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Efficiency Is the Enemy

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Re: Efficiency Is the Enemy

#221

Post by duxup »

Laarlf wrote: post #84
allenu wrote: post #79

Something that I've noticed recently is that in my work life, I'm finding there's more bureaucracy in what I do, mostly in the name of "efficiency". When you encounter a problem to solve, there's often a process already defined that is most efficient (or at least thought to be most efficient), when accomplishing tasks, there's a pre-defined way of laying out the tasks (i.e. tickets), updating them, reviewing them, an…

Overregulation and bureaucracy are the downfall of the west. The sooner we realise that, the sooner we can fix it.

Bureaucracy seems like it is tied to human nature.

Re: Efficiency Is the Enemy

#222

Post by staticautomatic »

pantalaimon wrote: post #179
thesuitonym wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>BTW our time tracking tool is a company wide motivation killer HINT: They all are.

With cryptic overly specific tasks and one that ends up being the 'catch all' for everything that doesn't fit one of the narrow categories?

You should see law firm timekeeping. It can be mind-blowingly labyrinthine.

Re: Efficiency Is the Enemy

#223

Post by andrewflnr »

This is also one of the things wrong with the global economy. Safety margin is necessary but inefficient, and insufficiently incentivized. In an older conversation here, someone phrased it along the lines of "a system that's highly optimized for one environment is correspondingly unoptimized for any other environment", including environments resulting from natural changes. I tend to think of it as an engine with all the tolerances honed down for efficiency, like a racing motorcycle, but with no room for grit or losing traction.

Re: Efficiency Is the Enemy

#224

Post by Qwertious »

pdonis wrote: post #196
barrkel wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many regulations cannot be local because of basic game theory. Beggar-thy-neighbour policies, for example; if one region allows a little more pollution and attracts industry because of that, then other regions are forced to do the same or lose out. As a result industry socializes the cost of its pollution and takes a private profit. Similar effects occur for safety standards, consumer standards, employment standards,…

> industry socializes the cost of its pollution and takes a private profit Um, isn't this what is happening now, with centralized regulation?

No, proper regulation either forces companies to curb their emissions or taxes it. In other words, to internalize it.

Re: Efficiency Is the Enemy

#225

Post by _carbyau_ »

zmmmmm wrote: post #210
mlac wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing that kills me about the ticketing systems is that they are often put into place in a way that is locally efficient but does not make sense globally. For example, an application owner might have to submit a ticket to request an upgrade once a year (or when a new OS is supported). What often happens is that the application owner now has to know about, find, and correctly understand a form that they see once (…

> all of the systems that were designed to take away the need for administrative assistants may once again require an assistant to navigate efficiently Made me laugh. My org has a completely automated online self-service travel booking system that even includes dedicated support from a corporate travel agent - and I recently needed a single flight booked for a day in another city (about the simplest travel you can do…

It is exactly the extra rules, inevitably poorly communicated, that aren't hard coded into the form that make these anxiety inducing to navigate.

I am here, procrastinating on one form right now. I have left myself this week to get to stage one( of three).

Re: Efficiency Is the Enemy

#226

Post by not2b »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #201
HWR_14 wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Federal regulations prevent a race to the bottom for things like pollution, labor rights, etc. And IP, internet, and other regulations only make sense at a federal level. But, in terms of how to lay out a town in terms of residential zones vs. commercial zones, sure that should be local.

> Federal regulations prevent a race to the bottom for things like pollution, labor rights, etc. Not really. Local people suffer the most from local pollution and low local wages etc., so they have the most incentive to strike a reasonable balance. Federalizing e.g. minimum wage is just an excuse for high cost of living areas to screw over low cost of living areas by depriving them of their natural cost advantage, pr…

Not necessarily. Before the EPA, states would often put their toxic dumps close to the state line, where the winds and the current would take their crap into the next state. Incentives only work if there are no externalities (sticking someone else with the bill).

And moving power from the cities to the state level tends to screw the city, especially in heavily gerrymandered states.

You're certainly right that NIMBYism in zoning laws is a big problem, but NIMBYs can be quite powerful at the state level as well.

Re: Efficiency Is the Enemy

#227

Post by treeman79 »

While traveling by car during one of his many overseas travels, Professor Milton Friedman spotted scores of road builders moving earth with shovels instead of modern machinery. When he asked why powerful equipment wasn’t used instead of so many laborers, his host told him it was to keep employment high in the construction industry. If they used tractors or modern road building equipment, fewer people would have jobs was his host’s logic.

“Then instead of shovels, why don’t you give them spoons and create even more jobs?” Friedman inquired.

Re: Efficiency Is the Enemy

#228

Post by hayst4ck »

Laarlf wrote: post #84
allenu wrote: post #79

Something that I've noticed recently is that in my work life, I'm finding there's more bureaucracy in what I do, mostly in the name of "efficiency". When you encounter a problem to solve, there's often a process already defined that is most efficient (or at least thought to be most efficient), when accomplishing tasks, there's a pre-defined way of laying out the tasks (i.e. tickets), updating them, reviewing them, an…

Overregulation and bureaucracy are the downfall of the west. The sooner we realise that, the sooner we can fix it.

> Overregulation and bureaucracy are the downfall of the west.

[citation needed]

I think it's pretty clear we are both over and under regulating.

Can you tell me the basis/primary purpose of regulation? Can you tell me what the the primary benefit of bureaucracy is?

Re: Efficiency Is the Enemy

#229

Post by duxup »

allenu wrote: post #79

Something that I've noticed recently is that in my work life, I'm finding there's more bureaucracy in what I do, mostly in the name of "efficiency". When you encounter a problem to solve, there's often a process already defined that is most efficient (or at least thought to be most efficient), when accomplishing tasks, there's a pre-defined way of laying out the tasks (i.e. tickets), updating them, reviewing them, an…

A company I worked at was aquired by another company. The new management team talked almost exclusively about tickets and metrics that came from tickets.

They knew almost nothing else, if you spoke to them they seemed confused if you didn't describe how it related to tickets.

It was weird.

A few months into the new company there was an emergency meeting. It was found that the ticket metrics were horribly wrong. They showed that a handful of yokels from the Midwest were closing ticktes faster than the folks in Silicon Valley...and worse they were staying closed and customer's were reporting more positive feedback, just didn't make sense.

So they ticket obsessed valley folks declared the guys from the new company must be creating fake tickets and otherwise messing with the numbers!

After months of accusations they got someone from the outside to investigate. They found there were widespread fake tickets and other shenanigans....

Everyone up to shenanigans worked for the ticket obsessed valley based managers.... all the folks who made the accusations.

They had driven their teams so hard that the employees just played the only game the management responded to, closing tickets....

The resolution? They declared the old metrics bad, reorganized the teams so management had some valley and some midwestern employees so that the pockets of ticket shenanigans wasn't as obvious.

Otherwise nothing changed. The ticket mania continued.

Re: Efficiency Is the Enemy

#230

Post by biomcgary »

joakleaf wrote: post #193
gherkinnn wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently heard a clever man argue (can’t remember who), that process does make things more efficient. Starting at chaos, the more things are defined, the more you get done. Until it doesn’t, at which point the relation inverts and you eventually end up stagnant. The problem is that because adding ever more processes worked so far, and now that you’ve hired process people, you continue adding more and more and ever…

I heard Jim Keller (the chip-designer) say this (or something similar) recently in a podcast with Lex Fridman. It is at the 24.40 mark in "Jim Keller: The Future of Computing, AI, Life, and Consciousness | Lex Fridman Podcast" https://youtu.be/G4hL5Om4IJ4?t=1480 "So there is a graph. Y-axis is productivity. X-axis at 0 is chaos and infinity is complete order. As you improve order, you increase productivity. And at so…

I would extend your point to say that any system with infinite chaos or infinite order necessarily lacks information about the world. Any system encoding information about reality necessarily looks like a mix of chaos and order. Unfortunately, any system that perfectly encodes / decodes information about reality has to be more complicated than reality itself.
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