Category: ROTD

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ROTD: Do Men Hurt More?

Let’s consider these last two arguments. We all know that women tend to be more expressive about their complaints – you can’t beat ‘em for wailing and gnashing of teeth. But the fact that men act more stoic and complain less doesn’t mean they hurt less. To economists, the relevant standard is willingness to pay, and by this standard new results suggest men hurt more from most harms:
What’s a marriage worth? To an Aussie male, about $32,000. That’s the lump sum Professor Paul Frijters says the man would need to receive out of the blue to make him as happy as his marriage will over his lifetime. An Aussie woman would need much less, about $16,000. But when it comes to divorce, the Aussie male will be so devastated it would be as if he had lost $110,000. An Aussie woman would be less traumatised, feeling as if she had lost only $9000. … The lifetime boost to happiness that flows from a birth – for the mother around $8700, for the father $32,600. … The death of a spouse or child causes a woman $130,900 worth of grief. … It costs a man $627,300.
via Overcoming Bias : Do Men Hurt More?.

Very interesting, must delve into this paper soon.

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ROTD::Do Working Men Rebel? Insurgency and Unemployment

Do Working Men Rebel? Insurgency and Unemployment in Iraq and the Philippines
Most aid spending by governments seeking to rebuild social and political order is based on an opportunity-cost theory of distracting potential recruits. The logic is that gainfully employed young men are less likely to participate in political violence, implying a positive correlation between unemployment and violence in places with active insurgencies. We test that prediction on insurgencies in Iraq and the Philippines, using survey data on unemployment and two newly- available measures of insurgency: (1) attacks against government and allied forces; and (2) violence that kills civilians. Contrary to the opportunity-cost theory, we find a robust negative correlation between unemployment and attacks against government and allied forces and no significant relationship between unemployment and the rate of insurgent attacks that kill civilians. [Emphasis mine]
via Do Working Men Rebel? Insurgency and Unemployment.

This is discouraging. Please remember that GMA is still an economist and in some accounts a sharp person. Does this mean that keeping people in poverty a viable strategy in minimizing rebellion? It seems to be what the warlords and government are actually doing.

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Sentences To Ponder: Some new happiness research

There is, I suspect, a common theme here – that people don’t predict what will make them happy at all well. Having children and investing in careers rather than in social networks doesn’t make us happy, and yet we do it in our 20s and 30s, only to be miserable later.
via Stumbling and Mumbling: Some new happiness research.

That was one loaded sentence. Thinking about my life, I am solidly in Team Social Network and Not the  TEAM Children/Career that a lot of my generation are slowly (fast?)  going into. I don’t know, maybe in our 40’s we would know.
PS 01: I’m not anti kids. Simply put I see myself as a big kidI sometimes can’t be trusted with myself, why the hell would I trust myself with the responsibility for another human being.
PS 02: I’m not strictly anti-career, It’s just that I believe that our society/backgrounds do not allow us the leeway to really find our passions. If we dive head on to our “careers” when will we ever find our passions. 2 things.
One, I’m lucky to have my mom and dad as my parents.  This for me means that I have a personal responsibility to be the best that I can be, whatever that means.
Two, I saw a friend from high school/college in the elevator yesterday, we decided to catch up a little. During our conversation he told me something. He has found his passion, He said in a way Pisay and UP wasn’t such a good fit for him, what he wanted to do was for from what he learned from these great learning institutions. This is the third time (That I remember vividly but probably more than 10 or even more) that I have heard this from a friend from Philippine Science/University of the Philippines. In a way it made me happy. Not that my friends wasted a lot of their time, rather they do not see the other side of the coin, I prefer to think of their predicaments more in the light of; I am lucky to have found my passion, it is probably because of the different things that I went through in life, of which going to PSHS/UP was a part of.
Read the original post to get to the research to justify the claims.

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Learned::Biased News Has Delayed Impact | Miller-McCune Online Magazine

This is big. What this means we really have to guard against alot of the things we hear from the media, we must always try to correct media people when they report the things incorrectly. This probably means almost nobody is immune! Better Press Corp Please!

Does Biased News Have a Time Bomb Effect?
A European study shows that, over time, even the most sophisticated readers can be manipulated.
By: Melinda Burns | November 09, 2009 | 05:00 AM (PST) |
Even the most hardened Europeans may succumb to media manipulation and change their political views if they are bombarded long enough with biased news.
There's nobody more cynical about the media than your average European.
Only 12 percent of Europeans claim to trust the media, compared to 15 percent of North Americans, 29 percent of Pacific Asians and 48 percent of Africans, the BBC has found.
Yet new research out of the London School of Economics and Political Science suggests that even the most hardened Europeans may succumb to media manipulation and change their political views if they are bombarded long enough with biased news.
via Politics Articles | Biased News Has Delayed Impact | Miller-McCune Online Magazine.