Not in the mood to rant

Schools out. I'm on hiatus. Not much to rant about. Well, I guess I'm just taking it all a bit more chill tho.

I'd like to make two public apologies tho:

(1) To Druanne: Sorry I pissed you off. I hope you like the brownies.

(2) To overstock.com: Sorry I was such a dick. But thanks for giving me not only ALL my money back but cut me a deal along the way. You still pissed me off but how else can I take out my frustrations on a faceless corporation. I can't so easily berate all the stockholders so I take it out on the customer service reps. Well, that is your job.

And one final praise to the karmic wheel: Channel surving during the 7 p.m. hour I stumble onto Ronin. Just moments before the chase scene. If you haven't seen that movie, it is worth renting the DVD just for the fun of that chase scene. (Cheers to Cloin.)

Peace out my pimps,

Wack Juice

(that's my ghetto name)

Inflation dilemma (revised)

The April 2006 CPI figures were released this morning and it has sent Wall Street reeling. Perhaps the 3.5% (annual rate) increase was above market expectations. That would likely lead investors to believe that the Fed will continue to raise interest rates to keep inflation in check.

Looking more closely at the figures we see that much of the increase is due to energy price spikes. But even the "core" as they call it, all items less food and energy, rose 2.3%.

A micro view:

Who all is really that surprised? In fact in this environment I would have bet against Wall Street that the expectations should be higher. It must be kept in mind that energy is an input into the production and delivery of many goods. As production costs are higher then prices should eventually be higher.

For several months we might have expected that firms have been able to eat some of the cost increases, that is keep prices steady and reduce profits. But at some point that ought to give. Firms will find it imparative to raise prices and will be certain rivals will follow rather than not (for those who know the "kinked demand curve" story, the point of tacit collusion has been racheted up). And they should be able to get away with raising prices because we should all be expecting higher prices.

a macro view:

Now, this inflation is most likely a "cost push" rather than a "demand pull" inflation. Demand pull is the usual type where money is easy and interest rates are low. Households and businesses spend and as firms reach their production capacity (in the short run) they have too many dollars chasing two few goods. The standard remedy is to raise interest rates to cool off spending and it takes the heat off rising prices.

Cost push inflation, however, is where firms face higher input costs. As these costs rise faster than wages (I would think there is significant lag these days) then people will have their limited dollars chasing higher priced goods. People will sooner or later have to start buying fewer goods. This can provoke the "stagflation" problem: rising prices and falling spending. Fed policy is in a bind. If they are hawks on inflation then further increases in interest rates will further cool off spending. But if they want to make sure employment levels are maintained, they will have to forget inflation and keep interest rates steady.

Ok Jack, but there is no recession. Ooops. Well, maybe it just hasn't happened yet. I'm not wanting one. Furthermore, we've experienced high fuel prices before. We know we can adjust. Regardless, as long as people continue to buy the same quantities of goods regardless of the price, we can have inflation with full employment. Unfortunately this adjustment mechanism has been notoriously sloppy in past episodes (oil shocks of the 70s, a little in early 90s). On the otherhand, the economy is more adept at processing information these days.

Anyway, I'm not at all surprised by today's news and I'm just not convinced that this is typical inflation. Furthermore, we don't know that energy prices will stay so high. If pump prices follow crude oil prices, then let's keep in mind that commodity prices can fluctuate. They are prone to speculative run ups. Those who are betting that prices will rise will further drive prices higher. At some point they will believe these prices to be unsustainable and will bet that the prices will fall. Crude prices could fall to $60 in a matter of days if the stage is set right.

I'm just talking out my ass folks. If I'm so smart I'd be rich. I'm not placing bets on anything. I'm a wuss.

J

P.S. See Colin's comment on today (5/17/06)

Put it down

To the women in my life: Put down that salt shaker. Please. The food really doesn't need it.

Salt is such an American seasoning. Bland. Just like our best selling beer.

You can do better.

But please, mom, sisters, you don't need that.

Please.


Tell them to their face? I've had trouble talking to people lately. I alienate. I try to be reasonable but when you put someone on the defensive like that they only get pissed. I need to try to get people to think that my ideas are actually their ideas.


But what do I know. I still have 11 sharpie slash marks on my arm from hanging out with the track team.

The Tao of Not Buying Insurance

The Undercover Economist on insurance

The Undercover Economist > Freakonomics

Judicial Independence

Not a rant. Just a rave.

You Go Girl!!

Oh no she di'in't!



Jackout

TicketBastard

http://www.slate.com/id/2141425/fr/rss/

Yeah, that's tough. It seems that the industry is always subject to
scalpers.

Back in the day when it was queuing, there were always scalpers there in
line. In Cincinnati there was a pharmacy in the suburbs. The many times I
arrived at 5:30 a.m. (for a 10 a.m. on sale) and some dude is there in the
parking lot. Gets out of the car goes to the door as I pull in.
Fortunately I beat him for the '95 Phish Nutter Center show. Got great
seats for that.

But even then we fought against those who got to call in their orders.

Would temporary online and phoneline blocks work? Again, the scalpers will
just get in line. This begets the "line lottery" issue where it is random.
Again, the hardcore fan is screwed.

Could they go to exclusive will call? Maybe. That could be a cluster fuck
at larger venues, or the requirement that the venue employ a lot of people
for a short time to distribute tickets.

Maybe do all internet and do all print your own tickets but deliver the
tickets the morning of the event. Makes people less reluctant to buy on
ebay if they don't get hard tickets.

The thing about it is that we are smart as are the scalpers. Every time I
find a way to get to the front of the line they find a way to reduce my
chances of that. It seems that tiered pricing works pretty good on those
high end events. But for a small club show or GA event you can't work the
tiered pricing so well.

I guess it isn't all TicketMaster's fault. They are the easy target. I so
welcomed online sales. As an out-of-towner willing to travel to see a show
I'm very happy to have access to it. I grudgingly pay convenience fees.

$10.85

Fricken $10.85 for a Phil Lesh/GRAB show this summer.

That's the bigger outrage, I think. There is so much market power there it
isn't funny. They cannot justify charging different convenience fees for
different events or for different priced tickets for the same event. Any
justification for a convenience fee would be to cover the average total cost
per ticket sale. And I cannot be convinced the marginal cost of selling one
more ticket is more than a buck. Even when you have to have a person sell
it to you that time is valued less than a buck.

And TM has us by the balls. "There's always the box office," they can point to. But that is a weak response that deflects the issue. The point is that it doesn't cost $10.85 to sell one ticket. And when you buy more than that in one transaction, the average and marginal costs are both falling. Marginal cost HAS to be zero for any ticket over 1 (up to the point where it increases the weight of the envelope, and that's only like 25-cents at probably the 7th or 8th ticket). Furthermore, for an event in high demand you have no box office advantage. For the recent run of Radiohead onsales, I bet no more than the first two people in any line at any box office or Ticketmaster retail outlet got tickets. So again, you're resigned to use only Ticketmaster.

Don't get me wrong. If I had the market power that Ticketmaster has I'd be charging whatever I could too. Ticketmaster has shored up their market power in large part by being agressive and signing venues to have Ticketmaster be the exclusive (alternative to box office) seller of tickets. They probably make the deal so sweet that competitors like tickets.com or ticketweb.com find it difficult to compete.

They also are figuring out that those of us who want to go to see an event are usually willing to pay more than we usually pay. Ok, so they steal some of our consumer surplus. I use steal only because in a more competitive market the price would certainly be much lower. Here's the rub: we don't get to haggle over the surplus. They have us by the balls. Take it or leave it and go to the box office.

OK, I rant. What can I do to solve the problem. Not go to shows or games? Sure. Only buy from box office? sure.

The bigger issue here is that this is something that deserves a court battle. But the little guy can't go up against the mighty corporate lawyers. Class action? Yeah, I'll get a buck back if we win. Maybe lower future fees could result. What should be going on is that the Justice Department or FTC should go after them. Funny how we haven't heard much activity from the feds on antitrust this administration. Ok, its not funny. It's very very sad that we have laws that won't be enforced. The court doesn't make decisions until someone complains and to complain to the court you have to have lawyers. I'd rather pay fees than pay lawyers.

I'll avoid fees when I can. And I'll continue to pay up because I still feel like I'm getting my money's worth.

I'm a two timer

So as much as I've been bad mouthing firefox lately, I gotta love the effective adblocker. And the pop up blockers i've used with explorer are very inferior. Can't find a good one.

So really folks, I've been a two browser user. Approx. 60% firefox, 40% explorer. Often it is a function of where I plan to surf.

I have tried Opera. It worked well for about a day and then wouldn't open. But Windows thought it was open and wouldn't close it. I tried it a few times. Maybe some other time.

Still can't get Last.fm to work. I'll just have to live vicariously through Cloin's last.fm

The President's favorite sandwich.

What is wrong with Ticketmaster?

I revised this on May 14. Neither are well written. I get that way when I rant. Sorry. It's just a blog that no one reads. Except maybe Colin. (Thanks.)

http://www.slate.com/id/2141425/fr/rss/

In response to the above...


Yeah, that's tough. It seems that the industry is always subject to
scalpers.

Back in the day when it was queuing, there were always scalpers there in
line. In Cincinnati there was a pharmacy in the suburbs. The many times I
arrived at 5:30 a.m. (for a 10 a.m. on sale) and some dude is there in the
parking lot. Gets out of the car goes to the door as I pull in.
Fortunately I beat him for the '95 Phish Nutter Center show. Got great
seats for that.

But even then we fought against those who got to call in their orders.

Would temporary online and phoneline blocks work? Again, the scalpers will
just get in line. This begets the "line lottery" issue where it is random.
Again, the hardcore fan is screwed.

Could they go to exclusive will call? Maybe. That could be a cluster fuck
at larger venues, or the requirement that the venue employ a lot of people
for a short time to distribute tickets.

Maybe do all internet and do all print your own tickets but deliver the
tickets the morning of the event. Makes people less reluctant to buy on
ebay if they don't get hard tickets.

The thing about it is that we are smart as are the scalpers. Every time I
find a way to get to the front of the line they find a way to reduce my
chances of that. It seems that tiered pricing works pretty good on those
high end events. But for a small club show or GA event you can't work the
tiered pricing so well.

I guess it isn't all TicketMaster's fault. They are the easy target. I so
welcomed online sales. As an out-of-towner willing to travel to see a show
I'm very happy to have access to it. I grudgingly pay convenience fees.

That's the bigger outrage, I think. There is so much market power there it
isn't funny. They cannot justify charging different convenience fees for
different events or for different priced tickets for the same event. Any
justification for a convenience fee would be to cover the average total cost
per ticket sale. And I cannot be convinced the marginal cost of selling one
more ticket is more than a buck. Even when you have to have a person sell
it to you that time is valued less than a buck.

Any other ideas?

Full disclosure. I have purchased tickets that I've resold. Sometimes at a loss. Sometimes at a profit. If I fee guilty I take comfort that at least two mutually advantageous exchanges were made. I was just an unauthorized middleman.

Haven't we learned what we're supposed to have learned already?

Why do people get fellowships and grants to "study the education system" of Japan or China or whatever exotic destination. We've been doing it for years. You're on a boondoggle people. You're wasting someone else's money and I'm jealous. Get back to work. And you philanthropists ought to stop funding those junkets. Are the trips memorable? Sure do they make a difference? If so why do we keep having to send you back?

I am a skeptic.

Jack out