Author: Andrew Sullivan

Global Gentrification?

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Surowiecki sees something like that in action:

The globalization of real estate upends some of our basic assumptions about housing prices. We expect them to reflect local fundamentals – above all, how much people earn. In a truly global market, that may not be the case. If there are enough rich people in China who want property in Vancouver, prices can float out of reach of the people who actually live and work there. So just because prices look out of whack doesn’t necessarily mean there’s a bubble. Instead, wealthy foreigners are rationally overpaying, in order to protect themselves against risk at home. And the possibility of losing a little money if prices subside won’t deter them, [urban planner Andy] Yan says, “If the choice is between losing 10 to 20 per cent in Vancouver versus potentially losing 100 percent in Beijing or Tehran, then people are still going to be buying in Vancouver.”

The challenge for Vancouver and cities like it is that foreign investment isn’t an unalloyed good. It’s great for existing homeowners, who see the value of their homes rise, and for the city’s tax revenues. But it also makes owning a home impossible for much of the city’s population.

Emily Badger wonders whether taxing foreign investors could be an answer:

Taxing them for the privilege – beyond existing property taxes – probably won’t deter foreigners who have a lot of money to shell out in the first place … But maybe that revenue could be spent mitigating some of the consequences of international investment. What if cities used that money to create new affordable or moderate-income housing, as communities in London are considering? Or to help pay for a proposal like Mayor Bill de Blasio’s $41 billion plan to ensure 200,000 affordable-housing units in New York? Or to support programs and infrastructure that benefit the residents who do live in town?

Cities already require such concessions of real estate developers, who have to fund public parks, affordable housing or new school construction in exchange for the right to develop a project. What would happen if we thought in similar terms about the investors who later come in to buy that finished real estate?

Update from a reader:

That graphic is pretty obviously wrong. It suggests that real estate in the most expensive market in the world, Monaco, costs $400 a square foot, which is considerably less than what it costs in suburban Boston, from whence I write. It also claims that real estate in New York will cost you $58 per square foot, and that real estate in London is almost three times as expensive as in New York. I looked at the original source, and it looks like the person who made the chart converted from square meters to feet squared (i.e. the original source says $1m will buy you 15 square meters, and 15 meters is 50 feet, so the graphic presents that as $1m will buy you 50 feet squared, whereas 15 square meters is in fact about 160 square feet, and the conversion error becomes much bigger as the sizes get bigger). So, in fact, the original data say that real estate in Monaco is about $6,200 a square foot, New York is a little over $2,300 (presumably they’re talking about relatively prime real estate), and London is just over 50% more expensive than New York.

(Graphic by Simran Khosla/GlobalPost)

Coloring Our Perception

Maria Konnikova reviews research on how misinformation affects our judgment:

Even when we think we’ve properly corrected a false belief, the original exposure often continues to influence our memory and thoughts. In a series of studies, [psychologist Stephan] Lewandowsky and his colleagues at the University of Western Australia asked university students to read the report of a liquor robbery that had ostensibly taken place in Australia’s Northern Territory. Everyone read the same report, but in some cases racial information about the perpetrators was included and in others it wasn’t.

In one scenario, the students were led to believe that the suspects were Caucasian, and in another that they were Aboriginal. At the end of the report, the racial information either was or wasn’t retracted. Participants were then asked to take part in an unrelated computer task for half an hour. After that, they were asked a number of factual questions (“What sort of car was found abandoned?”) and inference questions (“Who do you think the attackers were?”). After the students answered all of the questions, they were given a scale to assess their racial attitudes toward Aboriginals.

Everyone’s memory worked correctly: the students could all recall the details of the crime and could report precisely what information was or wasn’t retracted. But the students who scored highest on racial prejudice continued to rely on the racial misinformation that identified the perpetrators as Aboriginals, even though they knew it had been corrected. They answered the factual questions accurately, stating that the information about race was false, and yet they still relied on race in their inference responses, saying that the attackers were likely Aboriginal or that the store owner likely had trouble understanding them because they were Aboriginal. This was, in other words, a laboratory case of the very dynamic that [political science professor Brendan] Nyhan identified: strongly held beliefs continued to influence judgment, despite correction attempts—even with a supposedly conscious awareness of what was happening.

The Gender Gap In Retirement

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Jonnelle Marte details it:

Men had an average of $139,467 in their individual retirement accounts as of 2012, compared with the average of $81,700 that women had stashed in their IRAs, according to a report released Wednesday by the Employee Benefit Research Institute, a Washington-based research institute that focuses on health, savings and retirement issues.

As the chart [above] shows, women moved money to their IRAs just as often as men did. This was true for IRAs overall, which saw contributions for 10.9 percent of accounts held by women and 10.8 percent of accounts held by men; for Roth IRAs, which require people to contribute with after-tax dollars; and for traditional IRAs, which can include tax-deductible contributions.

Melanie Hicken considers some of the reasons for the disparity:

[F]emale workers make up about two-thirds of all part-time employees. And the majority of those jobs don’t come with employer-sponsored retirement benefits. That makes it harder to save for retirement at all, let alone to accumulate a nest egg large enough to last decades. Proposals to help workers who do not receive workplace retirement benefits, such as Obama’s new myRA plan, are a start but unlikely to make any major improvements.

Getting Away With Murder

There’s a place where it’s possible, apparently:

Let’s imagine Daniel and Henry are vacationing in Yellowstone National Park, and set up camp in the 50 square miles of the park that are in Idaho (unlike most of the park, which is in Wyoming). They get into a fight and Daniel winds up killing Henry.

But rather than bury the body and try to cover up the crime, Daniel freely admits to it and surrenders himself to the authorities.

At his trial, he invokes his right, under the Sixth Amendment, to a jury composed of people from the state where the murder was committed (Idaho) and from the federal district where it was committed. But here’s the thing — the District of Wyoming has purview over all of Yellowstone, even the parts in Montana or Idaho. So Daniel has the right to a jury composed entirely of people living in both Idaho and the District of Wyoming — that is, people living in the Idaho part of Yellowstone. No one lives in the Idaho part of Yellowstone. A jury cannot be formed, and Daniel walks free.

That scenario is fiction, but all the legal maneuvers Daniel employs are completely legitimate, and someone in a similar situation could quite possibly get off scot free. That got a lot of attention when it was first pointed out by Michigan State law professor Brian Kalt in his 2005 Georgetown Law Journal article, “The Perfect Crime.” After all, it implied that there was a 50 square mile “Zone of Death” of the United States where you can commit crimes with impunity, like in The Purge or something. The scenario even got featured in a best-selling mystery novel, Free Fire by CJ Box, who consulted Kalt when writing the book.

Update from a reader:

I served as a chaplain in a trauma hospital in Alabama, and I observed that criminal investigators from rural counties rarely bothered to investigate apparent suicides as possible murders. One case in particular stood out, where a man was brought in who had initially survived a gunshot wound to the head. The story being told by his common-law wife was that the gunshot wound was self-inflicted, but she seemed to be in a big hurry to have his life support removed. Others in the family were concerned that the wife was somehow responsible. When it was all said and done, the county law enforcement spent about 20 minutes investigating the incident and ruled it a suicide. The county didn’t do an autopsy because of funding issues and the man was cremated expeditiously.

I learned at that moment that if you wanted to get away with murder, stage a suicide in a rural county in Alabama.

Off-Roading With Google Street View

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While praising Google for bringing Street View to the Grand Canyon – “the company has captured the canyon with tremendous accuracy” – Jeremy Miller describes the limitations of virtual tourism:

[Street View Grand Canyon] feels conspicuously inadequate in critical ways.

On the virtual river you can fast-forward downstream, avoiding the soaking rapids and searing sun, putting in and taking out as you please. But part of the Grand Canyon experience is surrendering to the flow of the river and committing to the journey. Anyone who has traveled in canyon country knows how much the terrain can change in a matter of seconds during an afternoon rainstorm, or in the hours between noon and dusk, as sunlight glistens and fades upon the canyon walls. To these subtle but vital gradations, Google’s roving digital eye remains conspicuously blind.

I’d heard these shortcomings voiced by proud river runners and backpackers, often delivered with mild condescension (“I guess I can cancel my rafting permit for this summer”) or outright indignation (“Is nothing sacred?”). Jonathan Thompson, an editor at High Country News, invoked the cantankerous author Edward Abbey, who in the 1970s wrote, “The utopian technologists foresee a future for us in which distance is annihilated and anyone can transport himself anywhere, instantly. . . . To be everywhere at once is to be nowhere forever, if you ask me. That’s God’s job, not ours.” [Project leader for Google’s Grand Canyon mapping effort Karin] Tuxen-Bettman made a similar concession, pointing out that the map and its imagery were no substitute for the canyon itself. “It reflects what’s there at one moment of time,” she said, “but it does not replace it.”

Explain Yourself

It might make you more open-minded:

Recruiting a sample of Americans via the internet, [researchers] polled participants on a set of contentious US policy issues, such as imposing sanctions on Iran, healthcare and approaches to carbon emissions. One group was asked to give their opinion and then provide reasons for why they held that view. This group got the opportunity to put their side of the issue, in the same way anyone in an argument or debate has a chance to argue their case.

Those in the second group did something subtly different. Rather that provide reasons, they were asked to explain how the policy they were advocating would work. They were asked to trace, step by step, from start to finish, the causal path from the policy to the effects it was supposed to have.

The results were clear. People who provided reasons remained as convinced of their positions as they had been before the experiment. Those who were asked to provide explanations softened their views, and reported a correspondingly larger drop in how they rated their understanding of the issues.

Face Of The Day

by Chris Bodenner

Update from a reader:

It should be noted that this is actually a picture of two women in Portland, OR getting married, not in Pennsylvania.

The Best Of The Dish This Weekend

Berlin Zombie Run

First up, a little cavil at Ross today. The notion that Barack Obama’s foreign policy “stinks of failure” is a rather strange construction. It gets stranger when you see which issues Ross puts front and center: Libya and Syria. I won’t disagree on the idiotic Libya intervention, or its baleful consequences, but in the grand spectrum of policy challenges before the Obama administration from 2009 onward, I wouldn’t exactly put Libya front and center. Syria? Ross declares the policy a failure because Assad has used chlorine gas in recent months. But chlorine gas was never covered by the broader WMD accord brokered by Putin and Obama last fall, and that particular deal remains close to being completed. Given the actual options of enmeshment in a brutal vortex of civil and sectarian warfare, or a deal to impound all of Assad’s most lethal WMDs, I think the latter is a real gain.

On Iraq and Afghanistan, Ross seems to think that maintaining a residual force in both countries would have meant “success” as opposed to “failure.” Count me dubious about that. In fact, count Ross dubious about that – later in the column, he concedes “I sympathized with the decision to slip free of Iraq entirely.” The fact remains that Obama’s overwhelming task was to extricate the US from those quicksands with as little collateral damage as possible – and he did. That he also decimated al Qaeda’s Pakistani leadership and dispatched bin Laden to the depths was gravy. It can be easy to dismiss achievements of withdrawal; but they are often harder and certainly more thankless than the invasions that generally precede them. I think a little respect for those cleaning up the mess is only appropriate.

The Russia reset? Sure, it’s a failure. But so was Bush’s. And it made sense to try and get Russia’s cooperation if we could. Iran? Let’s just say that the alternative to a successful negotiation is what Ross regards as the most devastating foreign policy catastrophe in recent times – another US-initiated war in the Middle East. Does Ross really want the talks to fail? And does he not cede a scintilla of credit to Obama – for the sanctions regime at least – if they succeed? Israel-Palestine? Well, y’all know my view. Yes, it’s generally a hopeless task. But the increasing moral and strategic liability that the one-way Israeli “alliance” imposes on US foreign policy needs to be confronted some day. Obama has done his level best – and it’s not over yet. But, again, I’d rather have a president try and fail on this than never try at all.

So, no, I don’t think Obama’s foreign policy can be summed up with “At least he didn’t invade Iraq.” I think it’s better expressed as “At least he didn’t invade Iran.” And countless other half-assed things John McCain would have done twice before breakfast. It will take time for us to assess Obama’s mark on the world. But I suspect he’ll be seen as a continuation of George HW Bush and Bill Clinton, rather than Reagan and W.

This weekend, we re-published this immortal sentence from a French woman on the question of sex on the first date:

If you don’t have sex first, you build up too much pressure. You start thinking, I have seen this guy for four or five restaurants, or however you do it in the U.S.

Plus: why faking an orgasm can be a good thing. How to tell when a library book has become “mustie” and needs throwing out. The haikus of Yosa Buson, translated by W.S Merwin. And words to live by – by Walt Whitman:

Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God …

The most popular posts of the weekend were Map of the Day and Starting With Sex.

I’m taking next week to work on a longform essay, and leave you in the very capable hands of my Dish colleagues.

See you in a bit.

(Photo: Zombie clowns wait for the runners as they take part in the ‘Zombie Run’ on May 18, 2014 in Berlin, Germany. The race sees participants attempt to complete a 5 kilometre cross-country run, overcoming a series of obstacles, including ‘zombies’ attempting to take one of each runners’ three life-line strips . The event is currently touring Germany and is organized by Fox Channel. By Carsten Koall/Getty Images. Thumbnail image: Maria Morri)

Losing The Ring, Ctd

Readers offer advice to go along with the stories:

Sounds like a great opportunity to renew your vows.

Another:

My little suggestion: think about what you want to leave behind, and let the ring symbolize that shedding, and then decide what you want the new ring to bring in to your lives, and make the loss a renewal of your commitment. Hope that helps.

Or maybe a little bit of both. Another idea:

I am so sorry about your ring. This may be a crazy idea, but what if Aaron agreed to donate his ring to a pool of gold from which two new rings were cast?  Then some of that gold on your finger would also date back to your wedding.

Maybe a little too much work. Several more readers sound off:

So sorry to hear about your loss.  You, of all people, earned that ring. Not sure this is what you want to hear, but you might tell your other readers that a hospital will not likely INSIST that you take off your ring.

You can request that they secure it in place with adhesive tape.  My wife and I have been married nearly 28 years, and I’ve been in the hospital many times (cancer, chemotherapy, several other surgeries and been anesthetized 12 – 15 times) at six or seven hospitals, and have never taken off my ring.  They ask, I say no, they cope.

It helped that my wife is a registered nurse who had worked in several hospitals, who knew that I didn’t want the ring off and who knew the ropes.  She was able to prime me.  Hospitals are worried about loss of the ring or (in the case of diamond or other jewels) injury to the ring, loss of the stone, etc. Taping fixes that.

A labor and delivery nurse agrees:

This should not have happened.  No married person should be asked to remove a wedding band prior to surgery.  The band should be secured in place with tape during the pre-op prep in the anesthesia area.

You may have limited energy for taking on a new cause, if you are recovering from surgery.  But, the pre-op procedure at your hospital is NOT standard, and should be changed.  The thought that a wedding band could cause either contamination in the OR or loss of circulation to the ring finger is absurd and has been debunked.  It is indeed rare, and very outdated, for any hospital to have a protocol requiring patients entering surgery to do without the most important object they own – their wedding band.

Another offers a permanent solution:

Get one tattooed on. They aren’t going to ask you to take off your finger …

Another suggests having stand-ins:

I know I would feel terrible if I lost mine. I’ve even become attached to a secondary wedding ring I have. On our honeymoon in Hawaii, my wife and I got inexpensive rings to wear while snorkeling or doing other beach activities, lest our wedding bands fall off in the water. Mine is made of palm wood. I’ve worn it during all of our beach vacations during our four years of marriage.

Recently I thought to myself that if I lost it while swimming, I’d be just as upset as if I lost my wedding band. The wooden ring holds so much meaning and so many wonderful memories itself.  So, truly, I’m sorry for your loss.

One more reader:

I feel for you.  A couple years after our commitment ceremony in 1998,  I took my wedding ring off, laid it on the bathroom sink so I could wash my hands, was distracted by something and wandered off.  Two hours later I did what you did – grabbed with my right hand for my left ring finger and panicked when I found it bare.  I TORE THE HOUSE APART looking for it, to no avail.  My husband came home from work and found me weepy-eyed and distraught on the front porch. He was so understanding – “It’s just a ring; Tiffany makes more.” but I was bereft.  Another two hours of searching, then a flash – “THE BATHROOM!” A search around the sink. Nothing.  Did it fall down the drain?  Removed the sink trap. Nothing.  A trip to the basement to figure out if I could break into the cast-iron waste stack to … what?  I had no idea, but as I was staring at the pipes, a shout from upstairs: “FOUND IT!”  I had knocked it off the sink and my husband found it wedged under the toilet.  I cried.

My husband has put that ring on my finger three times.  First at the commitment ceremony in front of a hundred family and friends in Detroit.  Then in San Francisco City Hall in 2004, soaking wet from a night spent on the sidewalk in the rain, when we joined 4,000 other couples who married that glorious Valentines Day weekend.  That marriage was voided, though we have the certificate framed on our bedroom wall.  The last time he handed me the ring was in 2010 in Boston, surrounded by parents and siblings, nieces and nephews (none of whom were alive in 1998), when we married, for good, on the 6th anniversary of our San Francisco adventure.

Every morning I swim a couple miles.  And every morning I take my wedding ring off and clip it to my keyring.  The water compresses my fingers and, because of my swimming, the ring fits a little looser on my finger than it did in 1998.  My fear is that it will fall off and get sucked into a drain I can’t open.  So I keep it secure and slip it back on after I shower.  It is just a gold band, but it’s also a talisman, a symbol not just of our love, but of the journey and adventure we have shared for nearly 20 years.  It is what I reach for when I’m worried or sad or excited.  It is what reminds me of what’s really important.  I am so sorry for your loss.