Tim Swanson Archive
Happiness by Will or by Writ?
Few people know of a country by the name of Bhutan. Even fewer can point to it on the map. And I dare say that even fewer know what kind of over-riding principle the top-down, command economy by which it is managed. Happiness. Gross National Happiness. Or rather, the relative happiness conjured up in the minds of people like Jigmi Thinley, the Home & Cultural Affairs Minister. Compare this approach to that advanced in the new film starring Will Smith. FULL ARTICLE
What Won't Nasa Invent Next?
In its 20+ year lifespan, the shuttle program has a failure rate of around 1 in 50 launches, writes Tim Swanson. Yet with this abysmally low success rate, its ever-increasing budget requests are approved annually. Could you imagine the economic impact on the domestic airline industry if there was a 1-in-50 chance of your plane crashing? In all reality, it would not exist beyond the research and hobbyist industries. Yet because Nasa is politically controlled and taxpayer funded, it can continue receiving funds indefinitely. Bankruptcy is out of the question. FULL ARTICLE
Can the Future Do Without Economic Logic?
Flying cars and little green men aside, many science fiction writers have shown an uncanny ability to predict and "foresee" the future. Yet, for all their prophetic accomplishments surrounding the development of future technologies, many fail to grasp the economic laws — the catallactics — that have remained unchanged for thousands of years. Here Isaac Bergman and I write about the economic fallacies in Charles Stross's latest book, Accelerando. As intriguing as the technological wizardry within the story may be, the plot is unfortunately riddled with economic misconceptions and non sequiturs. FULL ARTICLE
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