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Assorted links
1 Liquid wood?
2. An excellent appreciation of MLK.
4. Luigi Zingales offers advice to Tim Geithner.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on January 19, 2009 at 03:10 PM | Permalink
Comments
maybe i don't get something, but isn't plastic also recyclable and wood supplies are limited just like petroleum?
Posted by: Alex G at Jan 19, 2009 4:13:48 PM
Advice; what, to pay his taxes like an honest man?
Posted by: dearieme at Jan 19, 2009 4:23:43 PM
Not all plastic is recyclable, Alex. Plastic is basically very long chain hydrocarbon molecules. In order to recycle it, you have to melt down the plastic so that you can resell it as stock (basically little plastic pellets) for making new plastic goods. Unfortunately, many of the plastics in use degrade when they are heated and cooled in the process of recycling, so that the applications of the recycled material are limited as compared to the applications of the virgin material. Until now, research had been focused on finding processes that could recycle plastic without causing it to degrade. It sounds like these researchers have found a solution from the other end (e.g. finding materials that do not degrade during recycling).
Posted by: quanticle at Jan 19, 2009 5:07:44 PM
I haven't read up on the chemistry, but perhaps someone knows: is there anything special about "liquid wood" beyond its origin?
"Plastic" is a pretty broad term, and I thought some had pretty good recycling properties. And the manufacture of plastic is a pretty small user of oil, compared to energy. So my gut says that this sounds like a marketing scam, trees good oil bad. Like "natural drugs" from plants not "chemicals"...
Posted by: improbable at Jan 19, 2009 6:27:41 PM
i wish they could make liquid glass -- is anyone working on that?
Posted by: babar at Jan 19, 2009 6:33:09 PM
The material described in the article is made largely of lignin. Lignin is abundant and is usually burned by paper mills. Burning is a low-value application. The ability to make lignin into a material which can be injectin molded is an advance. Now instead of burning (low-value) lignin might be able to be used in much higher-value applications.
It might not seem important when oil is $40 / barrel, but it will when oil is expensive again. Whenever that is.
Posted by: Curt Fischer at Jan 19, 2009 7:22:21 PM
Plant-derived plastics are hardly new, are they? One can only assume that these ones are more useful or cheaper.
babar: Glass already is liquid. Especially if you hit it with a torch.
Posted by: Sigivald at Jan 19, 2009 7:23:26 PM
Sigivald, Lignin accounts for 25 ~ 33% of the weight of most plants, so the new feat is to make a plant-"derived" plastic without extensive genetic modification or chemical processing of existing plant materials.
I would imagine it has a good shot at being far cheaper than the designer plant-derived plastics produced today like polylactide or PHAs.
Posted by: Curt Fischer at Jan 19, 2009 10:08:42 PM
A good suggestion for Geinther; take an H&R Block tax course.
Posted by: Superheater at Jan 19, 2009 10:24:30 PM
MLK Jr.'s "Strength to Love" is worth the read.
Posted by: Michael F. Martin at Jan 19, 2009 10:38:37 PM
MLK here is very poignant to see
Posted by: StreetWalker at Jan 19, 2009 11:08:52 PM
Judge pay seems kind of easy. Overturned decisions waste money, so compensate them on that. Then start cuttng/raising their pay until the attrition rate matches equivalent professions (e.g. elite law firm associates, wall st MDs, doctors, or whatever.) Maybe reduce variance a bit: say no more than a 2-1 maximum-minimum range at any pay grade (public service = more Weber bureaucractic.) Hard to see this job is worth much more than mid-level management, though.
Posted by: gorobei at Jan 19, 2009 11:27:11 PM
#3.
“But we don’t have a good measure of judicial quality.”
Ummm...Judges as public school teachers. If you don't have a good measure of quality, they why aren't you screaming about that rather than salaries?!?
Posted by: Andrew at Jan 20, 2009 3:55:08 AM
wood supplies are limited just like petroleum?
No. It seems you're missing something.
Posted by: JSK at Jan 20, 2009 4:03:09 AM
#1. They will definitely need a better trade name than LiqWood.
Posted by: Andrew at Jan 20, 2009 4:36:47 AM
Judges seem to be of decreasing quality, but underpaid is always relative.
Perhaps alternative occupations in the legal "profession" are overpaid.
I suppose however judges would expect to be paid handsomely as the royalty of the cartel known
as the bar association.
Posted by: Phil at Jan 20, 2009 7:59:48 AM
