Kruse Kronicle

Many Eyes: The Taxonomy of Sin

I recently discovered a website called Many Eyes where you can upload your data and create some really cool charts and graphs. Here is one I found particularly interesting (Be patient. It may take several seconds for it to load. There is a lot of sin.):

A new, lower estimate of climate sensitivity

World Climate Report: A new, lower estimate of climate sensitivity

There is word circulating that a paper soon to appear in Science magazine concludes that the climate sensitivity—how much the earth’s average temperature will rise as a result of a doubling of the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide—likely (that is, with a 66% probability) lies in the range 1.7°C to 2.6°C, with a median value of 2.3°C. This is a sizeable contraction and reduction from the estimates of the climate sensitivity given by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report (AR4), in which the likely range is given as 2.0°C to 4.5°C, with a best estimate of 3.0°C.

Further, the results from the new analysis largely eliminate the “fat tail” of the distribution of possible values of the climate sensitivity (that the IPCC AR4 report was fond of) which included the possibility that very large climate sensitivities are a realistic possibility. In the new paper, the authors find only “vanishing probabilities” for a climate sensitivity value greater than 3.2°C and that values greater than 6.0°C are “implausible.” Contrast that with the IPCC assessment of the literature (summarized in our Figure 1) which routinely includes studies concluding there is a greater than a 10% possibility that the true climate sensitivity exceeds 6°C and some which find that there is a greater than 5% possibility that it exceeds 10°C. ...

In Honor of Black Friday

In honor of Black Friday I felt I needed to reprise a little Daniel Amos from 28 years ago:

Mall (All Over the World)

from the album "Doppelgänger"

Words and Music by Terry Taylor
©1983 Twitchen Vibes/ Paragon Music Corp. ASCAP

Mall all over the world
Mall all over the world...

Moving into the age of leisure
Where east meets west in a maze of pleasure
And why do we feel we can live forever?
Cos' they've piped in music of religious nature...

How come you're sad, how come you cry
When golden arches 'cross your sky?
They're reminders of sweet bye and bye
This could be heaven when we die...

Mannequin left!
Mannequin right!
Do the mannequin day and night
Elevator up, Escalate down
It spreads like the blob
It swallows your town

Moving into the age of leisure
Where east meets west in a maze of pleasure
And why do we feel we can live forever?
Cos' they've piped in music of religious nature...

Mall all over the world
Mall all over the world...

Optimism and Opportunity: A Multicultural Look at Women in the US

Nielsen Wire: Optimism and Opportunity: A Multicultural Look at Women in the US

Though often stressed over money, work, and lack of free time, across ethnicities, American women exhibit optimism with regards to their future and their daughters according to findings in Nielsen’s report: Women of Tomorrow: U.S. Multicultural Insights.

With the face of the United States changing, the attitudes and behaviors of women from all backgrounds is increasingly important. Hispanics are now the fastest growing ethnic group, a trend that has tremendous ramifications on media, retail and manufacturers now and in the years ahead. Optimism was highest among African American and Hispanic women, especially when it came to how they viewed the opportunities they have had compared with those of their mothers. ...

The article presents an interesting series of graphs. I thought this one was particularly interesting.

Media and Mobile
Despite the stereotype that men are the primary users of media and technology, American women are heavy users of technology – even if they aren’t early adopters. Women of all ethnicities use media in similar ways, with one key exception: smartphones. Just 33 percent of Caucasian women have a smartphone in their household, compared to penetration rates in the 60s for women of other ethnicities.

Why do so few caucasian women use smartphones?

 

 

Mobility Impaired

National Review Online: Mobility Impaired

(This is a great piece but I don't advise reading it until you've had your morning coffee. It is a bit complex to think about it but he raises some important clarifications.)

... One way to assess the extent of mobility is to ask whether people tend to be better off than their parents were at the same age — whether they experience upward absolute mobility. Research for EMP conducted by my colleagues at the Brookings Institution Julia Isaacs, Isabel Sawhill, and Ron Haskins shows that two-thirds of 40-year-old Americans are in households with larger incomes than their parents had at the same age, even taking into account the fact that the cost of living has risen. That’s pretty impressive, but it actually understates the improvement between generations. Household size declined over these decades, so incomes now are divided up among fewer family members, leaving them better off than bigger households of the past. Another EMP study shows that when incomes are adjusted for household size, four out of five adults today are better off than their parents were at the same age.

The finding of pervasive upward absolute mobility flies in the face of liberal accounts of a stagnant middle class. These accounts generally conflate disappointing growth in men’s earnings with growth in household income, which has been impressive. Growth in women’s earnings has also been impressive, but economic pessimists have twisted these bright spots to fit a gloomy narrative. They claim that household incomes have kept pace only because wives have been forced into work to make up for the shrinking bacon their husbands bring home. That ignores the long-term trend of women’s obtaining more education in industrialized nations around the world, presumably with an intention to put it to use in the work force someday. It also ignores the evidence that married men rationally chose to reduce their work hours as their wives increased theirs (even as single men continued working the same hours), and the fact that employment grew more among the wives of better-educated men than among the wives of less-educated men. 

Nevertheless, incomes have not grown as fast in recent decades as they did in the middle of the 20th century. While the vast majority of Americans end up better off than their parents, the difference is probably not as great as the improvement of their parents over their grandparents was.

There’s another way to look at intergenerational mobility — asking whether those whose parents were at the bottom or at the top relative to Americans as a whole end up in the same place in adulthood. This is the question of relative mobility. You may have a higher income than your parents did, but if that is generally true of your generation, then your rank may be no different than your parents’ rank was. It may even be lower. And having less than others can figure more prominently in our assessment of our well-being than does merely having more than our parents did — as may be the case with scarce commodities, such as homes in the best school districts or slots at the best universities. ...

...  If the size of the boost that children get from greater parental income differs between countries, that could be either because parental income buys more access to the best opportunities in one country than it does in the other, or because the best opportunities are compensated more highly in one country than the other. It may be no more unusual for Americans from modest origins to become top executives than it is for similarly situated Danes, but American CEOs make a lot more money than Danish CEOs do. In this scenario, it’s not that opportunities to obtain the best slots in the United States are less fairly distributed than in other countries, it’s simply much more lucrative to occupy those slots here.

So, which is it? Research suggests that by the time they were in their 40s, American children born in the 1950s should have experienced the same earnings mobility as their Swedish counterparts if the economic payoff for additional schooling were not so much higher in the United States — and, more important, if that payoff had not grown so much between generations. And educational mobility in the two countries — the connection between parent and child schooling — was actually very similar for this generation. Opportunity for top slots may therefore have been as widespread in the United States as in Sweden.

However, evidence indicates that American children born since the 1950s have had lower educational mobility than children in Sweden and other Western nations. And recent research indicates that the link between parental income and educational advantages on one hand and child academic outcomes on the other is stronger in the United States than in other Western countries. So it may be that higher pay for better slots and narrower opportunities to occupy the best slots both now contribute to lower earnings mobility in the United States. Still, our country does not look particularly bad in terms of occupational mobility — the degree of similarity between the desirability of parents’ and children’s jobs. And in the broadest sense, that may be the best measure of opportunity for different slots. ...

... Where to look to encourage more upward relative mobility? Begin with the fact that just 16 percent of those who start at the bottom but graduate from college remain stuck at the bottom, compared with 45 percent of those who fail to get a college degree. There is a legitimate debate about whether pushing academically marginal students into college will give them the same benefits that current college graduates receive, but there are surely financially constrained students who would enroll — or who would stay enrolled — if they could afford to.

EMP research has also shown that children with divorced parents are less likely to escape the bottom than other children. Just as it is not incontestably established that sending more disadvantaged kids to college would increase upward relative mobility, it is also debatable whether reducing divorce would do so. But reducing the number of unplanned pregnancies would unquestionably reduce the number of children experiencing divorce and other disadvantages. Since it is more common among parents in the bottom than elsewhere, reducing unplanned pregnancy would lower the number of children starting out at the bottom and thereby reduce the number of children stuck there down the road. And it would improve the mobility prospects of many of the adults avoiding pregnancy.

Finally, remaining in the bottom is much more common among black families than white families. While much remains to be learned about why this is so, another EMP report starkly shows that black and white children grow up in entirely different economic worlds. Simply put, two-thirds of black children experience a level of neighborhood poverty growing up that just 6 percent of white children will ever see. That is a national tragedy. It’s certainly hard to see how the kids are to blame.

Broad-based economic growth, international competitiveness, and the ideals composing the American Dream all require that policymakers heed Governor Daniels’s call. Increasing upward absolute mobility — for all, but with a particular focus on those who start out at the bottom — should be the primary goal of policymakers. The first political party that commits itself to putting upward mobility first and that credibly takes on the challenge will be ascendant.

Is a Woman in Brazil Better Off than a Woman in the U.S.?

Time: Is a Woman in Brazil Better Off than a Woman in the U.S.?

Women overseas are reaching new heights professionally. Here's what we can learn from our emerging market counterpart.

The mention of women in emerging economies often evokes a picture of oppressed and poverty-stricken victims, relegated to the sidelines of male-dominated cultures. That’s the usual narrative, exemplified by the best-selling Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl Wu Dunn. Yes, these problems are real and of critical importance. But educated women in Brazil, Russia, India and China — the BRIC economies which represent the four largest emerging markets — and the United Arab Emirates, are telling a different tale: one of agency and power.

Just as in the U.S. — where female college graduates now outnumber men — BRIC women are flooding into universities and graduate schools. They represent 65% of college graduates in the UAE, 60% in Brazil and 57% in Russia. These figures represent more than just a tiny elite: Between 15 and 25% of young women in the BRICs/UAE are now college-educated — a substantial number. And they’re not just earning degrees: They are bursting with the desire to use them.

Highly educated women the world over are ambitious, but ambition and aspiration among BRIC/UAE women is off the charts. New data from the Center for Work-Life Policy show that 85% of female college graduates in India and 92% in the UAE consider themselves very ambitious, compared to a paltry 36% in the U.S. In India, 86% of college-educated women are shooting for the top job, closely followed by their counterparts in Brazil (80%) and China (76%).

And turbo-charged ambition is paying off. In Brazil, 14% of the CEOs of large companies are female; in India, the figure is 11%. Meanwhile, the number of women who head up Fortune 500 corporations in the United States and FTSE 100 firms in the United Kingdom is stuck at less than 5%. What’s behind these startling numbers? Our study — which is based on rich, new data — describes opportunities and obstacles, which are surprisingly different from those in the West. ...

Deconstructing development

Economist: Deconstructing development

Breaking down the constituents of the human development index

The UN released its new edition of its human development report on November 2nd. The report contains an index which is seen by many as an alternative way of measuring countries' prosperity and well-being. It is composed of three equally-weighted parts: health (through life expectancy at birth), wealth (national income per person) and education (average years of schooling plus expected years of schooling). The UN does a very good job of disseminating and communicating its statistics, so we encourage you to visit their site where you can read the full 185 pages of the report, or build your own index. Meanwhile, we've done one of the few things the UN doesn't do and deconstructed the index into its constituent parts in the chart below.

 

 

Thomas W. Gillespie, retired Princeton Seminary president, dies

PCUSA: Thomas W. Gillespie, retired Princeton Seminary president, dies

LOUISVILLE

The Rev. Thomas W. Gillespie, a pastor, theologian and church leader of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), died Nov. 5 of complications from surgery earlier in the week. He was 83.

A native of Los Angeles, Gillespie graduated from Pepperdine University in 1951 and Princeton Theological Seminary in 1954. He earned his Ph.D. in New Testament from Claremont Graduate School of Theology in 1971. While at Princeton, he received the A.A. Hodge Prize in Systematic Theology in 1953.

Following his graduation from Princeton, Gillespie served two lengthy pulpits in California ― as pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Garden Grove from 1954-1966 and as pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Burlingame from 1966-1983.

Gillespie became the fifth president of Princeton Theological Seminary ― the oldest seminary in the United States ― in 1983, succeeding the Rev. James I. McCord. He served as president and professor of New Testament until his retirement in 2004.

In a message to the Princeton community, President Iain Torrance wrote: “It has been rightly said that the story of his presidency is a story of building and development — of relationships, of academic scholarship, of campus facilities, of a worshiping community, of a worldwide network of ministry. During Tom’s tenure, Princeton Seminary entered a new century, celebrated a growing and enriching diversity in its students and faculty, mourned and ministered to a nation’s national tragedy on 9/11, and contributed to theological scholarship worldwide and to the mission of the international church.”

Gillespie’s service to the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) was lengthy. He served as moderator of San Francisco Presbytery, as  a PC(USA) delegate to the Consultation on Church Union, a member of the General Assembly’s Task Force on Biblical Authority and Interpretation, and as chair of the Standing Committee on Theological Education.

At the time of his death, Gillespie was serving on the General Assembly Mission Council and served a term as chair of its Discipleship Committee.

He is survived by his wife, Barbara; three children ― Robyn, William and Dayle; and several  grandchildren.

A memorial service has been tentatively scheduled for Nov. 14 at Nassau Presbyterian Church in Princeton, N.J.

It has been my privilege to get to know Tom Gillespie over the last seven years as we served together on the General Assembly Mission Council. Every so often you come across people who model qualities you hope to incorporate into your own life. Dr. Gillespie was one of those people for me. While carrying an air authoriy he was also humble and approachable. I valued his passion for pastoral theology and equipping congregants for ministry in their lives. He will be deeply missed and my prayers are with the Gillispie family as they celebrate his life and mourn his departure.

Cargill and Economic Development for the Poor

Fortune: Cargill: Inside the quiet giant that rules the food business

Here is just one example of the positive impact a large "evil" multi-national corporation has on economic development among the poor. There are many other stories similar to these that are rarely seen in the press.

... Seventy percent of the world's cocoa grows in West Africa, and most of that in one country, Ivory Coast. Since 1999, Ivory Coast has been through a bloody succession of military coups, rigged elections, and civil wars. "We were concerned about running into a ceiling on production there," says Harold Poelma, managing director of Cargill Cocoa. So Cargill began looking for other options. The solution that it came up with perfectly illustrates the company's global reach and long view.

Cocoa trees look like something Dr. Seuss would draw, with clusters of hard-shelled pods, as big and colorful as Halloween gourds, sprouting directly from the trunk and limbs. They don't grow just anyplace. They need shade, warmth, and humidity, as well as deep, rich soil -- conditions generally found within a band 20 degrees north and south of the equator. That band passes through Vietnam.

Cargill was one of the first U.S. multinationals to return to Vietnam when President Bill Clinton normalized relations with the government in Hanoi in 1995. Today it is the country's largest domestic producer of livestock feed and a central player in Vietnam's fast-moving shift from a state-controlled agricultural economy to one where small farmers are encouraged to work private plots for private gain. The effect of that shift has been transformative. Not long ago, Vietnam was importing a million tons of rice a year. Last year it became the world's second leading rice exporter. "Same people, same land," Vietnam's director of crop production, Dr. Nguyen Tri Ngoc, told me in his Hanoi office, speaking through a translator. "Before, farmers were not really farmers. They were workers in the fields, and they worked under the supervision of the government." And the difference now? "Free markets!" he says in English.

In 2004, Cargill launched a public-private partnership with one of its biggest customers, chocolate giant Mars, and the governments of Vietnam and the Netherlands. The aim: to create something that had never before existed in Vietnam, a cocoa-export economy.

First, Cargill had to convince a front line of growers to switch to cocoa from well-established crops like coffee, black pepper, and cashews. Two years before the first harvest (it takes at least that long for cocoa seedlings to produce fruit), before there was anything to buy, Cargill opened two fully staffed cocoa buying stations on major roads, in Ben Tre and Dak Lak provinces. It made an early commitment to transparency, posting on the Cargill website and offering by text message both the daily international price on the London market and what Cargill is paying locally; growers can lock their price for three weeks, the time it takes to ferment and dry the beans after harvest. Cargill also built a network of more than 100 demonstration farms, where curious growers can learn from their neighbors. And in February 2011 the company took delivery of the first Vietnamese cocoa beans to carry UTZ certification -- an independent sustainability program through which growers can earn an extra $100 per ton.

This year Vietnamese farmers will produce about 2,500 metric tons of cocoa, 70% of which will go to Cargill. That's a tiny sliver of the 3.4 million-ton global market, but the growth trend is impressive: 40,000 acres under cultivation in 2010, compared with 1,200 in 2003, and already 32,000 active growers in 12 provinces. Poelma sees the potential for 100,000 tons by 2020. Instead of shipping all of that to Cargill's North Sea Canal processing plant in Wormer, the Netherlands -- a voyage that takes 24 days -- Cargill hopes to have a Cargill factory in Vietnam by then, processing cocoa liquor, cocoa butter, and cocoa powder for export to growing markets in China and India.

None of that happens without the eager participation of thousands of small growers. One I met last summer was Trinh Van Thanh, a smooth-cheeked 43-year-old with a wife, three daughters, and roughly four acres of land in Baria-Vungtau province, a two-hour drive southeast from Ho Chi Minh City. Five years ago Thanh was growing pepper and coffee and raising pigs, and he was struggling. His pepper trees were afflicted by blight. The yield from his mature coffee trees was declining year by year. He says he was $5,000 in debt.

Thanh planted his first cocoa saplings, as Vietnamese farmers often do, in the shade of his coffee trees. He enrolled in an agricultural extension program in Ho Chi Minh City, where he learned how to build a specialized slow-drip irrigation system based on technology invented on an Israeli kibbutz. When the first crop came in, Thanh made the ambitious choice to ferment and dry the cocoa beans himself. Ultimately, he built more fermentation boxes and drying tables than he needed for his own crop, which meant he could perform those value-adding services for other growers. Soon he wasn't just farming, he was running a collection station. Next he planted a cocoa-tree nursery. Then he launched an irrigation consulting business. (The man gets the concept of a virtuous cycle.) Thanh still sells all his beans to Cargill but maybe not for long. What he really wants to learn how to do next, he told me, is make and sell chocolate.

Thanh's success so far almost defies belief. He says his mini cocoa conglomerate will gross more than $850,000 this year. And if his daughter, who's about to graduate from high school, wants to go to college in America -- and he hopes that she will -- he can easily afford it.

Later in Hanoi, I tell Ngoc all about my visit to Baria-Vungtau province. When does a farmer like Thanh, I ask him, become too much of a capitalist for the Socialist Republic of Vietnam? Ngoc beams. "No limit!" he says. Again in English. ...