Wafah Watch 3!

Dude! Totally serious! She said that! I'm not lying!

Index Mundi

Hands down my favorite web site is Nationmaster.com. The web site is arguably the largest and most comprehensive collection of economic and demographic information about all the countries in the world. You combine that with their charting and graphing functions and only the Legendary Redheaded, Lingerie Wearing, Video Game Playing Babe Economist Who Likes to Serve Irishmen Martini's that the Elder Economist of Yore spoke of could detract me for a Saturday evening.

All that being said, unfortunately the damn site copy rights all their charts, no matter how magnificent they may be. Alas, I can't use them here and share their splendor and glory with all of you.

But I did happen upon Index Mundi, which essentially is the same thing as Nationmaster, but;

1. It doesn't copyright the charts, thereby allowing for the advancement of economic knowledge
2. It also DOESN'T provide the correlation coefficients and other statistical measures that Nationmaster does. Thus me and Liberal Guy, and Derek cannot debate whether they are statistically significant or not.
3. It has merely a fraction of variables that Nationmaster has.

Regardless, it does make for some pretty cool charts like Fertility Rates versus GDP per capita;

Which proves children are evil.

Or Fertility Rates versus Literacy Rates

Which proves children bring about stupidity.

Regardless, now you too can be cool like real life economists and toy around with the charting function yourself come some Saturday evening when you can't find a date.

Wafah Watch 2

This link was sent to me. Keep sending them.

http://www.damnfunnypictures.com/html/Bin-Ladens-Hot-Neice.html

Hear Ayman al-Zawahri might be dead. I'm still confused how anybody can be criticizing Bush on this war.

Winger

So it's Friday afternoon. And we all know that on Friday afternoons the production of GDP in the US drops to levels similarily found in The Republic of Chad.

Thusly, I was perusing about the internet, reading one of my favorite comics, and there's a link with a cartoon guy with a big nose "Winger."

Had nothing else to do so I clicked on it. And it was that one click that reminded me the best things that have happened to me were by taking chances.

"Armed and Dangerous" looked like a stupid video game, but I rented it anyway and found out it was my favorite video game ever.

Didn't see a trail in Badlands National Park, but I did see the buttes I wanted to go to, and so just trekked out right into the field. That resulted not only a great 24 mile hike, but finding 2 fossil sites that hadn't been discovered by humans since the beasts died there.

And let's not forget the radio show competition. Didn't know if I was really up to it, had a lot of competition and no previous experience to speak of. Now I'm one of four finalists in AM 1500's Next Big Thing competition.

Winger is the same thing, teaches you to click on that extra link, take the time to look at new things. ABSOLUTELY FREAKING HILARIOUS! And intelligently so too. And although I'm an adamant despiser of religion, and the hero, Winger, is religious, he actually shows you that you can be religious and an independent thinker and somebody who can function in the real world...of course, Winger is a cartoon whereas I've yet to find a religious person in the real world that does the same.

One final thing I will mention is that I do like the combination 1950's/1940's art with a hint of Japanese animation. It's like Walt Kelly's Pogo meets Cowboy Bebop, classy and modern at the same time.

Anyway, pay young Carson a visit. You shan't regret it.

I Want a Medal Too!

Seems to me that in the North Korean military you can get a medal for wiping your own ass.

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Read this and tell me how this isn't a very well crafted article;

http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=5385434

Economics is Becoming Less Volatile

I noticed something visually when I was perusing through some of my old charts and that was GDP growth has been becoming less and less volatile. Recessions are not quite as severe, nor are recoveries quite as heroic.

So what I did was went to EH.net and downloaded RGDP for the US going back to 1790 and calculated the 5, 10 and 20 year variances in RGDP growth rates, resulting in a chart that I left at my other office. Of course, it doesn't matter too much because official GDP data was not consistently compiled before the 1930's, so the estimates are somewhat questionable. Regardless, the chart did confirm what I saw, the volatility in economic growth has been decreasing.

I wanted to use some more consistent data and so I went to the FRED database at the St. Louis Fed and ran the same calculations except since 1947 we've been recording RGDP quarterly, allowing for more datapoints. This resulted in 5, 10 and 20 QUARTER variances shown below;

Notice the practical elimination of any volatility in our economic growth. It behooves the question if we're taming economics, learning more and more about what governs and influences the dismal science as time passes. Not mastering it mind you, as that would indicate we'd be able to boost our economic growth rate (which we're not),but being able to turn the precipitous drops and rapid recoveries into more of gentle ebbs and flows.

Several ideas come to mind. First and foremost my hero, Alan Greenspan. Notice variance all but ceases to exist once Al came in, implemented wise monetary policy, and destroyed inflation. Stable prices I'm sure contribute greatly to this decrease in volatility.However, I also think the Baby Boomers grew the ef up, and instead of protesting every Saturday, got jobs, had kids, which is certainly a life stablizing factor. Globalization has certainly diversified the economy and made us less susceptible to supply shocks. But I certainly would appreciate to hear what others think.

Regardless, the primary benefit to such consistency is that it would eliminate the riskiness of long term investments (which may in part explain why long term interest rates are so low and we're approaching an inverted yield curve).

I'm busy here, so feel free to do the writing for me and tell me what say you.

Terrorists and Leftists DO Have this in Common

Read this

http://www.atlasblogged.com/archives/2006/01/angela_bradbery.php

And then read this (albeit lengthy)

http://captaincapitalism.blogspot.com/2005/07/what-terrorists-and-leftists-have-in.html

and then tell me I'm not right.

Wulf the Teacher

I was kind of toying with the idea that I might want to teach. Knocked out enough hours in the profit world and thought that if I could instill some basic rules of economics, personal financial management and fiscal austerity in a generation of kids, then I'd have done my part to shore up the future finances of the country.

Then I substitute taught.

Good lord, you want to know where my pure hatred for public schools and teachers comes from, just go and substitute teach for a little bit.

And don't substitute teach because you can't find a job or because you think it's a cake walk. In other words, don't substitute teach for you. No, I want you to go and teach with the idealistic notion that you are to help actually educate the children. That your purpose there is to do your best to make sure they don't miss out on an interesting or important lesson in life.

And then you will see why all public schools must be destroyed.

For while there is a bumper sticker/saying in the Minneapolis public school district;

"Good schools, Great Kids; Minneapolis Public Schools"

You'd find out over the course of subbing that it should really say;

"Crappy, Absentee Parents = Dumbest, Most Retarded Children, + Lazy, Self-Serving Teachers = Biggest Pissing Away of Tax Payer's Money; The Minneapolis Public Schools"

(And I have the proof to prove this!)

Anyway, that's why I have respect for Wulf the Teacher.

Wulf is a science teacher and a conservative one at that. Although I've always noticed teachers of science and mathematics always lean to the right because they deal with reality, not theory. Regardless, how he or anybody else that is sane can tolerate teaching is beyong me. I seriously wanted to beat some of those kids and their parents senseless with multiple baseball bats, and I'm not joking about that either.

Anyway, he also posts at Atlas Blogged, a sharp syndicate of bloggers. Pay young Wulf a visit, he might teach you a thing or two.

Sorry for the Delay

My apologies for a lack of posts, I had to prep for another radio show. I am told I am one of the 4 finalists in the Next Big Thing competition at AM 1500. There is an actual paying gig to whoever wins.

I made a bunch of posts below, short as I'm short on time, but I think you'll like the charts (not that you wouldn't anyway, because how CAN'T you like charts!?)

And You Thought Dotcoms Were Overvalued

High oil prices seemed to have translated in the Holland Tulip Bulb insanity in the middle east.

Unsustainable and Not Real

I love this chart from The Economist. Shows you that the majority of the jobs created recently in France have been due to the government (public sector and subsidized). Problem with that is that since the government does not adhere to the demands and desires of the market, all it does is redistribute money from people who would have spent it on what they wanted (thereby maximizing utility and standards of living) and give it to people/employers to create jobs that aren't necessarily in demand, resulting in less production, wealth and utility.


You can expect France to forever trail behind the US.

Hillary is a Socialist. PERIOD

http://www.observer.com/thepoliticker/2006/01/clinton-and-belafonte.html

Look, democrats, I'm going to do you a favor. Don't run Hillary in 2008. She's a socialist. Everybody except you see through her...then again you probably think the rest of America wants socialism. Only the lazy people, my fellow democrats, only the lazy people.

Wafah Watch

OK, so those of you who have known me in the past month or so, know that I am a big fan of Wafah Dafour (Osama Bin Laden's niece) for obvious reasons. What gets me is this girl has no official site and quite frankly for such a drop dead gorgeous creature with such notoriety, not a lot of press or pictures.

That's why, to do my part to piss off Osama Bin Sheep F#cker and be a patriotic American, I'm officially instituting "Wafah Watch," which actually shouldn't be all that painful to do. Should I happen upon any more pictures of this gorgeous work of art, I will post them here. These are the latest I've come across;

My Future Wife

For My Loyal Readers and AM 1500 listeners;

Loyal Readers, do not fret, I know this doesn't make sense, but it is for a radio show i'm doing on Sunday. Please refrain from making any commentary until Monday.

AM 1500 listeners, this is the girl I'm talking about.

Well at Least We're Sexier than Them

And I thought economists were geeks.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/EDUCATION/01/04/largest.prime.number.ap/index.html

What possible practical application does this have?

The Advent of the SUV's Has No Affect on Oil Prices

I'm more and more convinced that the defining characteristic or trait of a liberal or leftists is that they disregard the truth to believe in whatever they want.

If it sounds good, shifts blame from me, and advances my cause, then screw whatever the truth is.

Alas, we here at Captain Capitalism know that the closer you follow and act on the truth (and implement fiscal and monetary policies that are based in facts) the more successful a person, a life and a country you will be (as Evo Morales and the people of Bolivia are soon to find out in reverse).

So when I read this;

in The Economist, it made me think, "gee, with all the other cars, factories, power plants, etc. that use and consume oil for its energy, do SUV's really have that much of an effect on gas prices?"

Now it becomes tricky because there isn't any data out there that breaks down how much gas was used to fill up SUV's versus cars. And I could go out and look at all the cars produced versus all the SUV"s produced, then also account for all the used cars, and then extrapolate an estimate of how much gas was being used by SUV's versus cars, but that would be too combersome and inaccurate.

Besides, it turned out to be unecessary. Because sometimes other related data will give you your answer. And I found my answer at the Department of Energy. Here, they list total crude oil and petroleum products used in the US going back to 1981. They break this down then between airplane fuel, power plants, heating oil, etc., including total motor gasoline consumption.

I calculated the percent of total crude oil and petroleum products that was used in motor gasoline comsumption, thinking that if SUV's really were to blame for higher oil prices, then we'd see an upward trend, showing that as SUV's guzzled more and more gas, then motor gasoline would consume a higher and higher percentage of our total petroleum consumption.

Well, here you go.

It seems that the advent of SUV's has had no discernable effect on the demand for oil relative to other users of oil. Motor gasoline still consumes roughly 43% of all petroleum, just as it has the past 20 years. Of course, cars have become more fuel efficient, and one could make a good argument that SUV's counter this, but the net effect is nothing. SUV's haven't bolstered oil prices as much as stabilized them.

Real GDP Per Capita

JTapp, our young Lieutenant friend in our southern climes who defends the US with his mechanical abilities has impressed me for within one week of me discovering a web site, he discovered it as well.

http://www.eh.net/

And so while I normally just cite the website or source of my data, this web site is actually cool enough that it warrants being referenced.

However, my original intention of going to this site was to look up another curiosity of mine and that is how the primary and best measure of standards of living has fared over the course of time; Real GDP Per Capita.

Of course communist weaklings, incapable of living and supporting themselves in the real world will advance their ulterior motive and call RGDP per capita a flawed measure of standards of living and will instead insist on using crap measures such as "the Human Development Index."

But they are public sector and non-profit wimps, and therefore rather than using their HDI which has been with us a whole whopping 5 or 10 years, we will use the adult measure of RGDP per Capita which has been with us (in one way or another) since the beginning of the country;


The chart itself is very interesting, note the dramatic drop and then recovery in the Great Depression and WWII. But what I was more curious about was whether we as a country have been improving our standards of living at a faster or slower rate compared to other generations. Thus I calculated the annual change in RGDP per Capita since the beginning of the country;


Of course, the length of the data and inherent volatility of economics allows for no discernable trend, so I did a rolling 20 year average.


This is where it gets interesting. Notice that for most of the country's existence RGDP per capita grew at about 1.5% or so on the average. Then the Great Depression hit, naturally bringing down standards of living. A rapid increase in RGDP per capita occured when we recovered from the Great Depression. This extremely high growth rate was due to the fact we were coming from such a lowered standard of living that growth rates mathematically were high and the economic boom that WWII brought about. What gets particularly interesting is when RGDP per capita just tanks in the 1950's.


This at first didn't make any sense to me. The 1950's were booming. Economic growth had not been rivalled like that ever in the history of the US. Why were standards of living dropping?

The answer can be found by looking at the "Pre-Great Depression" average growth rate in RGDP per capita and the "Post- WWII" average growth rate in RGDP per capita.


Note that after WWII the standards of living had been increasing at a consistent rate higher than ever before. Traditionally US RGDP per capita grew at about 1.5% per year on the average. After WWII the average was 2%, a full half a percentage point higher.

Savvy liberals and socialists desperate for data that "proves" their economic system works will immediately point out that before WWII and the Great Depression taxes were a mere fraction of what they are today. That after we implemented welfare, social security, and the bevy of other socialist programs standards of living increased at a faster rate, ergo, socialism rules.

Silly socialists.

For you see, there is a different variable that is at play here. And when I say "variable" I should really say "virus" or "sickness" or "epidemic." A plague that has thwarted mankind's attempt to increase their standards of living. A curse that explains the precipitous and contradictory drop in the RGDP per capita growth rate despite a booming economy in the 50's and explains why standards of living are growing faster than they ever have before in the history of the US;

Children.

Yes, children. The agricultural economic equivalent to locust. The more children you have, the more capita you have to divide that RGDP by. It should not be a shock that Ethiopia, Somalia and other sh!tholes in the world that have incomes per capita of $500 per year coincidentally have fertility rates of 6-7 children per woman. It should also not shock you that when the Baby Boom took place, standards of living tanked.

The reverse holds true as well as evidenced by the historically low birth rates in the 1970's to today. The less kids you have, the more RGDP you get to keep for yourself (or for you Jensenite I-bankers out there, the more shares of stock you issue, the more diluted your earnings become). Of course, this sadly points out something we already know; we don't owe our higher standards of living to working harder or smarter or advances in technology. And we certainly don't owe it to the volumes of sociology majors and communcations majors we're producing. We owe it because we're smart enough to make sure the denominator in RGDP per capita stays low.

The "Why" is Irrelevant...and Probably Stupid

OK, I'm putting an end to this.

Young aspiring male economist romanciers, I am going to educate you on a lesson that is arguably the most important lesson I ever figured out in courting the ladies. It is a lesson that is going to make your courting life a HELL of a lot easier. And I am being 100% totally serious when I say it is a VITAL lesson to learn for I have seen many a-aspiring male economist romanciers go through unneeded and undeserved pain and strife.

Read these comics in order;

http://sinfest.net/d/20020105.html

http://sinfest.net/d/20020109.html

http://sinfest.net/d/20020111.html

OK so this has happened to all of us and recently happened to a friend of mine (which triggered this post). Not to say that we've all had a date go "Oh my God, Dawson Creek is on" and then split on the date. But we all have been in the situation where we;

1. Land a date
2. Get excited about the date
3. And then either the date bails on us at the last minute or is no longer interested after the first date.

The problem is what happens after the girl bails on us or rejects us.

Note how Slick (the kid in the comic) responds in the last strip. He's kicking a can saying, "If I only...If I just....Maybe if I...."

And there's the problem right there.

It is this instantaneous, knee-jerk reaction that when a girl bails on us, men immediately and by default look at ourselves and say,

"Gosh, what did I do. Maybe if I did this, or maybe if I did that. What did I say? How could I improve."

And I too was in your situation as a young 24 year old when a girl cancelled on me on the last minute. And whilst racking my brain and replaying the events in order to find out what it was that I did wrong that caused her to bail, it then suddenly dawned on me;

WAIT A MINUTE, WHO SAID IT WAS MY FAULT?????

This revolutionary thinking totally changed the premise by actually admitting that maybe, maybe the problem wasn't the guy, but rather the girl. That maybe, it's just possible, that a man can play all of his cards right and the girl might be the one to fumble the ball.

Look at our young friend, Slick. How could an objective observer possibly blame Slick for the failure of the date?

So here's the rule gentlemen, it doesn't matter why the girl bails. The "why" is irrelevant. The only thing that matters is what "is." If the girl bails on you, don't rack your brain trying to find out why, you can't! The only thing you can do is accept what "is."

Furthermore, I want you to understand that the "why" is probably and most certainly stupid. The girl gets cold feet. The girl didn't want to go out with you in the first place, but just couldn't hurt your feelings. Dawson's Creek is on. Etc. Whatever the case, I can practically guarantee you that 100% of the time when a girl bails, cancels, etc., her reasoning is flawed and stupid. And that if you were to actually find out the "why" you would probably roll your eyes in disgust.

Alas, the whole benefit of this revelation is that you no longer have to piss away calories of energy, time, effort and thought trying to figure out why. You just accept and move on. Furthermore, there is the confidence that chances are it probably isn't you with the problem, and I am totally serious and I'll say it again, you will find out that, yeah, the VAST majority of the time it's not you, but the girl that has issues.

Of course, this whole theory is contingent on you playing your cards right and making sure you don't have a problem. And that means behaving in a manner or being a person that you are proud of. Being a gentleman. Being polite. Being somebody that you can look at and say, "If a girl turns this type of person down, then obviously she is the one that's ef'd up."

I personally aim my best to mimmick a WWII officer and gentleman. I mean, that's pretty safe. What possible rationale would a woman have to reject a WWII, 1940's, Cary Grantish gentleman? Thus, for me, when the girl can't make it because "her hair isn't dry" (I'm not kidding, I received this excuse MORE THAN ONCE IN 2005!!!!), I can sit back in confidence and say, "you know, I played that one pretty good. I was polite. I wasn't pushy. I was charismatic and funny on the phone. I was borderline Private Ryan with an element of Gregory Peck...this girl has issues."

So do yourselves a favor men, make a resolution for 2006. Resolve that you're not going to rack your brains over things that aren't your fault. Be a gentleman, be a good guy, be an upstanding dude. And if the ladies can't appreciate that, then we know whose fault that is.

Do You Hear That?

It's called "The Winds of Change."

http://upi.com/NewsTrack/view.php?StoryID=20051231-085021-8823r