Most popular posts of 2009

I did this in 2007 and in 2008 and so it is time once again to trawl through this blog's statistics and see what posts appeared to attract the most attention (in terms of hits) in 2009. They are:

1. Star Trek: for kids?
2. Informing economics through toileting
3. Revolutionary parenting innovation: The outdoor computer game
4. The second most intelligent life form
5. 2 hours of self play
6. Cold, Clothing and Fatality Risk

That last one so notable for comments that I now believe have been both life saving and a stimulus to the US economy. Just outside the list was my reaction to the WSJ review of Parentonomics. As it was the only US newspaper review, in retrospect, perhaps I should have been calmer. But I was most proud of this post on Rachel Nalebuff's little book.

In addition, these posts from past years still had enough hits to out do those above (just counting their hits in 2009 alone):

• Anakin Skywalker Lego Cake
• 2 year old birthday parties
• Subtraction before addition
• Swimming lessons
• The Amazing World of Starfall

I realise blogging has been light of late. It has been busy setting up here in the US but hopefully I'll get back into the swing of things in 2010.

Washington DC -- The Mall

So we are here in Washington DC where I had some vague idea that the kids might learn some more about the US that could get them up to speed at school. If that has happened it will be via a grudging osmosis. No overt grand wonder at the knowledge being spread before them.

The first event on this learning by doing exploration of the US was a road trip from Boston to DC on Christmas Day. My idea was to cover several states so that they at least could get a sense that there were more states than in Australia. That lead to complaining about that fact and how much harder it was going to be to learn what those states were. During the road trip I purchased a game where the children had to look out of the car and identify license plates from different states. Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Delaware and Maryland came easily and we picked up Indiana, Tennessee, Texas and California as well. North Carolina proved more difficult as it was the "First in Flight" and obscured by a dealer plate but we got there in the end. The same for Florida and Oklahoma. New Jersey was of interest in proclaiming that it was "The Garden State." However, my 11 year old daughter did remark during our visit to that state that it appeared devoid of gardens. This led to a suggestion that there was, in fact, one garden in the state -- "The Garden" -- and we just hadn't seen it. Nonetheless, the search for more states proved fruitless; including the highly prized Montana. I have no idea how we are going to get Hawaii but I guess we have a year of this to do so.

In DC, our first stop was the other Air & Space museum out near Dulles airport. This museum holds The Enterprise which, to disappoint our children, was in fact the space shuttle rather than the 23rd Century version and also had, in reality, clocked as much space hours as those later versions. It didn't even have real engines but I guess we got a sense of size. Nonetheless, aside from the disappointment at the level of human progress, that museum did have an impressive array of planes including a B1 Stealth Bomber and the Concorde. Definitely worth the trip.

We then moved on to the Lincoln monument leading to the discussion of what a "score" was. This lead to an evening walk amongst other memorials with varying significance represented by various pieces of art and sculpture. Growing weary, my 9 year old son happened upon a tree -- of which there were many -- and asked "what does this represent?"

The next day saw us start at the usual Air and Space museum and another set of disappointment at just how uncomfortable space travel is when we could stand up close with the original Apollo 11 capsule and walk through a Sky Lab prototype. The children came to the opinion that flying in the Wright brother's original plane looked more fun. We were all impressed, however, at the efficiency of the huge McDonalds there that appeared to fund the whole operation.

We then trudged over to the American History museum to learn some history. That turned out to be impossible as there were various artifacts but not much in the way of facts. That said, we did happen upon an exhibit with some pictures of bacteria. My 11 year old daughter has become quite obsessed with stomach bacteria of late -- a story for another time -- so much so that for her birthday I discovered, and I am not making this up, plush toys of various bacteria which now share a bed with her. I could not imagine that the demand for such toys -- which I discovered in the University of Melbourne bookshop -- was more than a single child in the world. Yet there they were.

Anyhow, my daughter was staring at an E Coli picture when another kid came up and said (and I am really not making this up), "E Coli. I have a stuffed toy of that." To say I was shocked is an underestimated. I immediately encouraged my daughter to quickly go and make friends with this kid. But she refused. I am pretty sure they will regret it for the rest of their lives.

We didn't spend much time at American History before moving on to the White House. Again this led to another round of disappointment for the children who thought they might be able to go in but instead were some distance away but quite close to Michelle Obama's vegetable garden. You can't imagine the excitement that generated.

Tomorrow, we will try the Museum of Natural History that has the virtue of being the subject of Night at the Museum 2: Battle of the Smithsonian. I sold it to my kids as such and my son remarked, "you mean we are visiting the set." I said, sure. I gotta go with the Hollywood path on this one.

Repugnant Milk?

The Courier Mail reports on the 'black' market for breast-milk:

A BLACK market in breast milk has developed in Australia as families desperate to feed their babies the natural elixir are being charged up to $1000 a litre on the internet.

One mother contacted the Gold Coast based Mother's Milk Bank to ask what the real "going rate" was for breast milk after online sharks demanded the extortionate amount when she placed a web advert seeking human milk.

Mother's Milk Bank director Marea Ryan told her that the not-for-profit bank sold milk for $50 for 1.2 litres.

The market has developed because of the marketed qualities of breast-milk. So mothers who have difficulty breast-feeding still have incentives to procure breast-milk elsewhere.

If I understand the article correctly, there are concerns that an unregulated market may give rise to health issues of the quality of milk is poor. That is, it should be regulated as a food. However, it appears to be treated as a bodily fluid and so regulated or open markets with transparent standards are shut down.

The Government clearly can't have it both ways here. If it believes breast-milk is important then ensuring quality supply is available widely is surely a good thing. On the other hand, there may be social norms at work preventing such markets by treating all sale of bodily fluids as a repugnant transaction.

My guess is that they are against the idea because of concerns that some mothers might opt to purchase breast-milk rather than produce it themselves. As an economist, that idea does not trouble me although I think that some regulations might be in order to ensure that mothers do not supply milk onto the market in ways that cause them to deny their own children that milk. Nonetheless, this is not an area where Governments should be dismissive of market opportunities.

Dining in Education Next

I have an article in Education Next recounting some dinner table conversation. Click here to read it.

Let's talk about the weather

When you are outside of the US and watch CNN, the impression is that it is a tad weather obsessed. It is all about storm front this, high pressure system that, category 5 hurricane the other. Surely, there are other things to interest people.

We have been here just over a week and we, it isn't going to surprise you, have bought in to the weather obsession. Part of the obsession is, of course, trying to reconcile what the 'written' weather is saying with the 'actual' weather that is outside. The major issue is that the weather is, for intents and purposes, invisible. You can't just go a window and see what it is. Moreover, you do not want to open the window, lest you find out while wearing inappropriate attire. And the open of actually going out and seeing seems costly again given the attire issue.

So what happens when I look it up on the Internet? In that case, it tells me it is currently 20 degrees outside. That is, of course, 20 degrees Fahrenheit but with my brain circuitry wired for Celsius it is hard for me to accept that it is really the -7 the 'conversion' algorithms tell me it is. In any case, what the heck is -7 degrees anyway? Remember, the lowest we ever get in Melbourne is around 5 degrees. So the best I have it is 12 degrees colder than really cold. But it is an abstract notion.

One indication that we have regarding what -7 degrees is, is what it does to an iPhone left in a car outside. For your information, it freezes, rock solid. The only application that works is that one where you use your fingers to wipe the condensation off the screen. By the way, an iPhone takes about 2 hours to thaw at 'room' temperature.

And it gets worse because the -7 degrees is just the temperature. There is another temperature that seems more relevant to me and that is the 'feels like' temperature. At the moment, that is 8 degrees F or -13 degrees C. So I lose another 6 degrees just for being a human with feelings! Who knows what it feels like to an iPhone. Near as I can tell, this is a big fat warning to not go out.

Sadly, that can't always been avoided. Now I know that this next thought is hardly original: what I want is the Weather Channel to tell me what I should wear. Helpful readers told me what to buy (and I am grateful and happy to report we haven't lost anyone, yet) but with a full closet, the whole, what to wear issue is looming large. If the Weather Channel can tell me what it feels like, why can't it tell me what it feels like as I add and remove various bits of apparel? One could imagine even specifying it by particular coat, jump, thermals and brand. Consider the advertising possibilities: "if you just had an LL Bean ridiculously large and puffy parker, it would feel like 17 degrees to you now, instead with what you have got it will feel like -3 degrees. Would you like the nearest directions to LL Bean?" To my economist's mind, there seems to be missing markets all over the place.

For us, the issue is that the weather changes. It can do so from minute to minute making it impossible to optimise clothes. We can be cold and all of the children have ample incentive to keep various layers, scarves and gloves on. Then it gets warmer and the extremities get exposed. Then it gets colder, and we engage in a freezing search for lost gloves. Now I know that we need to sow them on but just haven't had the time. That will happen because for the moment, our entire Boston experience is a continual concern about losing gloves. Why they can't put an RF chip in these things with a location finder, I don't know.

We are told it is unseasonably cold at the moment. That is all very well at the moment but it is the word 'unseasonably' that has me worried. That means there is a season for this cold and it is coming. And it will come with snow which our children are yet to really see. My only hope is that it doesn't come with 'unprecedented' cold.

Update: some of my wish has just come through. This site translates your weather into Star Wars terms. The snap shot below is what I am facing. Where is a dead tauntan when you need one.