Lately I’ve noticed people describing our current economic situation as “negative growth.” We used to call the same thing “contraction.” As in… there’s less now than before. But culturally we can’t seem to wrap our minds around anything other than more. So we still have growth! It’s just negative at the moment. I took these … Continue reading A Receding Tide
Here in California we’ve just received our first rain since last winter after another brutal round of massive forest fires. Our Mediterranean style climate cycles from a long dry hot period to a few short cool wet winter months. October is our most fire prone time of year. It’s hot, the earth is bone dry, … Continue reading Afterburn
A friend is visiting San Francisco from out of state and expressed an interest in relocating to the area. He has a budget of about $430,000 to buy a house. There are no properties of any kind in the city at that price so he was considering various peripheral locations. Like everyone else in his … Continue reading A Tale of Two Hillsides
A reader recently made a comment I took seriously: “I am certainly not here to try and refute much of what you have brought to light, only to suggest that your comments are not in the least bit constructive on the whole. That is why I have decided to pin you with the prestigious “Captain … Continue reading The Captain Hindsight Award
Memphis is full of commemorative plaques that declare the spot where so-and-so once lived or operated a successful business, or where a prominent religious or cultural center was erected. These were genuine millionaires, bankers, insurance executives, war heroes, political figures, scholars, and philanthropists. I learned a lot about the trajectory of the city and its … Continue reading Solvent Savings
I was recently invited to give a talk at a housing conference down in Los Angeles. Once again my fellow speakers engaged in the usual arguments. Aging Baby Boomers asserted that we need to keep building more 1957 style suburban homes on the edge of the metroplex because that’s what people want and can afford, … Continue reading Beginnings, Middles, and Ends
In the early days of the auto industry Detroit was a dynamic machine churning out huge numbers of cars with integrated supply chains clustered tightly together around Ford’s River Rouge complex in Dearborn or General Motors’ assembly plant in Hamtramck. But over time the industry spread out across the landscape, first to nearby states, then … Continue reading Bozeman: A Blessing and a Curse
Many years ago I remember a television commentator saying more Americans have outhouses than computer connections. This was in the early days of dial up modems. He seemed to suggest that household computers were little more than Japanese video games, which was actually true at the time. Well, thirty years have passed and this afternoon … Continue reading Shovel Ready
I was at a friend’s house when she got a delivery of groceries. The boxes arrived at her door from one of the many new services that allow customers to shop online. Fresh fruit, veggies, meat, wine, eggs, cheese, milk, Christmas wreathes, and fresh cut flowers. She just pushed a few buttons and voila! I … Continue reading The New Retail: Gird Your Loins
I recently published an article that explored some of the ways regulations make it difficult for small businesses to get off the ground and function. Among the examples I used from around the country was Bank Suey in Hamtramck, Michigan. My story was subsequently reposted on various other sites which the owner, Alissa Shelton, read … Continue reading Hamtramck: Scale and Institutional Frameworks
Granola Shotgun 