Evolution and Americans

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Nice trick, hiding text in my quotes topic

I had to steal your something something topic trick at least once.

I agree. And you dont see the (tele)vangelism here in Canada. Revivals are for paramedics and doctors to perform. We get some, but they are decidedly low key.

Maybe it is that Canadians value their privacy. We dont push ourselves into others beliefs. The only time I have had the topic broached was by a chiropractor. Needless to say I was shocked. That sort of thing is considered bad form.

I wasnt offended, but when I expressed a lack of interest in the subject, he differed and we went about worldly business. He was much more insistent on cracking my neck than saving my soul.

It was the only time in my life that I recall someone opening the subject so bluntly.

GDP is both production and consumption. It is where aggregate supply intersects with aggregate demand. Consumption is just part of demand, but questions of productivity go back to supply. The question of imports vs exports really does not matter, because imports and exports are accounted for in calculated GDP. GDP = Consumption + Investment + Government spending + Net Exports.

As for the issue of hours of annual work, that also gets into trickier business because Europe has labor regulations that the US doesn't, ergo, the US has less reason to produce more per work hour than Germany does. This is just a fact that would emerge from supply and demand models, if something reduces the amount of labor supplied(like the labor regulations do), then the Marginal Revenue Product for each laborer would be higher, but that isn't necessarily a good thing at all. In any case, there are a large number of factors to account for in stuff like this, and that cannot be reasonably accounted for, therefore I think your methodology is questionable.


Well.... no. The US GDP wouldn't fall by 20%. That's just bad economics, because the marginal benefit of additional hours of labor are LESS than the marginal benefit of the ones preceding, so if labor was reduced by 20%, then GDP would fall less than 20%, and there are also substitution effects that will reduce the loss in GDP. In any case, you have hardly proven your point, because your point rests partially upon a lack of understanding of diminishing marginal returns and substitution effects, and you are completely ignoring the valid statistics I have already put forward just to use a MUCH MORE questionable methodology just to support your position.

Hidden Agenda topic

My text got away from me. Strange that I did not notice when I started to type. Very strange. Something Canadian about it. I think this is the first time this has happened. Jeepers!

Thanks for pointing that out, fuzzy. I am almost embarrassed.

Be careful of chiropractors. Neck cracking can be a cause of stroke. I saw this on an episode of W5.

And about evolution. At the Ontario Science Centre last year there was an exhibit on Darwin. Very interesting. And not one protest. The exhibit was very peaceful orderly and well managed, on that ol'Canadian way!!

Not likely. Anti-intellectualism does not seem probable to impact practical education or the adoption of new capital. I mean, really, the issue is that the methodology is questionable, as manufacturing is one sector of the economy, and not all nations will focus upon it to the same extent or degree, which is the rational result of an international division of labor. Not only that, but the Anglo-Saxon economic model has not focused as much on manufacturing, and this has certain problems in and of itself.

http://www.institutional-economics.com/ ... rformance/

I'd suggest that a disregard of educating intellectually gifted children in ways that develop their innate abilities has everything to do with a lack of creative and critical thinking to tackle and change "mistaken strategic industry and trade policies." That same anti-intellectualism brought us the GWBush administration, and perpetuates the Creationist "young earth" belief, among many other things.

1) The labour in Europe do not lower the supply of labour - there is Europe a high unemployment rate, the free movement of labour inside the EU makes the supply of labour even better.
2) Relevant for the market are not hours worked, but the real costs of labour for a unit of each product (ton of a certain kind of steel, a car, etc.). The US-producers are in direct concurrence to the producers in Europe and they are loosing (see export statistics). To sell their products they must independent from the supply of labour lower the cost labour low. The only way is to raise productivity on products for which a market exists.
3) If the structure of an economy does not provide this pressure on the capitalist, the production becomes to easily compared to countries competing outdated.

It is even better for a economy to feed unemployment that to lower the pressure on the producer for rationalization. This is best way to keep the economy on edge of technology.



You are just saying than something less than 20% of all labour in the US is done without an real effect on the GDP?

Production is backbone of any economy of a certain size. Banking, services etc. are needed, but their main function is to provide services (capital, trade connections, etc.) for the production. The function of bank is accumulate capital and provide to be turned into "real" investment.

At end each $/€/£/Yen in the book must represent real goods in form of factories, products, roads, railway lines, buildings, etc. If this relation breaks down the whole system in danger, because at the end I want to be sure that my money can be turned in goods for the face value - and therefore goods must be produced in first hand. When in 1980s the discussion raised about a "service based society" it was, when I remember correctly the Deutsche Bank chair Wilhelm Christians how famously said: "We can't live from selling each other insurances and cutting each other hair."

The labor laws in Europe DO restrict the supply of labor though, in fact, your argument relies upon this.

Hours worked are relevant, in as much as restrictions on them can create an incentive for a substitution of capital for labor, this kind of substitution is also part of your case.

Outdated production would be reflected in GDP numbers. The issue is that outdated production does not seem a part of the question.


No, I am simply saying that the percentage change in labor will have a lesser percentage change in GDP.

Education does not do a lot to impact creativity from what I've seen, and critical thinking thinking is part of this.

As for "mistaken strategic industry and trade policies.", that applies to Europe, not the Anglo-saxon model, which is the US model.

Finally, the Bush administration was partly luck, and partly bad competition. The Creationist belief is perpetuated mostly by religion as well, as you cannot say that most believers in evolutionary theory actually think much about it. It usually is a belief for them too, just the belief happens to be substantiated by science.

Creationism is both logically AND scientifically false....Therefore, it should be BANNED. Violators should be forced to pay stiff fines, this would give the government an added source of revenue from wealth religious fanatic AND televangelists like Pat Robertson.

The backbone of an economy is useful goods and/or services. If a particular economy is good at combining information to create value, and this can be exported, then this can be viable.

Nope, money does not have to represent anything physical at all. What about IP? What about Indian call-centers? The relationship with money is always exchange, and this is a self-maintaining relationship. So, really, this focus on production is just as stupid as the focus by the physiocrats on land. Manufacturing != value. Value = value. And exchangeable value can really be a *LOT*.

I still maintain that anti-intellectualism (including some religious thinking), contributes to the above mentioned.

Z

Just so we're clear. The only report I'm familiar with (and admittedly I have no reason to be familiar with such reports) is that of the University of Groningen, and in that report in 2008 The US of A is measured as being comfortably ahead of Germany and most other countries in GDP per hour. (1990 GK$ 29.64 vs 36.58 United State's favor; similar considerations hold across the board).



AG already addressed the issue of marginal benefit. The average American dicks around an enormous amount of time on the job. Continuing the assumption that GDP is worth looking at (please direct all objection on that topic to somebody else), the United States leads Western Europe in GDP per capita by not anything like that much despite greater productivity. Assuming a constant GDP per hour, if the USA cut its work weeks GDP per capita would fall, but not even to Western Europe levels (tennis court sized countries like Luxembourg not being counting), which would by no means constitute a %20 GDP drop; that's just preposterous.

I'm also not sure I see that the USA doesn't have a "high technology" economy; some numbers would be kewl.

twoshots, on the matter of technology in the US economy, there are statistics to look at:

This is the technology and scientific infrastructure of a set of economies(which is stated close to the bottom).
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_i ... astructure

This is a measure of innovation.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_i ... innovation

R&D as a percent of GDP
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_r ... diture-gdp

Patents
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_p ... ts-granted

Technological achievement
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_t ... chievement

Technology index
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_t ... logy-index

Hopefully these numbers are kewl. All of them are obviously off of nationmaster, and the economy section, and most of them basically state that the US is as much a part of the high-tech community as just about any other nation, perhaps more so, given that the statistics I am giving seem reasonably fair metrics to measure this by, and all place the US high.

And why the products do not sell worldwide? At the end it is the marked how decides. To produce something which is only on the marked in the own country is not a good indicator for an economy.



First Luxembourg is not a "tennis sized country", but a founding member of the EU and NATO, has nearly 500'000 residences and is of the few fully trilingual countries, in which each citizen speaks at least three languages (otherwise he would even not able to understand the local newspaper). Rulers like Charles IV or Balduin of Luxembourg played the big game. The importance of Luxembourg is easy to recognize on the complex regulations of the Vienna Final Act in Art. 67, 68 and 71 in relation to the German Federal Act of 1815. I would not call this that easily a "tennis court size country".

as said above I do not trust the US-data fully, because they rely on US-markets, not on the world market, where real prices are defined.



There some areas in which the US had the lead: e.g. general IT. In other areas, like plant engineering and construction, transport systems, high technology optical system, car manufacturing, construction, production of special steels, so-called "white goods" the US are hardly seen by European companies as a competition.

He has a good point that relying solely on an internal market isnt very safe or healthy for an economy.