ένοι' οἷος ἐσσὶ μαθών
Become such as you are, having learned what that is.
Pindar
Sunday, March 29, 2015
Saturday, March 28, 2015
Friday, March 27, 2015
Today In Wyoming's History: March 26
Today In Wyoming's History: March 26: 1895 University of Wyoming Alumni Association founded.
Amazing to think that it's that old, or that it was founded so soon after the University was established.
Amazing to think that it's that old, or that it was founded so soon after the University was established.
Unsolicited Career Advice No. 5. How do you become a rancher?
Well, if you aren't rich, or born into it, I"m not too sure you can, at least in the ranch example.
I hate to say that, but this is a question that I've also been asked, which stands quite a part from the "should I go to law school question". I suppose on the occasional instances in which I get asked this, its because we have cattle and ought to know.
Just here recently I ran a series of posts due to it being National Agriculture Week. And I've run quite a few posts on farming and ranching, and even agrarianism, in the past. Anyone who has looked at these and seen any career type comments I've made there knows that I'm pretty pessimistic about people who aren't born into agriculture getting into it, although some do manage to do it. One thing about the law that's sure, you don't have to be born into it in order to get into it (and a lot of people born into it, but not all, don't go into it).
All agriculture, it should be noted, is local. People very often fail to realize that. Practices that are common 200 miles away might not be where you are, and for that matter, they might even work in your locality. So it's perfectly possible that a person might be able to walk right on to a farm in some other locality, while they'd never be able to do that in another. So, Caveat Lector.
Anyhow, at one time, the dream of owning a farm or ranch, and by that I mean a real operation, not 20 acres near a big city which you call a farm or ranch, was a common one. It's so much a part of the American mentality that, in spite of the fact that agriculturalist are often dismissed as "hicks", it still makes up a common theme in stories, particularly B grade romantic ones. In the old film Splendor In The Grass the main male protagonist, whose father has big hopes for his career, ends up disappointing the family and becoming a farmer, which we take to be the better (and more American) choice. In zillions of "Lifetime" type movies, people inherit a ranch in trouble, which they then rescue, or move to a relatives rustic ranch, where they become involved in its operation after an initial desire to avoid it. A stock background in film is that a person's parents or grandparents have a farm or ranch somewhere. And a fairly significant number of people obviously aspire to farm or ranch.
But how realistic is it?
Not very, at least by my observation.
I've written on it before, but land prices are perhaps the major reason why. They've simply gone out of sight, due in no small part to the land's value for subdivision or for the rich to buy essentially as a playground. And there's no region of the United States that I'm aware of that is immune from it.
Some regions, of course, are particularly influenced by this. The West, which ironically retains the romantic image of being "wide open", is pretty much closed for new agricultural entrants. This trend has been going on for some time, and at some point in the 1950s or early 1960s this became basically true, although there was still a little room to get in as late as the early 1980s. No longer. Ranches here now sell for such values that only the very wealthy or the those who are already possessed of large amounts of land they can leverage can get in.
Well, so what? That's just the way it is, right? After all, that's what happens to agricultural and in every free society, absent government intervention (which is another topic entirely, and which isn't going to happen). And, if you subscribe to the views advanced in the article written by George F. Will and reported here yesterday, it's all for everyone's good.
And I've read that thesis with this sort of thing before. The classic one is that the automobile manufacture puts the wagon maker out of business, but the auto maker makes more jobs, and the displaced wagon maker goes on to get a cubicle job for higher wages where he can buy Starbucks every day. Great, eh?
Or, more precisely, sure this means that fewer people are in agriculture, but with economies of scale, this keeps food cheap and that's good for everyone. People who would have been farmers can compete for jobs with those who own the land, or they can go into town and become podiatrists where they'll generate even more money, and their kids will become neurosurgeons and make even more. More and more money will result.
Well, maybe, but that's if that matters, and the evidence is that at some point, it doesn't.
Poverty matters, that's for sure. But there's no good evidence that after some point affluence does. Indeed, it doesn't seem to. And at that point, having closed off certain opportunities and occupations matters a lot.
This is particularly true when occupations that are close to the land are closed off. As a species, we have next to no experience with that condition, as up until recently the majority of human beings lived close to the land. Even those who didn't live on the land, often lived and worked close to those who did. Now this is rapidly becoming no longer true, but people still crave it at an elemental level.
And there are open questions about what sort of society this will be, for people.
Which digresses.
So, "how can I become a farmer or rancher"? I don't know. You might be able to become a farm manager a ranch manager for a landowner. I know several young men who have done that. It's a career path that doesn't offer a lot of wealth, but perhaps that doesn't matter, and it probably shouldn't. Over time, the men I've known who have done that (and they've all been men, fwiw) have married and had families, so certainly a normal life is possible. As for owning a place of your own, well, maybe or maybe not. Probably not, at least if what you hope for is a working ranch. But if that's your heart's desire, it might not matter what anyone tells you anyway, as it'll probably remain close to your heart.
Thursday, March 26, 2015
Old Picture of the Day: President Roosevelt
Old Picture of the Day: President Roosevelt: Today we feature a picture of Roosevelt looking presidential. The picture was taken during the last part of his presidency. I like th...
Old Picture of the Day: Roosevelt in Knickers
Old Picture of the Day: Roosevelt in Knickers: It is not just every man that has the self confidence to wear Knickers. I would say Roosevelt was one man who could pull it off. The b...
Old Picture of the Day: Teddy Roosevelt in Earlier Days
Old Picture of the Day: Teddy Roosevelt in Earlier Days: This is a picture of Teddy Roosevelt in days before he was famous as a military man or president. He is posed here as a hunter. He rea...
Old Picture of the Day: TR
Old Picture of the Day: TR: Today we have another picture of Teddy Roosevelt during his Military Years. The picture was taken in 1898. Also, we have another quote ...
Old Picture of the Day: Teddy Roosevelt
Old Picture of the Day: Teddy Roosevelt: This is another military portrait of Teddy Roosevelt from back in his Rough Rider days. Also, another of my favorite quotes from Teddy...
Old Picture of the Day: Colonel Roosevelt
Old Picture of the Day: Colonel Roosevelt: Welcome to Teddy Roosevelt Week! We will be looking at pictures of one of my favorite presidents. Roosevelt was genuinely a larger tha...
Closing our eyes
A long time ago I write this essay here, which at one time was one of the most popular ones on this site:
I mention that now, as we've just had yet another example of a senseless mass killing of a type we've seen several of in recent years, but we don't seem to see much proposed in the way of doing something about it. That is, the co-pilot of the Germanwings plane that crashed into the Alps this week turns out to be mass murderer.
This isn't the first time in recent years where a commercial pilot has chosen to kill himself and all of his passengers. It's totally inexcusable on every level. A question remains about this, that being, why is so much attention focused on controlling implements for which the legislative control of which will not have a demonstrative effect, while there hasn't been any outcry about whom is allowed to pilot hundreds in the sky?
Yes, I know there's commercial licenses, but even on the simple applicable standards level, it would appear that around the globe various pilots simply don't measure up to the American standard. They should, and there's no reason that a universal, very high, standard can't apply to all commercial air carrier pilots. But beyond that, perhaps the time has come to place these men and women through some sort of psychological battery every six months. It won't catch them all, but it might catch some who are getting dicey, or even just sloppy. And maybe the time has come for a third pilot to be in the cabin, just in case. These are big complicated planes and there's been a lot of accidents, which might be reason enough, and might help to keep something like this from reoccuring.
Lex Anteinternet: Peculiarized violence and American society. Looki...: Because of the horrific senseless tragedy in Newton Connecticut, every pundit and commentator in the US is writing on the topic of what cau...That essay came in the wake of a tragic mass killing and it looked at root causes, at a time during which a lot of public commentary was focused on proposed efforts that would not address them.
I mention that now, as we've just had yet another example of a senseless mass killing of a type we've seen several of in recent years, but we don't seem to see much proposed in the way of doing something about it. That is, the co-pilot of the Germanwings plane that crashed into the Alps this week turns out to be mass murderer.
This isn't the first time in recent years where a commercial pilot has chosen to kill himself and all of his passengers. It's totally inexcusable on every level. A question remains about this, that being, why is so much attention focused on controlling implements for which the legislative control of which will not have a demonstrative effect, while there hasn't been any outcry about whom is allowed to pilot hundreds in the sky?
Yes, I know there's commercial licenses, but even on the simple applicable standards level, it would appear that around the globe various pilots simply don't measure up to the American standard. They should, and there's no reason that a universal, very high, standard can't apply to all commercial air carrier pilots. But beyond that, perhaps the time has come to place these men and women through some sort of psychological battery every six months. It won't catch them all, but it might catch some who are getting dicey, or even just sloppy. And maybe the time has come for a third pilot to be in the cabin, just in case. These are big complicated planes and there's been a lot of accidents, which might be reason enough, and might help to keep something like this from reoccuring.
Lex Anteinternet: The Distrubing Thesis of Capital in the Twenty Fir...
Almost a year ago I was writing about Thomas Piketty's disturbing thesis in this entry:
Will characterizes Tanny's book which I also haven't read, as boldy presentign a new thesis, but it what it apparently does is bodly defend an old one, that being that Adam Smith was right and we need not worry about jobs being exported overseas. The book apparently expertly cites numerous examples, with the basis nature of them being that when jobs like making Iphones go overseas, the price lowers so much that in real terms all of our incomes rise. The book isn't limited to that type of analysis, however, and also, apaprently, defends monopolies.
This is obviously quite the opposite of Piketty, whom I still haven't read, but it strikes me that in some odd ways they may both be correct and incorrect at the same time. Will's Tanny is correct, that buying at Wall Mart or from monopolies, and from companies that manufacture in the cheapest possible fashion, means less of our income goes into purchases, but it also can't be denied, as Piketty demonstrates, that the wealth that's generated gets concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, who are by extension more and more powerful.
The overarching thing, however, is that Will's cheerful defense ignores something, which Froma Harrop has been exploring in her recent articles. Nobody wants to be poor, but at some point an economy that serves only to produce wealth and do so efficiently is really soulless and concentrates people into jobs that they might not really like. In other words, what if some people, indeed a lot of people, are just flat out happier working as a machinist on the factory floor, rather than in some clerk job in the cubicle forest?
Lex Anteinternet: The Distrubing Thesis of Capital in the Twenty Fir...: I haven't read it yet, but I've been reading a lot about Thomas Piketty's new book, Capital In The Twenty First Century. The b...This morning, in reading my local newspaper, George F. Will reviews a new book with a counterveiling thesis, that being John Tanny's new "cheerful, mind-opening book, “Popular Economics: What the Rolling Stones, Downton Abbey, and LeBron James Can Teach You About Economics.". Will's article is boldy entitled "How income inequality benefits us all".
Will characterizes Tanny's book which I also haven't read, as boldy presentign a new thesis, but it what it apparently does is bodly defend an old one, that being that Adam Smith was right and we need not worry about jobs being exported overseas. The book apparently expertly cites numerous examples, with the basis nature of them being that when jobs like making Iphones go overseas, the price lowers so much that in real terms all of our incomes rise. The book isn't limited to that type of analysis, however, and also, apaprently, defends monopolies.
This is obviously quite the opposite of Piketty, whom I still haven't read, but it strikes me that in some odd ways they may both be correct and incorrect at the same time. Will's Tanny is correct, that buying at Wall Mart or from monopolies, and from companies that manufacture in the cheapest possible fashion, means less of our income goes into purchases, but it also can't be denied, as Piketty demonstrates, that the wealth that's generated gets concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, who are by extension more and more powerful.
The overarching thing, however, is that Will's cheerful defense ignores something, which Froma Harrop has been exploring in her recent articles. Nobody wants to be poor, but at some point an economy that serves only to produce wealth and do so efficiently is really soulless and concentrates people into jobs that they might not really like. In other words, what if some people, indeed a lot of people, are just flat out happier working as a machinist on the factory floor, rather than in some clerk job in the cubicle forest?
Wednesday, March 25, 2015
We're Not Taking Enough Lunch Breaks. Why That's Bad For Business : The Salt : NPR
We're Not Taking Enough Lunch Breaks. Why That's Bad For Business : The Salt : NPR
I'm afraid I'm guilty as charged on this one.
I'm afraid I'm guilty as charged on this one.
Tuesday, March 24, 2015
Lex Anteinternet: And the pumps kept on.
And following on this:
Lex Anteinternet: And the pumps kept on.: Saudi production has reached 10,000,000 bbl per day, near (or perhaps) an all time record high. This comes in the face of Saudi resistance ...
I read in the paper this morning that the solar panel industry now employers more people in the US than coal mining.
Indeed, an irony of this is that there's now an effort in some states to tax homeowners who install solar panels, using the logic that they use power on the grid when they cannot generate power on cloudy days. While that's generally true, the law has generally been, or at least was (I haven't kept up on it) that power companies actually had to buy power sent back down the line by domestic solar and wind electrical generation. This has likely been regarded as a minor inconvenience by power companies for a long time, but now they're becoming irritated in some areas, apparently.
Irrespective of that, solar has quietly come a long way in the past 40 years. 40% of German electrical output is now solar (and if they'd continued to allow nuclear power generation, they'd have darned near 100% non emitting power). There's no reason to believe that a high American output isn't similarly possible, and perhaps now even probable.
All of this is hugely important to the state of Wyoming, and of course other energy producing states. With an oil industry that dates back to the 1890s and a coal industry that started when the Union Pacific was first constructed, the state has acclimated itself to the extractive energy industry being the main economic engine of the state. Coal severance taxes, which were at first stoutly opposed by some, have been funding the state government here for over 40 years now. The schools are nearly entirely constructed using money generated from taxes on coal. Coal production has been declining now for several years, and the coal industry's backers have been quite vocal about what they feel should be done to aid the industry, and that it can generate "clean coal". But the long term trends seem hard to ignore at present. Coal is being supplemented in the U.S. as a fuel, in Europe its being supplanted. The trend line in the US seems headed in the same direction unless major technological developments can change the dynamics of the situation. The coal market right now seems to be mostly China, but Pacific coast states and provinces object to the loading of it, and transportation of coal by sea has its own costs and problems. So, in spite of hopes in that quarter, and in spite of efforts by Wyoming's politicians in that direction, the Chinese saving the market seems unlikely.
And, as explored here earlier, it seems difficult not to conclude at this point that the Saudi Arabians have made a similar conclusion about future of petroleum oil, and have decided to keep the price on the floor so that they dominate the market during what they have calculated will be the transition phase. Probably calculating that the beginning of a technological transition from petroleum has commenced and that the process will take about the same amount of time one way or another, by keeping the price low, they'll dominate it during that period of time. In other words, the money is going to go somewhere, and it might as well go to them. By keeping the production high, and selling what they'll have, they'll make the most money possible out of their resource and probably try to use that to transition to some other type of economy. Goodness, knows they need to, as their current culture and economy isn't viable continuing on with its current model.
But for states like Wyoming, which have relied on these industries, the trend line is a bad one for the traditional economy. Agriculture, Extractive industries, and Tourism have been the three legs of the stool of Wyoming's economy. There's a pretty good chance that one of those legs is now broken, and there's no really solid idea of what to do to replace it, if it needs to be.
As a final observation, folks who note things like this here are often branded as "antis". However, as a Wyoming native, and a former crewman on a workover rig, and as a person with a geology degree, I think I can stand on my bonafides. I'm not declaring this as part of a manifesto, but rather observing as a person given to that by training and inclination. We probably need to be pondering these topics here.
Monday, March 23, 2015
And the pumps kept on.
Saudi production has reached 10,000,000 bbl per day, near (or perhaps) an all time record high. This comes in the face of Saudi resistance to pressure to decrease production.
Accompanying, this Chinese economy, long seen as a potential major oil importer, has been slowing down over the past 11 months.
Neither of which is a good sign for American oil production. Hovering in the $50 to $60 bbl range for months now, a decrease in the Saudi price and a maintenance of Saudi production can't help but be noticed by the domestic industry's planners.
Accompanying, this Chinese economy, long seen as a potential major oil importer, has been slowing down over the past 11 months.
Neither of which is a good sign for American oil production. Hovering in the $50 to $60 bbl range for months now, a decrease in the Saudi price and a maintenance of Saudi production can't help but be noticed by the domestic industry's planners.
Sunday, March 22, 2015
The Big Speech: War is sweet to the inexperienced
γλυκύ δ᾽ἀπείρῳ πόλεμος.
πεπειραμένων δέ τις ταρβεῖ προσιόντα νιν καρδία περισσῶς.
War is sweet to the inexperienced, but the experienced man trembles at its approach
Pindar.
πεπειραμένων δέ τις ταρβεῖ προσιόντα νιν καρδία περισσῶς.
War is sweet to the inexperienced, but the experienced man trembles at its approach
Pindar.
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