Rethinking the Economy

On the heels of San Francisco’s new parking meters that automatically adjust parking rates based on up-to-the-minute market supply & demand, Tyler Cowen wrote a nice NYT piece on the problems with the fact that here in the US of A, Big Government regulations mandate that real estate developers create lots [...]

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When I lived in the Bay Area, I did what Mark Mykleby said we should do: I biked to work. I don’t in DC, and it isn’t just the awful summer weather. It’s simple — I don’t want to die.
In DC, I have friends here who bike to work every day. They tell [...]

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Mark Mykleby, a friend of Thomas Friedman who works for the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s Office of the Chairman, published a letter in “his hometown paper, the Beaufort Gazette in South Carolina,” about the BP oil disaster. Friedman liked the letter so much he republished it in his column.
This isn’t BP’s or Transocean’s [...]

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The International City/County Management Association just came out with an report, Getting Smart About Climate Change, that’s a nice example of Principle #2, Place Your Bets. It uses case studies to illustrate nine strategies cities and counties are using to combat global warming:
1. Create more sustainable and resilient communities
2. Green the local economy
3. Engage [...]

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If you’re feeling blue about our side’s chances of getting its act together, WE ACT for Environmental Justice, and several other environmental justice organizations from around the country just released a report you should check out: Environmental Justice and the Green Economy. The report lays out three principles for building a just, sustainable [...]

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[Part 5 of the Beyond the Underpants Gnomes series, a response to Bill McKibben]
Playing on the local board sounds interesting. But can we win big enough here to make our efforts worthwhile?
To get a sense of what’s possible on this board, let’s take a quick tour of what US cities and [...]

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The Urban land Institute’s got a smart idea about how to get more bang out of federal transportation bucks: ‘Channeling Funding Through “the Three Bs”’ of Base, Bonus, and Bank.
1) Use Base Formula Funds to Maintain the System
Base formula funds should be the primary funding source for system maintenance and preservation. [...]

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