Problems....with Jeggings

NSFW.  Aggressively, exuberantly NSFW.

But pretty funny.

Linky 1

Linky 2

Link 3

Nod to Angry Alex. 

My Bromance with Eric Mazur

People, it's all come out in the open now. I've been publicly outed. You can see the spicy details right here.

IHS Art of Teaching Workship

A PSA for grad students. And, yes, I'll be at this party!

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Attn: Graduate students, if you’re interested in honing your research and teaching skills this summer, IHS has some great opportunities:
· The Symposia on Scholarship & a Free Society bring graduate students together with leading classical liberal scholars from a range of disciplines for a weekend of discussion and research presentations. All applicants are invited to submit an optional proposal for a paper presentation. Applications to attend this summer must be received by March 15th. Additional details: www.TheIHS.org/scholarship-free-society.

· The Liberty & the Art of Teaching Workshop taking place June 28-30 at Towson University in Towson, MD welcomes teachers, both new and experienced, to discuss and experiment with best practices for the university classroom. IHS provides full funding, including meals, accommodations, and program costs. Participants are responsible for travel (limited scholarships are available to cover travel expenses). For additional details on faculty presenters, topics, schedule, and feedback from past participants, visit www.TheIHS.org/teaching-workshop/liberty-art-of-teaching/

. Application deadline: April 15th.

IT Humor

So, I had never noticed this.  Have used this thing for years, never saw this.  When you are finished with using the projector system in the big auditorium (White Lecture Hall) on East Campus here at Duke, you get this confirmation screen.  And I always just pressed "yes" at the bottom.  But look at the choice in the middle:

Well played, IT android drones, well played!  Ya got me.

Great Little Economics Story for Class

From Tommy the Tenured Brit, an example.  I have adapted it for teachers of Econ 101: This is a fine little problem to give in class, complete with video. The essentials:

• Bridge revenue is tax-free, by law
• Bridge toll is 80 pence, for multiple passages per day
• Bridge revenue is 2,000 pounds per week in the busy summer, less in winter. About 80,000 pounds per year
• Owner is responsible for upkeep and repairs on bridge and toll machinery, cost 15,000 pounds per year
• Bridge "comes with" cottage, land, and fishing rights
• The bridge just traded hands at a price of 400,000 pounds.  

1.  What is the implied discount rate (assuming that the bridge (with repairs), the tolls, and the tax break are all perpetual)
2.  Now assume that tax break is eliminated, the discount rate is the same as for #1, and that the effective average tax rate on the owners is 40%.  What would be the predicted change in price, or the capital loss the owners would be stuck with?
3.  Are the owners making a supernormal return because of the tax break?

Unless I have got me sums wrong, the answers are:

1.  16.25%
2.  New price would be 243,750 pounds.  So the tax break is worth 156,250 pounds
3.  Of course not!  The tax break is the reason that the bridge was worth 400k instead of 243k pounds.  But the implied rate of return is the same, because the tax rate is capitalized into the value.

Now, then, let's talk about capital gains taxes on investments in new plant and equipment, SHALL we?

On Computers / WiFi in Class

It is so important to this professor that people only pay attention to him in all his narcissistic glory that he forced the class into a smaller room....

JUST so there is no wifi.

Wouldn't it have been easier to stay in the large class and ban laptops? Or make it possible to jam wifi somehow? It can't be hard.

Or, you could just let the students decide. As I argued before.

Political Economy Lecture Series Podcasts: Economics for Non-majors

So, here are the four podcasts from the PE lecture series from this fall. I put the name of the speaker, linked to his web page, and then a link to the podcast (in every case, an MP3). The sound quality is not always very good, because I was both the person in charge of recording and also the editor of final product.

Remember, the course that these podcasts come from is "Economics for Non-majors," a new but now permanent course being taught at Duke. (Syllabus for Fall 2011). Let me acknowledge the extremely helpful assistance of the Charles G. Koch Foundation and the Thomas W. Smith Foundation in getting this off the ground. We could not have done it without you, folks! There was nothing like this, and now there is a new permanent course, right here at Duke University. It will be offered at least twice a year from now on.

November 30, 2011: Professor Kevin B. Grier, University Professor and Professor of Economics, University of Oklahoma. (email him if you have questions!)

"MONETARY POLICY: PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE" (Link to mp3 file file)

November 2, 2011: Professor Timur Kuran, Professor of Economics and Political Science & Gorter Family Professor of Islamic Studies, Duke University. (email him if you have questions!)

"THE GREAT DIVERGENCE: WHY DO ISLAMIC COUNTRIES LAG ECONOMICALLY?" (Link to mp3 file)

October 12, 2011: Honorable William Gradison, US House of Representatives and PCAOB

"FINANCIAL REGULATION: CAUSES AND EFFECTS" (Link to mp3 file)

September 7, 2011: Professor John D. Lewis, Visiting Professor, PPE Program, Duke University. (email him if you have questions!)

"MORALITY OF EXCHANGE IN GREECE AND ROME" (Link to mp3 file)

KPC Summit: Angus on Monetary Policy

Last outside speaker for my "Econ for Non-Majors" course tomorrow (syllabus here):  Angus himself!

The course has been very fun to teach.  Just started it up (this is the second time around), and it has  80 students in the second semester.  (That's a pretty big class for Duke....)  The "real" sciences all have courses for non-majors, and I have noticed that a lot of students duck Econ because it has too much math.  But it's REALLY important (or so Angus insists).

I'll post the four podcasts (John Lewis, Classics; William Gradison, US House and PCAOB; Timur Kuran, Economics; and Kevin Grier, Economics) next week.  They were all REALLY good, and I'm sure Angus will be the cherry on top of my sundae of life, as always.

(Angus is flying in tonight.  A little trouble, though, because Ms. Angus screwed up his reservations.  Okay, no she didn't:  Angus got a little confused about the admittedly complex concepts of "before" and "after."  But it's all good.  The LMM has made a lovely gluten-free chocolate cake in anticipation of arrival d'Angus)

Martin comes to class!

Uber-reader Martin came to class and gave a very nice lecture on democracy. Worked well, and I appreciate the good lecture.

Flying Heads and Weak Knees

I went to NC Hunter Safety School for ten hours this week, and took my exam last night. Managed to pass, and now am certified to be able to kill things safely.

One of the Game Officers used the breaks to tell some stories of Bart, the decoy deer. Bart is a decoy that the Game Officers in Granville County use to catch idiots.

They put Bart up by the side of road, in a field, not near a house. Firing from a road, and especially firing from a vehicle, and hunting after 1/2 hour past sunset....all illegal.

And yet folks see Bart and just go a little nuts. Two stories I remember:

1. Guy in an SUV, wife in passenger seat, baby asleep in car seat in the back. Sees Bart. Apparently very excited. Opens passenger window, reaches around for rifle (apparently in back seat). Leans across wife, props gun on passenger window. Shoots Bart twice. Baby starts screaming. Idiot shoots Bart twice more. Bart, being made of wood and foam, with a deer skin covering, does not fall.

Game Officers come out of ditch on all sides. Wife is slapping at the guy, who is actually trying to get off just one more shot.

Game Officers approach. Guy says, "But, you have to understand. I have never shot a deer before. This would be my first."

Game Officer: "Well, I guess this is your big night for firsts, then. Have you ever been handcuffed?"

2. Bart is just the latest in a long line of Barts. The previous version of Bart was mechanical, and actually moved its head up and down and could wag and lift its little white tail. But earlier Bart had been shot so many times that the gears in the head-moving mechanism were broken. About every ten minutes or so, the gears would catch, and Bart would throw his head. Not very far, mind you, about six inches up and two or three feet to the side; the head would land a little ways from the body. Not something you see very often in a deer in the wild.

Anyway, an idiot drove by one night. He slowed down, drove ahead two hundred yards, and then stopped, presumably to get the rifle out of the trunk and load it. Then back he comes, and parks. Gets out of the car. Jumps down in the ditch, 20 feet from where the Game Officers are hiding, comes up out of the ditch on the other side. Lines up, and gets ready to fire.

And then the gears catch and Bart's head flies off, landing three feet in front of him.

The idiot backpeddles, trips, and falls on his butt at the top of the ditch, slides down headfirst on his back. The gun goes off, but no one is hit.

The Game Officers get up, to try to prevent death-by-moron.

BUT THE GUY DOESN'T HAVE ONE OUNCE OF QUIT IN HIM, NOT WHEN IT COUNTS. He crawls back to the top of the ditch, and TAKES A SHOT AT THE HEADLESS STANDING DEER. IT HAS NO HEAD. WHAT DOES HE THINK HE IS SHOOTING AT?

Mercifully, he was taken into custody. The officer claimed that he believed that not just deer, but also beer, may have been involved in this incident.

Now, I have no doubt that both these stories are in fact urban legends, repeated in the "I was there" fashion that improves their quality. But still, not bad as stories go. Thanks, Officer!

UPDATE: Frequent commenter and KPC pal Tom points out the following similar event. heehee....

Minsky Rising?

KPC BFF Der-zoo sends this link, a paean to absent friends.

One friend in particular, Hyman "Hy" Minsky. Check the abstract:

Recently, national newspapers all over the world have suggested that we should reread John Maynard Keynes, and that Hyman P. Minsky provides a valuable framework for understanding the world in which we live. While rereading Keynes and discovering Minsky are noble goals, one should also remember the mistakes that were made in the past. The mainstream interpretation and implementation of Keynes's ideas have been very different from what Keynes proposed, and they have been reduced to simple "fiscal activism." This led to the 1950s and 1960s "Keynesian" era, during which fine-tuning was supposed to be a straightforward way to fix economic problems. We know today that this is not the case: just playing around with taxes and government expenditures will not do. On the contrary, problems may worsen. If one wants to get serious about Keynes and Minsky, one should understand that the theoretical and policy implications are far-reaching. This paper compares and contrasts Minsky's views of the capitalist system to the tenets of the New Consensus, and argues that there never has been any true Keynesian revolution. This is illustrated by studying the Roosevelt and Kennedy/Johnson eras, as well as Keynes's reaction to the former and Minsky's critique of the latter. Overall, it is argued that the theoretical framework and policy prescriptions of Irving Fisher, not Keynes, have been much more consistent with past and current government policies.

Some thoughts:

1. Minsky's "model" predicted 11 of the last 3 recessions.
2. Angus and I used to mimic what we called the "Minsky Curve." Let's just say it hangs down rather limply, and is only policy-exploitable in the EXTREMELY short run. Ten seconds, max.
3. From the abstract: "If one wants to get serious about Keynes and Minsky...."? I don't, actually.
4. There's a Cal State Fresno? Really? Are Cal States like Circle K's; you can just buy a franchise, and put it up on a vacant corner lot? Ah, I see it is also called Fresno State. Okay, THAT I have heard of.
5. From the abstract: "Just playing around with taxes and government expenditures will not do." Amen.
6. There is such a thing as a "Minsky moment,"* apparently. I had a class from Hy, in grad school. For me, "Minsky moments" were times when I thought he was actually going to lecture, and say something about economics. Minsky moments of that sort were EXTREMELY rare. But this is an interesting article; have to give ol' Hy some credit, I think.

*A Minsky moment is the point in a credit cycle or business cycle when investors have cash flow problems due to spiraling debt they have incurred in order to finance speculative investments. At this point, a major selloff begins due to the fact that no counterparty can be found to bid at the high asking prices previously quoted, leading to a sudden and precipitous collapse in market clearing asset prices and a sharp drop in market liquidity.

(Nod to Art)

I am not alone!

Hi, my name is Angus and I'm a grade-avoider. I give exams right before spring break so that I can have "all week to get them done" but generally I'm up late on Monday of the next week feverishly grading to get them done by when I've promised them back to the class. While other people look at the new academic calendars for vacation days, I look for the line saying, "final grades due by:" If anything will make me stop professoring, it will be grading.

Mrs. Angus on the other hand is a grading machine. She'll give exams in both her classes and have the first set graded by the time the second class finishes taking their test.

Well I learned this week that I am a member of a big club according to Insider Higher Ed. Late grades are apparently a chronic problem and some schools are taking extreme measures to deal with them. The article is worth a read and so are all the comments. The comments will give you non-academics a feeling for why faculty meetings generally take so long and accomplish so little.

If you think the proposed remedies for late grades seem extreme, at the school where Mrs. Angus and I taught in Mexico, professors were required to go to an office before each of their classes and sign a form certifying that they were actually holding their class that day! I am not making this up. It irritated me to no end, so I wouldn't do it and the bureaucrats decided they weren't going to pay me, so I told them that would cause me to stop teaching the course. This real life "Mexican standoff" was resolved by me agreeing to sign about 20 backdated certification forms.

I really enjoy teaching but I despise grading.

The Best Email EVER, Prof Edition

An actual email, received from an actual student, by an actual professor. I have changed details and names, to protect the "innocent."

To put it in context, the prof is teaching an American politics course. Most
of the readings are on JSTOR. Here's the email:

Good afternoon-

XXXXX from your YYYYYY class (NNN) here, I just have a quick question for you regarding the JSTOR articles. I'm hoping/trying to get a jump on them and at least have them all printed out early and have them at hand.

But, regarding the {date} and {date} pieces, "Articles of Federation," and "U.S. Constitution," no authors were listed and I'm having some trouble locating the exact articles. And, when I search within the JSTOR database for "articles..." and "constitution..." there are a number of results.

-It just helps to have the author's name to narrow down the search to fewer articles within JSTOR and find the piece more easily.

I'm sure I'm missing something on this, but, could you lend a hand on this?

Thanks. :)

(Note the emoticon. Nice)

Oh. My. Goodness.

(Nod to {I can't even say. But a hearty nod!})