Tag Archives: Eduardo Porter

12.05.2012 | Female or Male Leftovers?

For Chinese women, success can be a problem.

China’s working women are becoming more affluent. And perhaps for that reason, there has been a backlash. The single, intelligent, successful female has been maligned by the All-China Women’s Federation, a state feminist agency. Calling them the “leftover” (sheng nu) women, the government agency has suggested these ladies should be focusing less on their careers and more on finding a man. One journalist connects the “leftover women” campaign to China’s extra men–118 for every 100 women–that resulted from China’s one child policy. Hoping to marry, the last thing men need is a choosy 30-year old date.

With women achieving professional success, with their status in marriage ascending, and with men having to prove their desirability, China is seeing how economic change has affected the institution of marriage. Yes, arranged marriages were the norm until the 1980s, even though Mao outlawed them 60 years ago. But now, as Gong Haiyan, the woman who founded China’s largest online dating service explains, women looking for men list as their key criteria, his salary, his house and his height. Instead of leftover women, as a New Yorker writer suggests, it sounds like China has leftover men.

Our bottom line: In The Price of Everything, Eduardo Porter says that as women increasingly entered the labor force in the US, American society profoundly changed. One cause of the change was the new price of women’s labor. Once women worked outside the home, they became more “valuable.” Sounds like China.

A final fact: Looking at a list of the wealthiest 100 people in China, you would see 6 female self-made billionaires. All in their 40s except for one, and all married except for one, 4 of these affluent women made their money in real estate.

Sources and Resources: Reading about the changing relationship between men and women in China, my favorite article was the New Yorker profile of Gong Haiyan, the woman who started Jiayuan (“Beautiful Destiny”), China’s biggest online dating service. The New Yorker’s notes about China took me to the articles about “leftover women,” here and here. Finally, for China’s female billionaires, here is the Forbes list.

Posted by: adminEcon
Tags: All-China Women's Federation, arranged marriage, China, Chu Lam Yiu, Eduardo Porter, Forbes wealthiest people in China list, Gong Haiyan, Jiayuan, leftover men, leftover women, marriage, self-made Chinese female billionaires, sheng nu, The Price of Everything, tradition, Wu Yajun
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09.22.2012 | Gas Tax or CAFE?

The goal is energy conservation. But what is the best way?

During the end of August, our newest fuel economy standards were announced. Now CAFE, our Corporate Average Fuel Economy mandate, is close to 29 miles per gallon. The goal is 35.5 for 2016 and 54.5 miles per gallon by 2025. So auto manufacturers have the incentive to produce hybrids, cars with more efficient gas mileage, electrified vehicles, lighter cars.

This takes us to the “rebound effect.” As we explained in a past Econlife post…

“Citing the ‘rebound effect,’ a New Yorker Magazine article introduces us to {an 1865} book called The Coal Question…{which}…explains that the energy efficiency created by the steam engine encouraged more energy use rather than less. {19th century economic thinker William} Jevons said, ‘It is wholly a confusion of ideas to suppose that the economical use of fuel is equivalent to a diminished consumption. The very contrary is truth.’”

What really makes us conserve? The law of demand. When prices rise, we are willing and able to buy less.

Or, as financial journalist Eduardo Porter explains, gas taxes are much better than CAFE because they make us drive less. Porter then describes what happens next, “When time came to replace the old family S.U.V., we would be more likely to consider a more fuel-efficient option. As more Americans sought gas-sipping hybrids, carmakers would develop more efficient vehicles.” For example, In the UK where the gas tax is $3.95 a gallon, Ford’s compact Fiesta goes 72 miles on a gallon. In the US, the number for the Fiesta is 33 MPG.

But, will you vote for a politician that supports higher taxes?

Sources and Resources: For the source of my Porter quote and much more detail on the cost benefit tradeoff between CAFE and gas taxes, this Porter article is excellent as is this New Yorker article that discusses the “rebound effect.” In addition, the specifics of CAFE standards are described further by the NY Times and an NHTSA press release.

Posted by: adminEcon
Tags: 54.5 mpg, CAFE, Eduardo Porter, Ford Fiesta, fuel-efficiency, gas tax, GM, hybrid vehicles, incentive, law of demand, NHTSA, rebound effect, William Jevons
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08.21.2012 | Augusta National Golf Club and Women

With Condoleezza Rice and Darla Moore soon to become the Augusta National Golf Club’s first female members, I keep thinking about how women have become more valuable. The reason takes us back to the family.

Assume for a moment that a family is a production unit–sort of like a little factory. In the traditional set-up, women and men contribute resources. Women bring their ability to reproduce and maintain a household; men are responsible for reproduction and economic sustenance. In other words, men had real dollar value but not women. And not having dollar value mostly meant having very little value.

However, once a woman enters the labor force, her worth can be quantified. By contributing to her household’s economic sustenance, at home and beyond, she increases her value. You can see from the BLS (Bureau of Labor Statistics) charts that conclude this post, women are increasingly participating in the work force, women earn money, they spend money and they are more educated. Their activities and accomplishments bespeak value.

And, as a woman’s value changes, everywhere she gets greater bargaining power…even at Augusta.

My Sources: For scholarly analysis of women’s value in marriage markets and of the family as a production unit with resource inputs and goods and services outputs, Nobel laureate Gary Becker’s The Essence of Becker is a perfect source. Then, as a complement with more of a historical focus, I suggest Claudia Goldin’s papers and books while the BLS paper for the charts (below) provides valuable statistics. In addition, econlife has looked at the recent controversy at Augusta that involved IBM’s CEO. Finally, I thank Eduardo Porter for The Price of Everything, whose chapter, “The Price of Women,” inspired this post.