This week's links roundup, featuring bribes for NIMBYs, the value of diagnosis, (hopefully) the end of terrible touchscreen controls in cars, and oh no I did a podcast.
Maybe it’s just me, but I was really underwhelmed by the Leslie/Kelly podcast on Trump. Was it more than 2 min of insight wrapped in 48 min of chat? Perhaps her FT pieces on him are pithier?
Another issue with "kompromat": what are the Russians supposed to have on Trump - prostitutes and golden showers? Grab 'em by the pussy and Stormy-gate have done him no harm. This is another thing for which many of his supporters would presumably give a hearty thumbs up?
Disagree on the value of bribes. 1. More infrastructure is good, and I'd rather just buy them off than have them increase costs through lawsuits and 2. electricity is not strictly a perk of having a pylon near you, because people far away from pylons also get electricity. It is unfortunately true that the costs of infrastructure are higher for people who live near it (except for train stations), and paying them off should help shift the balance in favour of infrastructure. A system where locals have less veto power would be better but that system also needs to be politically durable.
"if we’re giving bribes for pylons, why not bridges, railways, water networks or roads?"
Why not, indeed?
There's two arguments in favour, I think:
1) If bunging property owners £500 (or whatever) stops a legal case, does this work out cheaper? (in the absence of major reform).
2) At heart, it's about proceeds of growth. If (say) a rural village has lost it's post office, library and other 'governmental' services, I don't think it's unreasonable to feel that the growth generated by the new railway line is benefiting other people. Giving people cash is a way to "upfront" the growth that the infrastructure would generate.
Better of course to overtly provide new government services as a condition of giving approval (Dear local authority, there's a new hospital wing/park/bus service in it for you if you give approval...)
The second point I think is interesting and probably worth a whole essay soon. There’s something paradoxical about equity and development where on the one hand people say they want the benefits, but if you look at e.g. Crossrail the benefits for towns on the route are huge but people just sort of refuse to accept it, or see growth as fundamentally against their interests. It’s the same as how every English NIMBY wants to live in a 500 person village with a branch of John Lewis. Really hard to unpick a practical way you deal with if.
True - so there's either two ways to fix that. You either make positive moves (accept Crossrail and get new rail services from your station) or negative ones (if you don't want new housing in Barnet, we will cut the Underground services from your station). Essentially, on both sides, there's no such thing as a free lunch...
I tend to carry these thoughts to an heretical conclusion - I suspect "Net Zero" is basically unachievable in a first-past-the-post electoral system.
Could you point me at the evidence that touchscreen controls are so very dangerous? They’ve been in cars for years, in an extreme form in millions of Teslas. Presumably the police, the rescue services, the hospitals, the insurance companies have clear evidence that they are causing an epidemic of accidents.
Maybe it’s just me, but I was really underwhelmed by the Leslie/Kelly podcast on Trump. Was it more than 2 min of insight wrapped in 48 min of chat? Perhaps her FT pieces on him are pithier?
Another issue with "kompromat": what are the Russians supposed to have on Trump - prostitutes and golden showers? Grab 'em by the pussy and Stormy-gate have done him no harm. This is another thing for which many of his supporters would presumably give a hearty thumbs up?
Disagree on the value of bribes. 1. More infrastructure is good, and I'd rather just buy them off than have them increase costs through lawsuits and 2. electricity is not strictly a perk of having a pylon near you, because people far away from pylons also get electricity. It is unfortunately true that the costs of infrastructure are higher for people who live near it (except for train stations), and paying them off should help shift the balance in favour of infrastructure. A system where locals have less veto power would be better but that system also needs to be politically durable.
"if we’re giving bribes for pylons, why not bridges, railways, water networks or roads?"
Why not, indeed?
There's two arguments in favour, I think:
1) If bunging property owners £500 (or whatever) stops a legal case, does this work out cheaper? (in the absence of major reform).
2) At heart, it's about proceeds of growth. If (say) a rural village has lost it's post office, library and other 'governmental' services, I don't think it's unreasonable to feel that the growth generated by the new railway line is benefiting other people. Giving people cash is a way to "upfront" the growth that the infrastructure would generate.
Better of course to overtly provide new government services as a condition of giving approval (Dear local authority, there's a new hospital wing/park/bus service in it for you if you give approval...)
The second point I think is interesting and probably worth a whole essay soon. There’s something paradoxical about equity and development where on the one hand people say they want the benefits, but if you look at e.g. Crossrail the benefits for towns on the route are huge but people just sort of refuse to accept it, or see growth as fundamentally against their interests. It’s the same as how every English NIMBY wants to live in a 500 person village with a branch of John Lewis. Really hard to unpick a practical way you deal with if.
True - so there's either two ways to fix that. You either make positive moves (accept Crossrail and get new rail services from your station) or negative ones (if you don't want new housing in Barnet, we will cut the Underground services from your station). Essentially, on both sides, there's no such thing as a free lunch...
I tend to carry these thoughts to an heretical conclusion - I suspect "Net Zero" is basically unachievable in a first-past-the-post electoral system.
(Discuss, showing your thinking, 5000 words etc).
Could you point me at the evidence that touchscreen controls are so very dangerous? They’ve been in cars for years, in an extreme form in millions of Teslas. Presumably the police, the rescue services, the hospitals, the insurance companies have clear evidence that they are causing an epidemic of accidents.
It's actually such an issue that NCAP will be marking down safety ratings for cars that don't have physical controls from 2026. From first principles it's obviously very similar to a phone in terms of providing a screen that drivers have to look at and interact with, and we know how dangerous those are, and that's backed up by research from e.g. the AAA in the US https://www.driving.co.uk/news/technology/safety-regulator-tells-carmakers-to-reduce-reliance-on-touchscreens-or-face-lower-safety-ratings/