Why would I urge this?

I like watching Modern Marvels on History Channel and How’d They Make That on the Science Channel – and among my favorite shows are those that show how modern food is produced. I also had the pleasure of touring the Ben & Jerry’s factory over the summer and recently listened to this fantastic interview by Russ Roberts of an executive from the Frito Lay corporation. Consider the potato chip.

Do you know how many hands actually get put on a bag of potato chips from the time it is a tuber in the ground until the time it ends up on the shelf in your favorite store? At most two. And Frito Lay is trying to get it down to 1. Let’s think about what this kind of an accomplishment means. It means that potatoes are planted, weeded, fertilized, de-pested, de-fungused, harvested, packed, transported to the potato chip plant, taken from the train into a washer, then they are peeled, then they are cut, then they are cooked, coated with a little salt and oil (or other seasonings) then they are tested (each and every one of them) for shape, size and how well cooked it is, bad ones are discarded, and good ones allowed to continue, then they are packaged, placed in boxes, shipped in trucks, transported from truck to store shelf (there are warehouses in various places in between here), and then placed neatly and carefully on the shelf.

And through all of that, at most two pairs of hands touch the potato, and really none touch the actual food product at all (the worker who stocks the shelf is touching the finished product, a sealed and safe bag). Potato chips can be baked and new ways to cutting up salt can deliver the same salty flavor with considerably less sodium per chip. Some chips are baked and have no salt. The factories and machines are all sanitized and cleaned regularly, no dirty contaminated hands touch the food during any part of the process, the sealed bags are air tight and preserve freshness of this potato for months, no other customers put their hands on your food, and the food is available 12 months of the year. That a giant bag of the best chips cost $3.99 is a marvel. That no one I can remember has ever become sick or ill from consuming a potato chip is truly a marvel – compare that to what potatoes used to do to people even a few hundred years ago – they are not exactly naturally a food product fit for human consumption. Or check this out.

There’s nothing wrong with farm to table, it is a great notion. But to suggest (it’s beyond suggesting, isn’t it) that there is some kind of environmental, health, economic or moral superiority of that process over “processed” foods like Lays Chips is not giving a fair shake to the processed foods we enjoy. I propose that these processed foods are true wonders of our modern world and indeed are safer, more economical and perhaps even more environmentally friendly than almost anyone gives them credit for.

All hail the potato chip! All hail the tortilla chip! And yes, Frito Lay has me on their payroll too. It’s actually hard keeping up with all the people paying me to say these things: Exxon, the Kochs, and now Frito Lay. What AM I going to do with all of this money? Oh, I know, I am stuck in a vicious cycle whereupon the company pays me and then my only choice is to consume the goods they corner the market with.

Question: what level or growth rate of the population is “just right?” By the way, Hansen is half-right. Population growth did fall sharply in the Great Depression. But as Benjamin Anderson points out, this was likely due to the Great Depression.

Here is a difference between the animal and the man. Both the jay-hawk and the man eat chickens, but the more jay-hawks the fewer chickens, while the more men the more chickens. Both the seal and the man eat salmon, but when a seal takes a salmon there is a salmon the less, and were seals to increase past a certain point salmon must diminish; while by placing the spawn of the salmon under favorable conditions man can so increase the number of salmon as more than to make up for all he may take, and thus, no matter how much men may increase, their increase need never outrun the supply of salmon.

Here is an excerpt from his introduction to the issue of population growth in his masterpiece, The Ultimate Resource:

“After performing the most exact calculation possible…I  have found that there is scarcely one- tenth as many people on the earth as in ancient times…the population of the earth decreases every day, and if this continues the earth will be nothing but a desert”.
Charles Louis de Secondat Montesquieu, 1721, in Cerf and Navasky, 1984, p. 299.

The facts of human population growth are simple.
Paul Ehrlich, “World Population: A Battle Lost?”, in Reid and Lyon, 1972, p. 12).

Chapter 22: Table of Contents
Population Growth Rates
The Approaching Victory Against Premature Death
Summary

Schoolchildren “know” that the world’s environment and food situation have been getting worse. And the children’s books leave no doubt that population size and growth are the villains. As the Golden Stamp Book of Earth and Ecology says, “Can the earth survive this many people?…If the population continues to explode, many people will starve. About half of the world’s population is underfed now, with many approaching starvation…. All of the major environmental problems can be traced to people – more
specifically, to too many people.”

This child’s text distills into simplest form the popular adults’ books and articles about population and resources. And Herbert London’s study of schoolbooks shows this text to be representative. Indeed, the National Education Association in 1980 published a guide for teachers that says “Food production is losing the race with the population explosion, and a massive famine within the next decade seems probable”. It then goes on to forecast across-the-board worsening conditions in natural resources and the
environment.

But these propositions that are given to children with so much assurance are either unproven or wrong. (Indeed, the NEA 1980 forecast has already been proven incontrovertibly wrong; it would be interesting to know what the NEA says now.) This chapter deals with the demographic facts. The next chapter considers various forecasts, and the following chapter examines the dynamics of the birthrate and of population growth, in order to lay the foundation for the economic discussion of these issues in the
rest of Part II.

Indeed, schoolchildren increasingly “know” these foregoing facts to be true. If you watched the Super Bowl, the only reason the Audi ad was even a twinge funny was because there is much truth to it. I would remind readers to reread the end of the above section carefully. Simon met his critics head on with facts, empirical work and evidence supported by sound economic theory. Can his critics say the same? The large body of alarmist work is based on technical forecasts, superstition, and a complete ignorance of economic theory. Yet the alarmists’ stories still seem to win the day.

The beauty of the human mind and human ingenuity is that the internet and advanced modern technology have made millions of people aware of the work and ideas of Julian Simon. Indeed, I would not have been aware of his work without it. And now his work is an important chunk of what each and every one of my hundreds of students learn each year.

A 20%-30% recovery rate, which would be typical for this kind of field, would imply recoverable reserves of 600 million to 900 million barrels of oil equivalent, said Mr. Hutton.

…

The Tiber well, 250 miles southeast of Houston, Texas, is in 1,259 meters of water and was drilled to a total depth of 10,685 meters, “making it one of the deepest wells ever drilled by the oil and gas industry,” the company said.

I’m sure this was accidental. I am sure that without the chance to earn some income from it that these sources would continue to be found. I am sure that some planner would have thought it feasible to drill a hole over 6.6 miles deep into the earth just to get some oil. And I am sure that if some public servant were smart enough and risk-seeking enough to do it, that he could deliver it to us for the equivalent of $70 per barrel. Yup. I believe it.

That was in the gift shop. A little earlier I finished reading the following placquard:

“The slash-and-burn agricultural practice of these early ____ meant they had to move their villages every 15 to 25 years to find fresh sources of fertile soil, firewood, and game. This has made it difficult to arrive ata definite sequence for the Neuretral, Erie and Wenro settlements that were in Western New York at various times prior to 1655. By 1655, the ______ had pushed westward into the Niagara Frontier and displacesd the last of the local tribes. This ten became the hunting territory of the _____, the westernmost of the confederacy, whose main villages were in the Genesee Valley until 1779, when they were destroyed.”

Of course, they are referring to the Iroquois nation of native Americans … and that was right next to a display talking about how they lived in harmony with the environment.

And yes, that is our daughter Amelia. Her favorite object in the whole world is waddles her stuffed (soon to be fricaseed) penguin. At least when we are at the museum with our family, we can talk to her.