What Am I Working On

Here's my quarterly update on new things I've been working on at work
since the last update on March 20 (you can read past posts for my
ground rules on these quarterly updates):

* Helping draft an agreement between a municipality and a transit
authority to coordinate land use, private development, and
infrastructure investment around two transit stops

* Determining how much public subsidy is needed to make feasible a
proposed office building in an older, struggling municipality

* Re-running the numbers for a tax increment financing analysis we did
two years ago, accounting for update projections on new developments
to be added within the district

* Analyzing the relative risk of foreclosure of city versus suburban houses

* Forecasting economic indicators related to the valuation of a local
suburban shopping mall

* Quantifying the economic impact of historic preservation initiatives

* Coming up with an algorithm to more efficiently calculate a
municipality's tax base

SHRINK YOUR WORLD

A nice post by Al Hsu over at The Suburban Christian: "High Gas Prices and a Return to Local Parishes." Here's a comment I left on his site:

Al, a nice post and a good word! I've always maintained that a nice side effect (maybe a main effect?!) of a more localized lifestyle is the greater opportunity for "chance" encounters - with neighbors, congregants, co-workers. Versus the isolating, "have to make special effort and plan ahead in order to actually see people outside of our usual rhythm of life" nature of low-density living. Hopefully, people that follow your advice and "shrink" their world will be pleasantly surprised to see the gain in their depth of relationships as they "bump into" more and more familiar faces. Thanks for sharing.

CITY LIFE

While on the train to DC earlier this week, I finished a delightful little book called "City Life," by Witold Rybczynski. The author's descriptions of a variety of cities, mostly in North America, made me thankful I've been able to travel as much as I have, as well as lament that I haven't traveled more. Cities are fascinating places, and the more I see and experience the more I want to see and experience more.

Much has been said about the growth of the suburbs - and indeed it's where populations are growing, and suburb-to-suburb commutes are replacing many of the traditional hub and spoke metropolitan patterns - but with gas prices and environmental awareness both on the rise, I wonder if our future in this country, and in the world, is an urban future. If so, would that people arrive there not unwillingly, but pleasantly surprised with the beauty and intricacy of the textures, smells, and sights of city life.

BULLISH ON REAL ESTATE: PHILADELPHIA, 2008

I got a chance to pinch-hit for one of my colleagues at work and
address the Urban Land Institute Philadelphia Young Leaders group earlier this week. They were expecting to hear a detailed analysis of
the local residential real estate market, which is my colleague's
specialty, so while I couldn't talk nearly as eloquently as my
colleague, I did feel I needed to touch on the issue.

"Bullish on Real Estate: Philadelphia, 2008" was the title of my
presentation, one I admitted in my introduction might cause the
audience to tune out on account of thinking me either oblivious or
dumb. Hopefully, I am neither; I really do think Philadelphia circa
2008 is a good place and time to buy. Three reasons:

1. Philly's fundamentals are strong. We're not auto-dependent, we
have great natural and cultural amenities, and we're hosting more and
more "cool" events (X Games, MTV Real World, Live 8). Increasingly,
people are going to want to live in places that can be described like
that.

2. Transit-oriented development opportunities abound. As gas prices
rise, locations near transit stops will increase in value. Well, most
of Philly is near a transit line. We have to fix some pretty major
structural issues - high labor costs, taxes, property assessments,
City/SEPTA relationship - but there's momentum to make those fixes.

3. More and more jobs are locating in Philly. The Cira Centre, the
Comcast Center, and the proposed American Commerce Center represent
almost 3 million square feet of office space, that is filled or will
be filled by corporations that are either coming from outside the
region or could have left the region but for the existence of this
brand-new, Class A space. That's a lot of jobs right in the heart of
Philadelphia.

I understand that the subprime meltdown and national lows in consumer
confidence have people feeling quite bearish and skittish. But
long-term, I'm feeling quite optimistic about the City of Brotherly
Love. I've made my investment, and my prediction is that many others
will want to do the same.

Hard Work

I have a pretty hard job. It's not the kind of thing where you can
mail it in; on the contrary, every day I have to bring my "A" game, as
all we do is serve clients who expect no less. The work requires
constant networking, reading, writing, thinking, processing, and
problem-solving. And I love darn near every minute of it.

But yesterday I did some really hard work. I took a personal day and
prepped my daughter's room for painting. In an old house like ours,
in which people do the strangest things - for example, the phone cord
that ran alongside a groove in the trim had been painted over - this
is a multi-step, all-day process. Chip off old paint and wallpaper,
patch holes and cracks, sand everything smooth, clean off all the
walls, give the baseboards a good scrub with water and rags, tape
around windows and doors, put down painter's plastic, and, finally,
prime the walls. I'll leave the fun part - putting on the actual
paint - to my wife.

I got done a hair earlier than I had anticipated, even after a
thorough cleaning of the general area, so I decided to take my work
day outside. Raking, sweeping, breaking up fallen branches - a
surprising amount of clean-up in an alley less than eight feet wide
and a backyard the size of a postage stamp.

I hit the showers pretty smelly, and achy all over to boot. But with
a room all ready to be painted and a trash bag full of leaves and dirt
sitting on the side of my house, I feel a sense of accomplishment that
rivals the euphoria of hitting "Send" on a final report to a client.
I might have taken a day off, but I still did hard work.

More Press for "Dear Zachary"

More press for my friend's "Dear Zachary" documentary. Rock on, Kurt!

***

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, Jun 25, 2008 at 12:16 PM
Subject: "Dear Zachary" to launch MSNBC Films label / plays to
standing ovations at Silverdocs

Hello Everyone,

Kurt here; hope you're having a great June. I'm writing with some
very exciting news that I've been dying to tell you all for some time
now...and at last I'm allowed to, as the paperwork is now done and the
company has issued a press release...

"Dear Zachary" has been acquired by MSNBC and will be the first film
to launch its newly formed MSNBC Films division, a platform through
which they will be presenting provocative & award-winning films on
television, while also supporting films during their festival run and
theatrical release. It will have its North American television
premiere on MSNBC later this fall following a theatrical release that
is currently being negotiated and which I hope to be able to announce
in the next month. I do know for certain, however, that it will be
playing theatrically for a week in both New York City & Los Angeles
during the month of August - which it must do by August 31st to
qualify for Academy Awards consideration, which I'm contractually
obliged to do for MSNBC - though I do not know the exact dates & times
of those screenings just yet. I should know in a couple of weeks and
will send that information along as soon as I have it. That will be a
wonderful opportunity for all of my good friends in Los Angeles & New
York who have been repeatedly asking, "When do we get to see this
movie?" to finally do so. :) There are also several more festivals
in the film's future, which will be announced as the festivals
announce their slates...

A few articles have broken on line today about the MSNBC deal and I've
been told there will likely be more in Wednesday's print versions of
Variety & The Hollywood Reporter:

http://www.indiewire.com/buzz/documentary.html
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6573084.html
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117988009.html?categoryid=13&cs=1
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/news/e3i39a618183fe30fd51131ecbecaaa70a6

While I can't talk specifics about the deal, the proceeds from this
whole arrangement - which will, of course, be going to the Dr. Bagby
Scholarship at Latrobe Area Hospital and the Dr. Andrew Bagby and son
Zachary Bursary at Memorial University of Newfoundland - look to be
more than I dared hope for when I began this venture. They'll come in
installments over the course of the next two years, and I'm thrilled
that my dream of this movie helping to fund these scholarships is
finally becoming a reality. Thank you again to all of you out there
who helped make this happen!! In addition to the wonderful execs at
MSNBC, I have to give an enormous thanks to our wizardly distribution
advisor Josh Braun and the whole gang at his company, Submarine
Entertainment. He brought everyone together and made this all happen,
and I couldn't be more thankful or pleased. And another round of
thanks to Sebastian Twardosz for introducing me to Josh in the first
place! :)

In other exciting news, "Dear Zachary" played in Washington, D.C. this
past weekend at Silverdocs, the AFI/Discovery Channel Documentary Film
Festival, once again to standing ovations at both screenings.
Silverdocs nominated "Dear Zachary" for its inaugural Writers Guild of
America Documentary Screenplay Award, recognizing excellence in
writing for documentary films. It was nominated alongside 6 other
world-class productions (including the new film from last year's
documentary Oscar winner), so it was quite a humbling honor to be
included in such company. The whole festival was a fantastic
experience.

I mentioned in my last update that prior to the Canadian premiere at
Hot Docs in April, I sent letters to all 400+ members of Canadian
Parliament requesting the opportunity to screen this film for them. I
have started to hear back from several of them and have been finding
some supporters in the legislature, with whom I'm continuing to talk,
to work toward setting up a screening of "Dear Zachary" for Parliament
in the fall when they reconvene (they're currently on summer break).
Will keep you posted!

Lastly, for those interested, another wonderful review came out on
Ain't It Cool News a couple of weeks ago:

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/36945

Once again, thank you to all of you who helped us get to this point.
We couldn't have done it without you! I'll be in touch soon with
updates on festivals and theatrical play dates.

Happy Wednesday,
Kurt

www.dearzachary.com

Powerful News

Ever since I first visited the Newseum several years ago, I've vowed
to return once it moved into its new digs on Pennsylvania Avenue.
Yesterday, I took a day off from work and took the train down to DC to
check it out. I was not disappointed.

If you haven't been, I don't know what to say except go, and plan to
spend the whole day. I budgeted a half day and found myself
speed-walking through entire floors. The museum has seven floors
worth of exhibits, with photos and videos you could several days
combing through. I mean, does it get more powerful than to hear from
the person who shot the photo of the Napalmed Vietnamese girl, or to
get a sense of what was going through the minds of the people who
first captured the spectacle that was Hurricane Katrina?

The museum's 9/11 exhibit was the one that got me the most misty-eyed.
I don't think I had seen the one clip, a close-up of the second plane
slicing into the second tower that caused me and the rest of the
people crowded into the small theater to gasp aloud. Riveting stuff,
everywhere you turned.

Sometimes media can seem so familiar, so easily taken for granted.
But much of what I saw at the Newseum was ordinary men and women who
captured extraordinary moments with uncanny sensitivity to the moment.
The world is forever better for their having told the story, whether
with words or images.

REMEMBERING EVANS

Sam Evans passed away earlier this year at the age of 105. He was a giant in local politics, a man of tremendous influence. The Inky reported this morning on his wake inside City Hall, the first ever in the city's history.

I am one of tens of thousands who has at least one Sam Evans anecdote. My brush with him was five years back, when he was 100. We were hosting a luncheon for the First Lady of Cote d'Ivoire, and some of the people that I met at the event told me Sam Evans was there and that I had to meet him.

I have to confess that at the time, I hadn't heard of him, but I sensed this was someone important to meet. What impressed me about the man was his mental sharpness, not to mention that he seemed in great physical condition. We shook hands, exchanged a few comments, and that was that.

I was not able to attend the wake, but would like to offer my respects and praise for a man who was truly a difference maker, and someone who's name and legacy will continue on for many generations. Philadelphia is richer for his efforts, and no one should forget it.

RIDING TRANSIT, A PLEASANT SURPRISE

Am I the only one who gets a skip in my step when I see big numbers at the local gas station? Here's yet another article singing the praises of rising prices at the pump: "Five Reasons to Love $4 Gas." Thanks to Greg Mankiw's blog for the link.

One point I did want to make is that a lot of talk about increased transit ridership as people make the switch from driving seems to have focused on how the numbers now make sense for people to ditch their cars; but it's a lot more nuanced than that. Let's take money out of the picture for a sec - I know, hard to do for an economist. Here's the trade-off: your schedule and your private space but headaches associated with traffic and parking if you drive, versus time to read but planning is required to catch the train on time if you ride transit and you have to share your space with others.

My hope is that as gas has spiked up to $4+, people are making the switch to transit because of the monetary factor. But once they've gotten in the habit of riding transit, many are realizing that the non-monetary fork in the road that I described above is overwhelmingly in favor of ditching the car. I doubt that gas prices will come down, but my point is that even if they did, transit ridership might hold steady, as people decide that they prefer riding transit for qualitative reasons.

I could be dead wrong here: Americans are stereotypically hard-wired to want things on their timetable and to want their own, climate-controlled private space. I'm just offering that the car/transit choice isn't just about which costs more in money, but what our preferences are in terms of the quality and characteristics of the time we spend during our commutes. The assumption for many, absent experiencing both choices firsthand, was that driving was qualitatively better as well as cheaper; now that it's not cheaper and people are testing out riding transit, maybe some'll find out that a transit commute is surprisingly better in quality, and the fact that it is also financially cheaper is a nice side benefit.

LONG-TERM CHANGES

I swear I read this article after my June 12 post on long-term changes that high fuel costs will likely lead to, even though the article came out before my post. I buy that McMansions are losing attractiveness, cities are gaining attractiveness, and ease of commuting becomes a business location factor; although I'm a little squeamish about his call to sink massive amounts of federal money into finding the next big alternative fuel. But hey, three out of four ain't bad.

Sichuan Earthquake

A colleague of mine who is the board chair for the CDC in Chinatown
here in Philadelphia recently sent around a letter to remind folks
that China still needs help to unbury itself from last month's
earthquake catastrophe. I hadn't made a contribution before but have
done so in response to this letter; I hope you'll consider doing the
same.

***

Dear friends-

I am writing to personally ask for your help in getting aid to the
survivors of one of the worst earthquakes in decades that struck in
Sichuan , China. Even a month after the disaster there is a great
need for supplies, food, medicine, housing and fresh water. There
have been around 70,000 deaths and still close to 20,000 missing in
the disaster.

I have been in touch with Paul Michele who has been working to get
supplies to a group called Half The Sky which "was created in order to
enrich the lives and enhance the prospects for orphaned children in
China. We establish and operate infant nurture and preschool programs,
provide personalized learning for older children and establish loving
permanent family care and guidance for children with disabilities. It
is our goal to ensure that every orphaned child has a caring adult in
her life and a chance at a bright future." (see
http://www.halfthesky.org/work/earthquake08-healing.php#part2 for
recent pictures and info on Half The Sky). In addition, the Chinese
Red Cross is bringing relief to the hard hit areas.

A great effort is ongoing here to fill and ship a large container of
clothing, supplies and water to China on June 27th for Half The Sky.
This may be the first time that Philadelphia has sent a shipping
container to help the children of China.

So, I am asking for your help in either donating funds for water (many
cases to be bought to finish filling the container) and shipping costs
and/or to help with the loading on June 27th. Donations of $100, $50,
$25 or more are welcome and can be made payable to "PCDC" (tax
deductible). Please make sure to note that this is a donation towards
Sichuan relief, June 27th. The funds will be used to finish
purchasing water and other goods for the container and anything left
over will go directly to the Chinese Red Cross. Please include your
name and contact information.

You can send donations directly to: PCDC, 301 N 9th Street,
Philadelphia, PA 19107
Please let me know as well what you can do to help.

Signs of Grace

It was a simple enough question, yet profoundly challenging: "Describe
a time this past week in which you experienced God's presence." I
heard it at a church leadership retreat over a month ago, but continue
to hear it ringing in my ears; especially since I can seem to go days,
even days in which I have my morning devotions and think on Kingdom
things and do great acts of service, in which I fail to still myself
long enough to experience the very presence of God in my life.

When I do take the time to be still, I realize why I don't do this
more often: the silence is frightening. I am filled with shame and
discomfort and dread. Some is appropriate: I am a sinful man, and I
have finally slowed down enough to remember that I am in the presence
of Almight God. And some is terribly inappropriate: absent my actions
and accomplishments, my strivings and doings, I feel painfully
vulnerable and naked, as if with those things I could somehow hold my
own against God.

Thankfully, when I do take the time to be still long enough to let the
shame and discomfort and dread flood over me, I realize why I ought to
do this more often: such feelings are replaced with a sense of relief
and awe and conviction. For to be in the presence of God, even and
especially naked of any armor we seek to shield ourselves with, is to
recall that our God embraces us, loves us, accepts us.

What a profound reality: to be accepted by God Almighty. So I ask
myself again: why is it that I so busy myself that I can go days and
realize later that I haven't taken the time to experience His
presence?

PEDESTRIAN UNFRIENDLY

A big element of transit-oriented development, new urbanism, and all those related concepts is pedestrian friendliness. Agreed; but sometimes easier to understand in concept than picture in reality. What is clear as day to me are examples of pedestrian unfriendliness.

I walked as a pedestrian in one such place this morning. I had a meeting in a part of Philadelphia that is largely off the major transit grid, but does have bus service. So even though taking that bus line would entail coordinating my schedule around its twice-an-hour cycle and walking a total of 25 minutes before and after the bus leg, I decided to forgo my car and get there by bus.

The ride was pleasant and air-conditioned, and got me to the drop-off point early. So I could afford a more leisurely pace. Good thing, because I was soon on roads without sidewalks. The good news is that it was very nature-rich, a nice treat of chirping birds and wild vegetation for my walking pleasure. The bad news is I had to keep a watchful eye and ear for speeding motorists, so I could duck off the road and onto, well, nature.

In fact, on the way back to work from my meeting, a car sped past me, stopped, and then yelled over to me: "You want a ride?" The middle-aged woman seemed nice enough to not raise my safety alarms, so I hopped in. She said she did this a lot; since the place was so pedestrian-unfriendly, it was her little good deed for the day to get some poor pedestrian (like me) off the road and onto the main, sidewalked thoroughfare. Within minutes, she dropped me off and I gave her a warm thanks, happy to be walking on a sidewalk dedicated to walkers and not a road dedicated to vehicles much larger than walkers.

I've written about pedestrian-unfriendly places before, like Saratoga and San Jose. I guess there are places like that in my very own city as well.

A SINGLE POINT OF ACCOUNTABILITY

You know the proverb. “It takes a village to raise a child.” Unfortunately, when it comes to publicly delivered services to children here in Philadelphia, that village isn’t very well coordinated. At least that’s one of the findings of a recent report by my alma mater: ”Delivering Youth Services in Philadelphia: The Integrated Youth Services Project.” [warning: large pdf file] Contrast that to the single point of accountability that Mayor Bloomberg set up to deal with the issue of homelessness in New York City: ”Ending Chronic Homelessness: A Conversation with Commissioner Robert Hess.”

Providing social services is a daunting, complex, and multi-layered task, necessarily involving numerous agencies and programs. But the public begs for a single point of accountability, and each participating entity can do its work together if it knows it’s feeding into one place that will help make sense of everything. Such is the dirty little secret about that dirty word, bureaucracy: if organized right, it’s actually a good thing when it comes to delivering services.

Mayor Nutter has done a good job of this, the chief example being vesting Andy Altman’s position with authority over both planning and economic development, so that the two sets of functions actually talk with one another and get coordinated in a way that maximizes public benefit. Less talked about, but just as important, is what he’s put under Don Schwarz’s office: human services AND behavioral health AND supportive housing AND recreation AND Fairmount Park AND the libraries; it’s a village, and hopefully, under his leadership, it’ll be a somewhat coordinated one.

THE LONG-TERM CHANGES ARE HARDEST

As gas crept up two or three years ago, all you heard was more complaining, but not a lot of changes in behavior, even at the margins. I wondered at the time what the pain point was for Americans. Answer, apparently: $4 a gallon.

Here we are starting to see some short-term and medium-term responses. Anecdotally, bike racks and rail lines are filling up, SUV sales are down, and Vespers are cool again. Short-term and medium-term responses are somewhat easy to put into motion: we can bundle our car-oriented errands, change how we get to work, and even buy a different type of vehicle the next time we make that big purchase.

What will be interesting to see play out is the existence and scale of any long-term change that rising gas prices and increased awareness of environmental issues will bring. Will we see less far-flung suburban developments, as people factor a $20 a day commute into the cost of living there? Will Phoenix and Las Vegas cool off in terms of population growth, as residents are forced to pay the true price of making oases in the middle of deserts? Will people unclench and allow density in their neighborhoods, even if it means that “those people” will move in and use the same supermarkets and parks and schools?

It’s relatively easy, even trendy, to substitute plastic bags for burlap sacks, and to ride the rails into work instead of firing up the two-ton steel box. But the American psyche’s need for space, its preference for resort locations, and its disdain for associating with riff-raff, will make the long-term changes the hardest to make.

Worryingly, those are the changes that will really make a difference for our nation and for our planet. Let’s hope we can make them.

CREATIVE PHILADELPHIA

Gritty, blue-collar Philly doesn’t always conjure creative associations with folks; and yet, according to an artists’ resource guide put out by Pew Fellowships in the Arts [warning: large pdf file], there are a ton of resources for writers, dancers, videographers, and other artsy folks. Speaking of which, here’s a cool website I just found today, if you’re wondering where and when artists are getting together to do artsy things: Artist LINC Philadelphia. So Philly artists, unite; and non-Philly artists, come to Philly!

MONEY FROM OIL

As the Burj Dubai Skyscraper climbs to once unfathomable heights, my boss likes to say it's the perfect symbol of our country's inability to tax gas appropriately. Here's a great article that describes why artificially low gas prices - yes, even at $4 a gallon - actually take money out of our pockets and send them abroad: "At $4, Everybody Gets Rational". And the killer quote: "Goldman Sachs is predicting we will be paying $6 by next year. Why have the extra $2 (above the current $4) go abroad? Have it go to the U.S. Treasury as a gasoline tax and be recycled back into lower payroll taxes."

DATA-DRIVEN DECISION-MAKER

A nice piece in today's Inky about the City's new Managing Director, Camille Cates Barnett: "One Brisk City Boss." Our firm has had some interactions with her and found her impressively intelligent, driven, and demanding. It's great to see how data-driven the Nutter administration seeks to be in terms of its decision-making: it makes more more public accountability, less backroom deals, and better results.

It's particularly rewarding for me to see how many Felsonians are intimately involved in this revolution in public sector management; witness my colleagues' quote in the article about connecting Philadelphia's population loss to the relatively low number of direct flights to Philadelphia International from key immigrant countries. So for those of you "go-go's" looking for good governance movements around the world, keep an eye out on this stodgiest, most politically infamous of US big cities.

PHILLY'S HOPPING

There are at least three big events going on in town, of which I'll hope to subject my family to at least one of them:

1. The Odunde Festival, which annually attracts well over a half a million visitors, and is an amazing West African extravaganza of food, culture, and fanfare. (My firm did a study on the event's economic impact in Philadelphia last year.)

2. The Manayunk Bike Race, which only requires cyclists to scale a practically vertical street (affectionately called "The Wall") in a 14.4-mile circuit, times ten.

3. Independence Dragon Boat Regatta, which will find teams of 20 paddling down the Schuylkill River.

All are free to watch, and all will add to the flavor and buzz of Philadelphia. What a weekend!

CIRCLE OF LIFE

Do you remember Mufasa’s famous speech in “The Lion King,” about how the lions eat the antelopes, but then the lions die and turn into the grass that the antelopes eat? Now that’s sustainability. Unfortunately, we Americans are awfully good at breaking the circle and turning it into an arrow, as in: I buy it, I use it, I toss it.

Funny how more appropriate energy prices offer some of the incentive to reduce/reuse/recycle that politicians were too afraid to provide via higher tax rates. For example, here’s a story about stolen restaurant grease in San Francisco: ”Grease Stolen for Biofuel.”

At this point, it’s appropriate for me to give a shout-out to a colleague of mine who runs a company called Fry-O-Diesel, which produces ASTM-grade biodiesel from sewer trap grease and other waste greases. I love the concept: grease is an inevitable byproduct of cooking, so better to convert it to fuel than put it in our bodies or our landfills. After all, better circular use than the circular file.

The Children

I've been on a bit of a Halberstam kick of late. Having recently
finished David Halberstam's book on the 1950's called "The Fifties,"
I've turned my attention to a remarkable book called "The Children,"
which is about a group of black college students from Tennessee who
help launch the non-violence aspects of the civil rights movement. It
has been sobering to read of how segregated America was back then:
imagine living in a world in which people don't want you to share the
same drinking fountains, restaurant counters, or social events because
of the color of your skin. And it has been inspiring to read of the
courage of these students, who helped each other believe that because
their cause was so right, no matter what they had to endure in the
interim they would overcome. We have made a lot of progress since
then, but we still have a ways to go; and we will always have a lot to
learn from these Tennessee students and others who stood up to hate
and neither blinked nor hit back.

MORE BACK TO THE POOR

A common nervousness that people feel about rising energy prices is what it will mean for the poorest among us. This is a valid concern; but the economists will tell you that a bad solution to that problem is to make energy prices lower.

Despite high prices at the pump and on our utilities bills, energy costs are still artificially low, when you factor in important things like, oh I don’t know, the long-term survival of the human race. Lower prices mean more consumption than is economically optimal; truer prices lead to good things, like conservationism and innovation.

What to do about those for whom a big hike in energy prices is especially painful though? A recent economics paper confirms that these hikes are fairly regressive, in terms of causing more distress for lower-income folks than others, and that the best solution is a more aggressive give-back on income taxes, like the very effective Earned Income Tax Credit program (of which none other than Milton Friedman was a huge fan).

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: we should tax more what we want people to do less of (consume energy) and tax less what we want people to do more of (work). Even higher energy prices may seem painful to us all and particularly unfair to the poorest among us; but if we don’t start making our energy consumption decisions based on accurate assessments of their true costs, we’re all going to be in for a world of pain.