201–210 of 343 posts
William D. Nordhaus. Do Real-Output and Real-Wage Measures Capture Reality? The History of Lighting Suggests Not. in The Economics of New Goods ed. Timothy F. Bresnahan, Robert J. Gordon. U. Chicago Press (1996)
http://www.nber.org/chapters/c6064
Also, note that some of the data is Norhaus's (an economist) rough modern reconstructions at their home, such as burning wood in their own fireplace.
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Ah, I see you point. Sorry it took me awhile to get there :) Regarding "it leaves everyone poor", how is the case if it's zero sum? It seems like it comes down to how you define your metric of 'poor'. It seems like it presupposes there isn't enough money to go around, so it's better to have a few people rich and the rest destitute, rather than have everyone just be marginally poor. Or are we getting into productivity…
> how is the case if it's zero sum Trade isn’t zero sum. Ricardian mechanics is what overturned mercantilism. You paying more for your neighbour to do work than someone down the street deprives you of money and everyone of economies of scale.
> Back in the prehistoric era a person would have to gather, chop and burn wood for roughly 10 hours a day for six days straight in order to produce the equivalent light of a modern lightbulb shining for about an hour. This feels like a very odd comparison/metric. It doesn't really matter how many lumens/watts it has, I think a better metric is "How much does it take to 'comfortably' light a single room for 1 hour".…
> Back in the prehistoric era a person would have to gather, chop and burn wood for roughly 10 hours a day for six days straight in order to produce the equivalent light of a modern lightbulb shining for about an hour. This feels like a very odd comparison/metric. It doesn't really matter how many lumens/watts it has, I think a better metric is "How much does it take to 'comfortably' light a single room for 1 hour".…
This is why I resent the laws banning incandescent lights. I consider myself an environmentalist, and am very careful about wasting electricity. I love the warm dim light from an incandescent and think it helps me fall asleep... the light from one incandescent dimmed to about 20-40W is all I need after sunset, and all I want. It's like sitting near a campfire. My house is solar powered, and I keep a window open witho…
In colder regions it's been common sense to use an incandescent light bulb to keep a space heated so it's just above freezing (above 0C or 32F) during the winter months.
This is to prevent things like plumbing and sensitive machinery from breaking due to ice formation. A full blown heater is generally complete overkill and impractical for this.
Unless someone has a drop-in replacement for incandescent light bulbs for heat generation purposes, I want them back. And no, LED light bulbs do not work: LEDs don't produce significant heat.
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These are not dumb people, they are my friends and neighbors who are being systematically oppressed. Unless you're working a blue collar job in America you don't see this
Right, I'm saying they aren't dumb. If what you are saying is true they would have to not only be dumb, but barely have human level intelligence. You believe that your friends and neighbors are completely incompetent at things that are trivially easy, and they have no hope of ever figuring it out on their own. You are actually claiming that there are tens of millions of adult humans, who have lived 20, 30 years, and…
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There was an article posted here earlier this year[1] that pointed out the flaws in modern LEDs, and just how hard it is to get one that matches the color you want. It's a pretty long read, but the author does a really good job of showing just how much trouble he has getting comfortable lighting that actually lasts a long time. [1] https://nymag.com/strategist/article/led-light-bulbs-investi...
As I mentioned in some other comments, I settled on a lamp with a fully adjustable color and brightness. It’s lots of diodes, and the net effect is very nice. In other words, I’m agreeing with your article that the fixed bulbs typically don’t hit the mark.
https://www.sevarg.net/2023/04/08/ecosmart-smart-bulb-review... + https://www.sevarg.net/2023/03/11/philips-smart-wifi-bulbs/ + https://www.sevarg.net/2023/02/26/feit-electric-wifi-rgb-bul...
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As I mentioned in some other comments, I settled on a lamp with a fully adjustable color and brightness. It’s lots of diodes, and the net effect is very nice. In other words, I’m agreeing with your article that the fixed bulbs typically don’t hit the mark.
Are you sure that your "fully adjustable" bulb is giving you the spectrum you think it is? Syonyk's posted a few RGB bulb reviews recently, and they tend to have a lot more blue light than you'd think. And if you use the RGB functions, they tend to get REALLY spiky instead of having a smooth emissions curve. https://www.sevarg.net/2023/04/08/ecosmart-smart-bulb-review... + https://www.sevarg.net/2023/03/11/philips-sm…
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Who can't afford food? An egg costs like 30 cents, rice is like 20 cents a pound. Make some fried rice. Make a sandwich. The cost of great food is like $40 a month per person, with the bonus that they wouldn't be morbidly obese. Now explain why its unreasonable to expect people to eat high quality cheap food. (and no "poor people are too stupid" paternalistic arguments)
I'll take this as a teaching opportunity Here's who can't practically afford that: Someone with 3 kids working 80 hours a week in service or truck driving. Or someone that is disabled. Or someone that has severe mental health issues. There are quite a few prerequisites that you assume exist that just don't in a poor American household and the primary one that doesn't exist is time. Beyond the time you need to plan, s…
Considering that the amount of computing that could be rented for the price of a house every month could now be bought for $20, this isn't surprising. What's surprising is that with all these resources made available to the world, we still have systems that allow hoarding of wealth to such a degree that most people can't afford to own a home and many can barely afford rent and food.
Even if we look at only the resource of light, you'll find that over a billion people are still using kerosene lanterns, primarily in places with low electricity access. That's around 10 billion liters of kerosene still being used per year. It's more expensive, dangerous, unhealthy, and wasteful than a cheap LED light, but without electricity, it's still the best choice.
Light. Water. Ice. Calories (if not picky). Entertainment (radio, youtube, etc). Information (google, Wikipedia).
We still have a ways to go, but that's a good damn start.