https://fguide.org/?p=77 News, outrage, euphoria, etc from the Center for Popular Economics Wed, 24 Oct 2007 10:37:44 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.1 https://fguide.org/?p=77#comment-1215 Jonathan Teller-Elsberg Mon, 02 Apr 2007 16:26:02 +0000 https://fguide.org/?p=77#comment-1215 NPR provided an April Fool's spoof that relies, in part, on a similar use of absurd measuring of "economic costs." They ran a story on how New York City is considering mandating that <a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9210663" rel="nofollow">all phones use one of four City-sanctioned ring-tones</a>, in an effort to reduce "ring rage" (fights triggered by obnoxious ringtones). It was a great story and they had me going for a little while. Anyway, the guy defending the City's new mandate claims that obnoxious ringtones result in $1.2 billion in lost economic activity. Yes, this was made up as part of the April Fool's story but the fact remains that there are economists who would attempt to measure something like that and have their results published. When will someone research the extent to which sleep interferes with maximal economic growth? Just give everyone lots of methamphetamines and I bet they'd buy, buy, buy! And imagine how fast you could run the assembly line if everyone had access to all the coke they could snort? And once all the workers were hooked, you wouldn't have to pay them one red cent--just promise to feed the monkey on their back and they'd be working away without complaint. 24-hour workplace; near-zero wages; surely, it'd be the best of all possible worlds--from the perspective of too many economists, I fear. (I don't mean that there are any, or hardly any, economists who would really like this scenario if they took a moment to think about it. But there are plenty who's work and assumptions fit perfectly with stuff like this without their realizing it.) NPR provided an April Fool’s spoof that relies, in part, on a similar use of absurd measuring of “economic costs.” They ran a story on how New York City is considering mandating that all phones use one of four City-sanctioned ring-tones, in an effort to reduce “ring rage” (fights triggered by obnoxious ringtones). It was a great story and they had me going for a little while. Anyway, the guy defending the City’s new mandate claims that obnoxious ringtones result in $1.2 billion in lost economic activity. Yes, this was made up as part of the April Fool’s story but the fact remains that there are economists who would attempt to measure something like that and have their results published. When will someone research the extent to which sleep interferes with maximal economic growth? Just give everyone lots of methamphetamines and I bet they’d buy, buy, buy! And imagine how fast you could run the assembly line if everyone had access to all the coke they could snort? And once all the workers were hooked, you wouldn’t have to pay them one red cent–just promise to feed the monkey on their back and they’d be working away without complaint. 24-hour workplace; near-zero wages; surely, it’d be the best of all possible worlds–from the perspective of too many economists, I fear. (I don’t mean that there are any, or hardly any, economists who would really like this scenario if they took a moment to think about it. But there are plenty who’s work and assumptions fit perfectly with stuff like this without their realizing it.)

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