Would you rather work for Apple?

 

Apple Corp. Headquarters

The common wisdom in American political debate is that CEOs make hundreds of times more than their workers --  331 times according to the AFL-CIO ($11.7 million for the CEO vs. $35,293 for the average worker). And that this inequality is due to evil, greedy, capitalist CEOs being awarded outsized compensation packages by their cronies on boards of directors.

But there are a couple of things going on here which may require a re-think.

There is one small issue with the $11.7 million comparison. One must cherry-pick the CEOs to get such enormous earnings (the AFL-CIO selected the 350 most highly paid CEOs to get this number). If we use Bureau of Labor Statistics data for all firms, the average earnings of all CEOs (approx. 250,000 of them) is about $175,000. This is a ratio of roughly five times the average worker, a number that more closely tracks the truth of mid-sized manufacturing firms and plumbing supply businesses and the majority of Americans.

But there has indisputably been a growing inequity in wages of the middle class vs. the top one percent. Comparing the thirty year period from 1982 to 2012, we see the middle of the income distribution increase by 20 percent. But in the same period, the top one percent of workers saw their incomes rise by 94 percent.

Many attribute this growing divide to the growth of CEO and executive compensation.

But in a recent study, “Firming Up Inequality,” four economists from the University of Minnesota, Stanford University, and the Social Security Administration offer an explanation that is breathtaking in its simplicity.

The mistake we are making, they say, is to compare CEO pay to all American workers. Instead, they suggest comparing CEO pay only to the firm that each CEO heads. For instance, the income of Craig Manear, CEO of Home Depot, should be compared only to Home Depot workers. And the compensation of Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, contrasted only with his Apple colleagues.

Working from a Social Security Administration dataset, they were able to track the total compensation of all workers, and, more importantly, tie them to the companies for whom they toiled.

Contrary to the common assertion of growing inequality, the authors state that “we find strong evidence that within-firm pay inequality has remained mostly flat over the past three decades.”

Mostly flat? How to explain this?

First, the study does recognize that inequality has increased (20 percent vs. 94 percent income growth as stated earlier). But they show that this disparity occurs between companies, not between all executives versus all workers.

Here is an example. Say it is the year 1920. You work for a struggling buggy manufacturer while your brother is employed by a burgeoning Ford Motor Company. He makes more than you do.

Ford is taking the transportation market by storm and buggies are quickly becoming a curiosity. The average earnings of all employees at Ford is greater than those at your buggy company because Ford is making massive profits. A new technology is driving an increase in wage inequality, not between CEOs and workers, but between Ford workers and buggy makers.

In our current era, the past 30 years have seen an enormous growth in high technology firms. There is a new, information  economy and an old economy. Information economy firms, in aggregate, are growing rapidly and generating lots of profit. Old economy firms are plodding along, growth and profits humble. Compensation at the new economy firms is much greater than at the old economy firms. The average Apple employee makes much more than the average Pep Boys worker, especially when considering stock options. And this gap has been growing for three decades.

In this coming political season, which will be rife with populist cries for income equality, keep one simple question in mind.

In order to achieve it, would you be willing to give up your iPhone and say goodbye to Google?

Dreams of Summer Long-ago

In mid-June it’s hard to remember that it’s still spring. Summer doesn’t start this year until June 21^st, the longest day of the year in the Northern hemisphere. On that day, the sun will rise in Attleboro at 5:11 a.m. and set at 8:24 p.m. giving us over fifteen hours of daylight. Six hundred miles to the west, yet in the same time zone, sunset will not occur until 9:00 p.m. Those were the long days we remember, we who grew up in the country.

School out, hay tall in the meadows and ready soon for the second cutting, fragrant with alfalfa, clover, and orchard grass. These forage crops grew lushly, soaking up sunlight for the coming winter. An ancient method of storing solar energy, the hay was harvested, dried, and stowed against the cattle’s need for sustenance in the coming short, dark, frigid, barren days of winter.

It seemed that all of our efforts were directed to preparing for winter. Corn planted, to be stored in silos. Loft filled with the aforementioned hay. Orchards in bloom, with apples and pears and cherries to come. Gardens, planted only scant weeks before, already greening with tomatoes and greens, potatoes and squash, and, our favorite, watermelon.

All this bounty to be harvested, processed, and kept in some way before the frosts came. Potatoes, carrots, and apples into the root cellar. Tomatoes, beans, and corn canned, promising savory soups to come. A lot of labor – tilling, planting, weeding, harvesting, and preserving. But the payoff was in delicious, healthy meals, even in the dark of deep winter.

But it wasn’t all work. The neighboring farm contained a large pond, ideal for a squealing bunch of kids to swim and picnic and fish and snooze upon its sunny banks. A grove of young but supple maple trees, 2-3” in diameter, provided additional entertainment. Shinny up ten or twelve feet, then begin to lean to and fro. The tree would sway and then gently droop, lowering the grinning child to the ground, and rebound when released, no worse for the wear. Luckily in those days, lawsuits were not filed at the drop of a hat, so we were welcomed on the neighboring farms.

Further fun was to be had from our old balloon-tire, single-speed bikes, which, after laboriously pedaled up the steep dirt-road hills, careened joyously down the other side, spewing gravel as we descended. Braking was optional, laughter was loud, knees sometimes skinned. It was the best entertainment that could be had (short of riding the spunky horses that the city folks boarded with us). Yes, summer in the country entailed hard work, but offered many offsetting rewards.

We learned to be self-sufficient, but learned, too, lessons of community. When a neighbor was gored by his bull, our dad milked his cows and cleaned the stalls for many weeks. Dairy cows don’t accept any excuses – they must be milked twice a day, every day. This simple act of generosity was repaid in many ways, none the least of which was a tow up the hill during “mud season,” when our car sank to its frame, and only the neighbor’s John Deere Model A had the moxie and ground clearance to yank us out of the mud.

The world is so much more complicated now. Entertainment is everywhere, always on, always demanding our attention. Twitter and Facebook and Instagram compete for our time. Our smartphones ding and ping and chime to draw our attention. The cable news networks are all ALERT ALERT ALERT, all of the time. Everything is breaking news, demanding our concern, our empathy, our energy. It is so draining.

Perhaps it’s time, this summer, to return to the old ways. Even for a single day, a single hour, disconnect, drop out, and find a fragrant hay field in which to regard clouds floating in the blue sky, and nap. Perchance to dream.

How to lose weight and live a longer, healthier life

The answer is so simple that it’s hardly believable: beans.

And the question is – how to lose weight and live a longer, healthier life.

In a recent TED Talk and Wall Street Journal article, explorer and educator Dan Buettner describes what he calls “blue zones,” areas with unusual concentrations of centenarians. Buettner identified and studied seven such regions having an unusually high number of persons 100 years or older: Sardinia, Italy; Okinawa, Japan; Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, and Loma Linda, California.

Working with demographers and physicians, Buettner uncovered the common threads that these healthy oldsters share. Here is one of his major findings: “Their diet consists mainly of vegetables, fruits, whole grains, beans and other carbohydrates. They eat meat but only small amounts, about five times a month, usually on celebratory occasions. The cornerstone of every longevity diet in the world was the humble bean.”

The theory is that the complex carbohydrates and high fiber afforded by this diet in general, and beans in particular, are kind to our microbiota, the teeming trillions of bacteria in our guts. They, in turn, are kind to us, helping us to digest and glean energy from our food. Further benefits of healthy gut flora include increased metabolic function, prevention of allergies, and boosting the immune system. These little guys are busy, indeed.

A high fiber diet, in addition to longevity, is also correlated with weight loss. In a recent study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, researchers performed a dietary study of 240 adults in Worcester, MA. Their goal was to compare the efficacy of a simple, high fiber diet to the more complex, multicomponent American Heart Association (AHA) diet.

What they found was that by following one simple rule, that is, to consume a diet high in fiber, those subjects lost nearly as much weight as the ones on the much more complex AHA diet.

The value of this may not be immediately obvious. But take a look at just a small excerpt from the thousands of words describing the AHA diet:

“Consume a variety of fruits and vegetables; choose 5 or more servings per day. Limit intake of foods with high content of cholesterol-raising fatty acids. Match intake of total energy (calories) to overall energy needs. Limit salt (sodium chloride) intake.”

This, compared to only one rule: eat a high fiber diet. Those following this simple diet gained nearly all the benefit of those following the AHA diet. (Remember, this was for weight loss).

But how to choose a high-fiber diet when our supermarkets are full of sub-optimal stuff?

Harvard Health has the answer. In a 2013 study published in Public Health Nutrition, Harvard Health researchers developed a simple method to allow shoppers to choose healthy, whole-grain, high fiber products. They call it the 10-in-1 rule.

The simplicity is alluring. When shopping for bread, breakfast bars, pasta, chips, or any such related carbohydrates, pick the ones with the lowest “total carbohydrates to dietary fiber” ratio, no more than ten to one. Compare the nutrition labels on various offerings, and choose those where dietary fiber is at least 10% (more is better) of total carbohydrates.

Refer to the nearby depiction of a nutrition label. Note that total carbohydrates per serving is 28 grams, while dietary fiber is 9 grams. The dietary fiber is far more than 10% of the total carbohydrates (2.8g). This is indeed a high fiber choice.

What you will find is that that simple guideline will automatically steer you away from foods which are high in simple carbohydrates, sugars, and trans fats. A simpler shopping guide could not be found.

But you may find that some old favorites do not measure up. You may need to switch to whole-wheat pasta to get healthy spaghetti. Or that the white flour tortillas at the local grocer aren’t nearly as healthy as the whole-wheat variety from another supermarket. Or that you may need to change your brand of bread, because a much healthier option has been found. All this based on a simple ratio, no calculator required.

A rather whirlwind tour, but remember these points:

·         A high fiber diet (especially one rich in beans) is correlated with longevity

·         A high fiber diet is a simple way to lose weight

·         A high fiber diet is simple to shop for using the 10-in-1 rule

In the end, you must eat the foods that please you. But perhaps this will give you pause, and readiness, to try other options. Your microbiota will thank you. And their applause is thunderous.

From flint scrapers to wrenches in space

Larry's knife

In the beginning, prehistoric humans each made their own tools. If you needed a flint scraper to clean a hide, you made it yourself, chipping the edge to make it sharp. And then you used it, after cornering that wildebeest and bringing it down. You created and used your own tools, furthering the chief goal of survival by obtaining food and maintaining shelter and defending the homeland.

But over time, it became clear that one member of the clan was better at making scrapers and knives than anyone else. Let’s call him Larry. As the clan grew into a tribe, the chief appointed Larry to make things. Relieved of hunting duties, Larry churned out the best flint scrapers and knives in the valley. He traded them for food – the hunters and gatherers fed him in exchange for his sharp, sturdy tools. 

As families grew to clans, clans to tribes, and tribes to states, specialization became necessary and common. Hunters hunted. Fishermen fished. Farmers farmed. Weavers wove. Toolmakers made. And traders traded.

The basis for human production and commerce had been established.

The Deutsches Museum in Munich, Germany, chronicles this history of human activity in a wonderful series of exhibits. The evolution from early axes and bowed drills to steam powered lathes to the complex computer controlled milling machines of today is detailed. The exhibits make one thing clear – humans have excelled in learning how to make things with spectacular precision and in large quantities.

We have become exceedingly clever at removing material to achieve a desired result. This is what we are used to. It is called subtractive manufacturing. To make a wrench, we can start with a blank of steel, cut or drill out portions we don’t want, and finish the surfaces all to a precise plan. The wrench emerges from the block by the application of energy and human intelligence. In similar fashion, Larry’s scrapers emerged from chunks of flint. Michelangelo’s forms emerged from blocks of marble. And Toyota Camrys emerge from piles of raw materials.

The common thread in all this is the design, the plan, the vision, the details of the thing to be built.

We can extract out this essence of the thing, which describes it in precise detail, and represent it in a computer file. The dimensions, the angles, the faces, all precisely specified, the thing now exists, born from our imagination. All we need to do is manufacture it.

But instead of our historical approach of cutting and drilling and milling, we can now do something novel.

Three-dimensional (3D) printing is a technique for manufacturing things. Rather than subtractive, it is additive, with thin layers successively laid down in accordance with the plan, the 3D model, so that the thing slowly grows into existence. It seems like magic, but only because we are so accustomed to milling and drilling. But in a way, it is more natural. After all, cabbages and robins and human beings are all constructed according to a plan (their DNA) by addition, not subtraction, of materials.

While 3D printing is relatively new, it is rapidly gaining capability. Entrepreneurs at universities and start-ups are competing to develop improvements. An Australian company recently announced a new method they claim will be 25-100 times faster than existing technologies. This will be a race, and it will accelerate enormously in our lifetimes, driven by advancing computer power and materials science. It is human magic.

NASA is onboard.   In December, the agency emailed a wrench to the International Space Station. The design file of a ratchet wrench was transmitted to the station where it was downloaded to a 3D printer. Four hours later, the wrench emerged. Imagine the importance of this to a future moon base or Mars colony, where the delay of a resupply mission might be months or years.

NASA 3-D printed ratchet wrench

How about obtaining a replacement part for an old weed whacker that’s long out of production? No problem, Lowe’s Home Improvement has announced that they will soon install 3D printers in select stores. In addition to predefined design files, you will also be able to send your own computer models to Lowe’s for printing, and drop by later to pick up the finished product.

We are coming full circle. Soon we might each make our own stuff, if we so desire, unique to our individual wants and wishes. Larry would be pleased.