA 95929 >530-898-5321 >fax 530-898-5901 How willing is she to promote the tear-down of blocks of bungalows in Berkeley and their replacement with five-story apartment buildings, or to promote the tear-down of large houses in Palo Alto and their replacement with townhouses? Mass transit seems to require much higher densities than we have at present in California--even largely-urban California, outside of a very few regions. And the currently chi-chi forms of mass transit--light rail a la BART--appear, as best I can judge, to suck down huge amounts of money that could be better spent on more busses and bus lanes. But it's not my field. And land-use and transit planning is genuinely very hard... Brad DeLong -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- "Now 'in the long run' this [way of summarizing the quantity theory of money] is probably true But this long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. **In the long run** we are all dead. Economists set themselves too easy, too useless a task if in tempestuous seasons they can only tell us that when the storm is long past the ocean is flat again." --J.M. Keynes -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- J. Bradford De Long; Professor of Economics, U.C. Berkeley; Co-Editor, Journal of Economic Perspectives. Dept. of Economics, U.C. Berkeley, #3880 Berkeley, CA 94720-3880 (510) 643-4027; (925) 283-2709 phones (510) 642-6615; (925) 283-3897 faxes http://econ161.berkeley.edu/ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
[PEN-L:8157] URPE Summer Conference Info
This is from Susan Fleck [EMAIL PROTECTED] (202)606-5654 x 415 -- Sent: Wednesday, June 16, 1999 11:11 PM Subject: URPE Summer Conference Dear Friends, The Union for Radical Political Economics is planning its summer conference (Aug 21-24) this year. The topic is 'Political Economy, the Environment, and Economic Crisis". For more information (including downloadable registration form) on this conference, see the URPE website at: www.urpe.org. URPE is known for its laid back, fun, and family friendly summer conferences. Deadlines for proposals for presentations or complete workshops (2-3 people) is June 22, 1999. Presentations need not be on the topic of the conference. Presentations may be work in progress - although written papers are encouraged. All presenters may submit their work to the Papers and Proceedings issue of the Review of Radical Political Economics. Please contact Susan Fleck at [EMAIL PROTECTED] or evenings (301)270-1486, if you are interested in presenting. Hope to see you there. Susan Fleck -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
