Today's random interesting story about something you never thought about...
via the Wall Street Journal, Housing market downturn causes sawdust shortage.
I had two thoughts from this article:
1. Changes in the economy can have unforeseen impacts on completely unrelated areas of the economy - the market for new housing goes down, and animal breeders, plywood and wood-pellet producers, farmers, and container makers are impacted. It also seems cautionary about the effects of government intervention in markets - changes in one place can cause major unforeseen issues in others.
2. Now would really be a good time to get in the sawdust-manufacturing business. Anyone want to go into business with me?
posted by mad anthony @ 7:17 PM
2 Comments:
For a really excellent book that fits into comment #1, check out "Economics in One Easy Lesson" by Henry Hazlitt. It speaks in fairly plain language about the need for governments to view all aspects of an economic policy decision. Often their intent is to fix one very specific problem (dictated by lobbyists), causing major issues in another area.
The whole book can be found online at http://jim.com/econ/contents.html.
I actually own a copy of that book. It was the first econ book I really read, back when I was in high school, and it definitely changed how I saw the world - before I read it, I had that whole kind of "communism was a good idea in theory" idea. After reading it, not so much.
Post a Comment
<< Home