Well, Of Course…

Earlier I noted that the rapid rise in the US price of the Canadian dollar has left a sizable price differential between the US and Canadian prices of many goods, leading many Canadians to do more shopping in the US.

The price differential is narrowing only slowly as Canadian retailers are reluctant to take capital losses on their inventories purchased at higher prices — a classic case of ignoring opportunity costs.

The result has been that Canada Post has been swamped with parcels being shipped from the US to Canadian consumers. From the Glob & Mule:

A surge in Internet cross-border shopping by Canadians trying to cash in on the soaring loonie is creating headaches for consumers, border agents and Canada Post.

There are already complaints of delivery delays as mail sorting centres try to dig out from heaps of Canadian Internet orders from the U.S. — and the holiday shopping season is barely under way.

Officials say the volume of parcels has choked three main international mail-sorting centres operated by Canada Post and the Canada Border Service agency in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal.

There are reports of parcels from the United States languishing for days and even weeks at the centres before being released for delivery.

Bruce Cran of the Consumers’ Association of Canada says he is getting plenty of complaints and is warning that the backlog is going to get worse.

Canada Post and the border service agency say they are working to speed up service and are urging consumers who plan to cross-border shop for the holidays via the Internet to place orders as early as possible.

Watch for other effects:

• Consumers will make even more use of private couriers and shipping firms (e.g. UPS, Fed-Ex, DHL, etc.
• Consumers will make more personal trips to the US to do their shopping.
• Border crossings will become even more seriously clogged.

Well, Of Course…

Earlier I noted that the rapid rise in the US price of the Canadian dollar has left a sizable price differential between the US and Canadian prices of many goods, leading many Canadians to do more shopping in the US.

The price differential is narrowing only slowly as Canadian retailers are reluctant to take capital losses on their inventories purchased at higher prices — a classic case of ignoring opportunity costs.

The result has been that Canada Post has been swamped with parcels being shipped from the US to Canadian consumers. From the Glob & Mule:

A surge in Internet cross-border shopping by Canadians trying to cash in on the soaring loonie is creating headaches for consumers, border agents and Canada Post.

There are already complaints of delivery delays as mail sorting centres try to dig out from heaps of Canadian Internet orders from the U.S. — and the holiday shopping season is barely under way.

Officials say the volume of parcels has choked three main international mail-sorting centres operated by Canada Post and the Canada Border Service agency in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal.

There are reports of parcels from the United States languishing for days and even weeks at the centres before being released for delivery.

Bruce Cran of the Consumers’ Association of Canada says he is getting plenty of complaints and is warning that the backlog is going to get worse.

Canada Post and the border service agency say they are working to speed up service and are urging consumers who plan to cross-border shop for the holidays via the Internet to place orders as early as possible.

Watch for other effects:

• Consumers will make even more use of private couriers and shipping firms (e.g. UPS, Fed-Ex, DHL, etc.
• Consumers will make more personal trips to the US to do their shopping.
• Border crossings will become even more seriously clogged.

Hypothesis: Phillips Curves are Shaped Like Their Countries

Peter Goodman recently referred me to this paper in the Queen’s University Working Paper Series. It shows a plot of Japan’s Phillips Curve using data from 1980 through 2005. The researchers noticed that if you do a mirror image of the plot, it looks very much like the map of Japan.

I think the same thing is true for Canada. Here is a plot of the Canadian Phillips curve data from 1948 – 1996 (from the Canadian edition of The Economic Way of Thinking):

Careful inspection of the plot reveals that the upper dots represent the arctic islands, and the large gap to the east appears right where Hudson Bay is. For comparison, consider this map of Canada (courtesy of the CIA):

Update: In the comments, Alan wondered whether I was implying with those dots in the upper left that Canada had staked a claim to Alaska to strengthen its claim to the passages in the Arctic Ocean.

I should have made clear that even though I reproduced an azimuthal projection map originally, I had in mind a mercator projection map (the kind <a href=”
used by Google–who can argue with that authority?), like this:

With this map, it is clear that the higher dots all fall on Canada’s islands in the Arctic. There is even a dot in the lower left to indicate Victoria, on Vancouvre Island.

Update #2: There is more confirmation of my hypothesis that a country’s Phillips Curve is shaped like the country: Look at the Phillips Curve for the Czech Republic.

Update #3: More confirmation from The Netherlands.

Addendum: the Phillips Curve is named for the famous economist who discovered it, Professor Curve.

Hypothesis: Phillips Curves are Shaped Like Their Countries

Peter Goodman recently referred me to this paper in the Queen’s University Working Paper Series. It shows a plot of Japan’s Phillips Curve using data from 1980 through 2005. The researchers noticed that if you do a mirror image of the plot, it looks very much like the map of Japan.

I think the same thing is true for Canada. Here is a plot of the Canadian Phillips curve data from 1948 – 1996 (from the Canadian edition of The Economic Way of Thinking):

Careful inspection of the plot reveals that the upper dots represent the arctic islands, and the large gap to the east appears right where Hudson Bay is. For comparison, consider this map of Canada (courtesy of the CIA):

Update: In the comments, Alan wondered whether I was implying with those dots in the upper left that Canada had staked a claim to Alaska to strengthen its claim to the passages in the Arctic Ocean.

I should have made clear that even though I reproduced an azimuthal projection map originally, I had in mind a mercator projection map (the kind <a href=”
used by Google–who can argue with that authority?), like this:

With this map, it is clear that the higher dots all fall on Canada’s islands in the Arctic. There is even a dot in the lower left to indicate Victoria, on Vancouvre Island.

Update #2: There is more confirmation of my hypothesis that a country’s Phillips Curve is shaped like the country: Look at the Phillips Curve for the Czech Republic.

Update #3: More confirmation from The Netherlands.

Addendum: the Phillips Curve is named for the famous economist who discovered it, Professor Curve.

EclectEcon: At Least the Second-Best Economics Blog in Canada

Stephen Gordon, of Worthwhile Canadian Initiative, laments that there are only two economics blogs still going in Canada: his and EclectEcon. That means this blog is ranked at least second among all economics blogs in Canada. And by some rankings, it is number one.



All the staff associated with this blog will be out celebrating this news this weekend.

EclectEcon: At Least the Second-Best Economics Blog in Canada

Stephen Gordon, of Worthwhile Canadian Initiative, laments that there are only two economics blogs still going in Canada: his and EclectEcon. That means this blog is ranked at least second among all economics blogs in Canada. And by some rankings, it is number one.



All the staff associated with this blog will be out celebrating this news this weekend.

Was Anaximander the First String Theorist?

As I understand it, string theory is the result of attempts by physicists to find a theory of everything. The strings in the theory are very small, have various shapes or forms, and are the basis of all sub-atomic particles and the basis of all energy, too.



That sounds a lot like “apeiron”, a philosophical-physical abstract hypothesized by Anaximander. From Wikipaedia,

For Anaximander, the principle of things, the constituent of all substances, is nothing determined and not an element such as water in Thales’ view. Neither is it something halfway between air and water, or between air and fire, thicker than air and fire, or more subtle than water and earth.[8] Anaximander argues that water cannot embrace all of the opposites found in nature — for example, water can only be wet, never dry — and therefore cannot be the one primary substance; nor could any of the other candidates. He postulated the apeiron as a substance that, although not directly perceptible to us, could explain the opposites he saw around him.

Also from Wikipaedia, on string theory,

String theory is a model of fundamental physics, whose building blocks are one-dimensional extended objects called strings, rather than the zero-dimensional point particles that form the basis for the standard model of particle physics. The phrase is often used as shorthand for Superstring theory, as well as related theories such as M-theory. By replacing the point-like particles with strings, an apparently consistent quantum theory of gravity emerges. Moreover, it may be possible to “unify” the known natural forces (gravitational, electromagnetic, weak nuclear and strong nuclear) by describing them with the same set of equations, as described in the Theory of everything.

It is all well-beyond my comprehension, but they sound pretty similar to me.

Home Video of Amazingly Complex Rube Goldbergism

check this out.

More on Pumpkins

Following up on my earlier posting about jack-o’lanterns, here is a valuable site for this weekend’s pumpkin carving and/or Hallowe’en parties: Extreme Pumpkins

Nobel Peace Prize Committee to Disband

From TCS Daily:

Responding to overwhelming pressure from every civilized person on earth with any semblance of intelligence, the Nobel Peace Prize Committee today announced that it had voted to terminate its charter. Just prior to the unanimous vote, the Committee voted to rescind numerous past prizes – including the 2007 prize to itinerant comedian and performance artist Albert Gore of the United States – and award those prizes and all future prizes to the United States military.

“This about face by the Nobel Peace Committee,” stated former Committee Chairman and former leader of the Norwegian Labor Party, Trygve Andreesen, “came after hundreds of millions of civilized people sent e-mails, letters, telegrams, text messages, voicemails and carrier pigeon messages demanding that we stop giving awards to Islamic martyrdom supporters like Jimmy Carter, frauds like Rigoberto Menchu and corrupt mass-murderers like Yassir Arafat.”

“We got the message,” said Ola Oppigardem, Committee Secretary and former leader of the Norwegian Labor Party. “The Gore prize was what did it. We acknowledge that the warming of the Earth’s surface is an important issue that deserves careful scientific study, but we didn’t realize that Gore was an egocentric Luddite who specializes in creating hysteria and false science. …”

Two representatives accepted the Prizes on behalf of the U.S. military – former Senator Robert Dole (R-KS) and Senator Daniel Inouye (D-HI).

“Well, we never really expected any sincere gratitude from these Europeans,” said Senator Dole, who was wounded in Europe during World War II fighting Nazis. “It’s kinda nice and Elizabeth and I, we’re really, almost sort of honored to be here to accept the award for people who actually do real work for peace.”

Added Senator Inouye who was also wounded defending Europe in World War II, “I always thought the peace prize was a bunch of crap given to whiney, self-aggrandizing, busybodies by a bunch of self-important, narcissistic gullible, retired, left-wing, Norwegian, gasbag politicos. These awards may cause me to consider thinking about possibly reassessing my opinion.”

Just in case you hadn’t guessed, the wire service reporting this story is shown as “OSLO (SATIRENEWSERVICE)”