My response to a comment by John Green on Reddit
I really really like your work and webcasts (example included below).
This seems to me to make it really difficult on people trying to use judgement. Calling people’s actions “extremely paternalistic” if they are not definitely so, I think impedes debate. And I think debate should be encouraged.
When making Kiva loans I do steer away from loans with rates above 40% (I also prefer loans that are geared toward a capital investment that will increase earning power going forward though this is hard – lots of loans are essentially for inventory that will be sold at a profit so a fine use of loans but not as powerful [in my opinion] and new capital investments – say a new tool, solar power that will be resold to users…).
Just like people anywhere, people taking Kiva loans are capable of getting themselves into trouble. Choosing to allocate my lender toward certain loans does not mean I am being paternalistic.
I am not being paternalistic if I chose not to invest in the stock of some company that vastly overpays executives and uses high leverage to do very well (in good times).
I do like the idea of direct cash to people in need. I give cash that way (and in fact did it a long time ago, 20 years, for several years – before any of this new hipster cachet :-). And I still do like it.
While people question the value of a college degree a recent study by the New York Federal Reserve shows a degree is close to as valuable today as it has ever been. The costs to get that value have risen but even with the increased cost students earn on average a 15% annual rate of return on their investment.
Of course, not every student will earn that, some will earn more and some less.
…
The time required to recoup the costs of a bachelor’s degree has fallen substantially over time, from more than twenty years in the late 1970s and early 1980s to about ten years in 2013. So despite the challenges facing today’s college graduates, the value of a college degree has remained near its all-time high, while the time required to recoup the costs of the degree has remained near its all-time low.
So a college education is a great investment for most people. This can create a problem however, when people then assume that all they need to do is go to college and they will do well no matter what. The same thing happens in other markets. Real estate has proven to be a great investment. that doesn’t mean every real estate investment is good. It doesn’t mean you can ignore the costs and risks of a particular investment. The same goes for stocks.
The article, What’s the Real U.S. Unemployment Rate? We Have No Idea, provides interesting information on the process for calculating the unemployment rate.
But it also misleads in saying “real US unemployment rate.”
As Dr. Deming said: “there is no true value” of any measured process. The results depend on the process which includes the operation definitions used.
Over time the value of a measure (as a proxy measure for some condition you care to monitor) can change.
It is important to update measures to avoid using proxies that lose value.
The unemployment rate certainly has proxy issues. But there is no “true unemployment rate.” There are ways to change the process to focus on different things (make the proxy better matched to certain issues). But also it seems to me, unemployment rate needs to have other related measures that are considered in concert with the unemployment rate (such as the labor force participation rate, perhaps some measure of under-employment etc.).
Those paying much attention do use other measures in concert but the last few years I read lots of different people complaining that the unemployment rate doesn’t capture various aspects of how the job market is poor (and often claiming the unemployment rate was “inaccurate” as though there was a platonic form of the actual rate divorced from the measure process.
Related: What Do Unemployment Stats Mean? – Economic Measurement Issues Arising from Globalization – Why China’s Economic Data is Questionable
Business should not be allowed to store credit card numbers that can be stolen and used. The credit card providers should generate a unique credit card number for the business to store that will only work for the purchaser at that business.
Also credit card providers should let me generate credit card numbers as I wish for use online (that are unique and can be stopped at any time I wish). If I get some customer hostile business that makes canceling a huge pain I should just be able to turn off that credit card “number.”
Laws should be adjusted to allow this consumer controlled spending and require that any subscription service must take the turning off of the payments as cancellation.
For some plan where the consumer agrees up front to say 12 months of payments then special timed numbers should be created where the potentially convoluted process used now remain for the first 12 months.
Also users should be able to interact with there credit reports and do things like turn on extra barriers to granting credit (things like they have to be delayed for 14 days after a text, email [to as many addresses and the consumer wants to enter] and postal notification are sent to the user. Variations on how these work is fine (for example, setting criteria for acceptance of the new credit early at the consumers option if certain conditions are met (signing into the web site and confirming information…).
Better security on the cards themselves are also needed in the USA. The costs of improvement are not just the expenses credit card and retailers face but the huge burden to consumers from abuse of the insecure system in place for more than a decade. It is well past time the USA caught up with the rest of the world for on-card security.
The providers have done a lousy job of reducing the enormous burden of fraud on consumers. As well as failing to deal adequately with customer hostile business practices (such as making canceling very cumbersome and continuing to debit the consumer’s credit card account).
Related: Protect Yourself from Credit Card Fraud – Personal Finance Tips on the Proper use of Credit Cards – Continued Credit Card Company Customer Dis-Service – Banks Hoping they Paid Politicians Enough to Protect Billions in Excessive Fees
Amazon Prepares Online Advertising Program
This is potentially a real risk to Google. The odds of such a huge success it decreases Google’s profits are tiny (I think). But there is a real risk that the increase in Google’s profits going forward are materially affected by a well done competitor to Adsense.
Adwords is Google’s platform for buying ads. Those ads are then displayed on Google’s websites and on millions of other websites. Other websites can host ads via the Adsense program. It seems to me what is really at risk is better seen as Adsense business. The business on Google’s own websites is not at risk (Google’s profit from its sites are double I think all the other sites [via Adsense] combined).
If Amazon took away 10% of what Google’s Adsense business 4 years would have been that is likely material to Google’s earning. Not huge but real.
Even losing the ads on Amazon’s web site is likely noticeable (though not a huge deal, for Google, for many companies it would be significant, I would guess).
There is even the potential Google has to reduce their profitability, on Adsense, to compete – giving web sites a better cut of revenue.