tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/efficiency-2926/articlesEfficiency – The Conversation2021-06-02T12:26:03Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1613972021-06-02T12:26:03Z2021-06-02T12:26:03ZSick of dangerous city traffic? Remove left turns<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403824/original/file-20210601-15-ogp78e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=779%2C136%2C3734%2C2578&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Left turns are dangerous and cause a lot of unnecessary traffic. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/red-traffic-light-over-street-intersection-royalty-free-image/1149332178?adppopup=true">Chris Jongkind/Moment via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>To reduce travel times, fuel consumption and carbon emissions, in 2004, UPS changed delivery routes to <a href="https://priceonomics.com/why-ups-trucks-dont-turn-left/">minimize the left-hand turns</a> drivers made. Although this seems like a rather modest change, the results are anything but: UPS claims that per year, eliminating left turns – specifically the time drivers sit waiting to cut across traffic – saves <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-ups-drivers-dont-turn-left-and-you-probably-shouldnt-either-71432">10 million gallons of fuel, 20,000 tons of carbon emissions</a> and allows them to deliver 350,000 additional packages.</p>
<p>If it works so well for UPS, should cities seek to eliminate left-hand turns at intersections too? My research suggests the answer is a resounding yes. </p>
<p>As a <a href="https://sites.psu.edu/gayah/">transportation engineering professor</a> at Penn State, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=gIKMKzgAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">I have studied</a> traffic flow on urban streets and transportation safety for nearly a decade. Part of my work focuses on how city streets should be organized and managed. It turns out, restricting left turns at intersections with traffic signals <a href="https://doi.org/10.3141/2301-09">lets traffic move more efficiently</a> and <a href="https://nacto.org/docs/usdg/development_left_turn_operations_guidelines_yu.pdf">is safer for the public</a>. In a recent paper, my research team and I developed a way to determine <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/03611981211011647">which intersections should restrict left turns to improve traffic</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403825/original/file-20210601-13-rje2g7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two cars in an intersection after colliding." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403825/original/file-20210601-13-rje2g7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403825/original/file-20210601-13-rje2g7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403825/original/file-20210601-13-rje2g7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403825/original/file-20210601-13-rje2g7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403825/original/file-20210601-13-rje2g7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403825/original/file-20210601-13-rje2g7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403825/original/file-20210601-13-rje2g7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Left turns are responsible for 61% of all car accidents at intersections.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/car-accident-royalty-free-image/479044140?adppopup=true">studiodr/iStock via Getty Images Plus</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Why are left-hand turns so bad?</h2>
<p>Intersections are dangerous because they are where cars, often moving very fast and in different directions, must cross paths. <a href="https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/811366#:%7E:text=Based%20on%20the%20Fatality%20Analysis,20081%20were%20intersection%2Drelated%20crashes.">Approximately 40% of all crashes occur at intersections</a>, including 50% of crashes involving serious injuries and 20% of those involving fatalities. Traffic signals make things safer by giving vehicles instructions on when they can move. If left turns did not exist, the instructions could be very simple: For example, a north-south direction could move while the east-west direction was stopped and vice versa. When drivers make left turns, they must cross oncoming traffic, which makes intersections much more complicated.</p>
<p>One way to accommodate left turns is to have vehicles wait until a gap appears in oncoming traffic. However, this can be dangerous as it relies entirely on the driver to make the left turn safely. And everyone knows how frustrating it is to be stuck behind a car waiting to make a left turn on a busy road.</p>
<p>Another way to allow left-hand turns is to stop oncoming traffic and give cars turning left their own green arrow. This is much safer, but it shuts down the entire intersection to let left-turning vehicles go, which slows traffic considerably.</p>
<p>In either case, left turns are dangerous. Approximately 61% of all crashes that occur at intersections <a href="https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/811366#:%7E:text=Based%20on%20the%20Fatality%20Analysis,20081%20were%20intersection%2Drelated%20crashes">involve a left-hand turn</a>. </p>
<h2>How would eliminating left turns improve traffic?</h2>
<p>Traffic researchers have proposed a variety of <a href="https://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/intersection/rltci/">innovative signal strategies</a> and <a href="https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/research/safety/09060/09060.pdf">complex intersection configurations</a> to make left turns safer and more efficient. But a simpler solution might be the best: Restrict left-hand turns at intersections.</p>
<p>Some cities have already started limiting left turns to improve safety and traffic flow. <a href="https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/city-to-remove-left-turn-on-van-ness-leaving-only-two-lefts-on-corridor/">San Francisco</a>; <a href="https://archive.sltrib.com/article.php?id=52896856&itype=CMSID">Salt Lake City</a>; <a href="https://www.al.com/spotnews/2013/09/michigan_left_u-turn_along_us.html">Birmingham</a>, Alabama; <a href="https://lifeinbrunswickcounty.com/the-michigan-left-superstreet-heading-eastbound-a-midwestern-traffic-pattern-takes-a-detour-to-north-brunswick-county/">Wilmington</a>, Delaware; <a href="https://tucson.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/little-love-for-michigan-left/article_d0dc7114-c46d-5f52-9d65-90723c50de19.html">Tuscon</a>, Arizona; <a href="https://www.michiganradio.org/post/revisiting-origin-michigan-left">numerous locations in Michigan</a>; and dozens of other cities in the U.S. and around the world all limit left turns in some way. It’s typically done at isolated locations to solve specific traffic and safety problems.</p>
<p>Of course, there is a downside. Eliminating left turns would require some vehicles to travel longer distances. For example, if you wanted to turn left off a busy street to get to your house, you might instead have to take three consecutive right turns. However, research I <a href="https://doi.org/10.3141/2301-09">published in 2012 using mathematical models</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/21680566.2017.1337528">in 2017 using traffic simulations</a> showed that eliminating left turns on grid-like street networks would, on average, require people to drive only one additional block. This would be more than offset by the smoother traffic flow.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403826/original/file-20210601-663-1gnx1tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An aerial view of an intersection with cars making a left turn." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403826/original/file-20210601-663-1gnx1tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403826/original/file-20210601-663-1gnx1tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403826/original/file-20210601-663-1gnx1tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403826/original/file-20210601-663-1gnx1tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403826/original/file-20210601-663-1gnx1tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403826/original/file-20210601-663-1gnx1tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/403826/original/file-20210601-663-1gnx1tg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cities could limit left turns in busy city centers while allowing them in less busy areas.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/aerial-view-of-city-traffic-royalty-free-image/119544689?adppopup=true">Jeppe Wikstrom via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Which left turns need to go?</h2>
<p>Getting rid of left turns would be difficult to implement across an entire city – and at some intersections, left turns don’t cause problems. But if a city did want to remove left turns from some intersections, how should it choose which ones? To answer this question, my research team and I recently developed algorithms that use traffic simulations of a city to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/03611981211011647">identify where restricting left turns will improve safety and traffic flow the most</a>. </p>
<p>[<em>Get the best of The Conversation, every weekend.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybest">Sign up for our weekly newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>The exact answer for each city depends on how streets are laid out, where vehicles are coming from and going to and how much traffic is on the street during the busiest times. But, according to our models, there is a general theme: Left-turn restrictions are more effective at busier intersections in the centers of towns or cities than at less busy intersections farther from the town center.</p>
<p>This is because the busier the intersection, the more people will benefit from smoother traffic flow. These central intersections also tend to have alternative routes available that minimize any additional distance traveled due to the restrictions. Lastly, fewer cars tend to turn left at these central intersections to begin with so the negative impact of removing left turns is relatively small.</p>
<p>So the next time you are sitting stuck in traffic behind someone waiting to make a left turn, know that your frustration is justified. There is a better way. In this case, the answer is simple – get rid of the left turn.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/161397/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vikash V. Gayah receives funding from the National Science Foundation and National Cooperative Highway Research Program. </span></em></p>Left turns are dangerous and slow down traffic. One solution? Get rid of them. New research shows that limiting left turns at busy intersections would improve safety and reduce frustrating backups.Vikash V. Gayah, Associate Professor of Civil Engineering, Penn StateLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1526702021-05-18T12:24:54Z2021-05-18T12:24:54ZEngineers and economists prize efficiency, but nature favors resilience – lessons from Texas, COVID-19 and the 737 Max<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/400844/original/file-20210514-19-jy5kl9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C12%2C8409%2C5576&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The power grid in Texas provides a stark lesson in the balance between efficiency and resilience.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/TexasBlackoutsInmates/b71dd8075a6a4c80bbad12d50dd93d8d/photo?boardId=6576eeb175bb4623a6e17828de4a73e8&st=boards&mediaType=audio,photo,video,graphic&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=9&currentItemNo=0">AP Photo/David J. Phillip</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><strong>Takeaways:</strong></p>
<ul>
<li><p><strong>The damage from Winter Storm Uri, the economic devastation from the COVID-19 pandemic and the fatal Boeing 737 Max accidents show the price society pays for a relentless pursuit of efficiency.</strong></p></li>
<li><p><strong>Modern society has prioritized free-market economics and efficient computer systems to the detriment of other priorities.</strong></p></li>
<li><p><strong>Studies of algorithms show that efficiency can come at a high cost.</strong></p></li>
<li><p><strong>Sexual reproduction and car insurance highlight the benefits of resilience.</strong></p></li>
</ul>
<hr>
<p>There is a trade-off between efficiency and resilience. Efficiency requires optimal adaptation to an existing environment, while resilience is an <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/efficiency-isnt-the-only-economic-virtue-11583873155">ability to adapt to large or sudden changes in the environment</a>. Society’s <a href="https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/economic-thought-efficiency-versus-sustainability-by-robert-skidelsky-2020-12?barrier=accesspay">emphasis on short-term gains</a> has long tipped the balance in favor of efficiency.</p>
<p>However, the relentless pursuit of efficiency removes hurdles to the speed and reach of transactions, hurdles that also serve as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/30/opinion/sunday/coronavirus-globalization.html">buffers against shocks</a>. Buffers provide resilience in the face of ecological, geopolitical and financial crises.</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=DQaARsgAAAAJ&hl=en">computer scientist</a>, I look at how algorithms provide a way to test assumptions about resilience, even as the field of computing itself shares the bias toward efficiency. Three recent crises – the 2021 winter storm in Texas, the COVID-19 pandemic and the Boeing 737 Max software failure – highlight the cost of valuing efficiency over resilience and provide lessons for bringing society into balance. </p>
<h2>Economists and engineers ❤️ efficiency</h2>
<p>Economics has long been <a href="https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/economic-thought-efficiency-versus-sustainability-by-robert-skidelsky-2020-12">obsessed with efficiency</a>. <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/economic_efficiency.asp">Economic efficiency</a> means that goods and production are distributed or allocated to their most valuable uses and waste is eliminated or minimized. </p>
<p>Free-market advocates argue that through individual <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/terms/i/invisiblehand.asp">self-interest and freedom of production and consumption</a>, economic efficiency is achieved and the best interests of society, as a whole, are fulfilled. But this conflates efficiency with the best outcome.</p>
<p>The intense focus on efficiency at the expense of resilience plagues not only business and economics but also technology. Society has educated generations of computer scientists that analyzing algorithms, the step-by-step instructions at the heart of computer software, boils down to measuring their computational efficiency. </p>
<p><a href="https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/%7Eknuth/taocp.html">“The Art of Computer Programming,”</a> one of the founding texts of computer science, is dedicated to the analysis of algorithms, which is the process of figuring out the amount of time, storage or other resources needed to execute them. In other words, efficiency is the sole concern in the design of algorithms, according to this guide.</p>
<p>But what about resilience? Designing resilient algorithms requires computer scientists to consider in advance what can go wrong and build effective countermeasures into their algorithms. Without designing for resilience, you get efficient but brittle algorithms.</p>
<h2>A storm, a plague and some bad software</h2>
<p>Brittle systems are more likely than resilient systems to break down when crises strike. Cold temperatures and blackouts during <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/texas-winter-storm-uri/">Winter Storm Uri</a> killed <a href="https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/texas-cold-storm-200-died-analysis-winter-freeze-16070470.php">nearly 200 people</a> in February 2021 in Texas. The storm damaged the power grid and water systems, which lacked the weatherproofing features common to utility infrastructure in much of the rest of the country. </p>
<p>The harsh economic consequences of failing to prepare for a pandemic, despite many <a href="https://www.aging.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/hr157ml.pdf">early warnings</a>, provoke questions about whether the obsessive pursuit of efficiency, which has dominated standard business orthodoxy for decades, has <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/efficiency-isnt-the-only-economic-virtue-11583873155">made the global economic system more vulnerable</a> to disruptive changes. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/400846/original/file-20210514-23-5shuna.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A twin-engine jetliner with its landing gear partway down and the name Boeing on the side descends through the air" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/400846/original/file-20210514-23-5shuna.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/400846/original/file-20210514-23-5shuna.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400846/original/file-20210514-23-5shuna.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400846/original/file-20210514-23-5shuna.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400846/original/file-20210514-23-5shuna.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400846/original/file-20210514-23-5shuna.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400846/original/file-20210514-23-5shuna.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Boeing 737 Max fiasco resulted from engineering and business decisions that put efficiency ahead of resilience.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/FAABoeing/9ca52000db8d439e8daf2ec17450cb6f/photo?boardId=6576eeb175bb4623a6e17828de4a73e8&st=boards&mediaType=audio,photo,video,graphic&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=5&currentItemNo=0">AP Photo/Elaine Thompson</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A stark example of a system designed for efficiency and not resilience is the flight-control algorithm for the Boeing 737 Max. Boeing retrofitted the 737, a passenger aircraft first produced more than half a century ago, with more efficient engines. This retrofitting caused some <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/petercohan/2019/04/02/mit-expert-highlights-divergent-condition-caused-by-737-max-engine-placement/?sh=a0aa1140aabe">flight instability</a>, which the flight-control algorithm was designed to overcome. </p>
<p>But the algorithm <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/04/30/politics/boeing-sensor-737-max-faa/index.html">relied on data from a single sensor</a>, and when the sensor failed, the algorithm incorrectly determined that the plane was stalling. In response, the algorithm caused the plane to dive as an emergency measure to recover from a stall that wasn’t happening.</p>
<p>The result was two horrific crashes and hundreds of the aircraft being <a href="https://www.flightradar24.com/blog/the-boeing-737-max-grounding/">grounded for nearly two years</a>. In retrospect, the engineers overly optimized for fuel economy and time to market <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/24/sunday-review/boeing-737-max.html">at the expense of safety</a>.</p>
<h2>The price of anarchy</h2>
<p>If brittle systems are prone to disasters, why is society filled with them? One explanation is that, short of disasters, systems that emphasize efficiency can achieve a kind of stability. A fundamental theorem in economics states that under certain assumptions a market will tend toward a competitive balance point, known as the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/Pareto-optimality">Pareto-optimal equilibrium</a>, in which economic efficiency is achieved. </p>
<p>But how well does such an equilibrium serve the best interests of society? A team of computer scientists studied <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cosrev.2009.04.003">how beneficial or detrimental equilibria can be</a> from a computational perspective. The researchers studied systems in which uncooperative agents share a common resource, the mathematical equivalent of roadways or fisheries. </p>
<p>They came up with a ratio between the worst possible equilibrium – traffic congestion or overfishing – and the social optimum, a ratio dubbed the “<a href="http://www.ams.org/publicoutreach/feature-column/fcarc-anarchy">Price of Anarchy</a>” because it measures how far from optimal such uncooperative systems can be. They showed that this ratio can be very high. In other words, economic efficiency does not guarantee that the best interests of society are fulfilled. </p>
<p>Another team of researchers asked <a href="https://doi.org/10.1137/070699652">how long it takes until economic agents converge to an equilibrium</a>. By studying the <a href="http://www.esi2.us.es/%7Embilbao/complexi.htm">computational complexity</a> of computing such equilibria, the researchers showed that there are systems that take an exceedingly long time to converge to an equilibrium. </p>
<p>The implication is that economic systems are very unlikely ever to be in an equilibrium, because the underlying variables – such as prices, supply and demand – are very likely to change while the systems are making their slow way toward convergence. In other words, <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/economic-equilibrium.asp">economic equilibrium</a>, a central concept in economic theory, is a mythical rather than a real phenomenon. This is not an argument against free markets, but it does require a pragmatic view of them.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="an older man holding a large cloth bundle under his arm walks along the sidewalk in front of the metal grate of a closed pawn shop" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/400845/original/file-20210514-17-ei6956.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/400845/original/file-20210514-17-ei6956.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400845/original/file-20210514-17-ei6956.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400845/original/file-20210514-17-ei6956.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400845/original/file-20210514-17-ei6956.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400845/original/file-20210514-17-ei6956.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/400845/original/file-20210514-17-ei6956.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Free markets can be efficient and at the same time bad for society as a whole.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/EconomyJobsReport/79fc99505312438584edfad8b2e42448/photo?boardId=6576eeb175bb4623a6e17828de4a73e8&st=boards&mediaType=audio,photo,video,graphic&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=8&currentItemNo=1">AP Photo/Lynne Sladky</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>When sex is best</h2>
<p>It is interesting to consider how nature deals with the trade-off between efficiency and resilience. This issue was addressed in a computer science paper titled “<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2934662">Sex as an Algorithm</a>.” Computer scientists know that search techniques <a href="https://mathworld.wolfram.com/SimulatedAnnealing.html">allowing individual steps that are less than optimal but could lead to an overall better solution</a> are, in general, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1018538202952">computationally superior</a> to search techniques that mimic <a href="https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evo_25">natural selection</a> by creating “offspring” of previous solutions and adding random mutations.</p>
<p>[<em><a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/science-editors-picks-71/?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=science-corona-important">The Conversation’s most important coronavirus headlines, weekly in a science newsletter</a></em>]</p>
<p>Why, then, has nature chosen sexual reproduction as the almost exclusive reproduction mechanism in animals? The answer is that sex as an algorithm <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2934662">offers advantages</a> other than good performance. </p>
<p>In particular, natural selection favors genes that work well with a greater diversity of other genes, and this makes the species more adaptable to disruptive environmental changes – that is to say, more resilient. Thus, in the interest of long-term survival, nature prioritized resilience over efficiency.</p>
<h2>Car insurance and climate change</h2>
<p>The bottom line is that resilience is a fundamental but underappreciated societal need. But both computing and economics have underemphasized resilience. In general, markets and people are quite bad at <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Black-Swan-Improbable-Robustness-Fragility/dp/081297381X">preparing for very low-probability or very long-term events</a>. </p>
<p>For example, people have to be forced to buy car insurance, because buying insurance is not efficient. After all, in the aggregate, the insurance business is profitable for the insurers, not for the insured. The purpose of insurance is increased resilience. This example shows that ensuring resilience requires societal action and cannot be left to markets. </p>
<p>The economic impact of the pandemic shows the cost of society’s failure to act. And COVID-19 may be just the <a href="https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3114641/covid-19-only-dress-rehearsal-transformations-coming-climate-change">warmup act</a> for the much bigger impending climate crisis, so focusing on resilience is becoming more and more important. </p>
<p>There seems to be a broad recognition that the incalculable suffering and trauma of COVID-19 <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/10/06/fareed-zakaria-lessons-post-pandemic-world/">offers societies</a> ways to <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/who-will-we-be-when-the-pandemic-is-over/">change for the better</a>. Similar lessons can be drawn from Winter Storm Uri and the Boeing 737 Max. </p>
<p>Focusing on resilience is a way for societies to change for the better. In the meantime, the steady flow of news events – like a pipeline company that <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/05/15/energy-cost-cutting-price/">appears to have underinvested in security</a> – continues to underscore the cost of prizing efficiency over resilience.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/152670/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Moshe Y. Vardi is affiliated with the Baker Institute for Public Policy.</span></em></p>Disasters highlight the cost of society’s love of efficiency. Nature, in contrast, favors resilience. Being more like nature offers benefits for society, especially in the face of the climate crisis.Moshe Y. Vardi, Professor of Computer Science, Rice UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1334142020-04-26T12:01:38Z2020-04-26T12:01:38ZNetflix has capitalized on social isolation, but will its success continue in a post-coronavirus world?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/330262/original/file-20200424-126775-r225ev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C71%2C6000%2C3916&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Netflix faces many new challengers in the subscription-based video streaming market.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The coronavirus pandemic has been good business for Netflix: the video streaming service has added <a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/netflix-adds-more-than-15-million-new-subscribers-stock-rockets-higher-2020-04-21">more than 15 million new subscribers so far this year</a>. From an investing perspective, Netflix always surprises. Either the company’s <a href="https://www.investors.com/news/technology/click/netflix-stock-first-quarter-earnings-report/">quarterly results turn out to disappoint or amaze</a> — rarely do they stay within expectations.</p>
<p><a href="https://mashable.com/article/netflix-q1-2020-subscribers-coronavirus/">Netflix stocks have soared</a> since the beginning of the pandemic as people practising self-isolation have turned to their TVs for comfort, <a href="https://www.investors.com/news/technology/click/netflix-stock-first-quarter-earnings-report/">but fell when the latest results were announced</a> because the growth didn’t fully meet expectations. Will the company’s economic performance continue in the post-pandemic age?</p>
<p>Netflix <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/business-44904368">pioneered the subscription-based video streaming business model</a>. For a fixed monthly fee, subscribers gets a virtual smorgasbord of content — Hollywood, Bollywood, <a href="https://www.un.org/africarenewal/magazine/may-2013/nigeria%E2%80%99s-film-industry-potential-gold-mine">Nollywood</a> and dozens of Netflix’s own productions. </p>
<p>Subscribers can search particular movies or just browse through individually tailored recommendations based on their prior viewing habits. Having such a diverse choice of shows may be good for viewers, but it’s not economically efficient from a business perspective.</p>
<h2>A less efficient service</h2>
<p>The subscription model requires Netflix to buy and produce a wide range of movies and TV series, many of which may be of no interest to a majority of viewers. The larger the range of movies, the less efficient the service.</p>
<p>In contrast, pay-by-view models provided by companies like <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/ca/movie/the-lion-king-2019/id1471367629">Apple through its iTunes store</a> require customers to make a clear decision about whether they want to see the movie before renting or purchasing it. More popular movies may be more expensive, less popular movies could be free or viewed for a small fee. This model is efficient for viewers: you only pay for what you consume and your choices are likely to be better informed.</p>
<p>Both business models have pros and cons. Many viewers enjoy consuming a variety of movies from all over the world, often on an ad-hoc basis. This kind of explorative viewing is encouraged by subscription-based models and less likely when you pay by view.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/330412/original/file-20200424-163062-1azviif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/330412/original/file-20200424-163062-1azviif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/330412/original/file-20200424-163062-1azviif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/330412/original/file-20200424-163062-1azviif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/330412/original/file-20200424-163062-1azviif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/330412/original/file-20200424-163062-1azviif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/330412/original/file-20200424-163062-1azviif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Netflix business model is based on movies and series that appeal to wide audiences, as well as niche categories.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo Illustration/The Conversation</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>However, when rival models co-exist in a competitive industry, <a href="https://repository.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1041&context=mgmt_papers">the more efficient business models tend to win</a>. The market fails first on the production side. When production companies try to acquire financing for new ventures, financiers are more attracted to movies or TV shows that are similar to what’s currently popular. As a result, <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/martin-scorsese-avenges-the-auteur">current genres will be strengthened while diversity loses. </a></p>
<h2>Must appeal to niche audiences</h2>
<p>This is less of an issue for subscription-based services that need to satisfy viewers with diverse tastes and preferences. This is the world of Netflix. It’s a complicated world because Netflix needs to have shows that appeal to wide audiences, but it must also offer a range of niche programs. </p>
<p>Netflix has about 167 million viewers, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/21/business/media/netflix-q1-2020-earnings-nflx.html">and a large portion of the new subscribers this year have come from viewers outside of North America</a>. <a href="https://qz.com/1788491/netflix-earnings-slow-us-growth-and-rapid-international-expansion/">Building a global audience is a crucial factor</a> for Netflix to remain successful. Different regions have different preferences, so internationalization is an advantage for Netflix because of its diverse choice of content. </p>
<p>This diversity aspect changes the game between subscription-based models and pay-by-view models. What may be a niche movie in one region of the world may be mainstream in another.</p>
<p>Pay-by-view models are unlikely to build such a diverse portfolio, so production companies may still be encouraged to distribute their work via Netflix. For example, the TV series <em>Designated Survivor</em> was cancelled after two seasons on ABC. <a href="https://tvline.com/2019/07/24/designated-survivor-cancelled-season-4-netflix/">Netflix picked it up for a third season</a> and then offered viewers <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/1147496/Designated-Survivor-60-Days-How-is-Korean-series-Netflix-connected-US-Designated-Survivor">a Korean version of the show</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/330414/original/file-20200424-163088-k82h0g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/330414/original/file-20200424-163088-k82h0g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/330414/original/file-20200424-163088-k82h0g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/330414/original/file-20200424-163088-k82h0g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/330414/original/file-20200424-163088-k82h0g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/330414/original/file-20200424-163088-k82h0g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/330414/original/file-20200424-163088-k82h0g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Netflix faces many challengers in the subscription-based video streaming market, including a new rival, HBO Max, that will be launched in the U.S. in May.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It’s difficult to say whether Netflix will end up being the standard of TV watching for generations to come. This will mainly depend on how good they are in fighting the competition in different markets with better productions.</p>
<p><a href="https://mashable.com/article/hbo-max-hdr-4k-devices-price/">HBO Max</a>, a new subscription-based streaming service that will offer access to the many great HBO shows from the past as well as new content, is launching in the United States in May. It joins a crowded market of Netflix competitors like Amazon Prime, Disney+ and Apple TV+. To keep ahead of the competition, Netflix has <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/18/investing/netflix-cash-burn-stock/index.html">burned through billions of dollars and has seen its long-term debt quadruple since 2015</a>. </p>
<p>While we don’t know whether Netflix will win the game, the TV world is likely to remain more diverse and affordable for viewers.</p>
<p><em>This is a corrected version of a story originally published April 26, 2020. The earlier story incorrectly stated that most of Netflix’s viewers were based in North America.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/133414/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Felix Arndt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Netflix has added millions more subscribers as people practice social isolation to control the coronavirus. But service’s diverse menu of content is not an efficient business model.Felix Arndt, John F. Wood Chair in Entrepreneurship, University of GuelphLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1122872019-03-13T10:40:53Z2019-03-13T10:40:53ZEscalator etiquette: Should I stand or walk for an efficient ride?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262761/original/file-20190307-82695-1kxrp7h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=21%2C1120%2C2365%2C1485&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The science of getting quickly and safely to the bottom.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/HrBNsh-wzN8">Ryan Tang/Unsplash</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Love them or hate them, traffic laws exist to keep people safe and to help vehicles flow smoothly. And while they aren’t legally enforceable, pedestrian traffic also tends to follow its own set of unwritten rules.</p>
<p>Most pedestrians use walking etiquette as a way to minimize discomfort – “Oops! Sorry to bump you!” – and to improve efficiency – “I want to get there faster!”</p>
<p>Without even thinking about it, you probably abide by the common pedestrian traffic rule that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1068/b2697">faster walkers should move to the inside</a> of a path while slower walkers gravitate to the outside. In the United States, this aligns with street traffic rules, where vehicles pass on the left, while slower vehicles stay in the right lane of the road.</p>
<p>This approach to passing leads to the formation of pedestrian lanes of traffic. While they’re not painted on sidewalks like they are on roadways, these functional lanes can help pedestrians move more comfortably and quickly. <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=WKpzzVUAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">Human systems engineers like me</a> know that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cie.2010.07.030">pedestrian lanes emerge naturally</a> in crowded environments.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262759/original/file-20190307-82665-182a5tr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262759/original/file-20190307-82665-182a5tr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262759/original/file-20190307-82665-182a5tr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=897&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262759/original/file-20190307-82665-182a5tr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=897&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262759/original/file-20190307-82665-182a5tr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=897&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262759/original/file-20190307-82665-182a5tr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1127&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262759/original/file-20190307-82665-182a5tr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1127&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262759/original/file-20190307-82665-182a5tr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1127&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Is this the best advice?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/barneymoss/22780643773">Barney Moss</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Within the built environment, designers have used different techniques to encourage particular pedestrian traffic patterns. One example is signs that encourage pedestrians to “stand to the right” on escalators. Riders will use the right half of the step if they are standing and the left half if they’re walking (or running!) to reach the end of the escalator.</p>
<p>But do two lanes of pedestrian traffic on an escalator actually help you reach your destination more quickly? Should there be a walking lane and a standing lane, or should both lanes be used for standing only? One study reported that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02447-9_32">74.9 percent of pedestrians choose to stand</a> on the escalator instead of walking. Should an entire lane of the escalator be left open for a small, impatient proportion of the crowd?</p>
<p>When designers plan spaces such as roads, buildings and corridors, they consider the space needed for each person in the environment. The space needed changes depending on how the space will be used. For a pedestrian, the “buffer zone” describes how much <a href="https://trid.trb.org/view/114653">space a person needs to feel comfortable</a>, and varies by activity. Someone standing needs, on average, a little over three square feet (0.3m²) of space, whereas a <a href="https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/research/safety/pedbike/98107/section2.cfm">walking pedestrian needs more than eight square feet</a> (0.75m²). That means a constrained space such as an escalator can comfortably hold more than twice the number of standing pedestrians as walking pedestrians.</p>
<p>In London, planners reaped <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/jan/16/the-tube-at-a-standstill-why-tfl-stopped-people-walking-up-the-escalators">a 27 percent increase in the hourly capacity</a> by switching to a “standing only” policy on a typically congested escalator at a subway station. No walking was allowed on the crammed escalator, which allowed more people to move through the station in the same amount of time as before. A highly efficient escalator is one that has the most output – that is, carries the most people to the destination.</p>
<p>But the change was contentious. Social convention in transport has often favored the individual traveler. For example, allowing people to walk up the left does allow some individuals to move faster, even though it reduces the capacity of the escalator and slows down the overall travel time for others. While using one of the escalator lanes for walking can help the walking pedestrian exit more quickly, walkers’ varied speeds relative to the rest of the traffic hinders overall efficiency. To improve the overall system, the system-level efficiency is what should be considered.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262762/original/file-20190307-82677-15ek1mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262762/original/file-20190307-82677-15ek1mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262762/original/file-20190307-82677-15ek1mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262762/original/file-20190307-82677-15ek1mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262762/original/file-20190307-82677-15ek1mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262762/original/file-20190307-82677-15ek1mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262762/original/file-20190307-82677-15ek1mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262762/original/file-20190307-82677-15ek1mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">City walkers become adept at going with the flow.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/kevdia/16854049593">Kevin Case/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<p>Engineers consider a lot of pedestrians in one area a high-density crowd. In these situations, pedestrians tend to walk much slower than when in a low-density or open space. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cie.2010.07.030">This slower pace is caused</a> by both a lack of space, as well as the need for each pedestrian to make more decisions – should I speed up? Slow down? Pass this person? Just wait? The overwhelming number of small decisions can lead to pedestrians behaving like those around them. This literally go-with-the-flow mentality makes walking less mentally fatiguing.</p>
<p>So when people approach an escalator, they’ll often just do what the person immediately ahead of them is doing. If the person in front of them walks, they walk. If the person in front of them stands, they stand. All it takes is someone to start the trend.</p>
<p>Stand on both sides of the escalator. The others will follow. Counterintuitive as it may seem, this one change will help everyone get to the destination faster, especially when things are crowded.</p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lesley Strawderman receives funding from a variety of organizations, including the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, and the US Department of Transportation. </span></em></p>In many cities, convention holds that there’s a lane for walking and a lane for standing on the escalator. But human systems engineers suggest this isn’t the most efficient option for the system.Lesley Strawderman, Professor of Industrial & Systems Engineering, Mississippi State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1089532018-12-18T22:00:13Z2018-12-18T22:00:13ZThe Ontario government’s plan to loosen child-care rules is dangerous<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/251324/original/file-20181218-27758-1n49gz6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Ontario government tabled legislation Dec.6 which would increase the number of young children who can be cared for at once by home child care providers. The proposed legislation is as part of larger reform measures introduced under the Restoring Ontario's Competitiveness Act that the province says will cut red tape for businesses. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock </span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Ontario government’s <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-childcare-business-bill-1.4934815">proposed changes to home child-care legislation</a> would loosen the number and ages of children that providers can care for at any one time. This is dangerous and troubling.</p>
<p>These changes would impact the youngest and most vulnerable members of our society. The new proposed rules were recently introduced when Todd Smith, the province’s minister of economic development, job creation and trade, tabled <a href="https://www.ola.org/en/legislative-business/bills/parliament-42/session-1/bill-66">Bill 66</a>, Restoring Ontario’s Competitiveness Act. </p>
<p>The <em>Toronto Star</em> reported that in a note to care operators, Education Minister Lisa Thompson described the proposed changes as being part of a mandate to “<a href="https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/2018/12/06/ontario-government-loosens-child-care-rules-raising-safety-concerns.html">make life easier for all families</a>” across Ontario. </p>
<p>The view that child-care regulations are unnecessary restrictions, however, is wrongheaded. The primary purpose of regulations is to protect children. There is no way that care provided under the proposed circumstances will provide children with the safe, responsive and enriching care they deserve.</p>
<p>Instead of the proposed reforms, we suggest a different model: Replace the existing system with one where where every home that regularly cares for unrelated children for a fee must be licensed. </p>
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<h2>Will children really be safe?</h2>
<p>Right now in Ontario, home child care (HCC) is either delivered by providers associated with a licensed agency or by unlicensed individual providers who can legally operate as long as they adhere to number and age restrictions in the <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/S14011">Child Care Modernization Act, 2014</a>. The proposed legislative change would apply to both the licensed and unlicensed settings.</p>
<p>Licensed home child care is heavily regulated, but our research shows licensed agencies run only a small proportion of total home child care. </p>
<p>Under the proposed changes, care providers would be allowed to care for three children instead of two children under age two, and up to six children under the age of 13 (or up to five children in the case of unlicensed providers). </p>
<p>Rules around the age of a care provider’s own children would also change: right now, the provider’s children are not counted towards the maximum number of children allowed in the home if they are aged six or older. </p>
<p>But under proposed changes, any children of providers aged <em>four</em> and older would not be included in the count of total children in care. The new legislation also allows two caregivers to work together to care for double the number of children. </p>
<p>The resulting prospective care scenarios have left many advocates stunned.</p>
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<h2>Why regulations are needed</h2>
<p>The purpose of child-care regulations in Ontario and elsewhere is to ensure that children are cared for in safe and healthy environments that promote their well-being and development. More regulation and support for providers is necessary to achieve this, not less.</p>
<p>As recent research documents, unlike licensed home child care, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13669877.2017.1422786">unlicensed providers aren’t required to pass fire inspections or health inspections</a>. Unlicensed providers are not monitored or supported. Under the current act, regulations are enforced only as a result of specific complaints. And as recent history proves, the <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/daycare-death-1.4056033">results can be tragic</a>. </p>
<p>While the previous Liberal government was reviewing child rules leading up to the passage of the Child Care Modernization Act, <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2014/02/26/baby_found_dead_in_unlicensed_daycare.html">four infants and toddlers died in unlicensed child care in the Greater Toronto Area over a seven-month period</a>.</p>
<h2>Non-standard work, non-standard care</h2>
<p>To try to understand this sector better, we used parent surveys from the General Social Survey of Canada (2011). We found that <a href="https://www.oise.utoronto.ca/atkinson/UserFiles/File/Events/20170602_Summer_Institute_2017/SI_2017_Presentations/Understanding_usage_patterns_and_oversight_of_unlicenced_family_child_care_in_Canada.pdf">only about 12 per cent of children who attend home child care are with licensed care providers</a>.</p>
<p>We also found that parents using unlicensed home child care tend to be lower-income, less-educated and have non-standard work schedules. At least one parent, if not both, work evenings and/or weekends, making finding regulated care difficult. </p>
<p>Thus children from less enriched backgrounds who could benefit the most from high-quality care are most likely to find themselves in unlicensed HCC.</p>
<p>When we analyzed data from the General Social Survey and the Ontario government, we found many more parents report that their children are in licensed home child care than is possible given data on the number of licensed spaces. </p>
<p>This finding is consistent with showing that <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1476718X12466214">parents have important gaps in their knowledge of their child’s early childhood education and care services</a>. </p>
<p>Parents’ lack of knowledge is not surprising given the complexity of the child-care landscape and the fact that parents are already tasked with the challenge of finding care when it is often scarce. </p>
<p>Thus, the burden of quality assurance belongs with government, not parents. Appropriate regulations and their enforcement are necessary. </p>
<h2>License everyone, strengthen services</h2>
<p>A system that establishes standards and supports that allow all home child-care providers to be licensed individually would serve Ontario’s children and families far better than what we now have and what the government proposes.</p>
<p>Such a system would take into account the circumstances under which the care is being delivered: For example, circumstances of providing care in rural or northern regions are very different from circumstances in the large urban areas.</p>
<p>We propose that to be eligible for a licence, the home must: have appropriate, up-to-date First Aid training; provide a developmentally appropriate child-care setting including regular access to an outdoor play area; undergo annual health and safety checks conducted by Public Health and Fire Prevention officials; and undergo annual in-home quality assessment conducted by independent, trained observers.</p>
<p>But <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/10409289.2017.1324243">licensing of individual homes alone is not enough</a>. </p>
<p>We propose that, whenever practical, all home child-care providers must participate in regular visits to community-based <a href="http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/childcare/plan_report.html">early years sites</a> (hubs) dedicated to supporting HCC providers. <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10409289.2016.1256720">Support would be given through</a>: professional development; registry and referral services; equipment loans; back-up service arrangements; administrative support including, potentially, fee collection. Scheduled and unscheduled home visits would also be required. </p>
<p>We estimate that, depending on the actual program configuration, the per child cost of our entire proposal would be between 30 and 40 per cent of the cost under the current licensed HCC agency system. </p>
<p>Given how little is known about home child care, licensed and unlicensed, as it’s delivered in Ontario, it is time to find out the facts, learn from them and use them to guide future decisions. </p>
<p>It is not the time to relax the very limited regulations that are in place to protect our youngest citizens.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/108953/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Petr Varmuza provided consulting services for the Atkinson Foundation, City of Toronto, Child Care Human Resources Sector Council and Toronto Educational Workers . </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Linda A. White has received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Ontario Human Capital Research and Innovation Fund, and the McCain Foundation in the past five years.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michal Perlman receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, The City of Toronto, the Ontario Ministry of Education, the Ontario Human Capital Research and Innovation Fund and the Lawson, McCain and Bernard van Leer Foundations in the last five years.</span></em></p>Low-income, less-educated parents with non-standard work schedules rely most on home child-care providers whose rules would be relaxed under proposed legislation.Petr Varmuza, PhD Candidate, University of TorontoLinda A. White, Professor of Political Science and Public Policy, University of TorontoMichal Perlman, Associate Professor of Applied Psychology and Human Development, University of TorontoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/959982018-05-31T10:44:06Z2018-05-31T10:44:06ZIn praise of doing nothing<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/220829/original/file-20180529-80633-1gvg6vs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Modern life seems to encourage acceleration for the sake of acceleration – to what end?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/moving-traffic-light-trails-night-487507315">JoeyCheung/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the 1950s, <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/Take_Back_Your_Time.html?id=_UmpZOlnvU0C&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button#v=onepage&q&f=false">scholars worried that</a>, thanks to technological innovations, Americans wouldn’t know what to do with all of their leisure time.</p>
<p>Yet today, as sociologist Juliet Schor <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=KjZ54lNDE2EC&dq=overworked+american&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y">notes</a>, Americans are overworked, putting in more hours than at any time since the Depression and more than in any other in Western society. </p>
<p>It’s probably not unrelated to the fact that instant and constant access has become de rigueur, and our devices constantly expose us to a barrage of colliding and clamoring messages: “Urgent,” “Breaking News,” “For immediate release,” “Answer needed ASAP.” </p>
<p>It disturbs our leisure time, our family time – even our consciousness. </p>
<p>Over the past decade, I’ve tried to understand the social and psychological effects of our growing interactions with new information and communication technologies, a topic I examine in my book “<a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Terminal-Self-Everyday-Life-in-Hypermodern-Times/Gottschalk/p/book/9781472437082">The Terminal Self: Everyday Life in Hypermodern Times</a>.”</p>
<p>In this 24/7, “always on” age, the prospect of doing nothing might sound unrealistic and unreasonable. </p>
<p>But it’s never been more important. </p>
<h2>Acceleration for the sake of acceleration</h2>
<p>In an age of incredible advancements that can enhance our human potential and planetary health, why does daily life seem so overwhelming and anxiety-inducing?</p>
<p>Why aren’t things easier?</p>
<p>It’s a complex question, but one way to explain this irrational state of affairs is something called the force of acceleration. </p>
<p><a href="https://cup.columbia.edu/book/social-acceleration/9780231148351">According to German critical theorist Hartmut Rosa</a>, accelerated technological developments have driven the acceleration in the pace of change in social institutions. </p>
<p>We see this on factory floors, where “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=bdBTAAAAMAAJ&q=inauthor:%22Edward+J.+Hay%22&dq=inauthor:%22Edward+J.+Hay%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjs5vHLm6vbAhUjLn0KHaRSAqcQ6AEILjAB">just-in-time</a>” manufacturing demands maximum efficiency and the ability to nimbly respond to market forces, and in university classrooms, where computer software instructs teachers how to “move students quickly” through the material. Whether it’s in the grocery store or in the airport, procedures are implemented, for better or for worse, with one goal in mind: speed.</p>
<p>Noticeable acceleration began more than two centuries ago, during the Industrial Revolution. But this acceleration has itself … accelerated. Guided by neither logical objectives nor agreed-upon rationale, propelled by its own momentum, and encountering little resistance, acceleration seems to have begotten more acceleration, for the sake of acceleration. </p>
<p>To Rosa, this acceleration <a href="http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/hartmut-rosa-essay-acceleration-plagues-modern-society-a-909465.html">eerily mimics</a> the criteria of a totalitarian power: 1) it exerts pressure on the wills and actions of subjects; 2) it is inescapable; 3) it is all-pervasive; and 4) it is hard or almost impossible to criticize and fight. </p>
<h2>The oppression of speed</h2>
<p>Unchecked acceleration has consequences.</p>
<p>At the environmental level, it extracts resources from nature faster than they can replenish themselves and produces waste faster than it can be processed. </p>
<p>At the personal level, it distorts how we experience time and space. It deteriorates how we approach our everyday activities, deforms how we relate to each other and erodes a stable sense of self. It leads to burnout at one end of the continuum and to depression at the other. Cognitively, it inhibits sustained focus and critical evaluation. Physiologically, it can stress our bodies and disrupt vital functions.</p>
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<p>For example, <a href="https://www.bookdepository.com/Gender-Divisions-Working-Time-New-Economy-Diane-Perrons/9781847204974">research finds</a>
two to three times more self-reported health problems, from anxiety to sleeping issues, among workers who frequently work in high-speed environments compared with those who do not.</p>
<p>When our environment accelerates, we must pedal faster in order to keep up with the pace. Workers receive more emails than ever before – <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/3395457/this-is-how-much-time-you-spend-on-work-emails-every-day-according-to-a-canadian-survey/">a number that’s only expected to grow</a>. The more emails you receive, the more time you need to process them. It requires that you either accomplish this or another task in less time, that you perform several tasks at once, or that you take less time in between reading and responding to emails.</p>
<p>American workers’ productivity <a href="https://www.epi.org/productivity-pay-gap/">has increased dramatically since 1973</a>. What has also increased sharply during that same period is the pay gap between productivity and pay. While productivity between 1973 and 2016 has increased by 73.7 percent, hourly pay has increased by only 12.5 percent. In other words, productivity has increased at about six times the rate of hourly pay.</p>
<p>Clearly, acceleration demands more work – and to what end? There are only so many hours in a day, and this additional expenditure of energy reduces individuals’ ability to engage in life’s essential activities: family, leisure, community, citizenship, spiritual yearnings and self-development.</p>
<p>It’s a vicious loop: Acceleration imposes more stress on individuals and curtails their ability to manage its effects, thereby worsening it.</p>
<h2>Doing nothing and ‘being’</h2>
<p>In a hypermodern society propelled by the twin engines of acceleration and excess, doing nothing is equated with waste, laziness, lack of ambition, boredom or “down” time.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/220008/original/file-20180522-51091-3h8byt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/220008/original/file-20180522-51091-3h8byt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/220008/original/file-20180522-51091-3h8byt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=976&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/220008/original/file-20180522-51091-3h8byt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=976&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/220008/original/file-20180522-51091-3h8byt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=976&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/220008/original/file-20180522-51091-3h8byt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1226&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/220008/original/file-20180522-51091-3h8byt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1226&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/220008/original/file-20180522-51091-3h8byt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1226&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An ad for Microsoft Office stresses the importance of being able to always work.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/migrated-images/62/1440.MODHarrisSurveyInfographic_110613-FinalHighRes.png">Microsoft</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>But this betrays a rather instrumental grasp of human existence.</p>
<p><a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/1809754">Much research</a> – and many spiritual and philosophical systems – suggest that detaching from daily concerns and spending time in simple reflection and contemplation are essential to health, sanity and personal growth.</p>
<p>Similarly, to equate “doing nothing” with nonproductivity betrays a shortsighted understanding of productivity. In fact, psychological <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2432964">research suggests</a> that doing nothing is essential for creativity and innovation, and a person’s seeming inactivity might actually cultivate new insights, inventions or melodies. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/9780060750510/in-praise-of-slowness">As legends go</a>, Isaac Newton grasped the law of gravity sitting under an apple tree. Archimedes discovered the law of buoyancy relaxing in his bathtub, while Albert Einstein was well-known for staring for hours into space in his office.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/40222893?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">The academic sabbatical</a> is centered on the understanding that the mind needs to rest and be allowed to explore in order to germinate new ideas. </p>
<p>Doing nothing – or just being – is as important to human well-being as doing something. </p>
<p>The key is to balance the two.</p>
<h2>Taking your foot off the pedal</h2>
<p>Since it will probably be difficult to go cold turkey from an accelerated pace of existence to doing nothing, one first step consists in decelerating. One relatively easy way to do so is to simply turn off all the technological devices that connect us to the internet – at least for a while – and assess what happens to us when we do.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/cyber.2016.0259">Danish researchers found</a> that students who disconnected from Facebook for just one week reported notable increases in life satisfaction and positive emotions. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/16/technology/16brain.html">In another experiment</a>, neuroscientists who went on a nature trip reported enhanced cognitive performance.</p>
<p>Different social movements are addressing the problem of acceleration. The <a href="https://www.slowfoodusa.org/about-us">Slow Food</a> movement, for example, is a grassroots campaign that advocates a form of deceleration by rejecting fast food and factory farming. </p>
<p>As we race along, it seems as though we’re not taking the time to seriously examine the rationale behind our frenetic lives – and mistakenly assume that <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/being-busy-is-nothing-to-brag-about_us_5a4b9a6de4b0d86c803c7971">those who are very busy</a> must be involved in important projects. </p>
<p>Touted by the <a href="https://twitter.com/nbcnews/status/898748875225260032?lang=en">mass media</a> and <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2013/11/06/microsoft-office-declares-get-it-done-day/">corporate culture</a>, this credo of busyness contradicts both how most people in our society define “<a href="https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-the-good-life-4038226">the good life</a>” and the tenets of many Eastern philosophies that extol the virtue and power of stillness. </p>
<p>French philosopher Albert Camus perhaps <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/20617-idleness-is-fatal-only-to-the-mediocre">put it best</a> when he wrote, “Idleness is fatal only to the mediocre.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/95998/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Simon Gottschalk does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Technology has made many aspects of daily life much easier. So why do we still feel so overwhelmed?Simon Gottschalk, Professor of Sociology, University of Nevada, Las VegasLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/855472017-10-16T12:43:22Z2017-10-16T12:43:22ZThe coming transport revolution could deal a death blow to car ownership<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189992/original/file-20171012-31390-qfjh2f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=418%2C14%2C4401%2C2907&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/senior-man-cleaning-car-outside-house-15258916?src=-I7f_Gco2I4fnggT-V6k2g-1-38">Monkey Business Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The traditional model for car ownership is bust. The gleaming steed on your drive may be a powerful status symbol, but in truth your car is in use for less than 5% of the time. This makes little sense while transport costs account for about 12% of <a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/personalandhouseholdfinances/expenditure/bulletins/familyspendingintheuk/financialyearendingmarch2016">average household expenditure</a>. This will be the frontline in the battle to embed the idea of “intelligent mobility”: a new relationship with our vehicles that could sharply cut the number of vehicles on our roads, <a href="https://www.sciencealert.com/driverless-cars-could-reduce-traffic-fatalities-by-up-to-90-says-report">and mitigate the consequences that brings</a>.</p>
<p>Intelligent mobility describes <a href="https://ts.catapult.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Traveller-Needs-Study.pdf">how transport infrastructure</a> will make use of new services relating to digitisation, automation, mobile devices, open data, wireless communication and the Internet of Things. </p>
<p>It incorporates everything from smart-card access to public transport to autonomous vehicles. One report from 2016 predicted the global intelligent mobility market would <a href="https://ts.catapult.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/TSC-Intelligent-Mobility-Market-Update-2016-003.pdf">grow from an annual value of £140 billion</a> to just over £900 billion a year by 2025.</p>
<p>Lots of people are trying to take advantage. Every ride-sharing and e-hailing app; every bike-share or car-share programme; every mooted drone delivery service, self-driving car or on-demand “pop-up” bus <a href="https://newmobilityseattle.info/storage/app/media/Documents/Sept2017/NewMobility_Playbook.pdf">is part of the bigger picture</a>. It all puts pressure on the way we have ended up buying, keeping and using our vehicles, and it’s not hard to see why. </p>
<p>According to breakdown and insurance group, the RAC, the average car <a href="http://www.racfoundation.org/research/mobility/spaced-out-perspectives-on-parking">is parked at home 80% of the time</a>, parked elsewhere 16% of the time and is only on the move for 4% of the time. It’s the kind of dramatic inefficiency that gets experts excited.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189994/original/file-20171012-31422-182b5xw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189994/original/file-20171012-31422-182b5xw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189994/original/file-20171012-31422-182b5xw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189994/original/file-20171012-31422-182b5xw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189994/original/file-20171012-31422-182b5xw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189994/original/file-20171012-31422-182b5xw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189994/original/file-20171012-31422-182b5xw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189994/original/file-20171012-31422-182b5xw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Parked up.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/aerial-view-huge-storage-parking-new-598824077?src=1yqqNt6gSTdzeQMbBcPQjQ-2-39">Alexandr Medvedkov</a></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Opportunity</h2>
<p>You might wonder why progress is slow when the need seems so clear. Well, there is the inertia provided by an established way of doing things. And it may just be that transport decision makers have a more favourable experience of car travel than the average family, which tends to view transport <a href="http://www.marriedwithdebt.com/2013/03/cars-necessary-evil-or-asset/">as a necessary evil</a>. This may come down to the types of cars decision makers get to drive, while their income levels mean they spend a lower percentage of their salaries on transport. </p>
<p>It is not, however, a dead end. In the UK, the ownership model for private transport (almost all cars) has been changing, and more than three quarters of new vehicles are now bought <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-34383082">through Personal Contract Purchase</a>, where the driver no longer really owns the vehicle. This is starting to chip away at the association between social status and car ownership.</p>
<p>If the door is ajar, why not bust it open? We propose that, in an autonomous transport world, a fleet of vehicles at between 5-25% of the current total may be able to service the entire transport requirements of the UK. This would see a reduction of vehicles <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/608374/vehicle-licensing-statistics-2016.pdf">from 37m</a> to between 2-9m. </p>
<p>This is based on <a href="https://www.london.gov.uk/what-we-do/planning/london-plan/current-london-plan/london-plan-chapter-six-londons-transport/pol-27">research from Transport for London</a> which shows that every car club car eliminates the sale of eight new vehicles, before we even consider the effects of automation. It also accounts for <a href="https://www.rethinkx.com/blog/2017/6/14/how-many-cars">research from the US</a> which shows peak time commuting makes up only 18% of car journeys. <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-supermarket-surge-pricing-will-work-to-keep-shoppers-sweet-80180">Surge pricing</a> of the kind used by ride-sharing firm Uber could help to mitigate peak demand further.</p>
<p>The impact of a sharp reduction of car fleets would be huge. Urban streets could be freed up from the clutter and frustration of parking and parked cars. Pollution would decline; congestion would be reduced and roads made safer. It’s not a one way street, of course: the reduced demand for vehicles sales would lay waste to entire supply chains.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189996/original/file-20171012-31395-65eiwp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189996/original/file-20171012-31395-65eiwp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189996/original/file-20171012-31395-65eiwp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189996/original/file-20171012-31395-65eiwp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189996/original/file-20171012-31395-65eiwp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189996/original/file-20171012-31395-65eiwp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=498&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189996/original/file-20171012-31395-65eiwp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=498&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189996/original/file-20171012-31395-65eiwp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=498&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Quality?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/joshtechfission/19647037676/in/photolist-vW9cNU-imqE33-imquCJ-8Cse11-7C1yi5-Cb2kmo-6B1ByR-6B1Dyc-6CEVrt-8AA5kH-cDy6Z-fhivXd-9d5LGr-gkuknk-dpCCEX-7D96HF-6hpLqz-6CK4Ws-9ezbVE-6CK4K1-5m2U3E-6CLnaL-6CLnyj-pfzd8f-7AzNrt-6CLms3-6CK3WG-cEVhP-8X3n2d-8FGTjB-6CGdui-cGKUo-4ygEY2-CcZRM-bHmHUR-5ciiN5-nWju1z-8PoL3p-8PtT3x-cGKXr-nWjuhX-6tSm9P-8PoL8r-9ZucSf-ySxstX-6U4pbc-CgD8oW-BicjAV-s8nCC9-rNZiK6">Joshua Brown/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A key question in all of this relates to the “quality” of transport? Quality is important. It relates to how usefully spent your time is while travelling, how fresh are you when you arrive and how much you can achieve? Perhaps an autonomous personal “car pod”, configured as an office, could take two hours to get you to work. That would still be a step up from 45 minutes on a crowded train as your time use would be higher overall. </p>
<p>There are a number of developments coming together to mean that the total operational costs could be incredibly cheap. For example, a Tesla electric vehicle engine and transmission has <a href="http://gm-volt.com/forum/showthread.php?279729-18-moving-parts-in-a-Tesla">only 18 moving parts</a>, meaning less maintenance. </p>
<p>When this is combined with higher asset utilisation, less crashes, no driver and cheaper power source, the commercial owners of such vehicles are likely to generate a profit at a charge of around £0.05 per mile making it £0.11 cheaper than the current cost per passenger on a bus <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/579855/annual-bus-statistics-year-ending-march-2016.pdf">or £0.40 cheaper than you get for work based mileage</a> under the UK tax system.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189997/original/file-20171012-31386-i3g50t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189997/original/file-20171012-31386-i3g50t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189997/original/file-20171012-31386-i3g50t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=238&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189997/original/file-20171012-31386-i3g50t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=238&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189997/original/file-20171012-31386-i3g50t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=238&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189997/original/file-20171012-31386-i3g50t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189997/original/file-20171012-31386-i3g50t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189997/original/file-20171012-31386-i3g50t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=300&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">New models?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/28652222@N03/8599379579/in/photolist-cwaKo3-dZmpo5-e6U4Xa-nbp9tA-2AREye-cZpWxf-cZpWkU-cZpXd1-7LfDC9-auXxnG-cZpVZj-cZpX77-cZpXhW-cZpXnb-su56wc-cZpWC9-5ZqRkB-cZpXtf-7rDDzm-ecBLB7-8AcVEj-5TsqFR-nnMiqP-cZpUGb-62UJ5p-f9e3VE-ivYGsf-8EGT-cKx3kh-pR3tNa-8kCPEG-cZpVLm-qJsUEJ-cZpY4C-cZnTcN-Cp2oG-cZpXY7-5nJJyR-GK4Sqs-pQZ25i-atZq7o-RuVRg-4v5Zxr-5QCSdR-dR5ajy-ptMp8s-apL8ZF-dQYATe-fjwxg-4va2QG">Gwyn/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Metal boxes</h2>
<p>In some ways it boils down to how much space you have, and how connected you are. At present planning and management is based pretty much entirely around origins and destinations. In other words, transport organisations are moving metal boxes efficiently around a system. Passengers may choose to clamber into the metal box or not. It is very passive. </p>
<p>Truly understanding usage will be a real revolution in transport. Highly personalised transport plans should become possible. Imagine you live in Plymouth in the south of England and have a 10am meeting 485 miles away in Glasgow, Scotland. Currently this is a nightmare. In the future a car configured as a bed could pick you up at 11pm and wake you in the Lake District for breakfast and a shower. You then are driven the remaining 100 miles or so in a reconfigured car, designed for work. </p>
<p>The goal would be to eliminate wasted time. Payment will likely move beyond fixed payments for inflexible journeys and towards fixed monthly bills, like a mobile phone.</p>
<p>Intelligent mobility is rapidly approaching but the capabilities of the technology are far outpacing the development of new systems to harness it. Embraced properly, a dramatic shift in how we use and store our vehicle, and in how we fund and target public transport is entirely possible. </p>
<p>The potential benefits are huge. It will help governments address issues around climate change, the depletion of energy resources, and increasing urbanisation. It will also address a growing and ageing population, particularly the resources tied up in moving the young and those with mobility impairments. The opportunity is there to move people seamlessly, but at present, much of the transport architecture rather gets in the way. As engineer and consultant <a href="http://quotes.deming.org/authors/W._Edwards_Deming/quote/10091">W Edwards Deming once said</a>: “A bad system will beat a good person every time.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/85547/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marcus Mayers is affiliated with Liberal Democrat’s member and volunteer, member of the Insitute of railway operators,</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Bamford receives funding from InnovateUK and the ESRC. </span></em></p>Could we really reduce the number of vehicles on our roads from 37m to 9m?Marcus Mayers, Visiting Research Fellow, University of HuddersfieldDavid Bamford, Professor of Operations Management, University of HuddersfieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/810842017-07-17T20:03:01Z2017-07-17T20:03:01ZLow-energy homes don’t just save money, they improve lives<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178424/original/file-20170717-6046-1bm1rcr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Eco-houses at Scotland’s Housing Expo, Inverness. What is it like to live in a house like this?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">via Wikipedia</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Household energy use is a significant contributor to global carbon emissions. International policy is firmly moving towards technology-rich, low- and near-zero-energy homes. That is, buildings designed to reduce the need for additional heating, cooling and lighting. They use efficient or renewable energy technology to reduce the remaining energy use.</p>
<p>But what about the experiences of people who live in homes of this standard? Are these homes comfortable, easy to operate, and affordable? Do people feel confident using so-called smart energy technology designed for low energy use? What support systems do we need to help people live in low-energy, low-carbon houses? </p>
<p>We worked with other Australian and UK researchers to understand what it’s like to live in purpose-built low-energy housing. As part of this project, researchers from Sheffield Hallam University and the University of Salford in the UK visited South Australia to collect data from <a href="https://renewalsa.sa.gov.au/projects/lochiel-park/">Lochiel Park Green Village</a>, one of the world’s most valuable living laboratories of near-zero energy homes. </p>
<p>Lochiel Park’s 103 homes were built in the mid-2000s to achieve a minimum of 7.5 <a href="http://www.nathers.gov.au/">energy efficiency stars</a>. They’re purpose-built to be a comfortable temperature year-round, and are packed with a solar photovoltaic system, solar hot water, a live feedback display to show households their energy use, plus a range of water- and energy-efficient appliances and equipment. Combined, these systems reduce both annual and peak energy demand, and supply much of that energy at a net zero-carbon impact.</p>
<p>To reciprocate, we spent several weeks investigating similar examples of niche low-energy housing developments in the Midlands and the North of England. We listened to the stories of people living in low energy homes, who experience the difference on a daily basis, and from season to season. They help us look beyond the dollars saved or percentage of emissions reduced; for them the impact of low-energy homes is personal.</p>
<p>This research provides new insights into the relationship between people, energy technologies and low-carbon buildings. For example, one elderly householder told us that moving into a dry and warm low-energy home allowed their grandchildren to come and stay, completely changing their life, and the life of their family. </p>
<p>Low-energy homes create a wide range of physical and mental changes. Several households spoke about health improvements from higher indoor air quality. Even the idea of living in a healthier and more environmentally sustainable home can prompt lifestyle changes – one woman in her mid-50s told us she gave up smoking after moving into her low-energy house because she felt her behaviour should match the building’s environmental design. She also shortened the length of her showers, reduced her food wastage, and lowered her transport use by visiting the supermarket less often.</p>
<p>Purpose-built low-energy homes also give economic empowerment to low-income households. One household told us that savings on energy bills let them afford annual family holidays, even overseas. This economic benefit matches our findings in <a href="https://theconversation.com/sustainable-housings-expensive-right-not-when-you-look-at-the-whole-equation-60056">other Australian examples</a>.</p>
<p>As researchers, we might dismiss this as a macro-economic rebound effect, voiding many of the energy and environmental benefits. But to that household the result was a closer and stronger family unit, able to make the types of choices available to others in their community. The benefits in mental and physical wellbeing are real, and more important to that family than net carbon emission reductions.</p>
<p>Although international policy is firmly moving towards technology-rich, low-energy homes, our research shows that not all technology is user-friendly or easy to understand. For example, some households were frustrated by not knowing if their solar hot water system was efficiently using free solar energy, or just relying on gas or electric boosting. Design improvements with better user feedback will be critically important if we are to meet people’s real needs.</p>
<p>This research highlights the importance, in the transition to low-energy and low-carbon homes, of not forgetting the people themselves. Improving real quality of life should be the central focus of carbon-reducing housing policies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/81084/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stephen Berry has received research funding from various organisations including the Cooperative Research Centre for Low Carbon Living and the Government of South Australia.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr David Michael Whaley has previously received funding from various organisation including the Cooperative Research Centre for Low Carbon Living and Government of South Australia. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Trivess Moore has received funding from various organisations including the Australian Research Council. </span></em></p>There’s an international push towards low-emissions housing. New research investigates what it’s like to actually live in low-energy houses.Stephen Berry, Research fellow, University of South AustraliaDavid Michael Whaley, Research Fellow in Sustainable Energy and Electrical Engineering, University of South AustraliaTrivess Moore, Research Fellow, RMIT UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/720302017-02-27T11:53:07Z2017-02-27T11:53:07ZSay yes to mess – why companies should embrace disorder<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158282/original/image-20170224-32722-1vyse02.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Organisation is big business. Whether our lives – all those inboxes and calendars – or how companies are structured, a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/22/why-time-management-is-ruining-our-lives">multi-billion dollar industry</a> helps to meet this need. </p>
<p>We have more strategies for time management, project management, self-organisation than at any other time in human history. We are told that we ought to organise our company, our home life, our week, our day and even our sleep all as a means to becoming more productive. Every week, countless seminars and workshops take place around the world to tell a paying public that they ought to structure their lives in order to be more productive.</p>
<p>This rhetoric has also crept into the thinking of business leaders and entrepreneurs, much to the delight of self-proclaimed perfectionists with the need to get everything right. The number of business schools and graduates has massively <a href="http://www.franklin.edu/blog/what-jobs-will-a-business-degree-prepare-you-for/">increased</a> over the past 50 years, essentially teaching people how to organise well.</p>
<p>Ironically, however, the number of businesses that fail has also steadily <a href="http://fortune.com/2016/03/07/fast-growth-companies-fail/">increased</a>. Work-related stress <a href="http://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/causdis/stress/">has increased</a>. A large proportion of workers from all demographics claim to be <a href="http://smallbusiness.chron.com/key-reasons-job-dissatisfaction-poor-employee-performance-25846.html">dissatisfied</a> with the way their work is structured and the way they are managed. </p>
<p>This begs the question: what has gone wrong? Why is it that on paper the drive for organisation seems a sure shot for increasing productivity, but in reality falls well short of what is expected?</p>
<h2>New solutions to old problems</h2>
<p>This has been a problem for a while now. Frederick Taylor was one of the forefathers of <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=3jXZpwWopf4C&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=principles+of+scientific+management+1911&ots=SB_ddbe4CE&sig=FqPE8IionYZpc2gkJhAcmbkZD6c#v=onepage&q=principles%20of%20scientific%20management%201911&f=false">scientific management</a>. Writing in the first half of the 20th century, he designed a number of principles to improve the efficiency of the work process, which have since become widespread in modern companies. But even though the issues have been around for a while, new research suggests that this obsession with efficiency <a href="http://eprints.bournemouth.ac.uk/24668/">is misguided</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158284/original/image-20170224-21964-q4o9zq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158284/original/image-20170224-21964-q4o9zq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158284/original/image-20170224-21964-q4o9zq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158284/original/image-20170224-21964-q4o9zq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158284/original/image-20170224-21964-q4o9zq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158284/original/image-20170224-21964-q4o9zq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158284/original/image-20170224-21964-q4o9zq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tidy desk, tidy mind?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The problem is not necessarily the management theories or strategies we use to organise our work; it’s the fundamental assumptions we hold in approaching how we work. Here it’s the assumption that order is a necessary condition for productivity. This assumption has also fostered the idea that disorder must be detrimental to organisational productivity. The result is that businesses (and people) spend time and money organising themselves for the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/item/8931e3f1-de21-4d1e-b64f-357927469baa">sake of organising</a>, rather than actually looking at the end goal and usefulness of such an effort. </p>
<p>What’s more, <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=8nbqpvixpVYC&oi=fnd&pg=PT6&dq=eric+abrahamson+mess&ots=hVUmBrys3F&sig=cK--HtMdTjDtX6xH5Ix5g2IhFJg#v=onepage&q=eric%20abrahamson%20mess&f=false">recent studies</a> show that order actually has diminishing returns. Order does increase productivity to a certain extent, but eventually the usefulness of the process of organisation and benefit it yields reduces until at one point any more increase in order reduces productivity. <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191308502240058">Some argue</a> that in a business if the cost of ordering something outweighs the benefit of ordering it, then that thing ought not to be ordered. Instead, the resources involved can be better used elsewhere. </p>
<p>In fact, <a href="http://www.mariansalzman.com/PDFs/NYT_06-1221.pdf">research</a> shows that, when innovating, the best approach is to create an environment void of structure and hierarchy and enable everyone involved to engage as one organic group. These environments can <a href="http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-18153-0_4">lead to new solutions</a> that, under conventionally structured environments (filled with bottlenecks in terms of information flow, power structures, rules, and routines), would never be achieved. </p>
<h2>Who’s on board?</h2>
<p>In recent times companies have slowly <a href="https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/40f9/6a8deddd30315b40d4dce9fd01ba0ba170c1.pdf">started to embrace</a> this disorganisation. Many of these organisations embrace it in terms of perception (embracing the idea of disorder, as opposed to fearing it) and in terms of process (putting mechanisms in place to reduce structure). </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158286/original/image-20170224-32726-1h3qy91.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158286/original/image-20170224-32726-1h3qy91.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=394&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158286/original/image-20170224-32726-1h3qy91.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=394&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158286/original/image-20170224-32726-1h3qy91.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=394&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158286/original/image-20170224-32726-1h3qy91.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=495&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158286/original/image-20170224-32726-1h3qy91.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=495&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158286/original/image-20170224-32726-1h3qy91.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=495&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Google has embraced a more disorderly approach.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A large Danish manufacturer of hearing aids, Oticon, for example, used what it called a “<a href="http://pubsonline.informs.org/doi/abs/10.1287/orsc.14.3.331.15166">spaghetti</a>” structure in order to reduce the organisation’s rigid hierarchies. This involved scrapping formal job titles and giving staff huge amounts of ownership over their own time and projects. This approach proved to be highly successful initially with clear improvements in worker productivity in all facets of the business. </p>
<p>In similar fashion, the former chairman of General Electric embraced disorganisation, putting forward the idea of the “<a href="https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=13424380509&searchurl=tn%3Dmanagement%2B9th%2Bedition%26sortby%3D17%26an%3Dstephen%2Bp%2Brobbins">boundaryless</a>” organisation. Again, it involves breaking down the barriers between different parts of a company and encouraging virtual collaboration and flexible working. Google and a number of other tech companies <a href="http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-24921-6_9">have embraced</a> (at least in part) these kinds of flexible structures, facilitated by technology and strong company values to glue people together. </p>
<p>A word of warning to others thinking of jumping on this bandwagon: the <a href="http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-18153-0_4">evidence</a> so far suggests disorder, much like order, also seems to have diminishing utility, and can also have detrimental effects on performance if overused. Like order, disorder should be embraced only so far as it is useful. But we should not fear it – nor venerate one over the other. This research also shows that we should continually question whether or not our existing assumptions work.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/72030/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr Dinuka B Herath does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Whether it’s our inboxes and calendars or how companies are structured, we’re obsessed with making things orderly. But research suggests it’s time to break free.Dr Dinuka B Herath, Lecturer in Organization Studies, University of HuddersfieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/661032016-12-15T15:14:58Z2016-12-15T15:14:58ZHumans strive for efficiency but could learn so much from nature’s resilience<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150312/original/image-20161215-26059-xq5mtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption"></span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/pic-219449467/stock-photo-asphalt-plant.html?src=P3Ibm_nch8math5gFapS3Q-1-36">Evgeniya Anikienko/www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since <a href="https://faculty.unlv.edu/gbrown/westernciv/wc201/wciv2c18/wciv2c18lsec2.html">the industrial revolution</a>, humans have been driving towards ever greater efficiency. In fact, efficiency – making the best possible use of the resources at hand – has become the core concept of how we run the world.</p>
<p>On the face of it, being efficient makes us more in tune with our environment, by not being unnecessarily wasteful. However, it has in many cases led to a <a href="http://www.islandpress.org/book/resilience-thinking">reduction in resilience</a>, the ability to deal with change and crisis. </p>
<p>Unlike humans, nature is more resilient but far less efficient: numerous plant seeds are dispersed just to allow some to germinate, and many animals <a href="https://themysteriousworld.com/top-10-shortest-living-animals-in-the-world/">have extremely short lifespans</a> – both suggest a wasteful use of resources. </p>
<p>The human way can bring insight and foresight to decision making, and we can be proactive. Nature is essentially reactive, but does adapt to changing environments. So how do natural systems build resilience, and how can humans harness it, too? One key element seems to be the natural tendency towards increasing diversity. But from a human perspective, diversity can add complexity and a degree of redundancy. </p>
<h2>Manufacturing resilience</h2>
<p>Diversity is <a href="http://www.inderscienceonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1504/PIE.2013.060672">not a bad thing for business</a>. Vehicle manufacturer Peugeot was <a href="http://www.peugeot.co.uk/history/">founded over 200 years ago when there were no cars</a>. Its expertise was in making and processing thin steel, which then took it from producing products such as hand tools and watch springs to bicycles and cars. At each stage, the firm had a range of core products, and added more marginal activities often in response to changes in taste and fashion. </p>
<p>This broad portfolio gave Peugeot the flexibility to shift focus and downgrade core activities to a more marginal role, and vice versa. It has survived by identifying new opportunities in areas related to what it is already doing, often reducing risk by forming new companies or divisions to accommodate such ventures.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150323/original/image-20161215-26027-1av5fh9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/150323/original/image-20161215-26027-1av5fh9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150323/original/image-20161215-26027-1av5fh9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150323/original/image-20161215-26027-1av5fh9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150323/original/image-20161215-26027-1av5fh9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=474&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150323/original/image-20161215-26027-1av5fh9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=474&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/150323/original/image-20161215-26027-1av5fh9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=474&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The company Peugeot started life as a steel foundry in an old grain mill.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peugeot#/media/File:Peugeot_601_C_Eclipse_1934_Pourtout.jpg">Kévin Pourtout/Wikimedia</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Peugeot’s strategy is very similar to nature’s resilience: when the environment inevitably changes, the resulting shifts in conditions – temperature or the availability of food, for example – could mean that previously marginal species suddenly find themselves in the perfect situation. They can then become core species in the new system, while previously dominant species may come to play a more marginal role as conditions are now less favourable for them. As a result, the whole system can survive, albeit in a somewhat different configuration. </p>
<p>If those species that were marginal at first had not been there to take on the key roles, the system would have collapsed. Again, thinking of the automotive sector, those manufacturers who are heavily reliant on diesel, will find themselves in an <a href="http://www.thecarexpert.co.uk/what-is-the-future-of-diesel-cars-in-the-uk/">increasingly vulnerable position</a> in coming years as fuel supplies get low, and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/jun/30/tax-new-diesels-up-to-5000-to-cut-pollution-says-report">new legislation is enforced</a>. </p>
<p>Those who have experimented with EVs, meanwhile, will be better placed – despite the fact that in the past such activities may have been seen as inefficient and difficult to justify. General Motors’ <a href="http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-death-of-the-ev-1-118595941/">experiments with the EV-1</a> in the 1990s, for example, garnered <a href="http://content.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1658545_1658544_1658535,00.html">negative attention</a>, but the work put it in good stead to later develop its <a href="https://www.wired.com/2016/01/gm-electric-car-chevy-bolt-mary-barra/">Volt and Bolt</a> electric vehicles.</p>
<h2>Nature intervenes</h2>
<p>This type of resilience thinking has become particularly important in recent years, when natural disasters have disrupted human processes. Toyota – often presented as an example of efficiency due to its <a href="http://www.toyota-global.com/company/vision_philosophy/toyota_production_system/">lean production system</a> – was <a href="http://www.forbes.com/forbes/welcome/?toURL=http://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2011/04/08/japan-quake-tsunami-take-heavy-toll-on-toyota/&refURL=https://www.google.co.uk/&referrer=https://www.google.co.uk/">badly affected by</a> the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami in 2011. In the aftermath, a supply chain audit found that Toyota’s supply chain actually had <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0925527314002278">several potential vulnerabilities</a> due to its efficient thinking. For example, many single suppliers of key components were located in high risk earthquake zones. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/P-bDlYWuptM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>In order <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/jwebb/2016/04/26/toyotas-quake-proof-supply-chain-that-never-was/3/#56a583e85da7">to add resilience</a>, Toyota encouraged these suppliers to produce components in multiple locations, or store stock away from production sites. The carmaker itself is now moving towards <a href="http://europe.autonews.com/article/20130503/ANE/305039998/toyotas-10-million-plan:-common-parts-r?d=">greater commonality of components</a> across models, using parts that can be switched between models while increasing volumes per component – which also makes it easier for suppliers to justify new multiple production sites.</p>
<p>While we can ignore these stories – and this is indeed what we have mostly been doing in our drive for efficiency – particularly at times of change, it may be wise to take a closer look at the resilient way of operating. Some of our systems are by their nature better suited to resilience than efficiency. Healthcare systems spring to mind, or any other system where a rapid response to an unexpected extreme event can be, well, expected.</p>
<p>We are entering a time when our existing systems appear to be reaching their limits in many respects. Our overreliance on fossil fuels or economic growth, for example, are likely to hit natural limits, and if we are not proactive we may well be forced to rapidly adapt to a series of human-induced environmental crises.</p>
<p>Learning to speak the language of resilience by managing our systems more <a href="http://www.sustainableautomobility.com">as if they are natural systems</a> is the best way of preparing for this.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/66103/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Nieuwenhuis has previously received funding from the ESRC. </span></em></p>The natural world favours resilience over efficiency – so why don’t humans?Paul Nieuwenhuis, Senior Lecturer and Co-Director, Electric Vehicle Centre of Excellence (EVCE), Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/632882016-10-21T13:01:11Z2016-10-21T13:01:11ZAnnual performance review looming? How to give and receive feedback<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142427/original/image-20161019-20308-1i1kd00.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=422%2C305%2C5577%2C3287&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-500371147/stock-photo-mature-businesswoman-giving-presentation-using-flipchart-in-board-room.html?src=7VV0CE-HyfGwMUnTTjCZGA-4-0">bikeriderlondon/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Feedback is a daily occurrence. Workers get it constantly from their managers and colleagues, and how we <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacquelynsmith/2014/01/29/8-ways-negative-feedback-can-lead-to-greater-success-at-work/#acc821b32f9d">react to it</a> can have implications for <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/00483481011030557">job performance</a> and career success. Staff at companies around the world will soon start the laborious process of annual performance reviews as their bosses seek to inspire, admonish, or more likely, explain away this year’s pay freeze. The trouble is, our reactions to feedback may not be what the manager intended, and may not be in our best interests either.</p>
<p>Understanding how we respond to feedback would help a boss who genuinely wants to influence staff behaviour. <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/jasp.12407">Our study</a> set out to shed light on this: is feedback satisfying or useful? Does it change our thinking or behaviour? And how can we give better feedback to others? </p>
<p><a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-6916.2008.00068.x">Past research</a> suggests that people respond better to “enhancing” or wholly positive feedback, rather than anything negative or critical. This is because we are striving for <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6494.2010.00633.x">self-enhancement</a> or positive information. Less is known about how people take “improving” feedback, where a negative or neutral starting point becomes more positive over time. Some findings <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9004.2009.00231.x">indicate that individuals</a> are eager for this kind of improvement information. Both these approaches – “enhancing” or “improving” – might have their benefits.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142425/original/image-20161019-20308-1nd133z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142425/original/image-20161019-20308-1nd133z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142425/original/image-20161019-20308-1nd133z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142425/original/image-20161019-20308-1nd133z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142425/original/image-20161019-20308-1nd133z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142425/original/image-20161019-20308-1nd133z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142425/original/image-20161019-20308-1nd133z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142425/original/image-20161019-20308-1nd133z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Aim higher.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/polandmfa/7836793264/in/photolist-cWvBBf-4HXDsi-9to2it-nyruGg-aRvnW-nUcZKU-81Ff4E-5yczXw-9NF4Lm-86dZN1-oQibSz-oC62bv-9YcpfH-iVVwux-dY25tK-oA3GYq-cngeRU-r2oWdA-6EGgAv-7iEQDg-boAHJy-6kgtCn-6kkBJN-6QyC8C-aLhgMR-9NF6R7-5t1v1B-9NF7g3-9NF8Y1-9NF66y-9NChKc-9NCiK8-a4Kz26-9NCjUp-dY7MN7-sri2YH-bBwF2H-9NF979-9NF3UW-9NCptM-9NFaFW-6km3QQ-9NF9Fo-aCkwmQ-6kkLr3-9NCnCM-9NF8Gw-dnb2BQ-nJQnY2-7W3dLH">Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Impact assessment</h2>
<p>Across our experiments, 212 participants completed a series of tests assessing academic and life skills, and were given one of these types of feedback. We examined the potential psychological consequences on things like self-esteem or optimistic beliefs about future performance. We also looked at behavioural outcomes like the effect on people’s persistence. This is crucial stuff for businesses, where feedback is often targeted towards both enhancement and improvement, and is <a href="https://www.investorsinpeople.com/resources/share-and-inspire/constructive-feedback">delivered on multiple occasions</a> to people who at least <a href="http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0787973505.html">appear to want it</a>. </p>
<p>It turns out that the consistently positive message from the enhancing feedback made more of an impact both psychologically and behaviourally. People found it satisfying, and more satisfying and useful than the improving feedback. </p>
<p>Enhancing feedback also resulted in more optimistic beliefs about future performance on similar tests, higher levels of general satisfaction and self-esteem, and more willingness to persist on similar tests in the future.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142423/original/image-20161019-20330-k9niw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142423/original/image-20161019-20330-k9niw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142423/original/image-20161019-20330-k9niw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142423/original/image-20161019-20330-k9niw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142423/original/image-20161019-20330-k9niw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142423/original/image-20161019-20330-k9niw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142423/original/image-20161019-20330-k9niw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142423/original/image-20161019-20330-k9niw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mug’s game?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/28974995@N04/5187038544/in/photolist-8UmVR3-dZGU7A-hGxaXi-5G8WnZ-soPXJg-srbaRz-99X8VM-5mJmwP-9XRVNK-61GJhM-7N1Wsq-aBLMDj-df6w3C-c4Qki-4HLyZ4-53pYWj-dZBcqi-6aRrXn-5VCCvw-7BWFP-6aVFHe-8VY8Tf-GDkkU-cfu8BN-dZBCca-aa2Jh4-99Xbue-8s2hxQ-EWoTg-6aRshg-9a1gV5-ahNCFx-bCSsvF-f21K9-d9N9wa-noz52r-6aRrZt-85Zv4T-r5eLkH-AEJ1j-5rcLR-Pyp2R-qfnB6i-dZGU5h-iNbub-4bCwUf-tF7LB-ng5bV-rgWL8-99X9eg">Glen Wright/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Some managers might baulk at that message. Do they really have to put a cheery gloss on every pronouncement? Not quite. That relentless positivity got less satisfying and useful over time, and in the longer term, the improving feedback, that starts more negative and ramps up the good news as it continues, was rated as more satisfying. The improving style of feedback also resulted in a stronger sense of self-improvement. </p>
<p>For bosses trying to get the best out of staff, the message is <a href="https://www.thebalance.com/giving-positive-feedback-2275335">pretty clear</a>. If you want quick results then go in to the performance review with a smile and a message of joyful hope. In the short term, enhancing feedback fuels a multitude of processes. It increases satisfaction, self-esteem, and optimism and makes people more focused on performing well in the future. It will likely give you more bang for your buck in a one-time assessment.</p>
<p>This will be a tempting route. Who doesn’t want a workshop or an office full of (even temporarily) upbeat staff? But there is potentially more to be gained from feedback that charts an upward trajectory and takes its time to bring employees to a positive conclusion.</p>
<h2>Taking it on the chin</h2>
<p>But what does this all mean for employees? How should they adjust their responses as their year’s work is being picked over? Well, staff should start by understanding why they are emotionally charged after receiving feedback. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142426/original/image-20161019-20305-e1vz4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142426/original/image-20161019-20305-e1vz4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142426/original/image-20161019-20305-e1vz4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142426/original/image-20161019-20305-e1vz4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142426/original/image-20161019-20305-e1vz4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142426/original/image-20161019-20305-e1vz4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=490&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142426/original/image-20161019-20305-e1vz4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=490&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/142426/original/image-20161019-20305-e1vz4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=490&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Stay positive.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/eek/16295396/in/photolist-2rw47-dV2Fmy-bjQJTg-dUTTjS-buHHLP-eQAQ5d-facLhK-p85n8v-fJcxmJ-9nXmnw-6p8hBv-atvuC5-Er5aP-83BubD-bB1BU2-cbZ2tb-FH4RN-5og9wQ-9a6wbe-5YEUow-82Q5gC-4VVg6J-fNnMVw-4HVAF7-7fMDim-8bCH6f-4YHMiE-qiWeZ5-mtU7WV-9et2zw-6znrMG-5Zx1sC-9EM9dZ-8PtFsq-bopaKx-7yBPaL-cDzXaq-bvkgY5-5Zqwux-byaey4-9nGTj8-74mgna-7a6wKu-42S7Bf-7Bu9Dp-j3CQ6N-LiwiJ-8rERaM-buGi5i-7Hug2z">eek the cat/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Feedback clearly has an effect on <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/02683940710778459">self-esteem</a>, and the emotions felt are reactions to an increase or decrease in that self-esteem. If your annual review is going badly, there are, fortunately, ways to <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.92.5.887">mitigate the potential threats</a>. One is to develop self-compassion – kind feelings towards the self. Many exercises exist to <a href="http://self-compassion.org/category/exercises/">develop self-compassion</a>; 21 minutes <a href="http://self-compassion.org/wp-content/uploads/meditations/affectionatebreathing.mp3">of Affectionate Breathing</a> might just do the trick.</p>
<p>Perhaps more importantly, employees should also <a href="https://hbr.org/2015/08/how-to-give-tough-feedback-that-helps-people-grow">develop a good rapport</a> with their managers. This isn’t only good advice for getting along in your career, it could help you separate the feelings from the behavioural reactions and understand the manager’s feedback intentions. That is, neutral or negative feedback may be delivered with the intention of helping an employee grow and develop over time. In fact, people are more likely to <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/02683940410520637">accept negative feedback</a> if it comes from a credible source and is delivered in a considerate way. Unfortunately, not all of us will be that lucky.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/63288/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>This research was supported by Economic and Social Research Council grant RES-000-22-1834. </span></em></p>Here’s how to make a happy workplace during year-end assessments.Michelle Luke, Reader in Organisational Behaviour, University of Sussex Business School, University of SussexLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/632702016-08-17T00:37:18Z2016-08-17T00:37:18ZGood corporate governance is good for banks’ bottom line<p>Sound corporate governance not only boosts banks’ efficiency, it is also good for the profit of Australian banks and their shareholders. </p>
<p>However, <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1042443116300336">new research</a> shows that factors such as the number of board meetings, the involvement of large shareholders in boardroom decisions and whether or not the board has independent members don’t play a significant role in achieving those goals.</p>
<p>Our study, published in the <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/10424431/43/supp/C">Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money</a>, investigated the effectiveness of certain corporate governance measures on the performance of 11 Australian banks from 1999 to 2013.</p>
<p>It showed Australian banks improved efficiency after the introduction in 2003 of the <a href="http://www.asx.com.au/regulation/corporate-governance-council.htm">Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) Principles of Good Corporate Governance</a>, which aimed for improved governance mechanisms and thus better control over bank management.</p>
<p>The principles meant all ASX-listed firms should have certain board attributes. It is recommended, for example, that a board’s chairman should not be part of the executive team, that boards should consider size and composition (such as gender equality) to meet the reasonable expectations of most investors in most situations, and that different committees for detailed oversight be established. </p>
<h2>What makes a difference?</h2>
<p>The study assessed the impact of corporate governance by the number of directors, the proportion of non-executive directors, the number of board meetings, committee meetings, and the largest share of the individual shareholders in Australian banks.</p>
<p>After the introduction of the ASX’s principles, the Australian banking industry performed better in maximising its total revenue (from lending and non-lending activities) for any given level of borrowing and operating expenses. The results also revealed that the “Big Four” banks – National Australia Bank (NAB)
Commonwealth Bank (CBA), ANZ and Westpac – performed better in this than any competing regional banks. </p>
<p>We found that board size and committee meetings improve bank efficiency. This suggests that larger boards bring higher knowledge into the decision and supervisory process. </p>
<p>Committees considered in this study were: audit, nominating, remuneration and risk. These committees are seen as the main influence on boards’ most important decisions. </p>
<p>However, the number of independent board members and number of board meetings had no significant impact on a bank’s technical performance. </p>
<p>The study didn’t find any evidence of large shareholders executing power to affect banks’ performance. </p>
<p>Good corporate governance has intrinsic links to profit. Shareholders want value for money in paying board members. Regulators seek fewer failures and higher stability. And banks intend their corporate governance arrangements to deliver stronger oversight of management.</p>
<p>Investors have become more concerned about the role of the board in recent decades, especially in the wake of major corporate collapses including Ansett, OneTel, HIH and Bankwest in Australia. As a result, investors have demanded stronger corporate governance.</p>
<p>The consequences of ignoring risks and weak governance can be costly. For example, two former National Australia Bank (NAB) foreign currency options traders who were sentenced in 2006 for manipulating foreign exchange spot trades that falsely inflated profits and hid losses. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) <a href="http://asic.gov.au/about-asic/media-centre/find-a-media-release/2006-releases/06-221-former-nab-foreign-currency-options-traders-sentenced/">noted</a> in 2006 that </p>
<blockquote>
<p>By 13 January 2004, when the fictitious trades were discovered by the NAB, the loss incurred was approximately $160 million.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>After revaluation, the incurred losses for NAB totalled <a href="https://www.finextra.com/newsarticle/11398/nab-purges-staff-as-pwc-rogue-trading-report-slams-systems-and-culture">$360 million.</a></p>
<p>In its March 2004 <a href="http://www.apra.gov.au/MediaReleases/Pages/04_09.aspx">report into the case</a>, the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) noted that while the irregular trades did not threaten the bank’s viability or its capacity to meet its obligations to depositors,</p>
<blockquote>
<p>the governance and risk management weaknesses identified in the report were serious… NAB will need to address these issues promptly so that it meets “best practice” standards in its treasury area and problems of this kind do not recur.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Regulators have also developed new tools to supervise financial markets, stock exchange and financial institutions and to avoid corporate collapses. In 2008, APRA <a href="http://www.apra.gov.au/adi/prudentialframework/pages/adi-prudential-standards-and-guidance-notes.aspx">prudential standards</a> particularly for credit institutions to ensure their stability.</p>
<p>Our research results can be seen as good news for Australian banks in general and the Big Four in particular, in a dynamic and turbulent banking environment. However, regulators must continue to improve corporate governance principles and further strengthen the supervisory conducts of boards.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/63270/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Good corporate governance is good for efficiency and profit in banks. But having independent board members and the number of board meetings don’t play a role, research shows.Amir Arjomandi, Lecturer, School of Accounting, Economics and Finance, University of WollongongJuergen Seufert, Assistant Professor in Accounting, University of NottinghamRuhul Salim, Associate professor, Curtin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/600052016-05-30T13:05:33Z2016-05-30T13:05:33ZWhy schools shouldn’t approach technology like businesses once did<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/124314/original/image-20160527-869-xo1syh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Computers aren't a magical silver bullet for learning.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Computers began reaching the business world during the <a href="http://www.livescience.com/20718-computer-history.html">1980s.</a> Companies used them to automate many routine manual tasks. This led to what economist Robert Solow dubbed the <a href="http://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs181/projects/productivity-paradox/background.html">Productivity Paradox</a>. In 1987, he famously <a href="http://www.wired.com/insights/2014/11/solows-paradox/">quipped</a>: “You can see the computer age everywhere <em>but</em> in the productivity statistics.”</p>
<p>The problem Solow had identified was that while computers could automate manual processes, real productivity gains would only be experienced when technology was actively used to reinvent business processes. </p>
<p>The best businesses soon realised that computers were not just a tool to improve efficiencies but to redesign business processes. This sort of thinking has given rise to many modern innovative businesses like <a href="http://www.twitter.com">Twitter</a>, <a href="http://www.uber.com">Uber</a> and <a href="http://www.airbnb.com">Airbnb</a>.</p>
<p>Now schools are falling into the same trap as businesses did 30 years ago. They are focusing on the wrong objective when it comes to using technology in their classrooms.</p>
<h2>The wrong objective</h2>
<p>I recently came across a newsletter written to headmasters of schools around South Africa. It began by posing a question:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Is technology a “nice to have”, or will it actually improve the learning and educational outcomes of the youngsters in the class? If it doesn’t, or won’t, there can be little justification for it.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>On face value this seems like a good question to ask. But it contains two dangerous flaws. The first is that visible “improved…outcomes” is presented as the main reason for using technology. The second is assuming that the relationship is just between “technology” and “improved learning”.</p>
<p>The writer, from an organisation representing school leadership, went on to list the advantages of using educational technology, using phrases and words like, “Time is freed up”, “convenience”, “ease of handling”, “efficient way of collecting and storing information” and “immediate access”. These phrases point to the underlying perspective that many teachers have about the goal of technology in the classroom. It is seen as a means to improve classroom efficiency. </p>
<p>This perspective also pervades students’ perceptions. A research project just completed by one of my Masters students, which we hope to publish soon, found that 92% of students listed technology providing “improved access to information” as a key reason for using it for learning. </p>
<h2>Stuck in the industrial age</h2>
<p>While businesses might be excused for initially adopting an efficiency objective when it comes to technology, schools cannot. This objective has already been shown to be ineffective for <a href="http://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs181/projects/productivity-paradox/background.html">businesses</a>. More importantly though, efficiencies – unlike for business – should not be the objective of successful teaching.</p>
<p>British educationist and author Sir Ken Robinson has famously <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_changing_education_paradigms">called on</a> schools to abandon the efficiency-driven, industrial paradigm. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/zDZFcDGpL4U?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Sir Ken Robinson explores how educational paradigms are shifting.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Schools have lauded the rise of a new era in education that celebrates diversity, opportunities and innovation. However, most are actually using technology to reinforce these same industrial approaches rather than revolutionising the classroom.</p>
<p>Pursuing efficiencies to get students through more content, faster and with less effort, is the wrong objective. The focus should be on <em>effective</em> rather than <em>efficient</em> teaching. Technology is not just about computerising existing processes – it is about rethinking ways to teach and learn.</p>
<h2>The missing pedagogy</h2>
<p>The second flaw in the letter-writer’s question is the mistaken assumption that technology is the only factor that has an impact on learning. This makes the serious mistake of ignoring pedagogy, or ways of teaching. </p>
<p>There is a framework that sets out how this can be avoided. The <a href="http://www.tpack.org/">TPACK model</a> argues that there are three key elements for effective teaching with technology - Technology, Pedagogy And Content Knowledge. Teachers know their subject content and increasingly know how to use technology. However, without the “glue” of an appropriate pedagogy or method, technology can’t be effective in teaching content.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/FagVSQlZELY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">TPACK Model.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But many schools seem to assume that the technology vendors whose solutions they’ve implemented will be their teaching guides. It’s rather ironic to have teachers led by technologists! Other schools simply ignore teaching approaches, assuming by handing out iPads effective learning will spontaneously take place - leading to some spectacular <a href="http://www.macworld.com/article/2599988/lausd-ipad-cancellation-is-a-failure-of-vision-not-technology.html">failures</a>.</p>
<p>The key to effective technology-based teaching is effective technology teaching approaches. Simply <a href="https://theconversation.com/outdated-teaching-methods-will-blunt-technologys-power-40503">copy-pasting</a> traditional approaches is ineffective. This is confirmed by research that I completed recently, which <a href="http://www.teachernology.com/uploads/1/1/1/2/1112016/phd_-_craig_blewett_-_learning_in_a_facebook_environment_vs.pdf">found</a> that digital teaching methods must revolve around active learning approaches to bear fruit.</p>
<h2>A digital pedagogy</h2>
<p>Technology affords opportunities to move from traditional passive consumption learning to active approaches. These include curating content, engaging in conversation and developing content through iterative cycles of correction. </p>
<p>Such approaches form the basis of what I call the <a href="http://www.activatedclassroom.com">@CTIVATED Classroom model</a>, which is designed to support those who are teaching with technology.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123984/original/image-20160525-25247-n3883e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123984/original/image-20160525-25247-n3883e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123984/original/image-20160525-25247-n3883e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123984/original/image-20160525-25247-n3883e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123984/original/image-20160525-25247-n3883e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=567&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123984/original/image-20160525-25247-n3883e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=567&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123984/original/image-20160525-25247-n3883e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=567&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">@CTIVATED Classroom Model.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The letter I quoted from earlier concluded that, “Staff must be taught to use the technology.” Only part of this is correct: they must be taught how to teach <em>with</em> the technology. If this is ignored, educational technology will entrench the very approaches we were trying to change.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/60005/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Craig Blewett runs the website <a href="http://www.activatedclassroom">www.activatedclassroom</a></span></em></p>Schools are focusing on the wrong objective when it comes to using technology in their classrooms. They should focus just as much on how they teach.Craig Blewett, Senior Lecturer in Education & Technology, University of KwaZulu-NatalLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/550782016-04-19T13:12:10Z2016-04-19T13:12:10ZShould tax collection be privatised?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116624/original/image-20160329-13709-5odgt2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=4%2C39%2C1457%2C952&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Minding the tax gap.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/hmrcgovuk/8169131246/in/photolist-nKHWVn-awAHWX-nMSGAw-dCyBNW-fp3x9g-oaEgoG-oewfQY-drSLFg-drSW7s-brV1Ls-a3Bk9U-7Hp4gG-7YzsVx-eCzeDF-7Yzufg-7RUNmz-7RUNjt-7RY2nb-7X9udR-a3Bk9W-7TDJcp-acyMu-4Qysxs-e7o6sm-86vaXx-7RY2sC-7RUNft-7RY2FS-5VUQpW-7PDZYW">HM Revenue & Customs/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The release of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/panama-papers">Panama papers</a> is yet to reach its endgame, but there are some clear truths we can take from it. People or businesses who don’t pay their taxes – whether deliberately or through ignorance – undermine state revenues. They also distort competition by putting the non-compliant at an advantage, and they increase inequality as it is the better off who more often tend to escape their obligations. </p>
<p>When governments look around for easy savings or boosts to revenue, they might baulk at raising taxes but there is a good economic reason for improving how existing taxes are collected. The <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/apr/14/uk-under-pressure-from-eu-states-over-beneficial-ownership-secrecy">measures put into play</a> by European leaders since the leak from Latin American law firm Mossack Fonseca have accentuated both the importance of cooperation, as well as the potential value to nations from innovative action.</p>
<p>The last few weeks have reignited efforts by politicians <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-europes-new-tax-initiative-is-a-big-deal-57897">to enhance tax compliance</a> and make it <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/nils-pratley-on-finance/2016/mar/16/george-osborne-budget-2016-mighty-gamble-corporate-tax-base">a central policy concern</a> in many countries. And as government departments struggle to get a grip, every now and then, the idea of <a href="http://www.taxhistory.org/thp/readings.nsf/cf7c9c870b600b9585256df80075b9dd/fd1f76a4af13135185256f17005d0a57?OpenDocument">privatising the collection</a> system itself is mooted.</p>
<h2>The tax gap</h2>
<p>Much like other government departments, tax administrations in many countries have faced public demands for more efficient service delivery and greater accountability. Driving much of this is the existence of the “tax gap” – the difference between actual tax collected and the potential collection level if we all paid exactly what we owe. The more weak and inefficient a country’s tax administration system, naturally, the bigger the “tax gap” is. </p>
<p>Offshore avoidance and evasion is hard to factor in, but even so the numbers are significant. For the UK in the financial year 2013-2014, the “tax gap” was <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/470540/HMRC-measuring-tax-gaps-2015-1.pdf">estimated by the HMRC</a> to be £34 billion, which is roughly 6.4% of total tax liabilities. The self-employment tax gap alone over 2010-2012 <a href="http://www.res.org.uk/details/mediabrief/9096581/SELF-EMPLOYMENT-UNDERREPORTING-IN-GREAT-BRITAIN-Who-and-how-much.html">was at 19.3%</a>. </p>
<p>For other countries, with less efficient tax administrations, the tax gap is certain to be higher. In South Africa it is estimated at <a href="http://mg.co.za/article/2014-11-20-clampdown-on-tax-avoidance">15-30% of tax revenues</a>. If the extent of corruption is a good proxy for the “tax gap” the picture is significantly <a href="http://ac.els-cdn.com/S0147596707000522/1-s2.0-S0147596707000522-main.pdf?_tid=2306016e-f66b-11e5-bb49-00000aacb362&acdnat=1459337751_d0a18a26ca0aa862d146d81f2e245b2f">more troublesome in sub-Saharan Africa</a>.</p>
<p>It’s easy to see, then, why reform of tax administrations has become central to the policy agenda. Since the economic crisis, countries have struggled to tackle public deficits, restore stability and address high administrative and compliance costs. The focus of efforts by government agencies has been on the modernisation of the departments which collect revenue and their <a href="http://www.oecd.org/ctp/administration/tax-administration-23077727.htm">independence from other government agencies</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116628/original/image-20160329-13683-1j1dgnx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116628/original/image-20160329-13683-1j1dgnx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116628/original/image-20160329-13683-1j1dgnx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116628/original/image-20160329-13683-1j1dgnx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116628/original/image-20160329-13683-1j1dgnx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116628/original/image-20160329-13683-1j1dgnx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116628/original/image-20160329-13683-1j1dgnx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116628/original/image-20160329-13683-1j1dgnx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Taking a fair share?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/63158617@N07/7388188784/in/photolist-8vmoS6-8wUPrw-dMTPX3-7u34dQ-2vvz6-a54cgw-cfSp8f-7FaRf1-f2PmnX-3tqBWT-55KRvF-q5K8Ss-5DGfws-3jzdZ-82qsLo-9VqHX-3mcVdJ-678SUv-briaUM-cNFT3N-9gkqXV-8SuSum-7Goyyj-5MyJUG-6GZEqv-5kXmYp-g9NJwE-h7BJc6-7jRRyL-5t1CPU-5htKsE-rz6dDf-qEAyKe-5khTeN-aMunWr-robEb4-9jMC3L-jMEDAg-83AZC-6fvvKC-q2wLw-aFzfbp-ba2D76-hf8Ri9-5WFV3n-UUUGh-4X65Wc-8YqRy8-5wXA74-g9LFy9">Pernilla Rydmark</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Business case</h2>
<p>This has clear echoes of a more corporate approach. It is all about making tax collection work through flexibility in the management of budget and human resources. So tax officials get well-identified objectives (including the appropriate design of tax enforcement policies), performance standards (appropriately supported by the required resources) and incentivising mechanisms (including performance rewards). </p>
<p>Tax administrations which are run pretty much independently of the government, the argument goes, will increase performance by these means. It should also maintain accountability and transparency. But why not go the whole way? If a revenue administration is inefficient, perhaps efficiency could improve if some or all of their activities are outsourced to the private sector, under monitoring by the government. Is outsourcing of collection a more efficient social institution than a tax administration run by a government? </p>
<p>Recent <a href="http://www.oecd.org/ctp/administration/tax-administration-23077727.htm">examples of outsourcing arrangements</a> across a number of functions suggest some resurgence of interest in the concept. No doubt, there is appeal in allowing administratively inefficient governments to minimise the cost of collection of tax revenues, thereby providing much-needed savings which, in principle, can be passed on to consumers. </p>
<p>Different countries outsource different functions, but <a href="http://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/download/2313181e.pdf?expires=1459339520&id=id&accname=ocid45123513&checksum=41B1698FF6C4CB1C71BD4C03EA2EE617">some common categories emerge</a>. The provision of IT infrastructure has been farmed out in Australia, New Zealand and the UK; the collection and processing of tax payments has taken place through banks and post offices in Argentina, Australia, New Zealand, Greece, Sweden and the US. Less common is outsourcing of data processing operations (in Brazil, Denmark, Ireland and Mexico) and enforced collection of tax debts (in Australia, Ireland, Italy, Singapore and the UK).</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116631/original/image-20160329-13683-1qpwxif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116631/original/image-20160329-13683-1qpwxif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116631/original/image-20160329-13683-1qpwxif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116631/original/image-20160329-13683-1qpwxif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116631/original/image-20160329-13683-1qpwxif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116631/original/image-20160329-13683-1qpwxif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116631/original/image-20160329-13683-1qpwxif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116631/original/image-20160329-13683-1qpwxif.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Pushing the right buttons?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/jeremybrooks/2856458580/in/photolist-5mq6BS-6bHEQ5-9tH3RT-6vgaJZ-7rLPm8-9qJ6Tq-ekwRtB-7TPvhk-6fDLRv-9qJ5nb-pNDM9r-8oLhg1-7TPvkt-ehoVx-q9Rkwc-afUB7x-iYF9SK-pXMvrb-mWG4PH-q9N4td-4mUc6s-oY1gPy-aBA6JJ-gjQ5Qb-og4XHk-mhzTRr-iYYsDH-f7MqYZ-8gLyR8-839vki-dVy7PS-iYKUVr-5t4aVD-5p78Fi-7vTL6V-dXMtL8-99Ra4S-61WwPB-nfdbBe-6gTvxM-6fmmQA-drvfi7-99R9QE-9GFL3p-99N15c-nuDoQA-8zvFtT-nfckUq-9qF5Sn-9qJ5Pw">Jeremy Brooks/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Market stalls</h2>
<p>There is a good reason that some areas are favoured over others from an economics point of view. Efficiency of markets depends on the voluntary participation of the parties in a transaction (sellers and buyers), but with tax collection, <a href="https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/history/famous-cases/al-capone">as Al Capone might testify</a>, this is not always the case. Indeed, the presence of evasion suggests otherwise: tax transactions (being compulsory, unrequited and non-repayable) are not voluntary. Importantly, too, the process of tax collection requires the safeguarding of taxpayers’ rights and protection, in particular from overzealous tax collectors. </p>
<p>This requires monitoring, a function that only the state can perform – and one that requires considerable resources. Importantly, too, conflicts of interest might also arise, as collection requires private agents to have access to confidentially sensitive information on taxpayers that can be used to obtain an unfair advantage. It is, therefore, difficult to argue that one can rely on the market to generate an efficient outcome in collection. </p>
<p>Can we, therefore, rely on outsourcing to improve efficiency, while maintaining fairness in tax collection activities? While outsourcing might be appealing, the scope for privatising the core functions of tax administration looks limited. Secondary functions or low-scale collection of lower tax debts, might be feasible. Some early steps towards this are taken in some countries. </p>
<p>In Australia, for instance, handing collectable debt to external collection agencies was trialled in 2006 and implemented a year later. <a href="http://www.anao.gov.au/%7E/media/Uploads/Audit%20Reports/2011%2012/201112%20Audit%20Report%20No%2054.pdf">Early results show some promise</a>. They indicate that there is indeed some scope to improve efficiency through outsourcing certain aspects of the tax system, but it would be a brave, and possibly foolish, government which ignored the market obstacles which mean a wholesale privatisation is fraught with dangers and contradictions.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/55078/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christos Kotsogiannis is a member of TARC (Tax Administration Research Centre, University of Exeter) which is funded by the ESRC, HMRC, and HMT. He is also a Research Fellow of CESifo, Munich, Germany.</span></em></p>The Panama papers show how hard it is to keep on top of tax collection, but outsourcing to the private sector would bring problems of its own.Christos Kotsogiannis, Professor of Economics, University of ExeterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/517172015-12-11T11:39:30Z2015-12-11T11:39:30ZOur obsession with comfort is the carbon conundrum everyone ignores<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105245/original/image-20151210-7422-18bb6fw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'Not a goosebump between us.'</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&autocomplete_id=&search_tracking_id=tV3AeVzR6hETi_bAfz1pvA&searchterm=home%20comfort&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=255005554">WorldWide</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>What characteristics would your ideal home have? A sauna? Lots of natural light? An open-plan kitchen? </p>
<p>Whatever your answer, you probably didn’t consider how the things you wanted would affect the energy you use. The link between comfort and energy is not something that troubles most people, but actually it’s very important. In the UK, our <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/449134/ECUK_Chapter_3_-_Domestic_factsheet.pdf">houses consume</a> up to 27% of the energy we produce. </p>
<p>Governments encourage us to save energy through things such as turning off the lights and taking shorter showers; better insulation and boiler upgrades; and installing renewable energy sources like solar panels in the home. But none of this pays attention to the comforts we expect, and how they have changed over time. To give one example, indoor temperatures in the UK <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12606943">rose from</a> 12°C to 17.5°C between 1970 and 2010. Despite all our efforts to bring it down, the amount of energy we use at home <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/345141/uk_housing_fact_file_2013.pdf">is not</a> much different to 40 years ago. As the world digests the outcome of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/paris-2015-climate-summit">Paris climate talks</a>, it’s time our desire to be more comfortable came under the spotlight. </p>
<p><a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_Invention_of_Comfort.html?id=_Igomu7mUbIC">Until the</a> 18th century, comfort was far less about physical pleasure than spiritual satisfaction, well-being and consolation. Seating was designed to aid sitting respectfully with a refined posture. The equivalent of today’s La-Z-boy chair was created on medical grounds for invalids, pregnant women, and men with gout (see image below) – what we think of as comfortable was not even intended for normal able-bodied people. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105230/original/image-20151210-7431-1ad0x9a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105230/original/image-20151210-7431-1ad0x9a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105230/original/image-20151210-7431-1ad0x9a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105230/original/image-20151210-7431-1ad0x9a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105230/original/image-20151210-7431-1ad0x9a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105230/original/image-20151210-7431-1ad0x9a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105230/original/image-20151210-7431-1ad0x9a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105230/original/image-20151210-7431-1ad0x9a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Thomas Rowlandson, 1798.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The shift in our expectations happened for a couple of reasons. There was a <a href="http://faculty.econ.ucdavis.edu/faculty/gclark/papers/Consumer%20Revolution.pdf">consumer revolution</a> between 1700 and 1850, which saw people filling their homes with objects – clothes, accessories, furnishings and so on. And humanitarian reformers <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_Invention_of_Comfort.html?id=_Igomu7mUbIC">began to</a> see comfort as one of our basic human needs, and gave it more of a physical emphasis. Basic standards of comfort came to be seen as a benchmark for social equality – elevating an adequately heated home to a human right, for example. </p>
<h2>The quest for more</h2>
<p>The trouble is that once one basic need is met for everyone, there is always scope for improvement. Turn comfort into a commodity and it becomes part and parcel of a high-consumption society. With the best of intentions, this is what has happened to us. </p>
<p>In Glasgow in 1850, <a href="http://us.macmillan.com/themakingofhome/judithflanders">for instance</a>, each person used an average of 3.73 litres of water per day for drinking, bathing and so forth. Today’s average is roughly 150 litres. This reflects how social conventions have evolved alongside technical innovations, such as the development of the bathroom and new hygiene standards. </p>
<p>In the UK, the years between 1890 and 1920 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/134218.Home">marked a</a> dramatic transformation in our expectations of home comfort with the arrival of central heating, indoor plumbing, running hot and cold water, electric light and power. Connecting homes to these networks of water, sewage, gas and electricity unsurprisingly transformed domestic life and the layout of homes. Alongside these changes, our energy requirements skyrocketed. </p>
<p>The past few decades have seen further crucial changes. The pie charts below give a flavour of them. You can see a big rise in appliances, reflecting all the mobiles, tablets, consoles and so forth in modern homes. Energy for home computing <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/449134/ECUK_Chapter_3_-_Domestic_factsheet.pdf">more than doubled</a> between 2000 and 2014, for instance. </p>
<p><strong>Energy use in UK homes, 1970-2011</strong> </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105228/original/image-20151210-7467-4pn2pg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105228/original/image-20151210-7467-4pn2pg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105228/original/image-20151210-7467-4pn2pg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=263&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105228/original/image-20151210-7467-4pn2pg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=263&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105228/original/image-20151210-7467-4pn2pg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=263&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105228/original/image-20151210-7467-4pn2pg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105228/original/image-20151210-7467-4pn2pg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105228/original/image-20151210-7467-4pn2pg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/345141/uk_housing_fact_file_2013.pdf">DECC 2013</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We also use more hot water, having shifted from weekly bathing to daily showering, and more light bulbs. But the energy shares of water and lighting are down thanks to more energy-efficient technology. Cooking is down too, but don’t be fooled here. We are eating more takeaways and ready meals, so the energy for preparing them has just been outsourced.</p>
<p>On the other hand, we now actually use more energy to heat space. This is despite the fact that central heating has become very common since the 1970s. It is a more efficient way of making a room warm, but we heat more rooms and to higher temperatures. </p>
<h2>Technology and expectations</h2>
<p>Where householders were once brought together by the warmth of the fireplace in the living room, it became possible for them to do individual activities in individual rooms. Hence individual privacy became a fundamental expectation of home comfort, meaning that more rooms needed to be warm enough to spend time in. One consequence has been that the amount of living space per person in the UK <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264837709001124">has been</a> rising. And house and household size are some of the biggest determinants of energy demand.</p>
<p>The change in our view of what constitutes a normal indoor temperature in the past 20 years is down to the spread of air conditioning, central heating and <a href="https://theconversation.com/shivering-in-summer-sweating-in-winter-your-building-is-living-a-lie-9194">thermal regulations</a>. Which is an example of why we need to be aware that changes in technology and improvements in efficiency don’t always reduce consumption in the ways we might expect. Indeed, many researchers have been led to <a href="https://theconversation.com/air-conditioning-we-need-to-talk-about-indoor-climate-change-11286">suggest that</a> the 5.5°C rise in 40 years is grounds for switching our focus to indoor climate change. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105244/original/image-20151210-7425-qngu3h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105244/original/image-20151210-7425-qngu3h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/105244/original/image-20151210-7425-qngu3h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105244/original/image-20151210-7425-qngu3h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105244/original/image-20151210-7425-qngu3h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105244/original/image-20151210-7425-qngu3h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105244/original/image-20151210-7425-qngu3h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/105244/original/image-20151210-7425-qngu3h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Everything just so.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&autocomplete_id=&searchterm=family%20laptops&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=218249884">Monkey Business Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In short, governments and academics need to pay much more attention to what people want from their homes. They need to think about how these expectations of “normal” home comforts have been changing, and the influence of improvements in efficiency and low-carbon technologies. What we see from the Paris climate talks is that governments are focusing on <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-we-need-a-space-race-approach-to-saving-the-planet-50885">technical fixes</a> to our carbon problem, rather than <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/02/worlds-richest-10-produce-half-of-global-carbon-emissions-says-oxfam">challenging the</a> richest 10% of the population to question the sustainability of their desire for more and more comfort. Since they are <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/02/worlds-richest-10-produce-half-of-global-carbon-emissions-says-oxfam">responsible for</a> half the world’s carbon emissions, we won’t succeed until that finally changes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/51717/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Katherine Ellsworth-Krebs does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>While the Paris climate talks focus on technical fixes, no one talks about how we’re much more afraid of roughing it than ever before.Katherine Ellsworth-Krebs, PhD Researcher in Sustainable Development, University of St AndrewsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/450522015-07-24T01:12:03Z2015-07-24T01:12:03ZFactCheck: is the GST as efficient but less equitable than income tax?<blockquote>
<p>If you look at the efficiency of the GST – in other words, the amount of economic activity that is destroyed for every dollar you raise – the Government’s latest tax discussion paper says it is just as inefficient a tax as the income tax. It’s much less equitable though. The income tax is paid disproportionately by those further up the distribution and the GST hits those down the bottom. – Andrew Leigh, Shadow Assistant Treasurer, <a href="http://www.andrewleigh.com/the_gst_is_inefficient_and_inequitable_so_why_raise_it_rn_drive">interview</a> with Patricia Karvelas on RN Drive, July 20, 2015.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>There are two parts to the Shadow Assistant Treasurer’s statement. In the first part, he simply cites a Treasury report that shows that the GST is as efficient – or inefficient – as the income tax. The second part states that the GST is less equitable as “the income tax is paid disproportionately by those further up the distribution and the GST hits those down the bottom.” </p>
<p>A spokesperson for Dr Leigh said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>In terms of data supporting the statement, I’d refer you to p.25, chart 2.9 of the government’s <a href="http://bettertax.gov.au/files/2015/03/TWP_combined-online.pdf">Re:think tax discussion paper</a>. This shows that the GST and flat rate labour income tax have an equivalent marginal excess burden, according to Treasury modelling.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>What do economists mean by an efficient tax?</h2>
<p>There are both direct and indirect costs associated with raising taxes. Direct costs include those that are incurred in the collection of the tax. While direct costs are not insignificant (the Australian Taxation Office employs over 20,000 people), economists consider the indirect costs of taxation to be more relevant. These relate to the distortions that a tax creates. </p>
<p>For example, a tax on apples raises the price of apples to consumers and importantly makes apples relatively more expensive than say oranges. This will lead to consumers buying fewer apples and perhaps more oranges. While the government raises revenue in this process, the tax distorts the behaviour of consumers with possible impacts on the production of oranges and apples. </p>
<p>The efficiency loss is the reduction in welfare, usually measured in dollars, from a consumer buying fewer apples than what she would like to because of the tax, and also any distortions in production.</p>
<h2>Is the GST as efficient (or inefficient) as the income tax?</h2>
<p>To apply this idea in the current context, an income tax will reduce the remuneration of a worker, relative for example to other non-remunerated activities such as leisure. </p>
<p>Thus, in theory, an income tax could impact on one’s decision of how much to work (or whether to work at all). The GST, however, raises all prices except for goods and services not subject to it. </p>
<p>There lies the conceptual reason for the GST to have a similar impact than an income tax; individuals care not about the dollar amount they receive as wages but rather about the goods and services that they can purchase from their wages over their lifetimes, including savings and bequests. </p>
<p>Let me illustrate this with an example. Here I assume that there is no borrowing or saving, a flat income tax of 10% and a broad-based GST of 11.11%. Consider an individual on a $50,000 income. After paying taxes, she has $45,000 left to spend on goods and services. In this case, $50,000 expenditure on goods and services would include GST of $5,000. That is, both taxes would allow the consumption of $45,000 of goods and services and, as a result, should lead to similar behavioural impact and distortions. </p>
<p>This theoretical argument is borne out by <a href="http://www.treasury.gov.au/%7E/media/Treasury/Publications%20and%20Media/Publications/2015/Working%20Paper%202015%2001/Documents/PDF/TWP2015-01.ashx">Treasury modelling</a>. Chart 33 from the report is reproduced below. It estimates the “marginal excess burden” (MEB) of different taxes. </p>
<p>The MEB is measure of efficiency loss that captures the decrease in the future ability to spend across the economy per dollar of revenue raised from a tax. These estimates are derived using a long-run economic (computable general equilibrium or CGE) model where households are captured by a representative economic unit.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89446/original/image-20150723-22849-1anubmx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89446/original/image-20150723-22849-1anubmx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/89446/original/image-20150723-22849-1anubmx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=421&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89446/original/image-20150723-22849-1anubmx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=421&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89446/original/image-20150723-22849-1anubmx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=421&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89446/original/image-20150723-22849-1anubmx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=530&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89446/original/image-20150723-22849-1anubmx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=530&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/89446/original/image-20150723-22849-1anubmx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=530&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The chart reports the marginal excess burden of a number of taxes including a stylised personal income tax (represented by a flat rate), a stylised tax on labour income only and the GST. An out-of-model calculation for a marginal tax rate of 25% is presented as an illustration of an average taxpayer in 2011-12. As it can be seen in the chart above, the MEB estimates for the GST and the stylised income tax are nearly identical. </p>
<h2>Is the GST less equitable than the income tax?</h2>
<p>To answer this question, I need to define a couple of simple terms. </p>
<p>A tax system is regressive if the tax paid, as a fraction of income, decreases with income. A common view of the GST, reflected in the Shadow Treasurer’s statement, is that poorer households pay proportionally more than do richer households. Conversely, a tax system is progressive if the tax paid, as a fraction of income, increases with income. By design, the income tax rate faced by individuals in Australia increases with their income. </p>
<p>The table below uses a survey of households undertaken by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) to shed light on this question. It shows the average amount of GST, taxes and net income per income quantile for the 2009-2010 financial year. Net income includes pensions, family tax payments, and other benefits, and excludes tax paid on income. As expected, the income tax is clearly progressive. The amount of GST as a fraction of gross income varies considerably less across most of the income distribution, although it is overall decreasing, with the exception of the lowest quintile who pays a much higher fraction of their gross income as GST.
Taxes and GST paid as a percentage of average weekly household gross income per income quantile (2009-2010).</p>
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<p>However, looking at the fraction of GST paid and income may be misleading as incomes are volatile and spending can be smoothed via borrowing and savings. To take this into account, I report below the amount of GST paid as a fraction of total expenditures, which is likely a better measure of the level of spending that households can sustain. Once again, the lowest quintile pays substantially more GST as a fraction of expenditures, but there is a small variation for the other groups. </p>
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<h2>Verdict</h2>
<p>The Assistant Shadow Treasurer is correct that the efficiency of the GST as a tax is similar to that of income tax. He is also correct that the income tax is more progressive than the GST and that the GST hits disproportionally those in the bottom of the income distribution. </p>
<p>However, while technically the data above suggests that the GST is a regressive tax, the difference between the fraction of income or expenditures paid in the form of GST is small amongst the various quantiles of the income distribution, with the exception of the poorest. </p>
<hr>
<h2>Review</h2>
<p>I concur with the comparative distribution effects of the GST and personal income tax.</p>
<p>In the case of relative efficiency effects, because the income tax in practice falls on capital income as well as labour income and because it has a progressive rate schedule, it has additional distortion costs to those assessed with a flat rate tax on labour income considered in the FactCheck. </p>
<p>First, income tax applies to <a href="http://www.wisegeek.org/what-is-capital-income.htm">capital income</a> (for example, stock dividends) as well as to labour income. Capital income tax distorts aggregate saving versus current expenditure decisions. The hybrid Australian capital income taxation of different saving options distorts the composition of savings between one’s home, other property, bank deposits, superannuation and so forth.</p>
<p>Second, while the GST has a flat rate of 10%, the income tax rate schedule is a progressive one with marginal rates from zero to 49%. With efficiency costs increasing more than proportionately with the tax rate, a progressive tax rate generates larger distortions on average than a flat rate tax.</p>
<p>Accepting the comparative efficiency and distribution effects of the GST and income taxes, most sensible suggestions for taxation reform which involve a more comprehensive base and/or higher rate GST to reap efficiency gains from a tax mix change also propose that some of the GST revenue gain be recycled as higher social security rates and a lower but more progressive income tax rate schedule to maintain the effective purchasing power of the poor. – <strong>John Freebairn</strong></p>
<hr>
<p><em>CORRECTED: An earlier version of this article mislabelled the last two rows in the table titled “Taxes and GST Paid”. The last two rows were labelled “GST/Gross income (%)” and “Income tax/gross income (%)”, but have now been changed to “GST Net income (%)” and “Income tax/net income (%)”.</em></p>
<p><div class="callout"> Have you ever seen a “fact” that doesn’t look quite right? The Conversation’s FactCheck asks academic experts to test claims and see how true they are. We then ask a second academic to review an anonymous copy of the article. You can request a check at checkit@theconversation.edu.au. Please include the statement you would like us to check, the date it was made, and a link if possible.</div></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/45052/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Shadow Assistant Treasurer, Andrew Leigh, has said the the Government’s latest tax discussion paper says the GST is as inefficient as income tax, adding he thinks it’s less equitable. Is that right?Flavio Menezes, Professor of Economics, The University of QueenslandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/248032014-07-02T20:30:38Z2014-07-02T20:30:38ZGetting more bang for public bucks: is the ‘efficiency dividend’ efficient?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/52615/original/yys7mzm8-1404110458.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In the 27 years since the Hawke government came up with a public service efficiency dividend, the evidence has mounted against it.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/scripts/Imagine.asp?B=11607705">National Archives of Australia</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Every now and again in public policy debates a consensus emerges on some particular point among policymakers, stakeholders and commentators. These moments are distressingly rare. It is even more distressing when the government ignores such consensus. Unfortunately, this is the case with the most significant attempt in the federal budget to increase the efficiency of government, through the <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/BN/2012-2013/EfficiencyDividend">“efficiency dividend”</a>.</p>
<p>First introduced to federal public sector organisations in 1987 <a href="http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;db=CHAMBER;id=chamber%2Fhansardr%2F1986-09-25%2F0106;query=Id%3A%22chamber%2Fhansardr%2F1986-09-25%2F0120%22">by the Hawke government</a>, the efficiency dividend is a reduction of the budgets of these bodies by a certain percentage (usually 1.25%, but <a href="http://www.budget.gov.au/2014-15/content/overview/html/overview_33.htm">2.5% in the current budget</a>). </p>
<p>As the name suggests, this is intended to drive efficiency improvements. The idea is that public sector bodies do the same work with less resources and the government bottom line should benefit accordingly. Thus it is argued that this cut is not a cut at all, but merely a dividend from increased efficiency.</p>
<p>It is important to subject these justifications to scrutiny. As <a href="http://cpd.org.au/2014/06/false-economies/">my research</a> for the Centre for Policy Development points out, the efficiency dividend is the most significant initiative in May’s budget for driving more efficient government operations.</p>
<p>The measure’s predicted total saving of A$2.8 billion dwarfs the $530 million saved by the <a href="http://www.financeminister.gov.au/publications/docs/smaller-and-more-rational-government.pdf">“Smaller and More Rational Government”</a> initiative, which identifies a number of organisations for cessation or merger. This initiative is less of a blunt instrument in that it shows specifically what services will be affected, though the scattering of different organisations targeted makes it difficult to see any underlying rationale for the cuts.</p>
<h2>An incomplete form of efficiency</h2>
<p>The problem with the arguments for the efficiency dividend is that they take a very narrow view of efficiency. If the same results are obtained from fewer resources (this is questionable in some cases), this improves what is called technical efficiency. However, this ignores the “allocative” and “dynamic” <a href="http://cpd.org.au/?p=19141">aspects of efficiency</a>.</p>
<p>Allocative efficiency is about ensuring resources are directed to the areas where they achieve the highest benefits. An across-the-board cut affects all public services regardless of the value they provide. This means allocative efficiency is not increased; worse, it may be reduced because the efficiency dividend’s effects are not even.</p>
<p>Smaller organisations and offices (such as the <a href="http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/mediareleasesbyReleaseDate/745695D9AEBEFE64CA257CEE0004715C?OpenDocument">Australian Bureau of Statistics</a>) feel a disproportionate level of pain, while larger organisations have more flexibility on where to make the savings. This means smaller offices serving regional Australia tend to be disproportionately affected. It also punishes more efficient organisations since they are expected to improve at the same rate as those with more numerous and easily addressed inefficiencies.</p>
<p>Dynamic efficiency, which involves adapting to change (including new technologies and modes of operating), is also damaged because the operation of the efficiency dividend is directly at odds with the dynamics of innovation.</p>
<p>First, it applies each year, yet innovations are “lumpy” with large opportunities in some years and less opportunity in others.</p>
<p>Second, innovations often lead to an apparent decrease in efficiency before the gains begin to show. For example, the introduction of a more efficient computer system will initially slow down work as staff learn to use it. The efficiency dividend takes away the resources first, meaning that the initial dip in efficiency occurs in a situation of constrained resources.</p>
<p>Third, working out innovative new ideas and ways to implement them often requires an investment of resources. The efficiency dividend ensures such investment is harder to find.</p>
<h2>Experts unite against the efficiency dividend</h2>
<p>A number of well-supported government reviews stressed the need to review the efficiency dividend. Examples include parliament’s joint committee of public accounts and audit’s <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/parliamentary_business/committees/house_of_representatives_committees?url=jcpaa/efficdiv/report.htm">2008 inquiry</a> and the <a href="http://www.dpmc.gov.au/publications/aga_reform/aga_reform_blueprint/">2010 Moran Review</a>. </p>
<p>Cynics may reject these findings as self-serving, but they might find it harder to dismiss two more recent critiques. The <a href="http://www.ncoa.gov.au/">National Commission of Audit</a>, led by former Business Council of Australia head Tony Shepherd, was very critical of the common practice of governments to increase the efficiency dividend as a savings measure. The commission’s opinion is that cuts should be targeted with a clear rationale. </p>
<p>Even more damning was <a href="http://www.cis.org.au/publications/target30-papers/article/5191-withholding-dividends-better-ways-to-make-the-public-sector-efficient">this year’s report</a> by the Centre for Independent Studies (CIS), an organisation with a firm commitment to smaller government. The CIS recommended the “failed” efficiency dividend be abolished.</p>
<p>It is an indictment of any government’s commitment to efficiency that the most significant approach to driving more efficient operations is the use of such a blunt instrument, which flies in the face of condemnation from all sides. Complete disregard of advice on the efficiency dividend is unfortunately a bipartisan failing. It has survived through the governments of Hawke, Keating, Howard, Rudd, Gillard, Rudd again, and now Abbott.</p>
<p>The Rudd government’s <a href="http://www.budget.gov.au/2013-14/content/economic_statement/download/2013_EconomicStatement.pdf">economic statement in August 2013</a> increased the efficiency dividend to 2.25% for a period of three years despite all advice. The Abbott government has also gone against this advice, and the recommendation of its own Commission of Audit, by increasing the rate to 2.5%. </p>
<p>It is understandable, of course, that the Abbott government will not follow every recommendation. Governments must make decisions based on a range of different opinions, including from the departments of Treasury and Finance. Nevertheless, cultivating a more efficient government will require more rigour than the blunt and untargeted efficiency dividend. This approach is likely to be doing more harm than good.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/24803/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>This work draws on research conducted for the Centre for Policy Development's Public Service Research Program which is funded by the CPSU, the Becher Foundation and Slater & Gordon.</span></em></p>Every now and again in public policy debates a consensus emerges on some particular point among policymakers, stakeholders and commentators. These moments are distressingly rare. It is even more distressing…Christopher Stone, Research Director at the Centre for Policy Development and PhD Student, Macquarie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/163722013-08-20T13:10:28Z2013-08-20T13:10:28ZDeveloped world can’t have it all or health will hit the buffers<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/29586/original/pj529dwx-1376993092.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C0%2C2991%2C1976&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Mind the gap: health services in trouble if we continue to expect too much.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">PA/Carl Court</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Health services are under constant scrutiny and rarely out of the news. But discussions about how and even whether they can continue are likely to exercise the whole developed world in the near future.</p>
<p>Irrespective of whether funding and services are provided by the state, the private sector or by charities, a perfect storm of issues is brewing that could be catastrophic unless they are addressed.</p>
<p>In the UK and across Europe, <a href="http://www.wri.org/publication/content/8599">populations are reasonably stable</a>, average incomes are well above basic levels, and population health (in terms of basic needs such as housing and nutrition) is relatively good. Deaths from infectious diseases are also low and life expectancy is high, although the negative impacts of affluence (so-called “lifestyle diseases”, such as obesity and diabetes) are growing.</p>
<h2>More money, more problems</h2>
<p>But the population demography in health terms is changing. There is more emphasis on older people, and conditions such as dementia are increasing; more <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/healthcare-network/2012/feb/09/long-term-health-problems-nhs">long-term conditions and co-morbidities</a> (when people also suffer other health issues at the same time, including mental health problems) and <a href="https://theconversation.com/aande-is-in-crisis-because-we-all-take-it-for-granted-14458">rising hospital admissions</a> are all increasing the strains on health services everywhere. </p>
<p>Finances are also being tested. Most health systems (both state and private) depend on the insurance principle: the ratio between the number of people who pay premiums and the number who claim. That ratio is changing as older people pay less and claim more, which means <a href="http://mitpress.mit.edu/books/decline-welfare-state">higher costs for everyone else</a>.</p>
<p>Medical technology is accelerating; medical science has become steadily more capable over the years, with a growing ability to diagnose and treat more conditions like cancer. It is also better at providing (very expensive) treatments for extremely rare conditions such as Gaucher’s Disease as well as conditions such as baldness and erectile dysfunction, which <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-diseases-get-defined-and-what-that-means-for-you-16965">only became diseases</a> when they became treatable.</p>
<h2>Still we want more</h2>
<p>Rising expectations are also fuelled by politicians and the healthcare “industry”: politicians win elections by promising more services rather than fewer, and commercial companies survive by marketing their services to generate business. </p>
<p>We now expect more in terms of what services may be available, as well as where and when they’re delivered. Results are expected to be virtually guaranteed, and we’re increasingly concerned with improving our “patient experience” too.</p>
<p>Comparisons are regularly drawn between the delivery of health services and commercial ones such as banks or restaurants; John Lewis and <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/public-leaders-network/2012/mar/01/price-comparison-site-nhs-procurement">Amazon-style comparison</a> sites and others have been name-checked.</p>
<h2>Bigger and better</h2>
<p>The way in which rising expectations are driving demand exactly mimics the developed world’s wider consumerist philosophies: economies depend on growth which requires increasing demand, driven in turn by the <a href="https://theconversation.com/aande-is-in-crisis-because-we-all-take-it-for-granted-14458">public’s hunger for more</a> goods and services, delivered more quickly, more cheaply, and with greater choice. Just as next year’s smart phone has to be better than this year’s, so next year’s antidepressants have to be more effective, with fewer side effects, than those available now.</p>
<p>However, since health care is enormously emotive, and usually largely funded by third parties, the question, “can I afford it?” is rarely asked, either by individuals (for whom health is beyond financial measure) or by “the system”, for whom the penalties (electoral defeat for politicians, and lost business for suppliers) outweigh most hypothetical future problems. As a result, efforts to manage expectations downwards have been few and have generally failed to make much progress.</p>
<p>Experiments in prioritising need, such <a href="http://www.academia.edu/322208/The_Oregon_Health_Plan_A_Bold_Experiment_That_Failed">as those in Oregon</a> and <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11090036">New Zealand</a> have had little impact, so the only serious control mechanism to have been generally invoked is that <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/policies/making-the-nhs-more-efficient-and-less-bureaucratic">of increasing efficiency</a>. While there’s always room to improve, the pressures are such that efficiency savings will no longer suffice, and Society will have to start challenging what services are provided, not just how. </p>
<p>Genuine rising need, growing expectations, and medical technology’s ability to provide more are creating a tsunami of rising costs, which becomes the perfect storm once we include Society’s increasing risk aversion and reduced investment.</p>
<h2>We’re spoilt</h2>
<p>So can we avert it? Assuming the human propensity for short-term fixes can be overcome - possibly an assumption too far - reducing public expectations would help: understanding that healthcare resources are limited, and that some things are more important to treat than others.</p>
<p>How to do this is harder to prescribe; raising awareness of the real cost of services may help, even if these aren’t actually charged. The UK “<a href="http://www.birmingham.ac.uk/Documents/college-social-sciences/social-policy/HSMC/publications/PolicyPapers/Policy-paper-7.pdf">GP budget holding</a>” experiment in the 1990s (and now the new GP Clinical Commissioning Groups) was partly intended to increase cost awareness for professionals at least. But the way funding is organised means there’s little alignment between effort and reward.</p>
<p>Actual charging for some services to augment free healthcare services (<a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7458908.stm">co-payment</a>), is used in countries such as France and New Zealand to demonstrate the link between usage and costs, but wouldn’t go down well in the UK.</p>
<p>Creating “tiers” of services has been partially implemented in countries such as Canada, where everyone is guaranteed basic services, but more luxurious products have to paid for separately - for example, basic cataract surgery is free, but the fancier lens implants aren’t.</p>
<p>The obvious variables that could be adjusted are the availability of services, or their price. Changing the third variable - demand - would require our societies to bring back a more collective “communitarianism” in which politicians were braver in telling it like it is, and our expectations were more in tune with reality.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/16372/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jonathan Shapiro does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Health services are under constant scrutiny and rarely out of the news. But discussions about how and even whether they can continue are likely to exercise the whole developed world in the near future…Jonathan Shapiro, Honorary Senior Fellow in Health Service Research, University of BirminghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/66382012-05-02T20:30:27Z2012-05-02T20:30:27ZOur bloated cult of efficiency: doing the wrong thing right<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/10125/original/p7mvdnrr-1335766228.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Perpetually seduced by the coolest, most "efficient" conveniences, we prefer not to see the heat and waste we leave in our wake.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/EPA/STR</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The idea that improving efficiency makes sustainability problems worse seems counter-intuitive. But what if aiming to do more with less is actually doing the wrong thing right? If sustainability is our concern, this is almost always the case.</p>
<p>Doing more with less means we end up doing so much more that as a society we ultimately end up using more overall. This is called the Jevons Effect. It has been known for at least 147 years, though of course not commonly. If it was, we might be living sustainably by now. Recently, however, the problem of efficiency has been thrust back into the spotlight. </p>
<p>Amory Lovins and David Owen are two of the most prominent thinkers on the topic, with opposing views. Owen’s new book is <a href="http://www.penguin.com.au/products/9781921844829/conundrum-how-scientific-innovation-increased-efficiency-and-goodintentions-c">The Conundrum: how scientific innovation, increased efficiency, and good intentions can make our energy and climate problems worse</a>, and it includes the debate between the two that occurred after the publishing of <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/12/20/101220fa_fact_owen">Owen’s earlier feature article</a> in The New Yorker in late 2010. We’ve been using this article with our postgraduate sustainability students at Swinburne University’s <a href="http://www.swin.edu.au/ncs/sustainability.html">National Centre for Sustainability</a>. We’ll now use the book, as students examine the issue in some detail. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/10070/original/qx6zv2b6-1335754603.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/10070/original/qx6zv2b6-1335754603.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/10070/original/qx6zv2b6-1335754603.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/10070/original/qx6zv2b6-1335754603.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/10070/original/qx6zv2b6-1335754603.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/10070/original/qx6zv2b6-1335754603.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/10070/original/qx6zv2b6-1335754603.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Out with the old, in with the new: a woman gazes at an exhibition of e-waste.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Flickr/drspam</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Conundrum was <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/lifematters/the-conundrum/3884326">last month featured</a> on Radio National’s Life Matters program, during which the host Natasha Mitchell said that it left her feeling impotent and pessimistic. This is very different to the reactions we get in the classroom. </p>
<p>Exploring the implications of the Jevons Effect often engenders a sense of empowerment and a resurgence of hope. After all, if acting on a belief in technology as the answer, and efficiency as the key, is proving counter-productive - and there is plenty of evidence to suggest that it is - then here is a logical framework for understanding why that is happening, and how we might explore real sources of sustainability.</p>
<p>Lovins’ famous counter to Owen’s argument is that efficiency is “a lunch you’re paid to eat”; a more efficient car uses less energy, saving the environment while saving you money. But as Owen puts it, the world hasn’t lost weight by being paid to eat. Improving efficiency almost always results in increased aggregate consumption. </p>
<p>This has also been called the <a href="http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110217/full/news.2011.101.html">Rebound Effect</a>, but it is more pernicious than that. Owen suggests it might be better termed the Chain Effect. As we improve efficiency in one thing, say the fridge, its reduced costs make it accessible to more of us. And we don’t just go on to use bigger fridges and more of them (developing ideas like bar fridges, meat fridges etc.), we create and expand related spin-off cooling technologies, industries and activities. Air conditioning has become a “must”, we expect access to food from all over the world any time of year, and see refrigerated spaces in supermarkets take up increasing amounts of space as our demand for chilled goods increases. All that also conveys the sense that the food we buy will last longer than it does, resulting in increasingly excessive food consumption, and food waste (4 million tons a year in Australia alone). Of course, not only is the food wasted, so too is the energy used to produce, transport, buy, store, and dispose of it.</p>
<p>And as Catherine Simpson <a href="https://theconversation.com/green-cars-electric-vehicles-are-marketing-a-myth-5186">outlined recently</a> on The Conversation, we do all this while feeling better about being “green”. With the right car or fridge, we need care less about how we drive, eat and shop.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/10068/original/3syj63vf-1335753869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/10068/original/3syj63vf-1335753869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=359&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/10068/original/3syj63vf-1335753869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=359&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/10068/original/3syj63vf-1335753869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=359&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/10068/original/3syj63vf-1335753869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/10068/original/3syj63vf-1335753869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/10068/original/3syj63vf-1335753869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">‘Some kind of existential chasm opens before me while I’m browsing …’ Bret Easton Ellis, from American Psycho.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Flickr/avlxyz</span></span>
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<h2>It is time to blow our minds</h2>
<p>So if improving efficiency takes us backwards in sustainability terms, what are we to do? Far from hemming us in to more limited options, we are liberated from the unintended harm stemming from an old, flawed idea. We evolve the eyes for seeing far greater possibilities that serve to engender more care, rather than less, for our impacts upon each other and the rest of nature. We set our minds towards creating systems and institutions that help us live in more considerate, fulfilling, and less materially intensive ways. Past a certain material threshold, which most of us have passed in this country, these qualities very often go hand in hand.</p>
<p>There is plenty of evidence indicating diminishing returns in quality of life beyond certain thresholds of energy use and economic growth, while environmental impacts continue to grow (and these are far from limited to climate change). The renowned work of <a href="http://www.vaclavsmil.com/">Vaclav Smil</a> and others suggests that in many industrialised countries like Australia, this threshold has been surpassed, and in a big way. </p>
<p>Improving efficiency is very often doing the wrong thing right. Perhaps we would do better to think about efficiency in terms of evolving more (wellbeing, wisdom, care, etc) with less, rather than doing more for its own sake. What we do and why, are far more important questions than how. The former needs to guide the latter, rather than the reverse. </p>
<p><em>Comments welcome below.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/6638/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anthony James works for the National Centre for Sustainability at Swinburne University of Technology.</span></em></p>The idea that improving efficiency makes sustainability problems worse seems counter-intuitive. But what if aiming to do more with less is actually doing the wrong thing right? If sustainability is our…Anthony James, Lecturer with the National Centre for Sustainability , Swinburne University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.