Democracy in America

Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville

The French had a somewhat different experience with bringing on democracy than the Americans did. de Tocqueville took a look at the American experience through French eyes. He generally liked what he saw, though he did notice some flaws. The big difference he saw with American democracy was the equality. There was no aristocracy, thus everyone had potential. This helped democracy to work. It also meant a welfare state would be less of a benefit. Instead of desiring to get a job with the government, people desired to go work for themselves. People would "go west" to make their way. Politics was something that people did to help their individual causes, not to lord over others. Alas, the modern democracy in America has now adopted many of the negative traits seen in Europe. Moneyed "lords" have appeared. The government has become larger and provided more for people, leaving less self-interest. People are regularly advocating for taking some small amounts from the wealthy few. There is also more centralized national power. Can democracy in this form prosper?

The Varieties of Religious Experience

William James gave a series of lectures in Scotland about the various ways that people experienced religion. The focus is on the individual experience, rather than religious ritual. These experiences were further narrowed to those that more "novel" in nature. This often involves people that would go on to found religious movements. (George Fox and St Teresa seem to get the most coverage.) However, the experiences of regular people are also explored. These can often be as significant as the religious founders, though narrowed to an individual life.

Attempts have often been made to explain religion in the terms of science. Miracles are explained in terms of scientific concepts. However, this belittles some of the true benefits of religious experience. Fatih, mystical activity and other religious experiences have tangible benefits that cannot be easily explained otherwise. Religion also encourages efforts towards an external good rather than a personal desire. This can be taken to different levels (such as monks that shun all worldly comforts.) Religious experiences can be best explored when they are legitimately respected.

The Debt Bomb: A Bold Plan to Stop Washington from Bankrupting America

Tom Coburn begins Debt Bomb with a nightmare scenario where foreign organizations disavow American Debt, causing a massive devaluation of the dollar and a huge crisis. He then goes into details of why debt is bad and why congress keeps raising debt. His identifies "careerism" as one of the biggest problems. Politicians are more concerned with winning the election and staying in office. Politicians on both sides love earmarks and are in favor of producing pork for their home district. They are also keen to use slight of hand, passing bills authorizing programs without funding them. They can then say they did not add funding, but still brag about the new program. (The implication is that it would be funded.)
His argument is heavily towards the conservative side. The invisible hand of the economy is the best way of building up the economy. Government is viewed as inefficient. (However, he is in favor of some things like highways - even though private markets have managed those also.)
He is very passionate about his argument and is willing to sacrifice sacred cows to get there. I do buy into his concern with "careerism" in D.C. The press does love to cover the elections, but the actual governing does not tend to provide as much drama. We would do better if we had a congress that was focused on solving problems rather than distributing pork in order to get re-elected.
He also sees "purity pledges" and approval by third party organizations as problematic. Many special interest groups go to Washington with noble intentions. However, they gradually achieve a seat at the table and then fight to keep it. And soon they become part of the problem.
He proposes we work on reducing wasteful spending. In his book, similar programs in multiple departments are waste. Earmarked projects are also usually waste. Programs that have expanded beyond their initial purpose are also problematic. However, the big elephant in the room is entitlement spending. He would like to add free market aspects to entitlements as well as means testing. (Alas, this seems to go against his argument that people have "skin in the game".)
He has some persuasive arguments. However, the concern about the debt has been somewhat ameliorated by the persistently low interest rates. In real terms, interest rates are nearly zero now and trending downward. Some countries, such as Japan, have negative nominal interest rates. With rates so low, there is little incentive to reign in debt.
Furthermore, while arguing against having the government "pick the winners", he encourages us to maintain the current system of winners that the government has picked. He advocates continued fossil fuel use. In other words, continue the huge government subsidies to the highway and car transportation system. The country once had a highly competitive private railroad system. However, the government bulldozed communities and built "free" highways, giving road transportation a huge advantage over private railroads. Just because the government entered this arena does not mean it should remain.
Means testing is also a sticky topic. He criticized the stimulus plan for giving special funding for states that didn't keep their house in order, while not favoring those that did. However, he would also like social security and medicare to be means tested. This would do on an individual level what was not done on the state level. A better approach would be to make the health care system fully available to all. Perhaps a simple approach would be to have a public system that provides basic care for everyone, while leaving the private market for enhanced coverage. Some of his other ideas for health care reform were much better. The system we currently have of employer provided health care just needs to be thrown off a cliff.
Coburn is a die-hard conservative who is not fond of Republicans spending on pork when they get in power. Alas, he is also roped in to the rest of the Republican ideology. It would be great if we could have liberals who were concerned about keeping our finances in check.

Competing Against Luck: The Story of Innovation and Customer Choice

Why would you hire a milkshake? It may be because you want something to easily eat and occupy you on a morning commute. Or, you may want to "give in" to a child and spend some time together. In one case, the milkshake is a better alternative to a donut. In another, it is competing with a toy store. Both are very different reasons for hiring. Understanding the purpose that the milkshake is fulfilling helps to better serve the customers and sell more milkshakes.

Competing Against Luck primarily uses anecdotes from various organizations to show how the jobs theory can help in making decisions about innovating. Successful new products and services help perform "jobs" that people need. These jobs may not be easily apparent in standard market research. Sometimes, there may be other factors in play that were not evident when looking at the original problem. (For example, high tech solutions may help doctor's complete activities in treating their patients. However, the emotional connection is even more important, and the technology gets in the way of their role of relating to the patient.) Often, people will not know they have a need for something new and may reject the thought of it. (American Girls dolls were panned in the initial market research, but went on to become hugely successful.)

"Objective" data can be a tricky thing, especially for ongoing operations. Everyone can use data to tell their story. However, behind the data are a series of qualitative judgement. Somebody chose what data to collect and how to measure it. People often feel they are getting "the facts", but they are really just getting numbers that were generated based on a number of opinions. (The numerical "facts" do give an air of authority even though they are often no better than opinionated judgments.)

Jobs theory can be summarized as "know the deeper meaning of why something is being done." Problems can arise when companies look at the surface reason and miss out on the true actions. Railroads faltered as they thought people were hiring them because they wanted rail travel. In fact, people just wanted a mechanism to move from point A to B. When better alternatives were available, they migrated away from rail. Similarly, there are many times where people (or individuals) don't realize the true purpose for which things are done. A job to be done is typically described in nouns and verbs. It is also provided in a general sense that can be replaced by something outside the current industry. The "job to be done" can help to explore the deeper reason for why things are done throughout life - and can also help explain some of the failures and successes we see in this world.