One Guy and a Dream

With Massachusetts soon to follow?

Nevada Passes Law Authorizing Driverless Cars – Alex Knapp – Robot Overlords – Forbes.

(via marginalrevolution)

This is definitely worth coming out of my hibernation for:

Define American.

Be sure to watch the video and read the article, which is also printed in the NY Times Magazine here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/magazine/my-life-as-an-undocumented-immigrant.html?_r=3&ref=magazine&pagewanted=all

A short history of rockets, used as an example of a more interesting phenomenon of path dependence:

Space stasis: What the strange persistence of rockets can teach us about innovation. – By Neal Stephenson – Slate Magazine.

(via kottke)

A pessimistic but entertaining look back at 2010. Obviously over the top, but closer to accurate than should make you feel comfortable:

The 50 Most Loathsome Americans of 2010 The Beast.

(via kottke)

[Note: I have a few posts saved from last year that I'll probably be posting this week, so take the "Today" part of the tagline with a grain of salt.]

Tyler Cowen, the George Mason economics professor and main contributor at Marginal Revolution, wrote an eloquent analysis of income inequality and how it ties to the financial crisis:

The Inequality That Matters – Tyler Cowen – The American Interest Magazine.

An insightful look into the challenges of reducing poverty:

A Culture of Poverty – Ta-Nehisi Coates – Personal – The Atlantic.

(via myglesias)

One interesting dynamic of our political system is that for many issues, a small but determined group can push through legislation that is bad for most people, as long as the victims of the policy are sufficiently dispersed/diverse so that they do not form a strong lobby against the policy. This is especially evident in many farm subsidies. Here is one such policy that has been making it’s way around the series of tubes:

While Warning About Fat, U.S. Pushes Cheese Sales – NYTimes.com.

(via myglesias)

Double post today because I missed yesterday.

I’m a little late on this, but Peter Diamond was recently the co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in Economics. (For another interesting link, this prize is not one of the original Nobel Prizes.) I think my knowledge of economics (admittedly not very high to begin with) may have doubled just by reading this overview of his work:

Marginal Revolution: Peter A. Diamond.

Similar summaries of the other co-recipients are available on the same site:

Dale T. Mortensen

Christopher A. Pissarides

(via marginalrevolution)

Here’s an article about the politics of land ownership. This reminded me of the interesting though maligned economic classic Progress and Poverty:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/8f06df9e-8ac1-11df-8e17-00144feab49a.html

This is a revealing look at the state of criminal justice in the United States:

http://reason.com/blog/2010/06/09/three-charts-to-break-your-hea