I call it the Mega PAC.

One fabulously rich person (or a gaggle of them) would put X million dollars into a trust that expires November 9th. X would have to be very large. Probably several hundred million.

The rules would be simple. You could choose a funding cap for all candidates, x, which is much, much smaller than X. Say, $100 million. Plenty of money for a modest number of attack ads, since the parties must have a little fun.

The key: If any one candidate’s super PACs raised more than x, then the trust would automatically release an equivalent amount of funds to the opponent’s super PACs. The trust would be ready to hurl all its money if it must.

Now, imagine yourself the eccentric millionaire thinking of giving $5 million to your favorite in the race. You could still buy a little price and influence, but you would pay knowing that it would simply fuel your opponent’s campaign. I’m guessing you just use the money instead for that indoor 100,000 gallon scuba diving tank you always wanted.

The game theorists could improve the mechanism, no doubt. But I think this could work.

Now, if only there had been a sudden explosion young and idealistic of multi-millionaires this week. Oh wait.

A question. [The NGO] were unable to receive the grant direct from [the donor] so had to find an ‘accountable body’.  For this service, they were quoted 17% of the project’s budget – by a UN organisation. Can you relate fact or opinion on that at all?

[The NGO] eventually found that [a pan-African governmental body] was able to provide the service for free, with additional benefits. But UN, World Bank etc. apparently make having an accountable body to channel funds a very costly thing.

I’d be extremely grateful if you have time to share thoughts.

This is indeed a pet peeve of mine, but my ire is not directed at donors like DFID or the World Bank or UN. My response:

My opinion: 17% is an unfortunate expense but a rather common rate for administration, and even low by many standards.

It’s a requirement driven not so much by the multilateral donors, but a consequence of the fact that the giving public and governments have close to zero tolerance for misuse of funds.

This drives a Byzantine and expensive accounting system which partly reduces risk of misuse, and partly gives the multilaterals cover (“we did the best we could”).

This discomfit with misuse gets amplified by the press who tend to tend to report on graft and mismanagement more than success.

So the root cause is the failure of the public and donors to think about the high cost of extreme accountability.

It would be nice of the donors could take a sensible stand against this silliness. I’m not sure they are terribly concerned, or even cognizant. Surely it has occurred to some, but (in my experience) cost-effectiveness is so far down the list of most NGO and donor priorities it may as well be left off.

Thoughts from the NGO and donor world?

In this paper, we investigate how the impatience that results from placing a price on time impairs individuals’ ability to derive happiness from pleasurable experiences.

Experiment 1 demonstrated that thinking about one’s income as an hourly wage reduced the happiness that participants derived from leisure time on the internet.

Experiment 2 revealed that a similar manipulation decreased participants’ state of happiness after listening to a pleasant song and that this effect was fully mediated by the degree of impatience experienced during the music.

Finally, Experiment 3 showed that the deleterious effect on happiness caused by impatience was attenuated by offering participants monetary compensation in exchange for time spent listening to music, suggesting that a sensation of unprofitably wasted time underlay the induced impatience.

Together these experiments establish that thinking about time in terms of money can influence how people experience pleasurable events by instigating greater impatience during unpaid time.

Article here. Important caveat: the study is based on a mere 53 Canadian college students. So generalizability may be zero.

But perhaps not. Worth replicating.

The thought occurs: If only Yale college students would riot and join armed movements, my experiments would be a lot easier and cheaper to run.

h/t Farnam Street

This is a general concern with the whole warfare literature, where people are far too quick to write, remember and report the “end is nigh” finding, and reluctant to trumpet the “but on closer inspection not much is there” result.

I may be biased by my recent difficulties publishing a nor-do-commodity-shocks-cause-conflict paper. A blog post for another day, while I mull whether blogging about referee responses is a good idea or not. Probably not.

In any case, I am pleased to see a Journal of Peace Research special issue entitled “Climate Change Link to War Remains Tenuous”. I have not read it, and nor will I have the time before it is old news. But access to the issue is free until the end of the month of February.

If you read it, comments below will be welcomed.

But why do client firms demand an army of 20-somethings who have only run a lemonade stand?

The puzzle is why firms pay huge sums to big name consulting firms, when their advice comes from kids fresh out of college, who spend only a few months studying an industry they previous knew nothing about. How could such quickly-created advise from ignorant college students be worth the millions paid? Why don’t firms just ask their own internal recent college grads?

That is Robin Hanson, writing last week. (I am slow to blog these days.) There are some good responses at MR as well.

Robin’s answer: most intellectuals underestimate just how dysfunctional most firms are. Firms leaders need outside support for organizational change.

Here I can chime in with modest experience, having been just such a dewy-eyed, inexperienced business consultant during and after college.

I worked on a motley crew of projects: a big telecoms merger, a retail tire expansion, a national art galley’s control system, internet strategy for a real estate tycoon, and an engineering firm’s management structure.

When it became clear to my firm I was headed to grad school (and development), they stuck me with the lemon of the year: a donut chain upstart, a little firm deciding it would take on the country’s largest donut company (Tim’s–a shop so successful it managed to make itself synonymous with Canadian national  identity), in the most concentrated oversupplied donut market in the world (by a factor of about three). My entire job consisted of trying (in vain) to convince them this was horribly, horribly wrong. At least I got free donuts.

What use could these clients possibly have for young me? Robin is right that many firms are deeply dysfunctional. As much as I complain about the UN, or the average NGO, in many ways they are better run than my former clients.

Robin’s idea that the CEO has the right idea, and sees the need for outside support, is more dreamy. Often the CEOs were deeply dysfunctional themselves, and possibly victims of their own success. Two of my favorite insights into management: The five stages of small business growth and the collected works of Henry Mintzberg. A precis: the skills and ideas that help a business take off are seldom the same ones that bring it to the next stage.

One could draw the same parallel of skill mismatch and cycles of growth and crisis to political development. The founding fathers often have a little too much trouble letting go. Some take their country back down with them.

Back to the firms and the puzzling demand for bushy-tailed young consultants. I think part of the answer also lies in internal politics. It is very difficult to figure out the answer to questions or problems that cross-cut the organization, or to build consensus around change. Everyone inside the firm is too busy and also too entrenched in the politics of the firm. The consultant plays the role of neutral arbiter. Bright and earnest youngsters also have the advantage of seeming rather harmless. I was shocked at the way senior managers opened up to me, telling me things they would hesitate to tell their colleagues.

Another part lies in technology diffusion, and how it is really, really hard. Ideas do not spread as easily as you think. They must be painstakingly carried in, laid out, explained, lobbied, and discussed. For a nice example of this from India, see one of my favorite new papers, on Indian manufacturers.

In the end, though, I grew bored with business. You need something to get yourself out of bed in the morning and to work, and I can only get so excited about making old rich white men older, richer and whiter. So now my job is now figuring out how to make young poor non-white men older and richer (but hopefully not whiter). That is some progress.

Using the Twitter name “@chiefkariuki“, Kariuki sends messages to over 15,000 of the 28,000 people who live in Lanet Umoja. They include village elders, community and church leaders, the police, youth and women’s groups, and school principals.

When an incident occurs, the victims or eyewitnesses send text messages to the chief, describing the nature of the incident, the place and the nearest known landmark. The chief then broadcasts his instructions to the community through Twitter.

While not everyone has 3G-enabled cellphones here, many just subscribe to follow Kariuki’s account through their local service providers and receive his tweets by text message.

When the chief sends out a message, in a matter of seconds the entire location goes into action as directed.

Full article here. Do not miss the daring pit latrine rescue.

h/t @InnovateAfrica

h/t @cindyvriend

Do any post-conflict elections serve as an effective tool for conflict resolution? The existing literature suggests that they usually do not, yet much of the international community actively endorses and supports elections in this role. In contrast to other studies, I show that post-conflict elections can help terminate conflict and promote lasting peace. Post-conflict elections are useful in resolving conflict when militant groups and governments both participate as political parties.

So, why do both sides engage in certain post-conflict elections? I argue that the end of the Cold War has allowed these inclusive elections to become a mechanism for resolving conflict by facilitating international involvement in guaranteeing a peace deal above and beyond military intervention. Specifically, governments and militant groups often contest elections to commit themselves to a negotiated settlement in order to end the fighting through the engagement of an international actor that can then more easily monitor and sanction violations of the deal.

A new paper by Aila Matanock.

We present evidence from nearly 14,000 American Red Cross blood drives and from a natural field experiment showing that economic incentives have a positive effect on blood donations without increasing the fraction of donors who are ineligible to donate. The effect increases with the incentive’s economic value. However, a substantial proportion of the increase in donations is explained by donors leaving neighboring drives without incentives to attend drives with incentives

Doh!

A new paper in AEJ Policy by Lacetera, Macis and Slonim.

Jourdan’s full reply is worth posting in full.

Dayton, Ohio,

August 7, 1865

To My Old Master, Colonel P.H. Anderson, Big Spring, Tennessee

Sir: I got your letter, and was glad to find that you had not forgotten Jourdon, and that you wanted me to come back and live with you again, promising to do better for me than anybody else can. I have often felt uneasy about you. I thought the Yankees would have hung you long before this, for harboring Rebs they found at your house. I suppose they never heard about your going to Colonel Martin’s to kill the Union soldier that was left by his company in their stable. Although you shot at me twice before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad you are still living. It would do me good to go back to the dear old home again, and see Miss Mary and Miss Martha and Allen, Esther, Green, and Lee. Give my love to them all, and tell them I hope we will meet in the better world, if not in this. I would have gone back to see you all when I was working in the Nashville Hospital, but one of the neighbors told me that Henry intended to shoot me if he ever got a chance.

I want to know particularly what the good chance is you propose to give me. I am doing tolerably well here. I get twenty-five dollars a month, with victuals and clothing; have a comfortable home for Mandy,—the folks call her Mrs. Anderson,—and the children—Milly, Jane, and Grundy—go to school and are learning well. The teacher says Grundy has a head for a preacher. They go to Sunday school, and Mandy and me attend church regularly. We are kindly treated. Sometimes we overhear others saying, “Them colored people were slaves” down in Tennessee. The children feel hurt when they hear such remarks; but I tell them it was no disgrace in Tennessee to belong to Colonel Anderson. Many darkeys would have been proud, as I used to be, to call you master. Now if you will write and say what wages you will give me, I will be better able to decide whether it would be to my advantage to move back again.

As to my freedom, which you say I can have, there is nothing to be gained on that score, as I got my free papers in 1864 from the Provost-Marshal-General of the Department of Nashville. Mandy says she would be afraid to go back without some proof that you were disposed to treat us justly and kindly; and we have concluded to test your sincerity by asking you to send us our wages for the time we served you. This will make us forget and forgive old scores, and rely on your justice and friendship in the future. I served you faithfully for thirty-two years, and Mandy twenty years. At twenty-five dollars a month for me, and two dollars a week for Mandy, our earnings would amount to eleven thousand six hundred and eighty dollars. Add to this the interest for the time our wages have been kept back, and deduct what you paid for our clothing, and three doctor’s visits to me, and pulling a tooth for Mandy, and the balance will show what we are in justice entitled to. Please send the money by Adams’s Express, in care of V. Winters, Esq., Dayton, Ohio. If you fail to pay us for faithful labors in the past, we can have little faith in your promises in the future. We trust the good Maker has opened your eyes to the wrongs which you and your fathers have done to me and my fathers, in making us toil for you for generations without recompense. Here I draw my wages every Saturday night; but in Tennessee there was never any pay-day for the negroes any more than for the horses and cows. Surely there will be a day of reckoning for those who defraud the laborer of his hire.

In answering this letter, please state if there would be any safety for my Milly and Jane, who are now grown up, and both good-looking girls. You know how it was with poor Matilda and Catherine. I would rather stay here and starve—and die, if it come to that—than have my girls brought to shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters. You will also please state if there has been any schools opened for the colored children in your neighborhood. The great desire of my life now is to give my children an education, and have them form virtuous habits.

Say howdy to George Carter, and thank him for taking the pistol from you when you were shooting at me.

From your old servant,

Jourdon Anderson.

From the excellent Letters of Note, via the also ever-reliable @BostonReview.

As far as I can tell, my students have pretty much the same experience.

Source.

The premise: a callous professor of poetry receives treatment for ovarian cancer. Played by a former Sex in the City cast member.

You can see the source of my low expectations.

The author, who won a Pulitzer for the play in 1999, has yet to produce another work and continues her job as a primary school teacher in Georgia.

If you are not in New York, there is a television version that is apparently good.

In recent years, a trend has emerged in the behavioral sciences toward shorter and more rapidly published journal articles. These articles are often only a third the length of a standard paper, often describe only a single study and tend to include smaller data sets. Shorter formats are promoted by many journals, and limits on article length are stringent — in many cases as low as 2,000 words.

This shift is partly a result of the pressure that academics now feel to generate measurable output.

…But some researchers contend that the trend toward short articles is also better for science. Such “bite size” science, they argue, encourages results to be communicated faster, written more concisely and read by editors and researchers more easily, leading to a more lively exchange of ideas.

…We believe, however, there are a number of serious problems with the short-article format.

The article is here. I share their suspicions, though the article itself provides more accusations and suppositions than actual evidence. A stronger case can likely be made.

I’m preparing an article for a medical journal with psychologist colleagues and am struggling with the word limit. Economics and political science articles may drag on, and be fewer in number, but with that space they explore the nuance and limitations and validity. Plus context.

I would not give it up, but on the contrary, prefer to see more packed into the same lengthy space.

First, lest anyone mistake this blog for a quality news and analysis outlet, let me remind everyone I blog hurriedly in my nearly non-existent spare time, and do not think much before I write. For if I did, there would not be a blog post every day.

Nonetheless, there is thoughtless and then there is reckless. Sometimes I am the latter.

We’ll start with the minor bit: Freakonomics departed from the NY Times at least a year ago.

More importantly, a clarification and apology. I’ve received links and hat tips from both blogs in past years. Freakonomics references sources and hat tips routinely, but on balance refrains from hyperlinking. To link or not to link? Politeness will remain in the eye of the beholder. But I should not call that plagiarism, or allude that. It’s a serious charge not to be thown around lightly, as I did. For that I apologize.

Finally, a small stand. What irked me is far less serious than plagiarism, but not ignorable. It’s the impression that large and profit-oriented blogs, especially ones that are affiliated (past or present) with media giants are less generous with attribution than the rest of the world.

On some blogs, intermediate sources are not hat-tipped, a practice which is bad manners at best, and worse things at worst. On others, like Freakonomics, hat tips exist but are merely unhyperlinked. The latter discussion is perhaps not worth the bits and bytes it involves. Unhyperlinked is not even a word. I’ll let readers be the judge. But the former offense deserves more attention.

Why spend more blog space on such frivolous things? No good reason. On this occasion, I started it and I should fess up when I overstate myself, or falsely accuse.

Also, I have an overdeveloped sense of justice, which often pushes me in the right direction, but sometimes leads me along silly and fruitless paths, such as accosting strangers on New York City sidewalks for littering, or (more successfully) trying to bring order to Dubai airport lines when hundreds of people are jumping queues during a 4am rush.

I will admit: I still get a great sense of satisfaction from the memory of hundreds of people from as many nations meekly looking ashamed and falling back into line. How should I feel looking back on this episode? Reader opinions welcome.

I regularly read at least two big blogs run by newspapers — Freakonomics at the NY Times and Ideas Market at WSJ. They find a wonderful sampling of things across the web.

What’s interesting: they seldom say where they find their material. The bloggy custom of hat tipping is nearly absent. Once in a while Freakonomics gives a blog hat tip, but (oddly) they never actually hyperlink.

What’s the deal? One guess: the newspapery-blog-powers-that-be don’t want people leaving the site.

Impolite? Yes. Nefarious. Possibly. Plagiarizing? I’d ding my students if they did this so regularly and egregiously.

I have been the “victim” on more than one occasion, but not for some time. I don’t think that’s my motivation for this post. I don’t really care about the traffic. Rather, I see other blogs and sites I like become “victims” about every other week. Now my overdeveloped and misdirected justice and courtesy bones ache every time I read the offending blogs.

Reader thoughts and solutions?

Boycott Ideas Market and Freakonomics?

Some might think the question trivial, but I find these things symbolically important to the outside, as well as the inside. One of the worst transgressors in my mind is the World Bank, frequenter of business class and 5-star hotels–possibly more than any organization in the world.  That has to shape organizational people and practice, and not necessarily in a good way. (See my diatribes here and here).

Duncan gets many good, serious responses. No one brings up the issue that most people only go into humanitarian aid in order to do things like skinny dip with other thirty-something single do-gooders.

Nonetheless, I agree wholeheartedly with his winning comments. I particularly admire B and D.

Calvin: ‘Use the pool but don’t enjoy it’

Ros: ‘How we all agonize that we are not Gandhi’

But by popular acclaim, the prize for best comment goes to Matt for this gem:

A) Form a swimming pool collective with a rotating chair, with use of the pool to be voted on every week. Pool to be funded by bake sale at the local international school.

B) Divide the pool surface area into 100 square use rights – sell rights to the staff and/or guests, who are only allowed to swim within their allotted area, unless allowed to by other freeholders. Let residents buy and sell these rights to each other and let the market reach an efficient outcome

C) Let NGO workers use the pool, but constantly make them feel guilty about it: surround the pool with posters of photos from recent/ongoing drought. Actually, this could be a win win situation – if you run into anyone who seriously objects to the idea of Oxfam using a pool, let *them* stand on the side and heckle the swimmers.

D) Randomly allocate 50% of your guests with passes to the pool. Use pre and post survey data on stress levels, health, etc to evaluate the actual impact of pool usage. If you’re concerned about financial viability, charge a high price and then randomly distribute vouchers of varying levels to the treated group to tease out the demand curve for pool usage.

Following the Academy Award nominations earlier this week, we introduce the Exploiting Africa Academy Award (EAAA) nominations to recognize films who do the best against stiff competition to portray the most insulting and exploitative images of Africans, usually being heroically saved by some white people.

Machine Gun Preacher. This one is so exemplary that it inspired the EAAA in the first place. A commercial film based on a violent ex-con turned violent Christian who goes to central Africa to shoot bad guys and rescue any children still alive after the cross-fire. Principal white saviors : based on “true(?)” story of ex-biker-gang-member Sam Childers, supported in the movie by a beautiful model playing his ex-biker-gang-member-wife.

The Reckoning. About how the International Criminal Court protects African females and children against male African killers. Principal White Savior: Luis Moreno-Ocampo.

Darfur. About how Western correspondents protect African females and children against male African killers. Principal White Saviors: macho journalists supported by one attractive female journalist.

The Vice Guide to Liberia. OK it’s actually a web-based TV series from the Vice media empire, but it’s so horrifically exploitative (baby cannibalism, enough said), we had to include it. Principal White Savior: the Vice correspondent , although it’s very unclear how he’s saving anyone but himself.

An older classic:

Blood Diamond.  Educated the movie-going audience about the acronym TIA to be used whenever anything horrible happens in the movie — “This Is Africa”.Principal white saviors: mercenary and smuggler Leonardo di Caprio supported by gorgeous journalist Jennifer Connelly.

You can vote here. Or add your own nomination.

In the meantime, others have been forecasting more weighty matters:

Hunch then looks for statistical correlations between the information that all of its users provide, revealing fascinating links between people’s seemingly unrelated preferences. For instance, Hunch has revealed that people who enjoy dancing are more apt to want to buy a Mac, that people who like The Count on Sesame Street tend to support legalizing marijuana, that pug owners are often fans of The Shawshank Redemption, and that users who prefer aisle seats on planes “spend more money on other people than themselves.”

From “How Visa predicts divorce” in the Daily Beast.

Three of the Hunch forecasts above fit my profile.