Election day reflections

With another hour or so of voting, and another 5 hours perhaps to get good estimates of winners of the elections today, I thought I'd better distract myself as I can, and see what I think of democracy.

Thoughts most coming up have been around peak oil, global warming, and general sense of "doom and gloom" about a future of diminished resources to support our still expanding population. You just KNOW something must give sooner or later, and wonder what to do about.

Now as a relatively well off American, among a VERY well off country, there's quite a lot I can consider doing to "invest" in more sustainable future. I mean invest largely in the money sense, but as much in the time sense - taking the time to understand my corner of the world, what sustains it, and what responses it can take if times of crises or shortages come up.

Well, partly I recognize all the little things I might do are ultimately "nothing" in the bigger picture if others are not able to follow me, whether through a lack of money, time, interest, or ambition. Basically not only do I have to "lead by example" and "show personal benefit" by action, but also offer reasonable actions that many people CAN make, not just spoiled computer programmers who don't have a life or family to distract attention.

I've thought also about the nature of "limits", like with Halloween. A year ago there was TONS of candy at work before halloween, all those cute little wrapped confections of delight. So very easy to grab one, two, or TWENTY after a long work day. Well I found a compromise. Before halloween I allowed myself "one of each type per day" and I didn't like much of it, so that worked well, and after halloween when employees brought in even MORE extra candy, I had enough and said "one per day"", simple enough, and gosh darn, moderation works. It's annoying that moderation seems to have 3 numbers: zero, one, and infinitity. There just doesn't seem to be any interesting numbers between two and infinitity, well, except a stomach ache perhaps! But seriously, when no mental limits are applied, satiation perhaps is reached with about a dozen minichocolate bars per hour. Seriously, no more, but of course that's quite a lot!

My little example shows something, even if I'm not sure what. It shows that under times of stress, will power can't be easily control impulses, and something stronger is needed. What is strange is how rules can AID willpower.

I can go into economics. At work we used to have a little "snack pack", a small box with assorted candy and a slot for money to pay on an honor system, $0.60/snack. When the privider left, people missed it and I guess either we or one employee had a membership at Sam's club, so she started our own snack system, starting with a prepurchase from company money, and people again take snacks by the honor system. She calculated a cost of $0.40/snack.

Well, with the magic of bulk orders, our snack costs went down 33%! Now $2 could BUY 5 snacks. Since change is annoying, easiest to drop in $2 at a time, and count out 5 snacks. Well, easy if its used up in a few days! Seriously dirt cheap calorie rich, good tasting, stress comfort food! You know what I mean?

Okay, just mentioned that to notice that price actually effects consumption. Free is best of course, but 5 snacks for $2 is nicer than 5 snacks for $3, even if both are still cheap. And even at $0.40 each, apparently it earns a "profit" since she's used profits to buy kitchen equipment and supplies as well!

Now we might say my company is "enabling" poor eating habits, just like you might say "McDonalds". It's a funny issue, and surely 60% of the population has a reasonable control over their snacking, and another 30% has control most of the time with occasional binging, and then only 10% really has serious trouble with temptations.

Then looking at another side, my company pays 100% of the health insurance payments of employees, and complains about the high premiums, but meanwhile is tempting employees with bad "foods" all day. Always I accept personal responsibility, but doesn't the provider of temptation also have some responsibility as well?

Well, my "solution" would be to create a "sin tax" on snacks. Even if break-even costs average $0.25/each, why not charge $1/snack? People will still throw away their dollar without a care, because it is easy, but they'll start to consider how much they're adding up to and perhaps eat a little less. Maybe?

The same argument can be used for gasoline taxes. Okay, people NEED gas to power their cars to get around, but once you have cheap fuel, you use your car more, you create a lifestyle where you're drive all around to meet your needs each day, and you get LESS exercise, and it creates a downward spiral of poorer health since the worse shape you're in, the harder exercise is, and the easier it is to depend on auto travel.

So if gasoline cost $5/gallon, people will still pay for it, but they'll think about it a bit more. Okay, again, I'm thinking from the perspective of someone who doesn't "budget". Money I spend on gas or food is much smaller than I'd ever worry about hurting my budget. Others barely getting by will see $3 gas as hurting them, and $5 even more.

So at one level you might say "sin taxes" have no effect on people who have enough money, and HURT people who are already poor.

On being poor and food, my girlfriend said that McDonalds is not only cheap for eating out, but even cheap compared to grocery store food, at least "good food". I didn't quite believe, but admit when I was a student, McDonalds seemed pretty cheap.

And then contrast to the really ritzy "organic", "free range", "fair trade" stuff, well, apparently paying for good food is simply not affordable to the lower class, even if they wanted it.

Part of my support for "sin taxes" is that it encourages better choices, and helps make better alternatives more attractive.

For example, I'm not high on support for Ethanol as produced, but not hopeless yet. I complain that subsidies are not good, that they distort the market, so inefficient production can continue. I don't know if ethanol is a viable fuel, but I say rather than subsidizing ethanol $0.50/gallon, why not just add a $0.50/gallon tax to gasoline? THEN if ethanol can compete, I'll be happlier to accept it. It STILL might not be sustainable - might be depleting soil quality, or grown by using depleting natural gas supplies for producing fertiliers, etc.

I can't compare organic food since it isn't subsidized, but just in terms of raw materials, why not add a HUGE tax on "high frucose corn syrup" or other highly processed, poor nutritional valued ingredients to poor quality foods. These costs will get passed on into higher costs for junk food and drinks, and like my "snack pack", example people would overall consume less and be more likely to look at healthier alternatives.

It is actually "so obvious" it is surprising to me, in my naivity why this has never been proposed. Probably because not ONLY are we creating cheap sweeters from corn, we're SUBSIDIZING corn production and trying to find MARKETS for the excess. If we actually did something to lower demand, we'd HURT farmers even more by hurting prices. I don't know, but just imagining how self-interest fails to meet the needs of greater society, health and wellbeing.

Well, starting small, perhaps I'll try selling a "sin tax" at work, and propose a place to spend this surplus. Interestingly, if people KNOW how little it costs to buy the snacks, and that the honor system is never accounted for cheats, they can continue paying $0.40 each. So ultimately the "sin tax" becomes entirely voluntary. This WORKS in a workplace of well-off employees, but less so probably in the market place.

Imagine your grocery bill was $172.08, and adding a voluntary "sin tax" of $38.22. Would ANYONE pay this? That's perhaps an example of "scale". Adding a small tax to many small bills seems small, while the same tax on one larger bill seems less acceptable.

Well, I think of Xcel's "WindSource" program, voluntarily paying an extra $0.02/kwh, to cover extra costs of wind power, and in theory encouraging expansion of wind generation as people are willing to pay for it.

An impatient person wants to "tax all" out of fairness, and perhaps a wiser person accepts people are better of empowered by choices over limitations placed on them. Perhaps "voluntary" taxes could exist, although of course there's some fraction of the people who believe ALL government spending is corrupt and don't want one extra dime to go towards the government.

And of course people can already pay more for better products, like organic food. For me the only reinforcement for a "sin tax" on sweets is I believe I'm better off for it myself.

Well, interesting thoughts, not sure what I'll do with them....