Adding creative endeavors to GDP

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The federal government is set to change how it measures GDP and the new measure will include creative work:

The change is relatively simple: The BEA will incorporate into GDP all the creative, innovative work that is the backbone of much of what the United States now produces. Research and development has long been recognized as a core economic asset, yet spending on it has not been included in national accounts. So, as the Wall Street Journal noted, a Lady Gaga concert and album are included in GDP, but the money spent writing the songs and recording the album are not. Factories buying new robots counted; Pfizer’s expenditures on inventing drugs were not.

As the BEA explains, it will now count “creative work undertaken on a systematic basis to increase the stock of knowledge, and use of this stock of knowledge for the purpose of discovering or developing new products, including improved versions or qualities of existing products, or discovering or developing new or more efficient processes of production.” That is a formal way of saying, “This stuff is a really big deal, and an increasingly important part of the modern economy.”

The BEA estimates that in 2007, for example, adding in business R&D would have added 2 percent to U.S. GDP, or about $300 billion. Adding in the various inputs into creative endeavors such as movies, television and music will mean an additional $70 billion. A few other categories bring the total addition to over $400 billion. That is larger than the GDP of more than 160 countries…

The new framework will not stop the needless and often harmful fetishizing of these numbers. GDP is such a simple round number that it is catnip to commentators and politicians. It will still be used, incorrectly, as a proxy for our economic lives, and it will still frame our spending decisions more than it should. Whether GDP is up 2 percent or down 2 percent affects most people minimally (down a lot, quickly, is a different story). The wealth created by R&D that was statistically less visible until now benefited its owners even those the figures didn’t reflect that, and faster GDP growth today doesn’t help a welder when the next factory will use a robot. How wealth is used, who benefits from it and whether it is being deployed for sustainable future growth, that is consequential. GDP figures, even restated, don’t tell us that.

On one hand, changing a measure so that more accurately reflects the economy is a good thing. This could help increase the validity of the measure. On the other hand, measures still can be used well or poorly, the change may not be a complete improvement over previous measures, and it may be difficult to reconcile new figures with past figures. It is not quite as easy as simply “improving” a measure; a lot of other factors are involved. It will be interesting to see how this measurement change sorts out in the coming years and how the information is utilized.

A society that develops deep readers

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Sociologist Wendy Griswold has written about what it means to develop a reading culture and recent research about “deep reading” suggests people have to learn to have to do it:

Recent research in cognitive science, psychology and neuroscience has demonstrated that deep reading — slow, immersive, rich in sensory detail and emotional and moral complexity — is a distinctive experience, different in kind from the mere decoding of words. Although deep reading does not, strictly speaking, require a conventional book, the built-in limits of the printed page are uniquely conducive to the deep reading experience. A book’s lack of hyperlinks, for example, frees the reader from making decisions — Should I click on this link or not? — allowing her to remain fully immersed in the narrative.

That immersion is supported by the way the brain handles language rich in detail, allusion and metaphor: by creating a mental representation that draws on the same brain regions that would be active if the scene were unfolding in real life. The emotional situations and moral dilemmas that are the stuff of literature are also vigorous exercise for the brain, propelling us inside the heads of fictional characters and even, studies suggest, increasing our real-life capacity for empathy…

To understand why we should be concerned about how young people read, and not just whether they’re reading at all, it helps to know something about the way the ability to read evolved. “Human beings were never born to read,” notes Maryanne Wolf, director of the Center for Reading and Language Research at Tufts University and author of Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain. Unlike the ability to understand and produce spoken language, which under normal circumstances will unfold according to a program dictated by our genes, the ability to read must be painstakingly acquired by each individual. The “reading circuits” we construct are recruited from structures in the brain that evolved for other purposes—and these circuits can be feeble or they can be robust, depending on how often and how vigorously we use them…

This is not reading as many young people are coming to know it. Their reading is pragmatic and instrumental: the difference between what literary critic Frank Kermode calls “carnal reading” and “spiritual reading.” If we allow our offspring to believe that carnal reading is all there is—if we don’t open the door to spiritual reading, through an early insistence on discipline and practice—we will have cheated them of an enjoyable, even ecstatic experience they would not otherwise encounter.

If we put this in sociological terms, it sounds like the research suggests that deep reading is a socialized experience. Deep reading is a developed skill, perhaps explicitly modeled and taught and also observed and absorbed. For those who see the benefits of deep reading, the next logical question seems to be how to continue this socialization process. When Griswold studied reading culture in Nigeria, she discussed the role of printing presses and publishing companies, educated authors, citizens have the money to buy books, and citizens having the time to read novels and longer works. There are not the same kinds of issues in the United States: there are plenty books, authors, and potential readers with the time and money for deep reading. Instead, the issues are things like a lot of competition for reading and a value system that privileges progress, novelty, anti-intellectualism, and pragmatism.

What happens then if a society is post deep reading, having advanced past that stage according to the practices of many residents? Does this affect civic and social life in meaningful ways? Or, if a society is divided along reading and non-reading lines? There has been plenty of discussion about inequality regarding the Internet but what about with books and reading?

Sprawl disturbs cicada cycles

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Clearing land for suburban development disrupts cicada cycles:

“They have a tight connection with the tree,” says Dan Babbitt, the manager of the insect zoo at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History. Cicadas spend their underground years feeding off the roots of trees. Then when they’re ready to come up, they crawl back out along the tree trunk to the branches where they lay their eggs, all in the hopes that the next generation of cicadas will fall back into the soil, burrow down to the roots, and feed there for another 17 years.

This is why leafy residential neighborhoods often have some of the best cicada sightings (and sounds). It’s also why the absolute worst thing we could do to the creatures is clear-cut whole stretches of once-rural land for new development while they’re down there. Get rid of the trees, and you get rid of the cicadas. And re-planting those sad saplings common along many freshly paved roads in the exurbs won’t help…

“When they go out and build these things around Champaign-Urbana, they cut the trees down, they bring in the bulldozers, they pull up the top soil, and they stick the houses down,” Cooley says. “None of the cicadas in the ground there would have survived that. None of anything in the ground would have survived that.”

Some periodical cicadas do well in older, tree-lined suburbs, Cooley says, those places where houses were built slowly over time, “where they didn’t take the big trees.” Across history, it’s hard to tell if the shape and geography of broods has altered significantly around the footprint of expanding cities. Early records on when and where they appeared – and which broods were which – aren’t all that reliable. Some “straggler” cicadas also appear off the cycle of the rest of a brood, further confusing history’s witnesses.

Just another way that suburban development disrupts natural habitats. But, I’m still left with two pressing questions:

1. Would the average suburbanite see this as a problem? For those who live in the areas with more cicadas, are they viewed as a big nuisance even if they are only around every 17 years?

2. There is no indication in this article about how destructive this is. How bad is it if suburban development wipes out cicadas? What are the side effects? This is related to Question 1: perhaps suburbanites would be friendly toward cicadas if they knew they were making their lives and the habitat better.

A “brain gain” in rural America?

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A rural sociologist argues that rural America is experiencing a “brain gain” of young adults:

Hjartarson is among what University of Minnesota Rural Sociologist Ben Winchester coins the “Brain Gain,” in rural America.

“Discussions about the future of rural communities can have a negative tone, but this isn’t your grandfather’s rural,” Winchester said. “You look at the numbers and you can see the rural narrative is being rewritten.”…

However, the actual number of people living in rural areas in the United States increased between 1970 and 2010 from 53.5 million to 59.5 million. Urban areas grew, too, but at a rate faster than rural areas, resulting in a proportional decline of the population living rural.

“When it comes to 30- to 40-year-olds, one in five live in a rural area today,” Winchester said. “There is a growth in rural areas among the 30- to 35-year-old cohort, an age when a lot of people are re-examining their lives and looking for low density living. That’s also the cohort we are seeing decreasing in numbers in many metro areas.”…

“When it comes to the reasons 30- to 40-year-olds say they want to move to a rural area, jobs isn’t even in the top 10,” Winchester said. “Quality of life is No. 1. Others are a slower pace, lower cost of housing, and safety and security. Many of these people are creating their own jobs.”

Sounds interesting but we would have to see more data to tease this out. If the rural population increased 6 million between 1970 and 2010, how much of this was due to birth rates in these areas versus new residents moving in? How does the rural population growth rate compare to that of cities and suburbs? That to me is the real comparison: how do rural areas stack up against the dominant place of living for Americans: the suburbs.

Also, it sounds like this could be a class issue based on the quality of life issues pushing people toward rural areas. Who exactly are the 30-40-year-olds moving to rural areas? Would it be safe to guess that they are generally well educated and have the abilities and training for creating their own jobs?

Micro-apartments in Seattle

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Here is an overview of the growth in micro-apartments in Seattle:

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn is on record in support of micro apartments, as is City Council member Richard Conlin.

“The private market is building affordable housing for people who want it,” Conlin said. “Fundamentally, this is a good thing.”

Young people starting out, service workers and retirees on limited incomes all need affordable housing, Conlin and other supporters said.

Forty-one micro housing projects have come through the Seattle Department of Planning and Development since 2006, spokeswoman Cyndi Wilder said. Of those, 28 received permits and 13 are under examination.

The planning department is aware of the debate over the review process for micro apartment buildings, she said, and the Seattle City Council “is going through an information-gathering process.”

It would be interesting to hear more about why Seattle and a few other cities are approving more micro-apartments while not as much is happening in other cities. This isn’t necessarily happening in the densest urban areas so is this more about regulation or the willingness to try new housing arrangements (perhaps in cities that are more “bohemian”)?

This article also presents an angle that I haven’t seen much thus far in news coverage: nearby residents who oppose large numbers of micro-apartments. I wonder if micro-apartments are encountering typical NIMBY concerns such as traffic and changes to the neighborhood or whether opposition is focused on unique attributes of the units like higher density and the type of people who might live in such units.

Arguing over whether spires and antennas at top of skyscrapers count for a building’s height

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There is an ongoing argument, including this opinion piece from a “Chicago partisan,” about what at the top of a skyscraper should count toward the building’s official height. The latest round of argument involves the new World Trade Center building:

So far, nothing is official: the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, the international organization of skyscraper engineers, designers and builders that certifies a building’s height, will weigh in only when One World Trade Center is completed. At an expected, historically symbolic 1,776 feet, the New York tower seems to have a solid claim.

But Chicagoans who live in the shadow of the 1,451-foot tall Willis Tower, which has held the title of nation’s tallest for some 40 years, should cry foul — because deciding just how tall a building is turns out to be more complicated than it might seem…

The council has three categories for measuring the heights of tall buildings: height to “architectural top,” “highest occupied floor” and “height to tip.” This may seem like splitting hairs, but the differences can be considerable.

The meanings of “height to tip” and “highest occupied floor” are self-evident. But “architectural top,” the category the council uses to officially crown the tallest building, is less clear; it includes “spires,” but not “antennas, signage, flag poles or other functional-technical equipment.” This wording deliberately makes the short, pointy tops of the Petronas Towers count, but leaves out the much taller antennas that crown the Willis Tower.

The way this argument is going, it seems like city partisans want to change the definition of building heights in a way that best advantages their tallest structure. Why? This is more about status and prestige than anything else. The city with the official tallest building can claim something about themselves. Certain cities, like Chicago and New York, are known for their skylines and have historically dominated this international race.

I’m not sure why exactly this matters for certain cities. On the one hand, these tallest buildings can dominate a skyline. Being at the top of the record books can bring some attention, though it is unclear what exactly it leads to. On the other hand, the square footage of residential or commercial space that one building can add doesn’t make or break a business district (unless, perhaps, it is the only really tall building). Also, the tallest building can be built nearly anywhere, whether in New York, Chicago, Kuala Lumpur, or Dubai. Does the tallest building really signal architectural or engineering competence? Doesn’t it tell us something that not every major or global city is chasing this record?

In other words, this might be a record that only a few cities and boosters really care about.

Chicago suburb to raise revenue by selling guns

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St. Charles, Illinois has one solution for communities looking to raise revenues: sell confiscated and used guns back to the public.

But while some Chicago-area communities host buybacks where weapons are turned in and destroyed, one suburban police department is poised to sell about 20 firearms to two licensed dealers, including some guns seized from criminals.

“There’s value in these guns,” said police Chief James Lamkin of west suburban St. Charles. “They’re not illegal guns. Quite honestly, it’s a bottom line for us.”

Though Arizona has just enacted a controversial state law requiring local departments to sell firearms that are surrendered or go unclaimed, the practice appears to be unusual in the Chicago area. The Chicago Police Department and several suburban law-enforcement agencies, as well as Illinois State Police, say they destroy weapons after they’re turned in or no longer needed as evidence…

The choice for a public agency to sell or destroy seized weapons underscores the push in many suburbs to find new ways to generate revenue without raising taxes. The issue also places St. Charles in an unusual position among law enforcement agencies at a time when the gun control debate has been re-energized by the Sandy Hook school shooting and, in Illinois, by the current effort to enact a concealed carry law before a court-imposed June deadline.

My guess is that the negative publicity from a story like this – having a fairly well-off suburb make the front page of the Chicago Tribune for selling guns – outweighs the revenue that may come from selling 20 guns. This is the sort of negative attention that suburbs try to avoid. Yet, this is what happens when many American communities are desperate to find revenues. It would be interesting to see what St. Charles residents think of this. Does this story that could make their community look bad overpower the efforts the local government is making to avoid raising taxes?

McMansion owning Vermont governor criticized for real estate dealing with neighbor

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The governor of Vermont has run into some real estate trouble after buying the property of a neighbor:

Soon after the successful real estate investor built his McMansion on a rural dirt road here outside Vermont’s capital, he began throwing his wealth around, striking a deal to bail out his neighbor from a looming tax sale by buying the man’s property for a quarter of its appraised value.

Such a sale is not uncommon and likely would have gone unnoticed. Except the buyer was the governor of Vermont, Peter Shumlin. And the seller, Jerry Dodge, was a hard-luck ne’er-do-well with a criminal record and what his friends and family describe as limited intellect and diminishing prospects.

Since word of the deal surfaced last week, Shumlin has been under intense scrutiny in the state. Real estate lawyers generally conclude that he did nothing illegal, but that the governor might still have held himself to a higher standard of conduct, raising the question of when a savvy business deal becomes bad for his politics…

Some of Dodge’s dissatisfaction appears to have been fueled by family and friends telling him he took too little for his property. He recalled reciting the Pledge of Allegiance as a child, before he left school in the ninth grade. It’s not justice for all, he said. It’s “justice for the rich.”

Sounds like a sticky situation for a politician who doesn’t want to be seen taking advantage of another resident. At the same time, the use of the term McMansion is intriguing. See a picture of Shumlin’s house here and a wider overhead view here. From these far-off pictures, it doesn’t look too much like a McMansion. The house might have a large square footage but the exterior appears understated and the house does not dominate the large lot. In using the term McMansion, the AP might be referring more to the home’s recent construction by a wealthy resident rather than the architecture and design of a home within a suburban subdivision. The rest of the story does seem to play up the angle that Shulmin’s house is a wealthy and luxurious one, particularly compared with the more run-down property of his neighbor.

Chicago tries out a “pedestrian scramble” intersection

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Chicago has started testing the “pedestrian scramble” at a Loop intersection:

The changes center on a new pedestrian crossing pattern – dubbed the “pedestrian scramble” – that will be introduced at the intersection of State Street and Jackson Boulevard…

The test involves stopping all vehicles – heading east on Jackson and north and south on State – for about 14 seconds every other light cycle to give pedestrians a jump on traffic to cross in all directions, including diagonally, according to Bill McCaffrey, a spokesman for the Chicago Department of Transportation.

Developed more than 70 years ago, the pedestrian scramble allows pedestrians a running start to cross six ways instead of four ways.

The experiment is part of a larger plan by Chicago Transportation Commissioner Gabe Klein to reduce speeds and the number of vehicle travel lanes on busy streets in an effort to slash the number of crashes…

Klein’s strategy involves narrowing some streets, or putting them on a “road diet.’’

Two quick thoughts:

1. This reminds me of photographs of busy intersections in Tokyo where you see mobs of people crossing at all angles. See short videos here and here. Indeed, other countries have used pedestrian scrambles for decades.

2. People may not like the idea of a “road diet” but there is evidence that reducing traffic capacity could be more effective at dealing with traffic and congestion rather than continually expanding roads. Plus, you then get the side benefit of more safety and convenience for pedestrians and cyclists.

NHTSA asks states to wait on driverless cars

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The federal government is asking states to wait on approving self-driving cars for general use until more research can be conducted:

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration unveiled new recommendations to states for self-driving cars, urging them to be used only for testing and to require safeguards to ensure they can be taken over by a driver in the case of a malfunction.

NHTSA also said it was embarking on a four-year research effort on self-driving or autonomous vehicles as it considers requiring features like automatic braking, in which the car takes action to prevent crashes.

“We believe there are a number of technological issues as well as human performance issues that must be addressed before self-driving vehicles can be made widely available,” NHTSA said in its 14-page automated driving policy statement. “Self-driving vehicle technology is not yet at the stage of sophistication or demonstrated safety capability that it should be authorized for use by members of the public for general driving purposes. Should a state nevertheless decide to permit such non-testing operation of self-driving vehicles, at a minimum, the state should require that a properly licensed driver (i.e., one licensed to drive self-driving vehicles) be seated in the driver’s seat and be available at all times in order to operate the vehicle in situations in which the automated technology is not able to safely control the vehicle.”

NHTSA says as self-driving cars improve, they will reconsider. NHTSA says self-driving cars being tested in California, Florida and Nevada by Google and Audi of America should have the capability of detecting that their automated vehicle technologies have malfunctioned “and informing the driver in a way that enables the driver to regain proper control of the vehicle.” The Michigan Legislature is also considering allowing self-driving car testing…

Safety on the roads is an important concern but I’d be interested to see how much testing it might take for the government to approve self-driving cars. And, even if the safety appears to works out fairly quickly, will it take more time to reassure the public that such cars are safe?

It would also be interesting know how alert drivers are going to have to be while not driving. If the driver needs to be alerted to retake control, how relaxing is not driving going to be?