Mass transit vs. green alternatives

Mass transit is always good, right? It's way more efficient than all those cars clogging up the roads. I loved my years in Japan, where trains come and go everywhere with high efficiency and frequency. I didn't need a car, and it was great. You'll know what I mean if you've ever spent time in New York City or Washington D.C. Plus, the imminent threat of global warming compels us to build for a future of mass transit, right?

But while reading the Economist's excellent survey on The Future of Energy last week, a new thought occurred to me that I haven't seen discussed. What happens when, thanks to all this entrepreneurial energy going into solving our energy problems, we get zero-emissions cars? Then, what's the green argument for building zillion-dollar train and bus infrastructure? Some of these projects take decades to complete--by which time it's hard to imagine gas-hogging cars will still be around. Road congestion, parking scarcity, etc. -- all of these can be made much easier with information technology that again it's hard to imagine won't be in full swing by the time that gigantic train project is complete.

I'm just one guy, so you shouldn't make policy based solely on what works for me, but at the same time you risk doing terribly damaging and irrational things if you try to "guess" about what works best for society as a whole. If you aren't positive something's a good public policy idea, you should be extremely cautious recommending it, and public transportation policy is another example.

There is just no way you will ever make mass transit efficient enough for those of us in the suburbs to give up our cars. I'll carpool or vanpool to work if it's convenient, sure, but a bus? Or a train? No way, especially if I have one of those super-efficient low-cost, carbon-neutral cars of the future.

I bet virtually everyone supporting big mass transit projects agrees with me when they say we want mass transit for other people. I'm too busy/important/lazy to take the train, but you on the other hand shouldn't be able to enjoy my lifestyle. I want you to deal with hauling groceries, making multiple drop-offs for young kids, changing your mind to pick up last-minute takeout -- all the reasons it's rational for me to take a car instead of the bus or train. If you get off the road, it will make my life easier: no traffic congestion, no parking problems.

But what happens when you decide you want to move into your own single-family dwelling in the suburbs? Hmmm, maybe I can think of something that will prevent you from ever being able to afford that. Like, maybe if I raise your taxes enough to pay for some expensive mass transit project?

Incidentally, before you say it's obvious what should be done, take a look at Jimmy Carter's energy crisis speech of 1979.  What happened to the 20% of energy we were supposed to get from solar by 2000?  Or the declaration that "this nation will never use more foreign oil than we did in 1977"?  Laudable goals, but they look about as silly in hindsight as I'm sure most of today's well-meaning proposals will seem in 30 years.

I'm (about) as smart as a third world tenth grader

The people behind Two Million Minutes, that film about high school education in China and India, released an online test that lets you get a sense of what tests are like in India so you can compare yourself (or your kids) to their future competitors.

I tried the History exam.  Supposedly it's not nearly as rigorous as the real exam that Indian kids take, but at least it gives you a flavor of the difficulty. History is pretty fuzzy, of course, at least compared to math or physics or chemistry (some of the other sections on the test). I mean, with math it's fairly straightforward to ask a question like "what is the probability of having 53 sundays in a leap year". Even though you may have never heard that math question before, you'll know how to solve it if you know something about probability. With history, I don't see a way to do well unless you simply memorize every possible date or event. It basically boils down to a rote memory contest; somebody with photographic memory would do exceptionally well.

I think I understand now why I'm less than impressed with Indian schools, at least as they were presented by the movie and, now, the test. You don't need to understand anything about history other than dates. You could do well on this test even if you were completely incapable of applying lessons of history to current events, for example, or if you were unable to think outside the rote box.  Assuming the math and science sections are similar (a big assumption), I'm less worried about straight head-to-head competition on real-life matters.

On the other hand, there is much to be said for the type of discipline that these schools apparently instill in students who have the patience to learn fact after fact. 

The test took only took a few minutes to complete, and afterwards I received an emailed PDF summary of my results. Of 15 questions, I answered 9 correct, 2 incorrect, and 4 "no answer".  It concluded that I am "Good", but gave me no other obvious way to compare myself to other test takers.

One good reason to keep your bottled water

Today's Seattle Times describes bottled water and mentions that many of the the nation's mayors are suggesting we use tap water instead.

But missing from the discussion is the one difference between bottled and tap water that might matter: tap water contains fluoride (at least here in Seattle and Mercer Island).  Adults with healthy teeth don't need fluoride, and young kids can get it plenty of other ways.  Scientific American and others point out that many of us get too much, mostly thanks to tap water.

I just checked with Aquafina (and I'm sure the other mainstream waters are similar): they don't contain fluoride.

So my advice to anyone in government who wants to force us to give up bottled water:  turn off the fluoride in the tap water first.

Chasing the relative decline in Mercer Island incomes

One of the many ways people get frustrated with me is that I have a very skeptical view of statistics. Numbers are so easy to manipulate -- and so regularly wrong -- that I rarely see a so-called "fact" without finding a hole or two in it.

Here's my latest example, but first, I apologize for the misleading headline. I believe it is a statistical fact that Mercer Island household incomes are falling relative to the per-capita incomes of the rest of the United States. Unfortunately I'm unable right now to get specific Mercer Island historical information (at least, not on-line) so my claim is a little weak right now. But hear me out.

Anyone who reads the newspaper (or political web sites) knows that incomes in America are stagnant, and have been for a while. But just because it's in the paper, is it true?

I looked up the statistics myself on the Census bureau website. Here are the latest numbers available:

	Median household income
2006	$ 116,011
1995	$ 98,990

Sure enough: that's about 17% wage increase in 10 years -- less than inflation--and pretty pathetic. [insert newspaper man-on-the-street interview with somebody struggling to make ends meet. Extra credit: insert contrasting story about rich guy who made a windfall on oil profits]

Now let's look at per-capita income:

	Median per-capita income
2006	$ 26,352
1995	$ 17,227

That's a whopping 53% improvement during the same 10 year period.

How can both facts be true at the same time? The answer is that household sizes are changing. People who tell you that American incomes are stagnant are making the classic error of comparing apples to oranges; a "household" in 1995 is not the same as a "household" in 2006.  In fact, you would expect household incomes to rise more slowly relative to per-capita income because the more incomes rise, the more likely people are to want their own living space (think about 20-somethings who can't wait to get a job so they can move into their own place).

So how does this relate to Mercer Island? Well, we are one of the few areas in the country where (thanks to the limited amount of developable land available) the number of households hasn't changed much in 50 years. In fact, 68% of us live the Ozzie & Harriet way, with a mom+dad and kids all living in the same house, often with Mom earning no income. So I bet if you look at the ratio between Mercer Island household income and U.S. per-capita income in 1960, you'd find the gap has almost certainly dropped compared to today. Our households are becoming poorer relative to the rest of the U.S.!

The statistics above show how this would work nationally: in 1995, the ratio between household income and per-capita income was 5.75, but by 2006 it had dropped to 4.4, no doubt because all those rising incomes make people naturally want to move out of shared living quarters into their own private places.

How about it?  can somebody get me a previous year for the following statistics:

Mercer Island	HH income	# HH	# indivs	Per-capita income (MI)	Per Capita income (US)	Radio between MI-HH and US Per capita
1999	110,830	8,437	22,036	57,799	27,939	3.96
1989 ? or before	?	?	?	?		<I bet you this ratio is higher>

If I can find another earlier dataset, I'm sure it would prove my case.  Then, like anyone who finds a statistical fact that supports a preconceived idea, I think I'll try to find a politician who can do something to fix this inequity.  What can we do to prevent Mercer Island household incomes from plunging any further?  Don't laugh -- the statistics don't lie.  :-)-

Who is Marcie Maxwell?

Besides the presidential race, there's another election in November, one that will affect your house, your schools, and your neighborhood more directly than anything that happens in Washington D.C.  It may be more fun to discuss geopolitical issues, or pretend your opinion matters about macroeconomic policy, but your local and state representatives have an immediate affect on your day-to-day school issues and transportation options -- and as candidates they are a lot more responsive to your input.

The Mercer Island area is served by representatives from the Washington State 41st legislative district, and this year there are two candidates:  Steve Litzow (Mercer Island City Councilman) and Marcie Maxwell from Renton.  Steve's a good guy -- I have a lot of respect for him and his role on Mercer Island.  But I hadn't heard of Marcie until earlier this year. She presented to the Mercer Island school legislative team a few months ago and I'm sure she'll be making many more appearances as we head into summer and fall (she let me take that photo when I met her at a party).  So who is she?

She's a real estate agent with years and years of local community involvement in everything from the Rotary Club (she's local president) to the school board (former president) to her local neighborhood association (Kennydale, former president).  I'm pretty sure she knows everybody in Renton (including my favorite public official blogger, Renton Councilman Randy).

By all accounts, she'd make a great representative, but I have two concerns.  So I emailed her and she responded immediately with a personal reply.

First, since my natural inclination is to support my home team (Steve Litzow lives not far from me), I wanted to know what sort of connections (if any) she has with Mercer Island.  Here's her response:

My parents have lived on Mercer Island since 1989.  My dad passed away on December 13th, 2007 at age 86 and my mother continues to live in her condominium on Mercer Island.  As I grew up in Central and South Seattle and am Sephardic Jewish, we have many life long family friends and community connections on Mercer Island.  Also, for many years, we attended Temple B'Nai Torah where my children went to Sunday School and had their Bar/Bat Mitzvahs at the temple's former site on Mercer Island. 

I have worked directly with Mercer Island School Board Directors on education issues as well as built ongoing working relationships with my state legislators who live there.

Second, since education is my number one issue, I was concerned about one thing missing from her background: although she and her family seem extremely supportive of public schools, their focus seems to stop at high school.  What about college? or graduate school?  Does she push students to pursue doctorates and professional degrees?  Here's what she said:

My daughter graduated from Central Washington University with a degree in Nutrition; she went on to Western Culinary School and is a Classicly Trained Chef; and then graduated from the highly regarded Dietitian program at Oregon Health Sciences University and is a Registered Dietitian.  My son attended a university then graduated from Renton Technical College with an AA degree and ASE Certification in auto mechanics.  Both are successfully employed in their fields, supporting themselves, and are wonderful young people.

I grew up in a working class household in inner city Seattle, attended Seattle Public Schools, attended college but did not graduate as I needed and wanted to work.  At age 22 and with strong work ethics and promotions, I was hiring, training, and managing college graduates to work in the branch banking field.  I have been through extensive trainings and continued learning opportunities throughout each of my careers.

Long-term, deep community involvement is her biggest strength, but in one way that's her biggest weakness as well.  Her entire life and career, along with her family and friends, has been so focused on local that she's faced little serious competition from people or organizations out of the area, much less any kind of threat from world-class or global competitors.  The people of the 41st district will always need auto mechanics and chefs, policemen, and real estate agents, no matter how good the schools are in China or India.   Strong unions can protect teachers, and Olympia can ensure that the Microsofts and Amazons pay their "fair share" of the revenue needed for transportation and public services, but will that be enough?

These are the sorts of questions I think we should be asking of her (and Steve) between now and November.  A lot will happen between now and then, so I'm not ready to put my name (or money) on any candidate yet.  Marcie has plenty of impressive backers, but so does Steve.  Some people endorse both.  What do you think?

Your future as a classics major

As I continue thinking about the whole Yong Zhao discussion, Mercer Island resident Keith Pleas sent me a pointer to an interesting study mentioned on the Economist blog, (which in turn came from my favorite, Freakonomics blog).   Apparently your college major has little impact on lifelong earnings after you control for all the other influences like family background, differences in hours worked, and SAT scores. So, go ahead, major in philosophy!

This doesn't surprise me.  Motivated, ambitious people tend to be successful no matter what.

Sometimes we don't have a choice in what we study, as I'm reminded by in this quote from John Adams:

I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain.

Check out Glassdoor.com to see how your own salary compares and see if you agree.

Not enough jails in this country

When I arrived home from Vashon late last night, our mailbox was still there, but sometime between then and mid-morning, some jerk pulled it out of the ground and ran off with it.

They didn't take our neighbor's box (on the left) but that little stump (on the right) is all that remains of ours.  The policeman tried to suggest that maybe somebody knocked it over with a car, but that doesn't make sense: why would they steal the whole thing and take it with them?

All our important mail (finances, bills, letters from Trabant) goes to our PO Box, so the most a thief would get is maybe a late Fathers Day card or a copy of the Economist, and besides, the guy took it before the mailman arrived today anyway.  ("Are you sure, Daddy?" my daughter asked, "Maybe they wanted the Ross-Simons catalog").

It clearly was a deliberate act. We found the mailbox later, tossed under a tree on a nearby street.

What kind of a loser would do such a thing?

Our house has an armed security system, plus a web cam that pushes live images to the internet (unfortunately, it doesn't face the mailbox, though). Plus our neighbors all know each other and we talk a lot, so we are all now very wary.