Civil War soldiers

David Brooks provides another thoughtful column today, on the perspectives of Civil War soldiers toward their role in the conflict, as we approach the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg. He cites James McPherson and others who report patterns of civic mindedness in letters written by soldiers, and he contrasts them with the post-WWI "Hemingway" version of war perspectives that is considerably less rosy.

Two thoughts occurred to me. I wondered whether the written record during the Civil War was much representative of enlisted men as opposed to officers, during a period when literacy was not widespread. But it is also plausible that a fight to preserve the unity of the country, as opposed to the foreign wars fought since then, which have arguably never been existential, might well be perceived very differently by those involved.

Coffee houses and social media

As a follow-on to a post I made a few years ago about essays on caffeine, here's a fun related piece in the NYT about coffee houses as the social media of the 1600s. Samuel Pepys, stop wasting so much time on Facebook? And there's the ubiquitous reference to the use of social media in the classroom, something I wish I could get started with my students but so far haven't found the right way to do it.

WSJ on Janet Yellen

I enjoyed reading this WSJ article today about Janet Yellen, "Janet Yellen, a Top Contender at the Fed, Faces Test Over Easy Money," which is behind a subscriber firewall. Thanks to my dad for sending it along!

I had the privilege of serving as Janet's assistant on two trips to the OECD in Paris back during 1998 and 1999, when unemployment in the U.S. was dipping down toward 4.0 percent.  Those trips were a great education for me, a 25-year old Ph.D. student from Berkeley who was more than a little wet behind the ears.  Janet's preparedness, knowledge, and steady wisdom were inspiring.

Educated Chinese workers unemployed by choice

The Times reports on voluntary unemployment among two young Chinese workers (who happen to be dating) each with advanced education, who prefer to wait rather than take a factory job. Both report family support, which on the one hand is more strained than it would be in the U.S. because of more severe generational disparities in education, and on the other hand is less strained because of the one child policy.

Inside the late 2007 FOMC meetings

The New York Times published an article summarizing the FOMC meeting transcripts from fall 2007 that were recently released after the standard 5-year delay. Most notable to me were remarks attributed to Bernanke in the September meeting in which he argues for leaving the federal funds rate unchanged so as to avoid any appearance of a bailout of financial market participants.

Stiglitz on macro effects of inequality

Today Joe Stiglitz blogs about some costs of inequality and in particular why he feels it is responsible for the slow recovery. For me the notable statistic was that growth in the pre-crisis decade "was reliant" on the bottom 80 percent of households spending 110% of their incomes. Nothing like giving one hundred and ten percent.

SJSU and cyber-remediation

The Times published an article about Udacity and San Jose State University partnering to offer introductory and remedial classes online. If remediation can be more effectively achieved through cyber-learning, that seems like a development that is close to fully Pareto optimal, helping everyone and harming nobody.