Copycat Killers

It took Me forever to read this Post from Tyler Cowen this morning, because my Mind kept cycling out into Space. I could say that it is too early for either Patinkin or Burstein; maybe I could make some argument about ‘weakly dominant game-theoretic strategies.’(in case Anyone is interested, Weki-up). The Bored and Resentful (like myself) must survive with the knowledge that the Math works out, but that definition of herd behavior is not the totality of economic description. One has to separate between primary impulse and 2nd Generation response, and no one has defined a clear separation along theoretical lines, at least not satisfactorily to me. The entire Subject is starting to give me a Headache, and People should not make me think about such things!.

One should read Gary Becker even when One is not much interested in what he is currently talking about (if you begin thinking like he does, it won’t get you a girlfriend, but might get you a Job in a Depressed economy). Here is one of those Times when I agree with Mr. Becker, but not his line of Thought. It is common Today to rile against the UAW, but the poor Union did not do what it should have in the 1970s, and everything turned into disaster Today. What should they have done? Way back when they could make Demands, they should have demanded Profits-sharing, and financed their own Health Care and Retirement Plans. Now, they are tied to their Opponents, who are going down because of widespread Expenditure of those Profits with no Gain, when they could have had a viable Investiture in a stable Fund. I must say in their defense that no one even suggested such a Course back then, not even Me.

One can always take the low Road, and blame it on poor Product; the out-of-synch element here is that Auto Sales are down everywhere in the World, across all companies and Products. Here is a breakdown which clarifies that good operation varies little from bad operative behavior amongst Car companies, and the quality of the Vehicles have little to do with the End-Result. The real causation remains that the Car companies continually spent their Cash Reserves through the Years, and the fault was that of Management not Labor. It is obvious that Bankruptcy will be the only instrument which will get rid of bad Management, the real necessity in the Equation. lgl