Philip Greenspun’s Weblog

Top executives in Silicon Valley often have a huge cushion due to a monopoly position and high costs to customers to switch. John Chambers, who built modern-day Cisco, is an exception. While Cisco has a great brand name it has to fight for every sale given that, by definition, its boxes must be able to communicate with all of the rest of the world’s routers and switches.

What does someone like this think of our upcoming presidential election? The MIT alumni magazine, Technology Review, asked him:

Between Trump and Clinton, who has the better technology policies?

If you’re asking, “How do you give middle-class America a pay raise? How do you create opportunities? How do you make the country more competitive on a global basis in a way that allows everybody to benefit? How do you change health care and education?”—well, those questions are all about a digital agenda, and yet I’ve not heard a single candidate articulate a vision on that.

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Folks:

I leave today for Paris. Would any French readers like to get together on Saturday morning, July 23? Or perhaps on Thursday or Friday of this week? If so, please email me (philg@mit.edu). Happy to chat about any of the subjects that I’ve written about, e.g., technology, travel, photography, and economics.

Mom and I are going to be on a Royal Caribbean cruise. I should be available to meet up at the following times:

• July 26, 4 pm: Helsinki
• July 30, 1 pm: Talinn
• July 31: 3 pm: Riga
• August 1: any time 11-6, Klaipeda (Lithuania)
• August 3, morning or evening: Rostock (Germany)
• August 4: 10a-4p, Fredericia (Denmark)
• August 5-6, flexible: Copenhagen

Thanks in advance for making the effort!

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I met a suburban elementary school teacher at our local airport. She has just finished her second year and is brimming with enthusiasm for the job. “Could you do nothing and still get paid the same?” I asked. She said “Pretty much.” I asked if there were any burned out older teachers in her school who did as little as possible. “Most of them,” she said.

Related:

• The public schoolteacher on incentives to work hard

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I was about to throw my Windows 10 laptop into a bag for a trip when I reflected that I hadn’t used the machine for about 10 days. So I fired it up and watched it spend about 2 hours syncing Dropbox (via LAN sync from a desktop machine on the same network; I had a few GB of new photographs and expert witness materials). Twelve hours later I decided to look at “Check for Updates” to make sure that Windows had taken care of itself. In fact there were still about six updates to be downloaded installed and the machine wasn’t scheduled to deal with them until the next morning at 3:00 am. So I told the machine to “install now” and then “restart now”. Part of the sluggishness may be that this 2012 machine has a mechanical hard drive (I wanted to upgrade to a Lenovo X1 Yoga, but they couldn’t ship an OLED version in time for this last summer trip so what is the point?).

I’m wondering if we’re at the end of an era where the Internet isn’t fast or ubiquitous enough to do everything in the cloud but we aren’t tied to our continuously connected desktops. Thus we become sysadmin slaves to our laptops (unless the laptop is our primary computer).

Related:

• My 2005 plea for turning the mobile phone into the desktop computer via a dock (the iPhone was introduced two years later, in 2007, so if this were actually a good idea one would think that it would have been done at some point in the last 8 years)

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At lunch today friends were discussing Donald Trump’s uninspiring choice of yet another older white guy as running mate. I said “He should have chosen Michelle Rhee.” What do folks think? She’s 10 years younger than Pence. She is not a man. She is not white. She has experience as a teacher and as an education bureaucrat. Of all of the things that the government does, running schools is near the top of the list of stuff that matters to a large bloc of voters (i.e., those with children and grandchildren in K-12). I would still be pessimistic about Trump’s chances but at least with Rhee as a running mate he would not put potential voters to sleep.

Readers: What do you think? Could Michelle Rhee have given Trump a bigger boost than Pence?

Related:

• “Can two old white guys win a U.S. Presidential election?”

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Folks:

Friends of mine in Massachusetts have been installing rooftop solar. Apparently there are some government handouts that expire at the end of 2016 that make it much more attractive to do now.

I’m wondering if the payback periods are not correctly calculated for a homeowner who is using savings that would otherwise be invested in stocks and bonds. Suppose that a solar array costs $50,000. Had that money been invested in stocks and bonds it might have yielded 2 percent or $1,000 per year. This $1,000 of income will be subject to a tax rate of anywhere from 25-40 percent, however, depending on city and state. The energy generated by the solar array and used within the home, however, is not taxed as income (but maybe if you end up selling it all back to the power company they will issue a 1099 and then you fill out a Schedule C for your power generating business?). Thus electricity for the person who buys a solar array goes from being paid for with post-tax money to being paid for with pre-tax money, no?

This perspective could be entirely wrong, though, if we bring in property tax. What if there is a 2 percent property tax on the extra $50,000 in home value? It seems that at least in some states there are specific exemptions preventing towns from raising assessments due to solar energy systems (e.g., Massachusetts).

What do readers think? Is now the time to do rooftop solar? On the one hand the government has set things up so that people who live in crummy apartments have to work longer hours to buy solar panels for rich homeowners. On the other hand, if one waits a few years the technology will presumably improve. I don’t like the idea of buying anything for the house unless it is sufficiently common to be found at Home Depot.

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The deCordova museum and sculpture park in Lincoln, Massachusetts (suburb of Boston) has two shows that photographers (and allies) won’t want to miss. Both close on September 18, 2016.

The first show includes portraits by Lotte Jacobi and Lisette Model. There are some powerful images that will inspire you not to throw out the slightly out-of-focus pictures that nonetheless capture a subject’s mood perfectly. The second is “Overgrowth,” which includes a lot of photography of tangled vegetation.

Go on a nice day for walking as the sculpture park and grounds are worthwhile.

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Donald Trump has apparently picked a boring old white guy as his running mate (nytimes). It is tough to believe that more than a handful of voters will be motivated even to research Mike Pence’s biography (and if they did they would learn that Pence was yet another lawyer-turned-politician).

More than a year ago I wrote a post about how it seemed impossible for any Republican to win the Presidential race. Donald Trump is not exactly a standard Republican, e.g., he promises various forms of protectionism so that American workers will enjoy a higher income without working harder or developing better skills. However, he is an older white guy, a concept previously rejected by American voters.

Does this choice of VP doom whatever chances Trump might have had? Could he not have found a 40-year-old non-white female running mate? (Though of course we must always recognize the possibility that a running mate identifying as “female” in July could identify as “male” by October or November…)

Readers: Are you shocked by this choice? Does it not seem that Trump could have enhanced his chances with a non-white female?

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It’s summer so one of my usual dog-walking companions sometimes brings one of her three children along. On a recent day it was the 15-year-old daughter, a girl who has been carefully sheltered within a two-parent home or at a private school. The topic of her future career came up. The girl volunteered “Everyone knows that if you want to make money you marry and divorce a rich guy. That’s why my parents sent me to a school full of rich boys with low self-esteem. All that they need is an understanding wife. Then, oops, divorce after six months.” From whom had she learned this? “A bunch of the moms at our school made their money this way,” she responded. “[friend’s name]’s mom did it three times. And [other friend’s name]’s mom made money by having a baby without being married.”

After a little more conversation, we established that she overestimated the likely profit from a very short-term marriage and underestimated the profits from having children out of wedlock (Massachusetts offers unlimited child support revenue following a one-night encounter with a high-income resident or visitor). This was consistent with the survey of adults that we did in Harvard Square.

The inter-generational aspects are kind of interesting. The teenager’s mom is a fully trained attorney. The dad is an MBA who works in the financial services industry. They entered the workforce before the 1990s child support guidelines made it straightforward to calculate the potential profits from having children. The daughter is intelligent and healthy and will be the repository of more than $500,000 in education (K-12 plus college). Yet she recognizes that, compared to working with her college degree at a W-2 job, under today’s U.S. family law system, she can expect to earn far more cash through a thoughtful use of her body and her children.

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Excerpts from a mailing list of righteous Bernie and Hillary supporters in our wealthy Boston suburb (renamed to “Social Justice Village”)…

Mom #1 (a dentist): McLean Hospital [a local mental hospital] has signed a P&S agreement and intends to purchase 2 houses in the family neighborhood near Bleeding Heart St. Although only a few people who happen to peruse our Social Justice Village website regularly may have picked up on what has been transpiring, most of Social Justice Village has no idea that this is going on. McLean intends to run a transitional (half-way) house for teenage boys aged 15-21 who have psychiatric disorders. The closing is scheduled for the end of May. I am shocked that this project could have come this far without any notification to our neighborhood and town and I urge everyone to familiarize yourselves with what is going on since it appears that our Village has given their approval without finding out exactly what is proposed. In a town where we are protected from garish lighting, people cutting down trees, building garages that are deemed too large, it seems outrageous that our Planning Board, Selectmen, Zoning Board, do not consider a threat to its citizens’ security of importance. Is this the Social Justice Village Way? If it is … beware because this could happen in your neighborhood too.

Mom #2 (Harvard University employee): I suspect Town Counsel has determined that these uses are protected by right (State/Fed law?), and we will have only limited say. It is not that Town Counsel and/or other boards, committees and commissions have let us down, but rather that State & Fed. regs. may the our hands.

Mom #3: I don’t want to appear naive, but want to make an observation. I’ve never known more thoughtful, brilliant, upstanding, kind, philanthropic, humble, accomplished, creative, and worldly men than the husbands, fathers, and public servants in Social Justice Village. It is an excellent town for male role models.
A psychiatric disorder in a young man is not the same as a behavioral problem or a budding criminal. A person who has a psychiatric disorder may be suffering from depression or an eating disorder, or may be recovering from a trauma or an addiction. If they are in a halfway house, it means they have already shown they are committed to recovery. I wonder if this isn’t really the very best place for them, a place close to nature, where they can see such good men being good fathers and good husbands and excellent citizens every day. Maybe our community could rally behind them and help them in their re-integration into society, and in the discovery of themselves as capable and worthy, and maybe we could ask for their contribution to our town, which is also their town if they feel they are part of it . Maybe they have talents, maybe they’re willing to do chores and yard work and other things that would help them feel independent and help in their recovery.

[Note that Mom #3 has apparently not spent too much time in the local family court to hear how the local high-income husbands and fathers are described by their plaintiffs when it is time to pull the ripcord and grab the house, kids, and cash! Based on her ideas about these folks with psychiatric disorders doing chores it seems that she is unfamiliar with SSDI.]

Dad #1: I’m not sure which side of the fence I fall on without more info but I was also curious (mostly because I’m unfamiliar with them), does anyone know what the tax implications are with standing up such a facility on a property zoned for residential? At least their other facility charges like $1000 per day (average stay of 90-120 days, not covered by insurance….ouch). Do property taxes differ between residential and business zones?

Mom #4 (a Professor of Law): I am always pleased when I read that residents have had good experiences living next to one of the kind of group homes we are discussing (no snark–that is sincere.) That said, Dr. [Mom #1]’s question (and mine) is about process NOT about anecdotal experience. I assume that if she wanted to know how residents of these homes interacted with neighbors etc she would have asked about that. She didn’t. She (and many others) would like to know when the town learned about this and why homeowners most directly affected were not promptly notified. I take Mr. [Village official’s email] to be an attempt to respond to this issue. He says the kind of disclosure being demanded “…would be typically viewed as being discriminatory.” I do not understand that answer. Is it illegal for towns like Social Justice Village to inform residents about an impending group home or not? I am beginning to suspect that the answer is it is not. If so, this leads to the perfectly reasonable question–if not, then why are the interests of the owners/operators of the group home superior to those of Social Justice Village citizens?

Mom #5 (with a Masters in Education from Harvard): A few of the laws that make us do the right thing:

Affirmative Fair Marketing for Affordable Housing
Anti-discrimination laws
Right to vote laws
Equal Right Laws
Chapter 40B: requires affordable housing
Chapter 40A: allows educational, religious organizations: No zoning ordinance or by-law shall regulate or restrict the interior area of a single family residential building nor shall any such ordinance or by-law prohibit, regulate or restrict the use of land or structures for religious purposes or for educational purposes on land owned or leased by the commonwealth or any of its agencies, subdivisions or bodies politic or by a religious sect or denomination, or by a nonprofit educational corporation; provided, however, that such land or structures may be subject to reasonable regulations concerning the bulk and height of structures and determining yard sizes, lot area, setbacks, open space, parking and building coverage requirements.

We no longer warehouse people with special needs in institutions.

People with Developmental Disabilities now live in group homes and experience family with staff that can meet their needs. The Department of Disability Services does not release the addresses of group homes so as to not draw unwanted attention.

Mentally ill people and people with disabilities, transgender, gay or lesbian people are at the receiving end of violence far more often than initiating it.

*Why do we need these laws? Because without them, women would be making 50 cents on the dollar, black and white people would not be allowed to ‘inter marry’, African Americans would not be allowed to get mortgages, gay people would be back in the closet, mentally ill people would still be in institutions, there would be no affordable housing west of Boston, and no churches or schools in our neighborhoods, to name just a few reasons.*

People with disabilities are entitled to their privacy, that is why we are not told much about these programs. 20% of the population has one form of mental illness or another. They/we are everywhere.

[Note that the posited world in which “women would be making 50 cents on the dollar” would allow at least some women to get very rich indeed. They could run a company with a 100-percent female workforce and have dramatically lower labor costs than competitors, and therefore supranormal profits.]

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