Gyroscopic Investing

TennPaGa wrote:

I don't understand what problem would be solved by such an arrangement.

What do I have to gain by offering me a choice of my water supplier?  What does my 83 year old father gain?

Also, water is (for now and the forseeable future) the commodity of all commodities.  In a commodity market, low cost wins every time, so you'd end up with one supplier.  You'd eventually have Republican Congressmen cursing you for wasting all that money on two extra pipes.

Then again, I could foresee stealth polluters manipulating/decommoditizing the market.  Kind of like what we have now in the medical/pharmaceutical/food industry (whoops, wrong thread ).

I suppose the marketing frenzy might provide entertainment value.

I'm not sure I agree. Water isn't a commodity where price wins every time. Price only wins if quality is equal, which I believe this thread is about it not being. In my area, for example, the water is hard and full of minerals. So people buy water filters, and their evaporative coolers burn out faster because the evaporated water leaves behind minerals. Let's say there were two water companies. Company A delivered the status quo: hard water about $0.004/gallon. But company B could invent in a treatment plant and deliver you purified water (you know, what you buy in those bottles!) for, say, $0.005/gallon. People could chose which priority was more important to them: better-tasting water and longer evaporative cooler lifespan for higher cost, or worse water that required filtration and more frequent appliance replacement for less money. It's the choice that's important! It's what we don't have right now with our monopoly plumbed water companies, and it's what bottled water is offering because the government is not.

doodle wrote: All Im saying is that it seems to make more sense (to me) to spend a tiny fraction of the 30 billion + Americans spend on bottled water and filters every year to just upgrade our public water systems to provide high quality water so that we don't have to go through all the effort and expense of filtering our water when it comes out of our taps or buying water in bottles that has been trucked around to various locations.

Yes, it would be more efficient to have a single monopoly provide what everyone wanted at low cost. The problem, of course, is that monopolies never actually work this way, and human desires are varied, not uniform. This is why choice is important, and building systems that accommodate it rather than fight it tend to be the ones that function better and please more people.

Pointedstick wrote:

TennPaGa wrote:

I don't understand what problem would be solved by such an arrangement.

What do I have to gain by offering me a choice of my water supplier?  What does my 83 year old father gain?

Also, water is (for now and the forseeable future) the commodity of all commodities.  In a commodity market, low cost wins every time, so you'd end up with one supplier.  You'd eventually have Republican Congressmen cursing you for wasting all that money on two extra pipes.

Then again, I could foresee stealth polluters manipulating/decommoditizing the market.  Kind of like what we have now in the medical/pharmaceutical/food industry (whoops, wrong thread ).

I suppose the marketing frenzy might provide entertainment value.

I'm not sure I agree. Water isn't a commodity where price wins every time. Price only wins if quality is equal, which I believe this thread is about it not being. In my area, for example, the water is hard and full of minerals. So people buy water filters, and their evaporative coolers burn out faster because the evaporated water leaves behind minerals. Let's say there were two water companies. Company A delivered the status quo: hard water about $0.004/gallon. But company B could invent in a treatment plant and deliver you purified water (you know, what you buy in those bottles!) for, say, $0.005/gallon. People could chose which priority was more important to them: better-tasting water and longer evaporative cooler lifespan for higher cost, or worse water that required filtration and more frequent appliance replacement for less money. It's the choice that's important! It's what we don't have right now with our monopoly plumbed water companies, and it's what bottled water is offering because the government is not.

So why don't we just offer top quality water to everyone? Its not rocket science.....

And I didn't think of all the added expenses you mentioned like clogged pipes, showerheads and the myriad cleaning supplies and shortened lifespans those cause.

I don't think laying multiple pipes is the simplest solution....how about just placing tighter regulations on the quality of water that our public munipalities pipe out?

Pointedstick wrote:

doodle wrote: All Im saying is that it seems to make more sense (to me) to spend a tiny fraction of the 30 billion + Americans spend on bottled water and filters every year to just upgrade our public water systems to provide high quality water so that we don't have to go through all the effort and expense of filtering our water when it comes out of our taps or buying water in bottles that has been trucked around to various locations.

Yes, it would be more efficient to have a single monopoly provide what everyone wanted at low cost. The problem, of course, is that monopolies never actually work this way, and human desires are varied, not uniform. This is why choice is important, and building systems that accommodate it rather than fight it tend to be the ones that function better and please more people.

When it comes to cars and computers yes......not water.

doodle wrote: So why don't we just offer top quality water to everyone? Its not rocket science.....

And I didn't think of all the added expenses you mentioned like clogged pipes, showerheads and the myriad cleaning supplies and shortened lifespans those cause.

I don't think laying multiple pipes is the simplest solution....how about just placing tighter regulations on the quality of water that our public munipalities pipe out?

The issue is always cost. "The best" always costs more. Would people be willing to pay more for that higher quality. Some would, some wouldn't. Some might not be able to afford it very well, and devising a one-size-fits-all solution that privileges quality over cost is unfair to them. For all the wealthier people, sure, mandating higher quality at a higher cost might be fine. But I don't think that's really what you had in mind.

Pointedstick wrote:

doodle wrote: So why don't we just offer top quality water to everyone? Its not rocket science.....

And I didn't think of all the added expenses you mentioned like clogged pipes, showerheads and the myriad cleaning supplies and shortened lifespans those cause.

I don't think laying multiple pipes is the simplest solution....how about just placing tighter regulations on the quality of water that our public munipalities pipe out?

The issue is always cost. "The best" always costs more. Would people be willing to pay more for that higher quality. Some would, some wouldn't. Some might not be able to afford it very well, and devising a one-size-fits-all solution that privileges quality over cost is unfair to them. For all the wealthier people, sure, mandating higher quality at a higher cost might be fine. But I don't think that's really what you had in mind.

The costs in a progressive tax system inevitably are borne by the wealthier anyways...and for the most part these are the folks spending hundreds or thousands on bottled water every year.

Every human needs approximately the same amount of water to survive and the cost per gallon is a fraction of a penny. Increasing the quality in the pipes would be immensely cheaper, better for the environment, and less wasteful of human effort (driving around and filling shelves with stupid cases of water) than the present "free market" solution.

doodle wrote: Every human needs approximately the same amount of water to survive and the cost per gallon is a fraction of a penny. Increasing the quality in the pipes would be immensely cheaper, better for the environment, and less wasteful of human effort (driving around and filling shelves with stupid cases of water) than the present "free market" solution.

There you go talking about survival again. You and I are light resource users, but most aren't. My wife and I use about 25 gallons of water per person per day when the state average is three times that high. What are those other people using water for? I have no idea. That's why I'm not comfortable making these kinds of decisions for them. I don't know how I might be disrupting their lives.

I agree with you that bottled water is an imperfect solution to the problem of bad water, but it's what the market came up with because government wasn't delivering what people wanted. That's the important thing you have to understand. That the market is supplying people with bottled water is only a symptom of a problem that is squarely the fault of the government. Should it do better? Sure, of course, duh. Will it? I don't think so. That's why market solutions work: we don't have to wait for government to turn its fat ass around. We can just procure the service from another provider. That's the sort of thing I was hoping to foster and preserve with my multiple-plumbed-water-companies idea.

Pointedstick wrote:

doodle wrote: Every human needs approximately the same amount of water to survive and the cost per gallon is a fraction of a penny. Increasing the quality in the pipes would be immensely cheaper, better for the environment, and less wasteful of human effort (driving around and filling shelves with stupid cases of water) than the present "free market" solution.

There you go talking about survival again. You and I are light resource users, but most aren't. My wife and I use about 25 gallons of water per person per day when the state average is three times that high. What are those other people using water for? I have no idea. That's why I'm not comfortable making these kinds of decisions for them. I don't know how I might be disrupting their lives.

I agree with you that bottled water is an imperfect solution to the problem of bad water, but it's what the market came up with because government wasn't delivering what people wanted. That's the important thing you have to understand. That the market is supplying people with bottled water is only a symptom of a problem that is squarely the fault of the government. Should it do better? Sure, of course, duh. Will it? I don't think so. That's why market solutions work: we don't have to wait for government to turn its fat ass around. We can just procure the service from another provider. That's the sort of thing I was hoping to foster and preserve with my multiple-plumbed-water-companies idea.

Why? You pay for what you consume.....higher quality water will just cost you .0005 of a penny per gallon vs. .00045.......

doodle wrote: Why? You pay for what you consume.....higher quality water will just cost you .0005 of a penny per gallon vs. .00045.......

I am basically making two points:

1. higher quality always costs more money
2. practically speaking, government will not actually increase the quality

If you minimize #1 by assuming the costs to be very low, and minimize #2 by ignoring the practical political problems inherent to your idea, it's hard for me to take your argument seriously. I mean, I agree with you that it would be great if the government improved their monopoly water infrastructure to yield crystal clear water at an exceptionally low additional price… but to me such a possibility seems almost laughable.

Government will drive the costs up. They don't have a profit motive to induce them to lower costs.

There are many different bottled water companies. They compete with price and quality. The same would happen with pipes and bringing water to your home or business.

Just because you can't imagine how they would do it don't make the mistake of thinking it can only be done with violence. Violence is a very poor substitute for voluntary cooperation to solve problems and generate profit (create value).

People smarter than us will figure it out. We have no idea what would be best or even better, we can only guess at it.

The people in government are not smarter and do not have magical powers to make water cleaner or cheaper. All they have is a gun.

If phone lines and communication had been left solely to the government we'd probably all be sending smoke signals or paying hundreds of dollars a month for one of those old 1920's phones that look like a black candle and holding that little cup deal up to your ear. We'd consider the idea of a cordless phone with an antenna something out of Buck Rogers.

doodle wrote: The costs in a progressive tax system inevitably are borne by the wealthier anyways...and for the most part these are the folks spending hundreds or thousands on bottled water every year.

Every human needs approximately the same amount of water to survive and the cost per gallon is a fraction of a penny. Increasing the quality in the pipes would be immensely cheaper, better for the environment, and less wasteful of human effort (driving around and filling shelves with stupid cases of water) than the present "free market" solution.

doodle,

I am sure you have the best interests of others in mind with your proposed solution.  It makes intellectual sense.  However, I believe you may be missing the main point (at least to me).  People do not like solutions edicted to them, or crammed down their throat, by the "master".  Believe me, practical solutions that people want and where they have a choice and input into the solution (e.g. buying bottled water if they choose to do so) will almost always trump the brilliant top down solution from the "king".  Failure to understand that principle is frequently the source of discord whether it is with the liberal masters or the conservative masters.  We had a civil war over that issue but it seems many do not learn.  We are doomed.

... Mountaineer

Mountaineer wrote:

doodle wrote: The costs in a progressive tax system inevitably are borne by the wealthier anyways...and for the most part these are the folks spending hundreds or thousands on bottled water every year.

Every human needs approximately the same amount of water to survive and the cost per gallon is a fraction of a penny. Increasing the quality in the pipes would be immensely cheaper, better for the environment, and less wasteful of human effort (driving around and filling shelves with stupid cases of water) than the present "free market" solution.

doodle,

I am sure you have the best interests of others in mind with your proposed solution.  It makes intellectual sense.  However, I believe you may be missing the main point (at least to me).  People do not like solutions edicted to them, or crammed down their throat, by the "master".  Believe me, practical solutions that people want and where they have a choice and input into the solution (e.g. buying bottled water if they choose to do so) will almost always trump the brilliant top down solution from the "king".  Failure to understand that principle is frequently the source of discord whether it is with the liberal masters or the conservative masters.  We had a civil war over that issue but it seems many do not learn.  We are doomed.

... Mountaineer

The idea that the master can come up with a better idea and enforce it rather than have the marketplace of ideas discover the best by voluntary consent is a magical belief in superhero politicians.

The best idea is always the one that's chosen voluntarily since the point is to imporve lives. People don't need to have improvements forced on their lives. They will choose them. The smartest fellow or group of humans that come up with the best combination of cheap and delicious water will be rewarded by his fellow humans for his efforts to make their lives better. 

Mountaineer wrote:

doodle wrote: The costs in a progressive tax system inevitably are borne by the wealthier anyways...and for the most part these are the folks spending hundreds or thousands on bottled water every year.

Every human needs approximately the same amount of water to survive and the cost per gallon is a fraction of a penny. Increasing the quality in the pipes would be immensely cheaper, better for the environment, and less wasteful of human effort (driving around and filling shelves with stupid cases of water) than the present "free market" solution.

doodle,

I am sure you have the best interests of others in mind with your proposed solution.  It makes intellectual sense.  However, I believe you may be missing the main point (at least to me).  People do not like solutions edicted to them, or crammed down their throat, by the "master".  Believe me, practical solutions that people want and where they have a choice and input into the solution (e.g. buying bottled water if they choose to do so) will almost always trump the brilliant top down solution from the "king".  Failure to understand that principle is frequently the source of discord whether it is with the liberal masters or the conservative masters.  We had a civil war over that issue but it seems many do not learn.  We are doomed.

... Mountaineer

Good lord we are on different planets...

So if poor air quality is a problem, I guess the solution is to bottle air or go buy a respirator air mask.

Clean water is not the same as clothing styles or car brands....its a simple commodity that is essential to life and since everyone would choose clean water over dirty water I don't see what need for a market is. The solution to this problem is not prohibitively complex or expensive....

Kshartle wrote:

Mountaineer wrote:

doodle wrote: The costs in a progressive tax system inevitably are borne by the wealthier anyways...and for the most part these are the folks spending hundreds or thousands on bottled water every year.

Every human needs approximately the same amount of water to survive and the cost per gallon is a fraction of a penny. Increasing the quality in the pipes would be immensely cheaper, better for the environment, and less wasteful of human effort (driving around and filling shelves with stupid cases of water) than the present "free market" solution.

doodle,

I am sure you have the best interests of others in mind with your proposed solution.  It makes intellectual sense.  However, I believe you may be missing the main point (at least to me).  People do not like solutions edicted to them, or crammed down their throat, by the "master".  Believe me, practical solutions that people want and where they have a choice and input into the solution (e.g. buying bottled water if they choose to do so) will almost always trump the brilliant top down solution from the "king".  Failure to understand that principle is frequently the source of discord whether it is with the liberal masters or the conservative masters.  We had a civil war over that issue but it seems many do not learn.  We are doomed.

... Mountaineer

The idea that the master can come up with a better idea and enforce it rather than have the marketplace of ideas discover the best by voluntary consent is a magical belief in superhero politicians.

The best idea is always the one that's chosen voluntarily since the point is to imporve lives. People don't need to have improvements forced on their lives. They will choose them. The smartest fellow or group of humans that come up with the best combination of cheap and delicious water will be rewarded by his fellow humans for his efforts to make their lives better. 

Do children from poor families voluntarily choose to drink leaded tap water?

Dude, you lead a very sheltered life. Try stepping outside of your gated compound sometime into the real world. Not everyone can afford to buy bottled Fiji water for little precious.

doodle wrote: Clean water is not the same as clothing styles or car brands....its a simple commodity that is essential to life and since everyone would choose clean water over dirty water I don't see what need for a market is. The solution to this problem is not prohibitively complex or expensive....

How do you know this? And if you're right, what explains why it hasn't already been done? If it's so obvious, is everybody but you just a regressive idiot? Serious questions.

Pointedstick wrote:

doodle wrote: Clean water is not the same as clothing styles or car brands....its a simple commodity that is essential to life and since everyone would choose clean water over dirty water I don't see what need for a market is. The solution to this problem is not prohibitively complex or expensive....

How do you know this? And if you're right, what explains why it hasn't already been done? If it's so obvious, is everybody but you just a regressive idiot? Serious questions.

....many studies have shown that bottled water is not better or of higher quality than tap water (especially bottled water that has been sitting in plastic bottles for a month). Consumers largely have been duped into wasting their money on this crap through false advertising. Im not talking about the convenience of buying a bottle of water on the run....Im talking about people that stockpile it in their home and drink it there. So are many people regressive idiots? Yes.....  Buying bottled water is the equivalent of going back to the days before piping existed and you had to carry a bucket out to the well to collect water. 

So…
1. bottled water is no better than tap water
2. …so people who buy it are idiots
3. …because advertising made them do it

Do I have that right?

Pointedstick wrote: Right? Am I just crazy?

I think the debate is in how "poor quality" the water really is.  Because if you look at the rest of the world, people will think we are batshit insane to be buying bottled water with our "high quality" water infrastructure.  I'm intensely curious exactly how this bottled water mania actually got started and who is behind the marketing fiction.

I mean, fat junk food eating American Boobuses are not concerned with flouride and rocket waste being in their water enough to buy bottled water, AFAIK.  Is bottled water sold via fear campaigns???

Pointedstick wrote: So…
1. bottled water is no better than tap water
2. …so people who buy it are idiots
3. …because advertising made them do it

Do I have that right?

Numerous studies have shown that water that sits in a plastic bottle leeches chemicals from plastic.

Many studies show that bottled water is not necessarily of higher quality than tap water (that depends on manufacturer and municipal water source obviously)

People do stupid shit like buy pet rocks and bottled water. Im not saying they cant...if you want to do that fine.

Im just saying that there is essentially no difference between this



and this



And that it is much more efficient and cost effective for a society to supply the basic commodity product of clean water like this;

Stewardship wrote: Agree with you there.  But what do you think would happen if you and I tried starting a business which pipes better water to people than what public utilities currently offer?  I imagine we'd be shut down pretty quickly by the government.

The government would claim economic protectionism under guise of public safety concerns.  So until someone successfully overtunes that notion in court, the status quo will maintain.

So when someone says that bottled water tastes better than tap water, are their taste buds lying to them (having been duped by advertising, presumably )?

In areas where the municipal water quality is actually really bad, are people buying bottled water still braindead idiots?

I can't help but be a little put off by your blithe dismissal of so many people's opinions as the results of low intelligence or susceptibility to greedy outsiders eager to make a buck. How do you go through life harboring such disrespect for your fellow man? It must be awfully isolating to look at a group of people and (even subconsciously) imagine, "most of those people are ignorant fools."


Again, if it is "much more efficient and cost effective for a society to supply the basic commodity product of clean water", why have they not done so in a manner that makes people avoid alternatives? I personally am not satisfied by the quality of the water my local monopoly government sells to me. I don't buy bottled water but I run all my tap water through a filter before I drink it because otherwise it tastes strongly of minerals. Am I just a brainwashed idiot? Are all the people in government who should improve this situation braindead idiots? Are you just a trailblazer for having come to the completely obvious conclusion that government should sell to everyone at extremely low cost the highest-quality, best-tasting, most mineral-free water that can possibly be supplied?

MachineGhost wrote:

Stewardship wrote: Agree with you there.  But what do you think would happen if you and I tried starting a business which pipes better water to people than what public utilities currently offer?  I imagine we'd be shut down pretty quickly by the government.

The government would claim economic protectionism under guise of public safety concerns.  So until someone successfully overtunes that notion in court, the status quo will maintain.

I don't see how on earth this is even feasible. Are you going to pay each and every landowner whose property your private piping network needs to cross? Are you going to start digging up all the public roads again creating traffic havoc so that you can run a second layer of water infrastructure? What if a third competitor comes to market a few years later....are we going to rip all the roads up again as well?

WiseOne wrote: There's also the issue of needing to plan ahead to bring a water container with you.  Plain and simple, it'll never happen.  I once had a delightful experience with this type of conservation while traveling in the Soviet Union:  I bought a bottle of water and discovered that my money only bought the water, not the bottle.  You weren't allowed to take the bottle out of the store.  Lacking a container, I had to drink it all on the spot.  In retrospect that was kind of dumb because it was probably just tap water.

I don't see whats wrong with paying for the convenience of not having to bring water with you so long as the water bottle is filled up with RO water, instead of all the marketing fictions and transportation & waste that has popped up for what is natural sourced waters.  There's an island in the South Pacific that is actually able to grow its dirt poor subsistence economy by exporting and selling its underground aquifer water.  How's that for irony?

doodle wrote: I don't see how on earth this is even feasible. Are you going to pay each and every landowner whose property your private piping network needs to cross? Are you going to start digging up all the public roads again creating traffic havoc so that you can run a second layer of water infrastructure? What if a third competitor comes to market a few years later....are we going to rip all the roads up again as well?

You don't appear to have any understanding of the fact that this is actually how everything happens in the world today. When the government wants to enlarge the road, what do you think they do? Just wave a road-building wand and two extra lanes appear? As for buried utilities under private property, they're called "easements". And yes, property owners can be paid for them. How often do you think the government does, though?

doodle wrote: I don't think laying multiple pipes is the simplest solution....how about just placing tighter regulations on the quality of water that our public munipalities pipe out?

What we need is basically cap and trade for water quallity.  You heard it here first!