The Jevons Paradox and the Rebound Effect

The U.S. imposed its first automobile fuel-economy regulations in 1975, a response to the Arab oil embargo. (If you’re old enough, you remember lining up to buy gasoline and odd-even days to fill up, based on your license number.) Since then, average miles-per-gallon has gone from 13.5 to about 27 now. (33 for cars, 24 for light trucks. Overall consumption has increased, however, the result of more miles driven – more than double since then – increased horsepower and heavier vehicles. Hence what is called the “Rebound Effect.”

In the mid-nineteenth century, William Stanley Jevons published “The Coal Question,” a book casting doubt on England’s long-term prospects as a world power. Britain’s industrial and military dominance was supported by its abundance of coal, a natural resource it was rapidly depleting. Jevons argued that conservation, e.g. energy efficiency, would not delay the inevitable depletion.

It is wholly a confusion of ideas to suppose that the economical use of fuel is equivalent to a diminished consumption. The very contrary is the truth.

His thesis, also known as the “Jevons Paradox,” is that the more something is perceived as economical, the more people will use. Our cars are more fuel efficient, so we drive more.

Since climate-change has officially been determined to be a hoax and unfair to the U.S., we may as well extract all the fossil fuels and burn them. And if it turns out that burning carbon is not good for us? Not to worry, Mother Earth will recover and be just fine after we’re gone.

(For a rebuttal of the Jevons Paradox, click here.)

The Tonya Harding Chronicles

Figure skating fans and Portland weirdness aficionados are familiar with the saga of Tonya Harding who transitioned from famous to infamous at the 1994 Olympics. Ms. Harding was the U.S. Figure Skating champion in 1991 and placed second behind Kristi Yamaguchi in that year’s World Championship. She was the first woman to complete a triple axel jump at a sanctioned international event. She finished fourth at the 1992 Winter Olympics.

At a practice session for the U.S. Figure Skating Championship, prior to the 1994 Olympics, Harding’s Olympic teammate and competitor for media spotlight, Nancy Kerrigan was assaulted after leaving the rink. Her attacker hit her on the leg, above the knee, with a police baton. Kerrigan was forced to withdraw from the event, which Harding went on to win. Ms. Kerrigan recovered in time to win a silver medal at the Olympic competition. Harding placed eighth.

Jeff Gillooly, Harding’s ex-husband and Shawn Eckhardt, her bodyguard, had hired Kerrigan’s assailant, with instructions to break her leg and thus prevent her participation in further competitions. The attacker and his employers all served time for this misdeed. Tonya Harding was also implicated. Gillooly cut a deal with prosecutors in exchange for testimony against his ex-wife. Ms. Harding pleaded guilty to conspiracy to hinder prosecution of the attackers. She received three years probation, 500 hours of community service and a $160,000 fine. The U.S. Figure Skating Association stripped her of her title and imposed a lifetime ban on participation in any future events.

Nancy Kerrigan has stayed in the public eye making guest appearances in TV and movies, a special correspondent at the 2010 Winter Olympics, competing on Dancing With the Stars. She was inducted into the U.S. Figure Skating Hall of Fame in 2004.

Tonya Harding has also stayed in the public eye, promoting an explicit “wedding video” of she and Gillooly, managing professional wrestlers, commentator on the cable TV show World’s Dumbest…, and professional boxer, including winning a bout against Paula Jones. In 1996 she used mouth-to-mouth resuscitation revive an eighty-one-year-old woman who had collapsed while playing video poker in a bar.

The Tonya Harding legend has recently resurfaced with the Hollywood promotion machine’s publicizing a major motion picture of her life. I, Tonya is now being filmed and is due for release in 2018.

Musical Interlude with the Dankworths

Cleo Laine will turn ninety years old this year. She was born to an English mother and Jamaican father. With her multi-octave voice, she and jazz-musician husband John Dankworth became musical royalty, entertaining audiences around the world for decades.

Years ago at a show in Portland, Dankworth introduced an instrumental number, telling the audience it was in an unusual time signature – 7/8 or something. He went on to say we would know the band performed it correctly if they all finished at the same time.

John Dankworth died in 2010 at age eight-two.

Oregon and California and James G. Blaine

James G. Blaine represented the state of Maine in the House of Representatives – where he served as Speaker – and the Senate. He later became Secretary of State and ran for President in 1884, losing narrowly to Grover Cleveland. In that campaign, Blaine visited every state except one, Oregon.

Eighty years later, Oregon author and journalist Stewart Holbrook, with tongue in cheek, founded the James G. Blaine Society. Concerned about environmental issues and population growth, Holbrook took Blaine as namesake of his non-organization. He felt that Blaine, having never set foot in Oregon, should serve as a model to others.

Tom McCall, Oregon’s governor from 1967 to 1975, earned notoriety when extolling the state’s natural beauty, he urged people to come visit, but added, “For heaven’s sake, don’t move here to live.”

Since that time, Oregonians have blamed the influx of Californians for everything from escalating home prices to crowded freeways. (Oregon universities encourage Californians to come. In this age of diminishing financial support for higher education, Oregon universities like out-of-state tuition.)

California has begun doing its part to help. An article in my former hometown newspaper reports that for various reasons, the area is suffering a shortage of workers. In fact, it’s so bad that “Jackson Family Wines just offered a job to an Oregonian because it couldn’t find anyone in California with the skills to program the computers that control high-speed bottling lines.”

Honoring Mothers

Mother’s Day became an official U.S. holiday in 1914, after years of effort by Anna Jarvis. Anna’s mother, Ann Reeves Jarvis,  initiated “Mothers’ Day Work Clubs” in West Virginia to teach women how to care for their children. After the Civil War, she promoted “Mothers’ Friendship Day,” to connect mothers with former Union and Confederate soldiers to promote reconciliation.

Within a decade, Anna Jarvis was fighting against the commercialization of the holiday. She was even arrested for protesting at a Mother’s Day carnation sale.

“Mama was my greatest teacher, a teacher of compassion, love and fearlessness. If love is sweet as a flower, then my mother is that sweet flower of love.”

Stevie Wonder

 

“All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother.”

Abraham Lincoln

 

“The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found.” 

Calvin Trillin

 

“In our ecclesiastical region there are priests who don’t baptize the children of single mothers because they weren’t conceived in the sanctity of marriage. These are today’s hypocrites. Those who clericalize the church. Those who separate the people of God from salvation.”

Pope Francis

 

“I don’t mind if two men fall in love, fine. Two women, fine. But I flinch when I think of two Jewish women getting together and having a child because the idea of having two Jewish mothers makes my head explode. I have one; I couldn’t handle two.”

Gary Shandling

 

“My mother had a great deal of trouble with me, but I think she enjoyed it.”

Mark Twain

 

“June Cleaver didn’t keep her house in perfect order; the prop man did it.”

Barbara Billingsley

 

Overheard at a family gathering

Jesus: “Coming, mother.” [What does she want now.]
Mary: “They’re out of wine.”
Jesus: “Didn’t they know how many people were coming to this wedding?” [And you expect me to do something about that?]
Mary: “Don’t be a smart guy. They need your help.”
Jesus: “Ma, I’m not ready to start doing that kind of stuff.”
Mary: “I know son, but can’t you do this one thing for your mother?”
Jesus: “But… mom!”
Mary: “Just this one time?”
Jesus: “Well, okay. For you, mom.”