From The Dail Mail:
Helen Hancock, 39, was found dead alongside 48-year-old company director Martin Griffiths at a property in the upmarket village of Duffield just months after she walked out on her husband...
Detective Inspector Steve Shaw of Derbyshire Police told the court the couple were discovered at the £400,000 detached property in Duffield, Derbyshire, the early hours of New Years' Day.
From The Evening Standard:
Planes giant Boeing was humiliated on Friday after hundreds of internal emails showed staff fraught with concerns over possible design flaws on the 737 MAX, saying the doomed jet had been “designed by clowns”...
According to documents released to Congress today, Boeing employees repeatedly raised concerns internally about design issues, with one person involved saying software had “piss poor” design and was “doomed”.
“This airplane is designed by clowns who in turn are supervised by monkeys,” the employee wrote in April 2017. Another employee involved in the jet’s development wrote: “Part of me wants to see it fail so we can say WE TOLD YOU SO. That’s kind of sick of me, huh.”
That seems pretty damning to me, you'd think that Boeing would just keep quiet and pray for lenience.
But no:
Boeing apologised for the messages. “The language used in these communications, and some of the sentiments they express, are inconsistent with Boeing values, and the company is taking appropriate action in response.”
Exactly not.
Those emails are entirely consistent with Boeing's (lack of) values, as evidenced by the subsequent 737 disasters and botched cover-up attempts. Boeing shouldn't be apologising for the messages, they should be apologising for the crimes (that were exposed by the messages). The "appropriate action" would be to never cut corners like this again and listen to their engineers' concerns in future.
Re my earlier post, here is a worked example showing that you can use the quadratic formula approach to work out what non-decimal base a calculation is in.
(Update: Rational Anarchist developed this technique independently and posted a worked example a few minutes ago in the comments to the earlier post. So this is a Newton v Leibniz type spat...)
Problem
"15 x 36 = 642. This doesn't work in decimal/base ten. What base is it in?"
Solution
You express the first part as: (x + 5) x (3x + 6)
You multiply those to get: 3x^2 + 21x + 30 (expression A).
You express the second part as: 6x^2 + 4x + 2 (expression B)
You subtract expression A from expression B and get:
3x^2 - 17x - 28 = 0
You solve this using your preferred method.
Using factorisation, you get (3x + 4) x (x - 7) = 0
So x (the base) could be -4/3 or 7. The base must be at least 7 because the highest digit in the original calculation was "6", so rule out -4/3 and try with 7.
Check
You have to convert the given equation from base 7 to base 10 and see if it works.
Base 7................Base 10
15.......................7 + 5 = 12
36......................(3 x 7) + 6 = 27
642....................(6 x 49) + (4 x 7) + 2 = 324
15 x 36 = 642...12 x 27 = 324
Sorted!
NB - If the calculation you are given is a division - i.e. "642 ÷ 15 = 36", then you just turn it into the multiplication 15 x 36 = 642" and use the same approach,
I have been thinking about bases other than decimal (such as binary) and quadratic equations. These are normally treated as separate topics, but there are overlaps, and if you think it through, you reach some surprising conclusions.
Whether there will ever be any practical application of this is doubtful, so only read on if you have quarter of an hour to spare. Here goes...
Bases other than decimal
We use decimal numbers (base ten) all the time and I hope that most people are also familiar with the concept of binary numbers (base 2). They used to teach it at school (heck knows why, but it was fun).
If you see the number "11" you assume that it means "eleven", but if you are told this is using binary notation, it means "three". Instead of columns for hundreds, tens and units, you have columns for fours, twos and units.
You can use any base you like, the computer chaps like using hexadecimal (base sixteen), They use digits up to nine and use A for "ten", B for "eleven" and so on up to F for "fifteen" (the highest digit is always one less than the base), The columns are for 256s (16 squareds), sixteens and units. So if "1A3" is a number in hexadecimal, its decimal equivalent is 419.
It's fun writing down numbers in other bases and trying to add, subtract, multiply and divide. It really messes with your mind, if you like that sort of thing.
Quadratic equations
If you are asked to solve something like "x^2 + 2x + 3 = 27" for x, it is quite a faff because you have to use one of the techniques for solving it (preferably this one), and you have to concentrate on not getting confused between x-squareds and x's.
My first breakthrough was to realise that we are all actually very familiar with the quadratic format/concept... because that's how we read and write numbers.
The number "111" (in base ten) means 1 x 100 (ten squared) + 1 x 10 + 1. = 111. Easy.
You can also imagine it as a quadratic equation x^2 + x + 1 = 111, where x = ten.
The number "111" (in base 2) = "7" (in base ten). If you know we're using binary, that's also simple enough. It's a two squared, plus a two, plus a unit.
You can also imagine it as a quadratic equation x^2 + x + 1 = 7, where x = 2
Putting two and two together... to make five
Some maths puzzles give you a calculation that looks odd, such as "12 x 13 = 222" and your challenge is to work out what base this is in. By trial and error, you can work out that it is in base four*. "12" means 4 + 2 and "13" means 4 + 3, the answer is 42 (in decimal terms), which in base four is expressed as "222" (2 x 16 + 2 x 4 + 2).
UPDATE: I have now done a post with a worked example to show how you can solve such "identify the base" problems using the quadratic approach.
So... when you are solving a quadratic equation where the signs before the x-squareds and the x's are positive, solving for x is the same as asking what base it is in!
If I tell you that "2x^2 + 2x + 2 = 42", you can turn that into two very similar problems.
1. You can turn it into "222 in a non-decimal base = 42 in base ten. Which base is '222' in?".
Or...
2. You can turn it into "Solve for x". If you've been following so far, you know that one of the answers must be four... but negative five is the other valid answer.
So there actually two possible answers to the first type of question as well - it could be base four or it could be base negative five.
It is here that my train of thought grinds to a halt. It would be fun to argue the toss with a maths teacher whether he would accept "base negative five" as a valid answer to question 1*.
Apart from that I see no practical use to this concept - could there ever conceivably be a situation in which it is handy to use a negative base, in the same way as the computer chaps find hexadecimal and binary useful?
Answers on a postcard...
* Of course, another answer to the problem "in which base is 13 X 14 = 222 a valid equation?" is "negative one" if you multiply up and solve it using the quadratic equation approach, but while I accept the existence of negative bases, there can be no base one, because the highest digit you can use is one less than the base, in this case zero.
From City AM:
... thanks to a concerted push to appeal to younger buyers, the 111-year-old company has managed to bring the average age of its clientele down by 13 years over the last decade to just 43.
“That means that for everybody who is 60 [buying a Rolls-Royce], you have somebody who is 20,” chief executive Torsten Muller-Otvos told City A.M.
Nope, mathematically wrong and seems unlikely. More likely is e.g. for every 60 year old buyer there are nine 42 year olds; or four 39 year olds.
Andrew Carey left the following comment under yesterday's post about why replacing Business Rates (and other taxes on businesses) with LVT would help get occupation rates on the High Street back up:
Brilliant by Mr Wadsworth. And unlike the Council Tax equivalent of this you're not at risk of losing your own home if you misjudge the market rent.
OK, let's agree that "losing your own home" is A Bad Thing.
And let's define "losing your own home" as being evicted by a landlord for non-payment of rent or simply because he wants to sell; or being repossessed by the bank because you can't keep up the mortgage repayments (usually because a borrower has lost their job).
(Then there is the thorny issue of people who are prevented from owning a home in the first place; their taxes are being used to fund public services and they are paying off their landlord's mortgage. For every five years they pay rent and extra tax, they have lost a home. Doesn't that count?)
We can then judge the relative merits of Home-Owner-Ism and an LVT system by looking at how many people lose their homes under either system. Whichever leads to the lower number is the better system.
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How rosy is the picture under full-on Home-Owner-Ism at present?
Statistics from The Resolution Foundation show the following:
Safe/not at risk
Owned outright with no mortgage - 28.3% of households (mainly older and pensioners).
Council and Housing Association Tenants - 13.1%.
Total 41.4%. This number will drift downwards if the Homeys have their way. Council housing will be sold off; and there are fewer first time buyers, whose average age and mortgage terms are increasing. Instead of buying at 25 and paying off the mortgage in 15 years (home free in your forties!) like in the Good Old Days of Georgism Lite, they are buying at 35 and paying off the mortgage over 30 years, just before retirement age.
At risk
Households with mortgages 24.7%
Private renters 17.2%
Sub-letting, sharing or living with parents 16.7%
Total 58.6%, a figure which will drift upwards. How many of those lose their homes each year? Difficult to tell, and I don't know. But it's a number X.
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How would things look under a 50/50 Georgist system, with income tax and LVT only (no Council Tax, SDLT, IHT, VAT or NIC etc).
1. At present, only about 3% of people are involuntarily between jobs at any time (and stand to lose their homes). This number would go down with lower taxes on productive activity, so maybe 2% under Georgism. So they could add a 2% "unemployment insurance surcharge" to LVT bills and simply exempt people for a few months if they lose their jobs.
Seeing as the average LVT bill would be about £7,000, as long as one partner is working, the LVT is affordable in nine cases out of ten anyway. And the mortgage arrears that build up while one partner is out work will be lower (because mortgages will be lower).
2. The total amount paid in rent/mortgage plus LVT under Georgism will be considerably lower (thousands or tens of thousands of pounds a year per household) than the amounts people currently have to pay in rent/mortgage plus Council Tax, SDLT, VAT and NIC (basic maths and logic). So there will be a safety cushion built in.
3. Under Georgism, house prices will be lower and being a residential landlord will not be such an attractive option. So a lot of the 34% currently living with parents, sub-letting or renting privately will be able to afford to buy, which greatly increases their housing security (can't be chucked out on a whim and it's just nice to own your own home to decorate or improve as you wish).
(Many of those who currently are prevented from owning their own home in the first place will now own one; a few of those might lose it again. But overall, it's a win.)
4. Pensioners are a non-issue, there would of course be a roll-up and defer option if both owners are over pension age, so none of them will lose their homes. Heirs will inherit less, but so what? The heirs will have been able to buy their own homes long before their parents die so overall most are just as well off (if not better off).
5. There would be more council housing for truly affordable rents, which is far cheaper for the taxpayer than subsidising private landlords via Housing Benefit. (I'd argue it makes an actual cash profit but whether it does or not, it's cheaper than paying Housing Benefit).
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Therefore, overall, housing security (the flip side of the risk of losing your home) will improve quite markedly under Georgism. The current low number of people who lose their homes each year will fall considerably to close to zero. This is not hypothetical. Property tax rates in the USA vary widely, and areas with higher rates have fewer mortgage repossessions.
I fully accept that under Georgism, there will still be some people who budget badly (who would lose their homes under Home-Owner-Ism anyway); or couples who've paid of their mortgage and who both lose their jobs and simply cannot find work during the exempt period (who would have been safe under Home-Owner-Ism). And those people will actually "lose their homes because of LVT".
There will be an outcry in The Dailymailexpressgraph every time it happens. But that number will be a lot lower than whatever the number currently is under full-on Home-Owner-Ism, X. where three-in-five households are at risk of losing their homes. It's the risk of it happening that grinds people down psychologically, even if it never happens to most (although there are plenty of horror stories about no-fault evictions).
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So as per usual, if you think about the slogan and look at actual hard numbers, what appears superficially to be an argument against LVT is in fact and argument in favour of LVT.
Emailed in by Lola from Ipswich Star:
The Edinburgh Woollen Mill, in Buttermarket, Ipswich, looks set to be the latest national brand exiting the town.
Large signs have appeared in the store's windows which state: "This store is closing down - all stock must go". owever, the store's message is somewhat contradicted by a much smaller sign underneath which reads: "Subject to landlord negotiation". This is a tactic The Edinburgh Woollen Mill has employed before and used at dozens of stores across the country.
Earlier this year similar signs appeared in the windows of Peacocks fashion store, in Carr Street. But despite having the signs up for most of the year the store, which is owned by The Edinburgh Woollen Mill, still seems to be going strong.
It appears the signs are introduced as a result of annual negotiations of new leases in a bid to strike a better rent deal with landlords.
Retailers are gradually cottoning on to this tactic, in the medium term, it will work, hopefully.
LVT (as opposed to Business Rates) would give landlords the required kick up the arse and accelerate the process. LVT on any high street would be based on average rents being actually paid by normal tenant businesses. For charity shops (which are arbitraging the 80% Business Rates reduction for charities) and vacant premises, each landlord would be asked how much rent they are holding out for (assuming the premises were rented to a normal business) and would pay LVT based on that amount. If they pitch too high, they will be overpaying LVT; if they lowball, then the council can ensure that the premises are actually rented out for that amount and a local business gets its foot in the door.
The theoretical optimum rent (and hence optimum LVT receipts) on any high street is the highest figure that landlords can demand before shops start falling vacant, which leads to a downward spiral. In the real world, the optimum is "a bit less than that".
LVT will encourage landlords to find that optimum:
- LVT will tend to push rents down a bit. A rational landlord is indifferent between a) charging £40/sq ft rent and paying £30/sq ft LVT and b) charging £35/sq t rent and paying £25/sq ft LVT, either way, the landlord nets £10/sq ft.
- LVT will also push rents up a bit. If all other landlords are charging £35/sq ft, fixing the LVT on all shops at £25/sq ft, clearly a minority of landlords will go for £36 or £37, while still only paying the £25 LVT and thus netting £11 or £12.
But so what? If rents fall below that theoretical optimum, at least there will be shops and jobs in the area; the council's loss is local business' gain, and not local landlords' gain.
Presumably, there are some High Streets where the maximum rent that can be demanded is less than it costs to maintain the buildings, these areas are beyond the margin and are very difficult to revive. Reducing other taxes (in particular VAT) would revive at least some of them, which is all part of the plan (LVT could largely replace VAT).
I only go to watch films which get bad reviews because nine times out of ten I am pleasantly surprised and come out thinking "It wasn't that bad, really". (The last film I watched which got good reviews was "Black Swan" and I would have walked out halfway through if I hadn't been there with Her Indoors who quite liked it. I skipped the two Paddington films because they got good reviews, which was a big mistake on my part, they were both on telly over Xmas and they are great!)
"Last Christmas" is a counter-example, it got mediocre reviews but that's actually a *really good film* in a completely non-ironic way.
I accompanied Her Indoors to see "Cats" (the musical) donkey's years ago, and it was truly dreadful (although again, Her Indoors liked it). With expectations that low, I happily went with her to watch the film version yesterday.
We can file "Cats" along with "Downton Abbey" and "La La Land". Objectively, it is a crock of shit churned out by cynics to fleece an undemanding and unquestioning public. But these films are very well made (camera angles, lighting, sound etc) and if you just sit back, relax and judge it by its own standards (in the rather glorious Odeon Luxe recliner seats), it's really quite enjoyable and I came out smiling.
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Surprise of the film: there are two-and-a-half actually funny lines in the film. James Corden delivers both-and-a-half of them *perfectly* and I actually chuckled out loud each time.
I'd be grateful if you could take a few minutes to read it.
Thanks. I'm not doing this for fun.
Everybody is piling in with their opinions on this story. From an economics/accounting stand point, those schools are stupid for turning down the bequests, which were earmarked for paying for school places for "poor white boys".
Perhaps Bryan Thwaites did this for entirely benevolent and altruistic reasons; perhaps he was a downright racist - that is entirely irrelevant.
The point is that such schools usually award a few free places anyway to maintain the pretence that they are charitable institutions, which secures them a very modest corporation tax break and a very hefty Business Rates discount (which will be phased out in Scotland next year). Ultimately, the reason for this is to bump up their grade averages, thus attracting more fee-paying pupils, it's like a loss leader.
We would assume - or hope - that some of those free places would have gone to "poor white boys" anyway, so all the schools have to do is to match the income with the corresponding largely notional expense.
Let's say that in the absence of the bequest, they would have handed out ten free places, five to "poor white boys" and five to "poor non-white boys". The bequest pays for, say, two free places, they just earmark two of them as "Thwaites Scholarships" and reduce the number of other free places awarded to "poor white boys" from five to three; thus maintaining the intended five/five ratio (and banking the bequest for themselves).
If they want to be politically correct and pass on the benefit of the bequest, then in addition to the two "Thwaites Scholarships", they could also award the planned ten free places off their own bat, four to "poor white boys" and six to "poor non-white boys", meaning that instead of five/five it's six/six and everybody wins, including at least one "poor non-white boy".
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To give another example, I vaguely remember a case where a non-white person was prepared to be an organ donor, but insisted that his organs could only go to a non-white person (or perhaps it was the other way round, doesn't matter). The NHS turned him down for being racist.
Equally stupid.
If you are white and on a waiting list for a new heart, the chances are there are some non-white people ahead of you on the list. You aren't going to get that non-white heart, but a non-white person above you on the list will, so at least you move up the list and benefit from the donation, however indirectly.
