Escape from the city

“A new age of suburbanisation could be dawning.
 

THOUGH THE pandemic has not fully released its grip on America, signs of an incipient boom are everywhere: in surging demand for workers, imports and, above all, houses. Residential property prices rose at an annual rate of 12% in February--the fastest pace since 2006--buoyed by rising incomes, low interest rates and the belated plunge into housing markets by a crisis-battered generation of millennials. A clear preference for large but affordable suburban homes over pricey city-centre flats seems to be emerging. That covid-weary Americans might be eager for suburban life is hardly surprising. Yet the latest pursuit of leafiness and expansive floor plans contains hints of a potentially transformative shift in how Americans choose where they live.
 

People's housing decisions incorporate much more than mere economic concerns. Yet the geographical distribution of households reflects some rough balancing of the costs and benefits of living in one place rather than another. Other things equal, people flock to areas that provide access to good jobs or desirable amenities, like pleasant weather, or a lively arts scene. Movement towards attractive places is ultimately checked, however, by the associated costs--congestion, say, and the price of housing--which rise until there is no longer much to be gained from relocating.
 

From time to time, however, economic shifts disrupt the prevailing equilibrium and trigger large-scale movement. In the mid-20th century cars and highways enabled people to obtain more for their money by moving into suburbs while still maintaining access to city-centre jobs and amenities. Explosive suburbanisation followed. In 1940 about half of Americans lived in metropolitan rather than rural areas, and most metropolitan residents--about one-third of the total population--resided in city centres rather than suburbs. By 2000, in contrast, 80% of all Americans lived in metropolitan areas, but the vast majority--accounting for half the total population--lived in the suburbs.
 

In the past two decades, shifts in demand have given rise to a new equilibrium. Rising incomes in knowledge-economy industries attracted workers to a few highly productive places (like New York and the Bay Area), and increases in congestion and commuting costs encouraged many to live near work. Housing costs in high-wage cities rocketed, propelled by restrictive zoning policies that prevented housebuilding from keeping up with demand. Highly paid elites were concentrated in pockets of wealth, while many other Americans settled in places offering jobs of middling productivity and pay, but where housing was more affordable.
 

Though it is early days yet, covid-19 may have disrupted this pattern. Before the pandemic, about 5% of full-time-work days in America came from people working at home. That figure rose above 60% last spring; though it has since fallen back, it remains well above pre-pandemic levels. Broad adoption of remote work stands to drastically alter households' locational calculations. Recent research by Jan Brueckner of the University of California, Irvine, and Gary Lin and Matthew Kahn of Johns Hopkins University considers two ways in which a transformation might unfold. People with high-productivity jobs could work remotely from anywhere, potentially severing the link between a local economy's productivity and the demand to live there, and thus enabling a large-scale migration from high-cost cities to low-cost ones. And remote work could allow workers to spend more time at home while still occasionally commuting into the office. In that case, remote work would reduce the cost of a given commute and might thus lead metropolitan areas to become more sprawling.
 

In fact, both appear to be occurring. In 2020 price gradients flattened between metropolitan areas, as house prices in low-cost cities rose faster than those in high-cost cities, and also within them, as prices in low-cost suburban counties rose faster than those in high-cost urban ones. Another recent paper, by Arpit Gupta and Jonas Peeters of New York University and Vrinda Mittal and Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh of Columbia University, arrives at a similar conclusion. In the year to December 2020 and across America's 30 largest metropolitan areas, house prices rose faster the farther one moved from urban hubs. Prices of properties 50km from a city centre grew by 5.7% more than those in centres.
Whether these trends continue depends on the extent to which remote-working habits stick. But even a modest persistent change would have large knock-on effects. One recent estimate, by Jose Maria Barrero of the Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México, Nicholas Bloom of Stanford University and StevenDavis of the University of Chicago, suggests that the share of hours worked remotely is likely to stabilise at about 20%. In that case, dense city centres could face a cycle of straitened circumstances like that which accompanied car-driven suburbanisation, as local spending and tax revenues decline, leading to cutbacks in amenities. Spending within city centres could drop permanently by 5-10%.

A new equilibrium might also yield striking macroeconomic benefits, however. Slow growth in housing supply in high-productivity cities has weighed on the economy by rationing access to high-wage jobs. Had building rules in New York and the Bay Area been no stricter over the last third of the 20th century than those of the typical American city, then the growth rate of national output would have been a third higher, according to one estimate. Remote work stands to relax this constraint on growth, by allowing workers to take high-wage jobs without having to buy costly homes within easy commuting distance.
 

The geographically disruptive potential of information technology has long been apparent. In a book published in 1997 Frances Cairncross, formerly of this newspaper, imagined that it might yield a "death of distance". It may have taken the public-health imperative to stay away from others to help realise it at last.” [1]
 

1.    "Escape from the city; Free exchange." The Economist, 8 May 2021, p. 72(US).

Mokėjimo technologijų reikšmė

"Perėjimas nuo bankininkystės gali padaryti finansines paslaugas pigesnes ir sąžiningesnes. Tačiau tai kelia grėsmę privatumui ir suverenitetui.

 NIEKAM NEPATINKA bankai. Jų technologija dažnai yra primityvi. Jų vartotojai patiria nenuspėjamus mokesčius. Jų funkcijos yra svarbios, tačiau jų aprėptis nėra išsami. Tai gali palikti daug žmonių turtingose ​​šalyse ir visas neturtingų gyventojų grupes visuomenės paraštėse. Daugelis didžiausių bankų uždirba daugiausiai iš prekybos ir mokesčių, nesuteikdami paslaugų paprastiems klientams. Ir blogiausia, kad jų nesėkmės gali sukelti katastrofišką žalą, už kurią jie patiria tik dalį išlaidų. Todėl atrodytų racionalu priimti naują aršią konkurenciją bankams, mažinančią tradicinį bankų vaidmenį. Plečiantis kapitalo rinkoms, vis lengviau suderinti turtą su įsipareigojimais, kurie juos natūraliai finansuoja, sumažinant banko paleidimo ar žlugimo riziką. 

Daugybė mokėjimo technologijų keičia tai, kaip žmonės ir įmonės elgiasi, suteikdami milijonams nepilnai aptarnautų klientų anksčiau neįsivaizduojamų galimybių gauti finansavimą. 

Paskoloms užtikrinti vietoj turto gali būti naudojami duomenys, kad žmonės ir įmonės galėtų pasiskolinti pinigų pagal savo charakterį, o ne pagal užstatą. 

Didįjį finansavimo pažadą galima pasiūlyti dar didesniam skaičiui žmonių. Didelės išlaidos, susietos su skolinimusi, sumažėja. Geriau informuotos įmonės taip pat turėtų sušvelninti nestabilumą, būdingą šiandieninei kreditų teikimo formai.

 Tačiau ši revoliucija atneša naujų problemų. Kadangi mokėjimo platformos gauna naudos iš tinklo efekto (reiškinys, kai produktas ar paslauga įgyja papildomos vertės, kai juo naudojasi daugiau žmonių), mokėjimo platformos bus linkusios susitelkti tik į vieną ar du milžiniškus tarpininkus. Didėjant atskirčiai nuo bankų, esami pinigų politikos mechanizmai gali būti pasenę. 

Rizika prarasti pinigų sistemos kontrolę įžiebė ugnį po, paprastai sustingusiais, centriniais bankininkais. Greito mokėjimo sistemų paspartinimo projektai išaugo visame pasaulyje. Taigi jie stengiasi sukurti centrinio banko skaitmenines valiutas, skaitmeninę popierinių grynųjų pinigų formą, kad būtų galima konkuruoti su privačių milžinų skaitmeniniais mokėjimais. Kinijoje, kur mokėjimo įmonės yra pažangiausios, bandomuosiuose projektuose skaitmeninį juanį jau naudoja daugiau, nei 100 000 žmonių. 

Taigi, naujos pinigų sistemos išplėtimas kelia riziką. Daugelis iškeltų problemų yra tokios pat keblios, kaip senų laikų finansinio stabilumo ir įtraukties problemos. Žmonės, pervesdami savo pinigus į centrinių bankų skaitmenines valiutas, ištraukia juos iš bankų, grasindami sulaužyti sistemą, sukurtą skatinti paskolas be akivaizdaus valstybės kišimosi į kreditų paskirstymą. Skaitmeninis centrinio banko dalyvavimas kasdienėse operacijose padidina ne tik tokio kišimosi riziką, bet ir yra dovana tiems, kurie nori šnipinėti piliečius. Ekonomikos koncentracija į skaitmeninius pinigus, nesvarbu, ar juos valdo privačios firmos, ar centrinis bankas, galėtų suteikti naują kelią kenksmingiems dalyviams destabilizuoti sistemas per kibernetinį karą."[1]

Kadangi tinklo efektas iškelia tik vieną ar dvi mokėjimo technologijų įmones, tai visa mažos Lietuvos fintech sistema yra pasmerkta žlugimui konkurencinėje kovoje.

1. "A brave new world; Money on my mind." The Economist, 8 May 2021, p. 0.12(US).

The importance of payment technologies

 "The transition from banking may make financial services cheaper and fairer. But it will threaten privacy and sovereignty

NOBODY LIKES banks. Their technology is often primitive. Their users are hit with unpredictable fees. Their functions matter, yet their coverage is incomplete. This can relegate swathes of people in rich countries and entire populations of poor ones to the fringes of society. Many of the biggest make most profits from trading and fees, not providing services to ordinary customers. And worst of all, their failures can cause catastrophic damage for which they bear only a fraction of the costs.

It would seem rational, therefore, to cheer the fierce new competition that is reducing banks' traditional role. As capital markets expand, it is becoming easier to match assets with liabilities that naturally fund them, reducing the risk of bank runs or failures. A proliferation of payment technologies is upending how people and firms conduct their lives, giving millions of underserved customers previously unimaginable access to finance. Data can be used instead of assets to secure loans, making it possible for people and businesses to borrow money against their character, not their collateral. The great promise of finance can be offered to many more people. The great costs are diminished. Better-informed firms should also temper the instability inherent in today's form of credit provision.

But this revolution brings with it new problems. Because they benefit from network effects, payment platforms will tend to concentrate into just one or two giant intermediaries. As more activity migrates away from banks, existing monetary-policy mechanisms may become obsolete.The risk of losing control over the monetary system has lit a fire underneath usually staid central bankers. Projects to accelerate fast payment systems have cropped up worldwide. So have efforts to create central-bank digital currencies, a digital form of paper cash to compete with the digital payments of private giants. In China, where payments firms are most advanced, more than 100,000 people are already using a digital yuan in pilot projects.

The roll-out of what amounts to a new monetary system thus comes with risks. Many of the issues it raises are as tricky as the financial stability and inclusion problems of old. As people move their money into CBDCs they will pull it out of banks, threatening the system developed to foster loans without overt state interference in credit allocation. The digital involvement of the central bank in everyday transactions would not only increase the risk of such interference but also be a gift to those wishing to snoop on citizens. And the concentration of the economy in digital money, whether it is run by private firms or by a central bank, could provide a new route for malicious actors to destabilise systems through cyberwarfare." [1]

  As the network effect raises only one or two payment technology companies, the entire fintech system of small Lithuania is doomed to collapse in the competitive struggle. 

1. "A brave new world; Money on my mind." The Economist, 8 May 2021, p. 0.12(US).

Pergalingi kariuomenės perkėlimo būdai

 „Balandžio mėnesį įvykdyta daugiau kaip 100 000 Rusijos karių masės perkėlimas prie Ukrainos sienos buvo nedviprasmiška žinia Vakarams: prezidentas Putinas gali juos išsiųsti bet kurią akimirką, jei jis tai nuspręs. 

Vargu ar poezijos dalykas, kaip kariuomenė pereina į mūšio pozicijas. Homero „Iliada“ prasideda tuo, kad graikai jau 10 metų praleido, apgulę Troją. Vis dėlto karo variklis, tiesiogine to žodžio prasme, yra gebėjimas judinti armijas. Daugelis mokslininkų mano, kad tikrasis Trojos karas galėjo būti didesnio konflikto tarp Viduržemio jūros regiono bronzos amžiaus karalysčių ir jūrų konfederacijos, vadinamos jūros tautomis, dalis. Dėl šių jūrų reiderių tapatybės vis dar diskutuojama, tačiau jų transporto priemonės yra gerai patvirtintos. Jūrų tautos turėjo didžiausią ir geriausią laivyną, tai leido joms klajoti po jūras. Viduržemio jūros prekybos tinklas žlugo dėl jų negailestingų išpuolių. Daugelyje regionų civilizacija atsiliko; net graikai per kelis šimtmečius prarado rašymo meną. 

Vakarai atsigavo ir klestėjo iki penkto amžiaus, kai romėnus užvaldė aukštesnės arklių nešamos vandalų armijos. Jų Vidurio Europos žirgai, išauklėti jėgos ir ištvermės, pavertė karo meną greitesniu ir mobilesniu. Išradus karo balną, mobilumas tapo savaime veiksmingu ginklu. Čingischanas tai suprato geriau nei bet kuris jo priešininkas. Jo suburta kariuomenė per dieną galėjo įveikti iki 100 mylių, padėdama išplėsti Mongolų imperiją nuo rytų Kinijos krantų iki Austrijos sienos. Bet arkliams reikia ganyklų, o 1238–1242 metų Europos klimatas buvo pernelyg drėgnas. Anksčiau derlingos lygumos tapo šlapiomis pelkėmis. Pirmąją šiuolaikinę invaziją sustabdė lietus. 

Blogas oras ir toliau užtikrino veiksmingą apsaugą nuo įsibrovėlių. Napoleonas į Rusiją įžengė 1812 m. su virš 500 000 pajėgų. Ne sezoniškai karšta vasara, po kurios įvyko nepakeliamai šalta žiema, nužudė daugumą jo arklių, imobilizuodamas raitelius ir tiekimo vagonus, kurie būtų neleidę jo kariuomenei badauti. Jis grįžo su mažiau nei 20 000 vyrų. Pasitikėjimas gyvūnais reiškė, kad iki pramoninės revoliucijos armijos nebuvo greitesnės už jų romėnų kolegas. JAV pilietinis karas pirmiausia parodė, kokie naudingi gali būti geležinkeliai. 1863 m. Konfederacijos Chattanooga, Tenn., apgultį nutraukė 23 000 federalinių karių, kurie per septynias valstijas nuvažiavo virš 1200 mylių, paremdami generolo Williamo Rosecranso vadovaujamas Sąjungos pajėgas. 

Prūsai tokį kariuomenės manevravimo karą įvardijo kaip bewegungskrieg, judėjimo karą, panaudodami jį sutriuškindami mažiau judrius prancūzus Prancūzijos ir Prūsijos kare. 

Pirmosiomis Pirmojo pasaulinio karo savaitėmis Prancūzija vis dar stengėsi mobilizuotis; Paryžiaus karinis gubernatorius generolas Josephas S. Gallieni garsiai griebėsi „Renault“ taksi, norėdamas kelti karius į Marno mūšį. 

Vokiečiai pradėjo Antrąjį pasaulinį karą, nors jų gamybos pajėgumai atsiliko nuo sąjungininkų; jie kompensavo atnaujindami „bewegungskrieg“ į vadinamąjį „blitzkrieg“ arba „žaibo smūgį“, kuris sujungė tankų greitį su koncentruota jėga. Jie per šešias savaites pribloškė prancūzų gynybą. XX a. antrojoje pusėje kariuomenės transportas tapo dar išradingesnis, jei ne lemiamas. Dauguma 2,7 milijono JAV karių, išsiųstų į Vietnamo karą, buvo skraidinami komerciniais lėktuvais. (Civilinėms oro stiuardesėms, skraidančioms virš kovos zonų, buvo suteiktas karinis antrojo leitenanto laipsnis.) Nors būsimi konfliktai gali būti kovojami elektroninėje erdvėje, kol kas šiuolaikinis karas reiškia masinį dislokavimą. Norint laimėti vis tiek reikia judėti. "[1]

1. REVIEW --- Historically Speaking: The Winning Ways of Moving The Troops
Foreman, Amanda. Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]08 May 2021: C.5.

The Winning Ways of Moving The Troops

"The massing of more than 100,000 Russian soldiers at Ukraine's border in April was an unambiguous message to the West: President Putin could dispatch them at any moment, if he chose.
How troops move into battle positions is hardly the stuff of poetry. Homer's "The Iliad" begins with the Greeks having already spent 10 years besieging Troy. Yet the engine of war is, quite literally, the ability to move armies. Many scholars believe that the actual Trojan War may have been part of a larger conflict between the Bronze Age kingdoms of the Mediterranean and a maritime confederacy known as the Sea Peoples.
The identity of these seafaring raiders is still debated, but their means of transportation is well-attested. The Sea Peoples had the largest and best fleets, allowing them to roam the seas unchecked. The trade network of the Mediterranean collapsed beneath their relentless attacks. Civilization went backward in many regions; even the Greeks lost the art of writing for several centuries.
The West recovered and flourished until the fifth century, when the Romans were overwhelmed by the superior horse-borne armies of the Vandals. Their Central European horses, bred for strength and stamina, transformed the art of warfare, making it faster and more mobile. The invention of the stirrup, the curb bit, and finally the war saddle made mobility an effective weapon in and of itself.
Genghis Khan understood this better than any of his adversaries. His mounted troops could cover up to 100 miles a day, helping to stretch the Mongol empire from the shores of eastern China to the Austrian border. But horses need pasture, and Europe's climate between 1238 to 1242 was excessively wet. Previously fertile plains became boggy marshes. The first modern invasion was stopped by rain.
Bad weather continued to provide an effective defense against invaders. Napoleon entered Russia in 1812 with a force of over 500,000. An unseasonably hot summer followed by an unbearably cold winter killed off most of his horses, immobilizing the cavalry and the supply wagons that would have prevented his army from starving. He returned with fewer than 20,000 men.
The reliance on pack animals for transport meant that until the Industrial Revolution, armies were no faster than their Roman counterparts. The U.S. Civil War first showed how decisive railroads could be. In 1863 the Confederate siege of Chattanooga, Tenn., was broken by 23,000 Federal troops who traveled over 1,200 miles across seven states to relieve Union forces under General William Rosecrans.
The Prussians referred to this kind of troop-maneuvering warfare as bewegungskrieg, war of movement, using it to crushing effect over the less-mobile French in the Franco-Prussian War. In the early weeks of World War I, France still struggled to mobilize; Gen. Joseph S. Gallieni, the military governor of Paris, famously resorted to commandeering Renault taxicabs to ferry soldiers to the Battle of the Marne.
The Germans started World War II with their production capacity lagging that of the Allies; they compensated by updating bewegungskrieg to what became known as blitzkrieg, or lightning strike, which combined speed with concentrated force. They overwhelmed French defenses in six weeks.
In the latter half of the 20th century, troop transport became even more inventive, if not decisive. Most of the 2.7 million U.S. soldiers sent into the Vietnam War were flown commercial. (Civilian air stewardesses flying over combat zones were given the military rank of Second Lieutenant.)
Although future conflicts may be fought in cyberspace, for now, modern warfare means mass deployment. Winning still requires moving." [1]

1. REVIEW --- Historically Speaking: The Winning Ways of Moving The Troops
Foreman, Amanda. Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]08 May 2021: C.5.

Kur dingo jaunesnių konservatorių konservatyvumas?

 "Ne tai, kad kapitalistinis dinamizmas neišvengiamai ištirpdo konservatyvius įpročius. Tai daugiau todėl, kad turtas, kurį sukaupia šis dinamiškumas, jo suteikiama laisvė ir jo sugalvoti technologiniai trukdžiai, leidžia žmonėms gyventi individualistiškiau - iš pradžių laimingai, su laiku galbūt mažiau. Tai yra būdai, kurie galiausiai pakerta konservatyvumą ir rinkos dinamiškumą. Tuo metu pavojus kyla ne iš pavojingų dantų ir nagų rinkų, o iš kapitalizmo, kuris panašus į Aldouso Huxley „Drąsų naują pasaulį“ - tas turtingas ir technologiškai įgudęs pasaulis tampa sterilus (be vaikų) ir distopiškas."  

Where has the conservatism of the younger conservatives gone?

 "It’s not that capitalist dynamism inevitably dissolves conservative habits. It’s more that the wealth this dynamism piles up, the liberty it enables and the technological distractions it invents, let people live more individualistically — at first happily, with time perhaps less so — in ways that eventually undermine conservatism and dynamism together. At which point the peril isn’t markets red in tooth and claw, but a capitalist endgame that resembles Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World,” with a rich and technologically proficient world turning sterile and dystopian."