Figure 1: age-adjusted death rates from heart and cerebrovascular diseases, USA, 1950 – 2013
Source: Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.
Death rates from the two leading causes of death in the USA since 1950
02 Aug 2015 Leave a comment
in economic history, health economics, politics - USA Tags: life expectancies, The Great Escape
RT Sorry, vegans: Eating meat and cooking food is how humans got their big brains
02 Aug 2015 1 Comment
in economic history, health economics Tags: economics of physiology, PEETA, The Great Escape, vegans, vegetarianism
Eating meat and cooking food made us human, the studies suggest, enabling the brains of our prehuman ancestors to grow dramatically over a few million years.
Although this isn’t the first such assertion from archaeologists and evolutionary biologists, the new studies demonstrate that it would have been biologically implausible for humans to evolve such a large brain on a raw, vegan diet and that meat-eating was a crucial element of human evolution at least a million years before the dawn of humankind.
via Sorry, vegans: Eating meat and cooking food is how humans got their big brains – The Washington Post.
Grand Canyon Sunrise
02 Aug 2015 Leave a comment
Grand Canyon Sunrise http://t.co/slS9Xtde7W—
WOW Pictures (@WOWPicsOfLife) March 15, 2014
40% of Fortune 500 companies were started by immigrants or children of immigrants
02 Aug 2015 Leave a comment
in economic history, entrepreneurship, industrial organisation, survivor principle Tags: creative destruction, economics of immigration, entrepreneurial alertness, top 1%
The alternative to orchestrating a vast conspiracy
02 Aug 2015 1 Comment
in applied price theory, economic history, health economics Tags: conspiracy theories, GMOs, moon landing
Motor vehicle related death rates for males and females aged 15 to 24 by race since 1950 in the USA
01 Aug 2015 Leave a comment
in economic history, politics - USA, transport economics Tags: road accident rates, road safety
The large drop in white young white male deaths so dominates figure 1 that it conceals a halving in white female deaths. These measures in figure 1 are not related to propensity to drive a car. It must be hypothesised that women were driving more than they used to in the 1950s and 1960s. Nearly all of the decline in white young female road deaths has been since 1990.
Figure 1: motor vehicle related deaths of males and females aged 15 to 24 by race, USA, 1950 – 2013
Source: Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.
Deaths of black males young black males in the road actually increased in the 1980s before falling again. There has been no change at all really in the number of deaths of young black females since 1950.
Cumulative Growth in Average Inflation-Adjusted After-Tax Income by Before-Tax Income Group, 1979 to 2011 with 1% annual adjustment for inflation measurement bias
01 Aug 2015 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, applied welfare economics, economic history, politics - USA Tags: CPI bias, living standards, measurement errors, The Great Enrichment
The Congressional Budget Office did its best to adjust after-tax incomes for inflation between 1979 in 2011. In figure 1, I added an extra 1% inflation adjustment in every year from 1979. 1% per annum is a common estimate of the inflation bias introduced by the inability of most measures of inflation to account for new goods and upgrades in the quality of existing goods to name but a few bias is in the measurement of consumer price inflation.
Figure 1: Cumulative Growth in Average Inflation-Adjusted After-Tax Income, by Before-Tax Income Group, USA, 1979 to 2011, 1% upward annual adjustment for inflation bias for new goods and quality upgrades
Source: derived from Congressional Budget Office, The Distribution of Household Income and Federal Taxes, 2011.
As can be seen from figure 1, with a 1% up left for measurement bias, instead of increases of 48% and 40% in the incomes of the lowest quartile in the middle three quartiles respectively, their after-tax, after inflation incomes about doubled since 1979.
"The rich got richer, true. But…" —@DeirdreMcClosk buff.ly/1Imdv4o http://t.co/M3ERx3JTIn—
HumanProgress.org (@humanprogress) June 28, 2015
Well done, capitalism. Everyone was on a working class income in the 1970s is now on a middle-class income. Such are the joys of compounding 1% per year over more than 30 years.
Source: Congressional Budget Office, The Distribution of Household Income and Federal Taxes, 2011.
The original Congressional Budget Office diagram above with the higher income quartiles is presented for comparison. I didn’t present the top quartiles in figure 1 because it made it unreadable because of the dominant influence of the top 1%’s increase in income.
The lesson for the day is small inaccuracies in the measurement of prosperity can over several decades through compounding lead to massive misunderstandings of the increases in prosperity.
The American stock market is highly regulated
01 Aug 2015 Leave a comment
in economic history, economics of regulation, financial economics, industrial organisation, politics - USA Tags: financial regulation, rational ignorance, rational irrationality
Check out this awesome chart of U.S. Market Complexity
bloomberg.com/news/articles/… http://t.co/gRQNnhwjZo—
Barry Ritholtz (@ritholtz) July 09, 2015
The first-ever video played on MTV TD 1981 was?
01 Aug 2015 Leave a comment
in economic history, economics of media and culture, entrepreneurship, industrial organisation, Music, survivor principle Tags: competition as a discovery procedure, creative destruction, entrepreneurial alertness, legacy media, The meaning of competition
Death rates for homicide, black and white males aged 15 to 19, USA, 1950-2013
01 Aug 2015 Leave a comment
in economic history, economics of crime, law and economics, politics - USA Tags: crime and punishment, life expectancies
Figure 1: Death rates for homicide, black and white males aged 15 to 19: United States, selected years 1950-2013
Source: Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.
Arab Gulf states vastly outspend Iran on military
01 Aug 2015 Leave a comment
in defence economics, economic history, war and peace Tags: arms races, Gulf States, Iran, Middle-East politics, Saudi Arabia
Arab Gulf states vastly outspend Iran on military http://t.co/9Aq2RBpSJm—
ian bremmer (@ianbremmer) July 29, 2015
What is the Great Fact?
31 Jul 2015 Leave a comment
in comparative institutional analysis, development economics, economic history Tags: Deirdre McCloskey, The Great Fact
Developing countries’ share of economic activity increased from 20% of global GDP in 2000 to 40% in 2013—@JimKim_WBG http://t.co/QxqPkGjzvQ—
World Bank (@WorldBank) June 09, 2015
"Starvation worldwide is at an all-time low & falling…" —@DeirdreMcClosk. Data to explore: buff.ly/1G78cDt http://t.co/598P4mYdzH—
HumanProgress.org (@humanprogress) June 09, 2015
Life expectancies at age 65 by sex and race, USA, 1950 – 2010
31 Jul 2015 1 Comment
in applied welfare economics, economic history, health economics, politics - USA Tags: life expectancies, The Great Escape
There was quite a jump in life expectancy in the decades of the 1950s and 1960s, followed by slow progress for white females and black females. In the case of men of both races, the situation appears to be steady progress in post retirement life expectancy since 1950. Black male life expectancy actually fell in the 1960s for those aged 65.
Figure 1: life expectancies at age 65 by sex and race, USA, 1950 – 2010
Source: Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.
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