I'm Speechless....

As 2011 winds down and limps to an end, so has my blogging.

It's not that there aren't plenty of things that have caught my attention and might deserve my cunningly incisive analysis, for example:

• The bizarre and frightening GOP/TP candidate-of-the-week-club.  Surely there are more competent and compassionate possibilities than these.....
• The upside-down logic of the GOP/TP that the solution to our economic woes is to cut taxes on the wealthy and raise them on ordinary workers. I'm referring of course to the recent attempt of the GOP/TP to block an extension of the payroll tax cut while simultaneously fighting to retain cuts for the wealthy. (Actually, I commented on this somewhat prophetically in my blog last September, Punishing the Victims, Part Deux. )
• The puzzling assessment in the media and by Democratic Leaders that a measly 2-month extension of the payroll tax cut finally passed by Congress is somehow a brilliant victory.
• The stunning failure of the so-called Super Committee to produce a workable deficit reduction plan, illustrating yet again the dysfunction of our congressional leaders.
• A recent study by University of Michigan showing that the average net worth of members of congress more than doubled from 1984 to 2009, while the net worth of the average American family declined slightly, and other research that shows the growth of income inequality has tracked very closely with measures of political polarization (see also my earlier blog about our misperceptions concerning wealth inequality in America).

 And on the international front, we have sad reminders that no matter how lousy our own political and economic situation, it is a million times better than what many people around the world have to contend with:

• Peaceful protests in Syria continue to be brutally punished by a ruthless government.  A wrenching interview by Barbara Walters with "President" Assad revealed a man that was pathetically and dangerously out of touch with reality.
• The pride and promise we saw in Egypt has evaporated in a new and more violent round of demonstrations by those who seem to want nothing more than to fulfill the democratic promises they thought they had won.
• A laughably strange and crazy yet thoroughly despotic leader in North Korea dies (yeah!) but is replaced by his mini-me son who promises to be just as bad for his people and for the world (sigh).

All of these events are important developments.  But somehow I can't find the words to convey my emotional and intellectual reactions to them in any satisfying way.  The best I can do is to offer my sincerest hope that the coming year will show at least a glimmer of sanity and moderation in the world generally and in America in particular.

Happy New Year!

What It's Like To Be Robbed

The burglars broke into our house through a back window, a classically vulnerable location where it was dark, not visible by neighbors or people passing by, and adjacent to an area of vacant land where they could make their escape.

I had left the sliding windows in one of the bedrooms open slightly for ventilation and placed rods in the tracks so the windows couldn't be opened further, or so I thought.  The thieves tried one window, gave up, and then must have reached in and used a stick or something to dislodge the rod in the other window.  We know the point of entry because of the damaged screens and the muddy footprints that originated there and then tracked through the rest of the house on our brand new carpet.

This happened while we were 6500 miles away in Bhutan, a very peaceful country where the influence of Buddhism makes this kind of crime rare.  Actually it is also rare in our small Hawaiian community relative to other parts of the U.S., but it still does happen and seems to be on an uptick with the economic downturn. We learned of the break-in while we were on our trip in emails from our neighbors and from our handyman who checks our house each week while we are gone.  We have asked them NOT to contact us about major problems while we travel unless there is something we can actually do about the situation -- our philosophy is why ruin a trip when it won't accomplish anything?

In this case, though, we were able to give them instructions that turned out to be crucial.  For example, we asked them to look for our spare car keys and discovered that the thieves had taken them, possibly planning to return to steal one or both cars.  Our neighbors were able to secure the garage by parking one of their own cars in front of the door to prevent this until we returned and had the ignition locks changed.

Our attitude toward home security has always been pretty casual because we don't have a lot of expensive art, jewelery, or electronics.  Investing in an alarm system or a safe seemed hardly worth it, given the value of our potential losses.

Now we realize that our loss was far greater than we imagined -- not in monetary terms, but in the psychological impact the break-in has had on us.  The emotions we have felt have been a complex mixture of fear, anger, violation, vulnerability, contamination, loss of control, and sadness.  The sadness and anger arise from our realization that many of the items taken were more valuable to us than we thought because of their intimate sentimental meaningfulness.  For example, most of my wife's stolen jewelry was collected during our travels over the past 40+ years and although it wasn't terribly expensive, each piece was associated with a particular memory and cannot be replaced.  Our anger in this case arises partly from a sense of unfairness: the thieves got very little while we lost a great deal.

The feelings of violation and contamination were particularly strong at first, when the muddy footprints and jumbled contents of closets on the floor were vivid signs that an intruder had walked through every room and had pawed through every drawer.  Judging from the large size of the footprints, one of the burglars was male. But there were also indications that one was female -- ten pairs of my wife's shoes were gone, carefully selected from many other pairs, and some of her favorite purses and scarves.  [Male readers should consult a woman to gain an appreciation for the depth of response my wife had to this.] 

Vulnerability and loss of control are very uncomfortable feelings, and throughout our lives we go to great mental and behavioral lengths to avoid them, even when the control and security we think we have achieved is illusory. In my case this has meant spending a great deal of effort in closing the barn door after the horse has left. I modified the windows throughout the house to prevent future thieves from duplicating the successful break-in.  I installed motion activated lights to eliminate the dark areas where burglars could work undetected.  And at least for a while we have been more careful to lock doors and windows even when we leave for a short while.  We've also tried to convince ourselves that this was just a crime of opportunity and that we really don't present a juicy target to desperadoes.  Illusion or not, doing these things feels very positive.

There is some good that has come out of this.  I realize what wonderful neighbors and friends we have and how much they are willing to do on our behalf.  They provide a very comforting balance to the despicable behavior of the burglars.

I also have learned a worthwhile lesson about attachment to possessions --namely that although I can pride myself on not being beguiled by their monetary value, I have unwittingly invested a great deal of emotional capital in them. But the wonderful experiences that generated their sentimental value cannot be stolen and thieves can never truly cash in on their loot. The experiences, not the objects, make us rich.  If  I can just convince myself of the truth of this pearl of wisdom, I might even be able to feel a degree of compassion for the burglars -- the experiences they have violating other people can never bring them any real benefit.

Bummin' With Buddha In Bhutan

My wife and I recently spent about three weeks in the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan.  It has been in the news recently because the country's beloved young king got married in a stunningly exotic ceremony that made a great visual "human interest" piece for media broadcasts.  Bhutan is also known for its policy of judging the worthiness of public programs and new laws against a standard of "Gross National Happiness," a rather different approach than some of the ideas being promoted currently in our own policy debates.

As a tourist destination, Bhutan offers what many of us seek in a travel experience;  a colorful, exotic culture with a rich and important history in a beautiful physical setting.  However, this tiny country also has several unique characteristics that make it particularly fascinating. For one thing, it is a country that -- though friendly and welcoming once you're there -- has historically closed itself off from the outside world.  Tourists were not allowed in Bhutan until 1974, and even now are tightly controlled and even banned in certain areas to protect the culture.  A visitor must travel as part of a supervised group or as many do (including us) with a personal guide and driver, enter or leave the country only via the state airline, Druk Air, and spend a minimum per day of $200 (this will increase to $250 in 2012).  These policies restrict the number of tourists and their activities and so far have mitigated some of the problems mass tourism usually brings to underdeveloped countries. 

It is also a fiercely vertical country, an attraction especially to those who enjoy multi-day trekking expeditions.  We stuck to day hikes and traveling by car.  Even so, my gps measured an accumulated elevation gain of 92,000 feet as we journeyed west to east and back, crossing high mountain passes between picturesque valleys along the country's only main "highway," a very scenic but scary road 1 1/2 lanes wide in most places.  Average moving speed according to the gps was 18 mph, leading some days to what we called "Bhutan Butt Rash."

One aspect of Bhutan traditional culture that appeals to many tourists is the prominence of Buddhism in people's daily lives, especially the many colorful festivals held each year in monasteries throughout the country. Most visitors from western countries are not familiar with Buddhist beliefs, and though Bhutan's monastic rituals and ceremonies are puzzling they are exotically photogenic in the extreme.  Buddhism was first introduced around 800 a.d., but really reached a peak in the 14th-17th centuries with the establishment of hundreds of fortified monasteries call Dzongs that are now an architectural hallmark of the country (the style is similar to the famous Potala Palace in Lhasa, Tibet). The monastic order still wields great influence in the political, economic, and social institutions of Bhutan, perhaps more than any other country in the world at this time.

Possibly because of Bhutan's self-imposed isolation in modern times, traveling there is a little like taking a trip in a time machine to a Himalayan Buddhist society of the 1500's or earlier.  This is a "magical" experience in two senses of the word.  First, most visitors are charmed by what they encounter, though they probably have little understanding of it.  Second, belief in magic and supernatural powers is pervasive and at the core of everyday life.  These beliefs are not essential to Buddhism though they are often presented to visitors as if they were.  Rather, they derive from earlier religious traditions in the Himalayas that included shamanistic practices, animism, and beliefs in myriad demons and deities that controlled one's fate, and many of these beliefs were retained as Buddhism was modified to fit local sensibilities. We were repeatedly shown sites where Guru Rinpoche, the founder of Bhutanese Buddhism, subdued a local demon and then meditated for 3 months in a nearby cave, usually leaving an imprint of his body in the stone.  Even his arrival in Bhutan was magical -- he flew in on the back of a tiger who was actually a manifestation of one of his eight consorts. Many other historical figures are credited with feats of similar supernatural powers, ranging from creating a new animal from the bodies of two other species to diving under water with a lamp that did not extinguish.  It seems that the monastic order not only tolerates such beliefs but actively promotes and controls their expression -- many of the rituals performed during the yearly festivals at monasteries are based on such ideas.

The magical aspect of Bhutanese culture is perhaps not that different than similar beliefs in many other countries and religious orientations, including our own, but may be problematic in Bhutan in at least a couple of ways.  First, Bhutan is a country that is emerging from its historic isolation with a jolt. Somehow these traditional beliefs must be reconciled with the wider world that Bhutanese will encounter, and this may involve adjustment difficulties at both the personal and societal level.  Up to now there have been no challenges to magical and supernatural beliefs and I wonder if the Bhutanese monastic order has considered how to adapt to such challenges, as has been done successfully in other parts of the world where Buddhist practice is quite compatible with secular and scientific modes of thinking.

A second problem for me is that Western visitors to Bhutan come away with the mistaken impression that magical thinking is an essential characteristic of Buddhism in general -- for instance, that in order to be a Buddhist you must believe that monks can fly on the backs of tigers.  An example is a man from the U.S.we met as we left Bhutan who had just finished a National Geographic tour of the country. He really enjoyed Bhutan, he said, "but I really didn't buy all that Buddhist stuff."  National Geographic organizes high-end expeditions all over the world that supposedly provide highly informative and educational travel experiences. Yet this man's comments suggested a rather murky understanding of what he saw and rather than opening him to the possibility of an alternative religious approach the tour seems to have had the opposite effect. This is unfortunate, because my own study of Buddhism has convinced me of its value without any reliance on flying tigers.

Whatever their beliefs, the Bhutanese have an undeniable charm and gentle dignity about them that is refreshing in today's climate of strife and polarization.  Although I fear the odds are against them, I hope that they retain these "magical" qualities as their society encounters the outside world.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
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Suggested Reading:

What Makes You Not a Buddhist by Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse
Buddha by Karen Armstrong

Bankers' Math -- 0+0=5

Banks are scrambling to find new ways to charge for their services now that new regulations restrict some of their more lucrative practices, like automatically signing up people for high cost overdraft protection for debit cards, or charging merchants $.40 per debit card transaction.  I've already written about higher ATM fees, which have risen in some cases to $4 or $5.  Other increases include charges for returned items like checks or bounced electronic payments -- charges which are in principle justified, but not at the levels now being levied (for example, $30 for a declined ACH electronic transfer which requires little human intervention).   And one of my favorites is a $1 to $2 fee just to find out your balance via an ATM.

The fee hikes and increasing number of fees are bad enough, but banks are apparently reluctant to reveal publicly what their fees are so that consumers can make comparisons.  According to a research study presented in Consumer Reports, when 400 banks across the country were contacted "...fewer than half of the bank branches complied easily with a request for fee schedules. Under the Truth in Savings Act, banks are required to provide this information. However, only after two or more requests did 55 percent of branches provide fee schedules."

Of  course, providing information in a clear and informative way may have negative results for the banks.  For example, a recent study also by Consumer Reports found that only 22 percent of bank customers have opted-in for debit card overdraft protection now that new Federal regulations require banks to get permission before signing them up.

My own local bank, First Hawaiian, has recently shown that the Aloha Spirit is fine as long as it doesn't interfere with profits.

In the envelope with my monthly statement the other day was a little slip of paper detailing changes in account fees.  There were the usual hikes like those mentioned above plus a couple of particularly puzzling ones.  The first was an "Inactive Account Fee" of $10 for each month the account is considered inactive.  Does it really cost the bank $10 per month to keep an account in its electronic database when there are no transactions into or out of it?   Damn, the price of electrons must be skyrocketing!

Another one is a particularly good example of Bankers' Math.  First Hawaiian doesn't charge a fee for receiving a paper statement each month (yet).  If you elect to go Green and have only electronic statements sent to you that also is free.  However, if you choose to have both a paper and an electronic statement the fee is $5 per month, despite the fact that the electronic image used to print and mail a paper statement is likely the same one available for viewing online.

In other words, according to Bankers' Math, 0 + 0 = 5.


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Related Blogs:

Bankers' Math -- Parts Un, Deux, Trois, Quatre, Cinq

Punishing the Victims II -- The High Price of Being Poor

I yearn for the good old days when I didn't get a headache trying to follow the arguments of our political leaders and when I had the feeling that even though they disagreed they were willing to compromise to keep the government running.

Before the recent budget deadlock that nearly brought the country to a standstill, I voiced my disagreement with the Republican/Tea Party strategy for balancing the books because it seemed to put more of the burden on those least able to afford it, Americans of modest means who have suffered most from a recession caused by the investment decisions of Wall Street bankers.

As a central feature of their strategy, the Republicans/Tea Partiers (RTP) adamantly refused to increase revenue by allowing the Bush-era tax breaks for corporations and the wealthy to expire, and even proposed lowering their tax rates while simultaneously cutting spending for social programs that benefit ordinary people. Another idea was to reduce the amount companies have to pay workers, the logic being that this will stimulate growth by increasing profits. For example, one RTP proposal was to repeal an act that requires companies receiving federal contacts to pay workers at least at the level of prevailing local salaries and benefits.  In short, the conservative economic strategy is to increase the income of corporations and the wealthy but cut the income and benefits of middle and lower class workers.

And now the latest development, which is perhaps the most difficult for me to follow, is that the RTP may push for allowing the temporary payroll tax break enacted as part of the Tax Relief Act of 2010 to expire next year, according to a recent AP report.   Payroll taxes are levied only on payroll income, not income derived from capital gains, dividends, or other investment sources, and only on salaries up to $106,000.  In other words, these taxes apply primarily to people in the middle and lower income brackets. Allowing the tax reduction to expire would increase revenue and help balance the budget, but it is exactly the kind of revenue increase the RTP fought so fiercely against during the debt deadlock when the expiration was for temporary income tax breaks for the wealthy.

The Regressive logic of this seeming contradiction is expressed by Texas Republican Representative Jeb Hensarling's comment, "...not all tax relief is created equal for the purposes of helping to get the economy moving again."  That is, tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy are good because they may lead to investment and expansion, but tax cuts for workers aren't so good because they only allow families to buy groceries and pay their mortgage.  Bottom line: to get the economy moving again, lower taxes on corporations and the wealthy and raise them on middle and low income workers.

The latest wrinkle in this drama is in President Obama's just-announced Jobs Package, in which he proposes temporarily continuing and increasing the reduction in Payroll Tax for workers (which the RTP should be against) and also reducing the employer contribution as well (which the RTP should support).  The upcoming gymnastics of Regressive logic will be "interesting" to watch.

Time to buy more aspirin......

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Related Blogs:
Punishing the Victims (Part Un)
Misperceiving Wealth in America

Reflecting on 9/11 Ten Years Later: Unity & Civility No More

It is hard to believe it has been 10 years since the World Trade Center attacks.  So much has happened in the world and in my personal life since that moment that it seems much more distant.

I suppose every generation has a few world events that are so personally significant they stand out it photographic detail in peoples' memories -- you can picture where you were and what you were doing at the time with great clarity.  For me there have been three such instances in my lifetime so far:  the assassination of JFK, the moon landing, and the 9/11 attacks.   I note that two of these three are negative events -- a ratio I wish was reversed.

9/11 occurred just a couple of months after my wife and I had moved here to Hawai'i to enjoy our retirement.  Given the time difference between Hawai'i and the East Coast, the attacks had occurred in the early morning hours while we were sleeping.  I had gotten up around 6:30 and as part of my usual routine I was enjoying a cup of coffee while checking email and reading some online news.  It was then that I saw the incredible headlines that the Trade Center had been attacked and had fallen.  At first I thought it was a hoax -- somebody must have hacked into the news website and planted a false story, so I checked many other online news sources, and then turned on the television to find that the story was not only true but even more horrific than I had imagined.  I woke my wife and tried to explain what had happened -- I can still picture the confusion and disbelief on her face.

In the days and weeks that followed there was a heart-warming outpouring of compassion, sympathy and support from people not just in the U.S. but from all parts of the world.  Within the U.S. there was a feeling of unity and national identity that was greater than any other time I can remember, though I suspect older Americans might point to similar reactions connected with WWII.  Political and social differences were secondary to collective concerns of security, mourning, and recovery.

Sadly, the unity and civility of that time seems to have evaporated.  Instead we now have a social climate that is characterized by the divisiveness and intransigence we witness daily among political leaders, many of whom seem to regard compassion as a budget line item to be chopped and programs for the public good as extravagances to be dismantled.

9/11 showed the positive spirit of people in the face of  tremendous adversity.  The spontaneous acts of selflessness and compassion that were commonplace showed that we have the potential to overcome our differences and work for the common good.  I hope it doesn't take another 9/11 to make that potential manifest itself again.

Why Is That Geezer Smiling?

[*** Warning***  This is another in my series of Geezerhood blogs. Instead of reading this you may want to do something more fun, like checking your investment portfolio.  Related blogs to avoid are given at the end.]

There are a lot of negative stereotypes about aging.  One of them is that most older people suffer from a variety of negative emotions, like depression, remorse, and despair as they confront the problems and challenges of aging. Old people are just not happy campers.

Like many stereotypes, this one sounds reasonable. For example, depression and sadness seem like a natural reaction to the loss of friends and family, declining physical and mental abilities, and to the contemplation of one's unfulfilled goals and dreams.  The stereotype of the sad geezer is especially strong among young people, but even older people seem to share this pessimistic view (Hummert, et. al,1994).  In fact, just reading this is making me a bit depressed.

However, there is ample empirical evidence that even though it sounds reasonable, the stereotype is wrong, and that older people report generally higher levels of happiness and life satisfaction than do younger people (Mroczek, & Kolarz, 1998; Myers & Diener, 1995;  Charles et al., 2001).  According to Laura Carstensen, a renowned researcher on aging at Stanford University, the fact that emotional well-being is actually maintained and in some ways even improves across adulthood "...is among the most surprising findings about human aging to emerge in recent years" (Carstensen et. al., 2011, p. 21).

A cynic (probably someone young) might argue that this is just another symptom of the cognitive decline of Geezerhood -- no longer in touch with reality, the oldsters are in denial and just assess everything as positive. However, Carstensen's research indicates that older people in fact exhibit both positive and negative emotions to situations, often in a more complex way than younger people do:  "...investments in meaningful activities under time-limited conditions elicit richly complex emotional experiences, such as gratitude accompanied by a sense of fragility and happiness tinged with sadness" (Carstensen et. al, 2011).

One explanation of these changes in emotional well-being across the life span is given by Carstensen's "Socioemotional Selectivity" theory of aging, which proposes that we structure our life goals partly on the basis of how relevant they are to the time we have left:

The central change in adulthood is a shift in the salience of social goals. Younger adults, having much to learn and relatively long futures for which to prepare, are motivated by the pursuit of knowledge—even when this requires that emotional well-being be suppressed. For older adults, the reverse trend appears. Facing relatively shorter futures and having already accrued considerable knowledge about others, older adults prioritize emotional goals because they are realized in the moment of contact rather than banked for some nebulous future time.
       The theory stresses that age does not entail the relentless pursuit of happiness but rather the satisfaction of emotionally meaningful goals, which entails far more than simply feeling good. Finding meaning in existing relationships, even conflictual ones, emerges as a central task in later life. (Carstensen et. al., 2000, p. 645)

So, the picture that emerges is that older people are happier overall, but also experience negative emotions in meaningful ways. I would add to Carstensen's example of relational goals a more general openness to experiencing all life events in an emotionally meaningful way, including those we probably dismissed as insignificant when we were younger.

Our young cynic, clutching at straws now, might point out that the research showing that geezers are happier than young people is "cross-sectional" in design and that so it really hasn't demonstrated that people's emotional well-being improves as they age.  It could be that the current crop of old people have always been happy, perhaps because they grew up in simpler, more supportive times.

A recent longitudinal study by Carstensen (Carstensen et al., 2011) has eliminated this possible alternative explanation by following the same group of people over a 15-year period.  The results showed that as participants in the study aged their emotional well-being improved, thus supporting the earlier cross-sectional conclusion .

So, why is that Geezer smiling?  You'll find out when you're older.

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Related Blogs and References:

Jogging the Memory of a Geezer
Embracing Your Inner Geezer
How to Compress Your Morbidity
The Power of Negative Thinking
Thoughts for a New Year
So, What Do You Do All Day?

Carstensen, L. L., Pasupathi, M., Mayr, U., & Nesselroade, J. R. (2000). Emotional experience in everyday life across the adult life span. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79, 644–655.

Carstensen, L. L., Turan, B., Scheibe, S., Ram, N., Ersner-Hershfield, H., Samanez-Larkin, G. R., Brooks, K. P., & Nesselroade, J. R. (2011). Emotional Experience Improves With Age: Evidence Based on  Over 10 Years of Experience Sampling. Psychology and Aging, 26, 21–33
 
Charles, S. T., Reynolds, C. A., & Gatz, M. (2001). Age-related differences and change in positive and negative affect over 23 years. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80, 136–151.

Mroczek, D. K., & Kolarz, C. M. (1998). The effect of age on positive and negative affect: A developmental perspective on happiness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 75, 1333–1349.

Myers, D. G., & Diener, E. (1995). Who is happy? Psychological Science, 6, 10–19.

Whack-A-Mole Maintenance

 My neighbor and I stood looking at the side of my house, beers in hand, admiring my latest home maintenance project.  "Looks great," he said taking a swig. But I could tell there was a lack of earnestness in his voice that meant he really wasn't sure what I had done.  Being a fellow home owner, though, he wanted to show support.

That's the way a lot of home maintenance is -- it makes problems disappear but you can only appreciate the effort if you had noticed the problem in the first place.  And preventative maintenance that heads off bigger repairs later on is even less noticeable.  It looks the same only more so.

The joys of home ownership include maintaining and fixing things constantly.  You can put this off, but you'll pay the price later in terms of expensive repairs, lots of remedial work, or a lower resale value.  So most of us either learn to use tools or we line up a stable of professionals to do the work for us.  The trouble with the second approach is that (a) pro's can be expensive and (b) they usually don't like small jobs and (c) good ones can be hard to find.

Home maintenance is a game of whack-a-mole, only in this version you pay a lot more to play and the game never ends.  Whack one problem -- say a rotted stair railing -- and another pops up, like the stair tread your foot went through while you were fixing the railing.

Then there's the "one-thing-leads-to another" phenomenon where fixing one small thing becomes a marathon of additional projects that become necessary before the small thing can be fixed -- that small repair becomes a super-sized pain in the ass.  We recently decided to have our living room carpet replaced.  Other than moving some furniture and writing a big check, this required very little on our part.  But of course we realized that before the new carpet went in, we really should re-paint the room.  And before we repaint, we really should put in a new outlet box for the tv and stereo connections.  And before we do that, we really should run a new cable through the wall for connecting the tv to the dvr.  And before we do that, we really need to install another cable splitter in the crawl space.  Etc., etc., etc.

Whack, whack, whack. whack.

A particularly irritating, vexing, and usually expensive aspect of maintenance is the "what the heck is that?" phenomenon when one repair reveals previously unknown problems of even bigger magnitude than the original.  We were once going to put it new flooring in a bathroom, a fairly simple and inexpensive project.  Removing the old flooring exposed serious rot in the wood underneath, requiring ripping out major chunks of the whole underneath structure and rebuilding it.  Hmmm.

It follows that any repair or maintenance project is bound to take way, way longer than you think.  Changing a light bulb?  Plan on several hours.  Doing some rewiring or plumbing work?  Count on days or weeks.  When I call my handy man to schedule help with a project I give an estimate of how long it will take, like "should be quick, just a couple of hours" -- the response is barely suppressed laughter.

It is easy to become despondent, frustrated and overwhelmed by Whack-a-Mole-Maintenance.  However, whenever I begin to feel this way, I remind myself that these days I should be thankful to still have a house to maintain.

Benefits of Dangerous Travel, Revisited

In a previous blog I described a recent trip to three countries in the Middle East, including Syria.  I titled the blog "Dangerous Travel" to highlight the demonstrations that were occurring in Syria at the time and the brutal crackdowns by the government.  Despite the depictions of these events in the media as widespread chaos throughout the country, my wife and I felt quite safe and were very glad we continued the trip.  At that time (April and early May of this year) the violence was in very specific areas at very specific times, posing little threat to tourists.  And most important, the target of these demonstrations was the current regime, not the governments of other countries.

Since then the internal situation in Syria has gotten steadily worse.  Larger and larger demonstrations have occurred, and they have taken place in some cities that were previously thought to be strongholds of support for the Assad regime, like Aleppo. Since we stayed in Aleppo for a few days, this caught our attention.  When we were there things were very calm, and as usual the people welcomed us warmly as they had elsewhere in Syria.  We were struck by the modern sophistication of the city and the charm of its old town area, a noteworthy feature of which was a huge Orthodox Christian cathedral next to an equally huge mosque, and a neighborhood where Burkas and knee-length dresses were evenly mixed on the streets.  The city had prospered over the years from the Assad regime's strong-arm enforcement of stability and had been rewarded for its support of the government's policies.  For demonstrations to occur here was a striking sign of the erosion of Assad's power. 

A second place we visited that is currently in the news is the smaller city of Hama, a picturesque place known for its ancient waterwheels throughout town that are used to draw water from the town river.  We enjoyed it very much, and again we are startled by the contrast between the quiet, seemingly calm place we saw and the images of it as the center of demonstrations by 100,000 anti-government protestors and violent reprisals by Assad's armed forces.  This is the town where Assad's father killed an estimated 10,000 or more in earlier uprisings about 30 years ago.  As detailed in an informative article by Al Jazeera, the recent events began to take place just days after we were there.

Finally, there are the demonstrations in Damascus and the storming of the French and American Embassies there.  These events are chillingly different because they seem to have been sponsored or at least encouraged by the government in response to the visit to Hama by the French and American Ambassadors.  The claim -- without foundation from everything we saw -- is that the anti-Assad demonstrations that have been going on for months now have been instigated by these foreign governments.  Our interpretation is that this is a very desperate attempt by Assad to legitimize his brutal crackdowns in the eyes of his dwindling supporters.

Is it now too dangerous to travel to Syria?

Prior to our trip my answer to this question would have been a quick "Yes."  After traveling there, meeting the people who are the targets of their government's brutal retaliation, and seeing firsthand the disconnect between filtered media versions of events and the reality we experienced, I'm not so sure.  But I think what would now keep me from going is the change in the government's attitude toward foreigners from being objects of  economic exploitation to scapegoats for justifying brutality.  If a government is willing to use tanks and machine guns to quell peaceful demonstrations and kill thousands in the process, it might not care about a protecting a few tourists.

Misperceiving Wealth in America

How is wealth in America distributed?  We're a capitalist country so a certain degree of inequality is justified and appropriate. After all, a major motivational advantage of the wealth-generating power of capitalism is that it allows some people to amass a greater portion of a country's wealth than others.   But just how unequal is the distribution in America today? How accurately do people perceive the inequality? How close is the current distribution to what we might consider ideal?

Harvard Business School Professor Michael Norton and Duke Psychology Professor Dan Ariely have recently published a study that examines these questions (Norton & Ariely, 2011).  The results are timely, given the recent debates over our budgetary crisis and economic policies, and are likely to be very relevant for evaluating the election rhetoric that is already beginning to heat up.  Although our political leaders clearly disagree on the question of ideal wealth distribution,  it isn't at all clear what ordinary people think nor how much agreement there is among them.  Nor is it clear how accurately ordinary Americans perceive the current wealth distribution in America.

Norton & Ariely surveyed 5,522 Americans who were representative of the population in terms of income, voting record, gender, and state of residence.  The careful nature of their sampling technique allows confident generalization to the larger population.

The study revealed that people are generally pretty inaccurate in their perceptions of the actual distribution of wealth in America, tending to believe that wealth inequality is less than it really is.  For example, the richest 20% of Americans actually own 84% of the wealth, but people estimated they own just 59%.  For the middle 60%, where most of us fall, the actual amount owned is only 15%, but people think it is much higher, about 37%.  Estimates regarding the poorest 20% of Americans were most accurate -- they actually own less than 1% of the wealth, but people think they own 5%.  Although there were slight differences in the estimates among demographic groups based on personal wealth, party affiliation, and gender the level of consensus was very high -- inaccuracy was not much greater in one group than another.

In terms of their ideal distributions of wealth, there was a clear tendency to accept a certain degree of inequality, but to prefer a level that is much less than currently exists.  For example, in people's ideal distribution the wealthiest 20% would own 32% of the nation's wealth, a rather lower figure than the 84% they actually own, and the poorest would own about 11%, not the .1% they actually do.  For the middle 60% the ideal was 57%,  a dramatically higher figure than the 15% actually owned by this group.  Again, income level, party affiliation, and gender were associated with only small differences in ideal figures.  Compared to their estimates of current inequality,

All groups—even the wealthiest respondents—desired a more equal distribution of wealth than what they estimated the current United States level to be, and all groups also desired some inequality—even the poorest respondents. In addition, all groups agreed that such redistribution should take the form of moving wealth from the top [20%] to the bottom [60%]. In short, although Americans tend to be relatively more favorable toward economic inequality than members of other countries (Osberg & Smeeding, 2006), Americans’ consensus about the ideal distribution of wealth within the United States appears to dwarf their disagreements across gender, political orientation, and income. (Norton & Ariely, 2011)

In contrast to the conservative view voiced by congressional politicians who want us to believe that the historical trend in America has been for greater and greater advantage being given to those in lower economic brackets, resulting in overpaid workers, bloated welfare programs and an entitlement society, the reality is that inequality favoring the most wealthy has been steadily increasing, particularly since 1970.  Evidence for this is powerfully presented in a very informative interactive graphic recently published online by The Washington Post.  I urge you to look at these data yourself, but in the meantime I'll offer the Post's summary regarding income distribution in the US:  "Inequality in the U.S. has grown steadily since the 1970s, following a flat period after World War II.  In 2008, the wealthiest 10 percent earned almost the same amount of income as the rest of the country combined (my italics)."  These wealthiest 10 percent are those whom the Republican/Tea Party leaders are willing to defend to the point refusing to consider any budget that would lead to higher taxes on the rich, and in fact have proposed lowering taxes on corporations and on people in the highest income brackets, despite the fact that their tax rate is lower than it has been for most of the past 100 years.

This does not seem like a strategy that might get us closer to most people's ideal distribution of wealth in America. 
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Related Blogs:

Punishing the Victims
Terminate Me, Please
Does Size Really Matter?
Tax Tips for Tea Time
The Real Lesson from This Election
These Will Be "The Bad Old Days"

"Lei"zy Horses and Hot Malasadas

There are a number of annual events that make living in Hawai'i very enjoyable.  One I have already written about is the awe-inspiring Ironman Triathlon.  Several others are more celebrations of local culture and history that primarily involve residents, though visitors lucky enough to be here when they occur will also find them to be a unique treat.

One is the yearly parade in honor of King Kamehameha I, the Hawaiian monarch who unified the islands into one kingdom in the late 1700's and ushered in a period of unprecedented peace and prosperity.  Kamehameha was born on our island, and so there is a special local connection to this celebration, which is held state-wide each June. 

Pa'u Riders

The parade route is along part of Ali'i Drive, a waterfront street that passes through the quaint business area of Kailua-Kona.  The backdrop is the crystal clear blue Pacific 50-100 feet away and lining the route are palms, banyan trees, colorful bougainvillea, plumeria, orchids, and other assorted varieties of tropical greenery.  In the golden morning sunlight the scene is eye-poppingly beautiful.

Princess and Two Escorts

The special feature of the parade are eight groups of Pa'u horseback riders, each representing one of the main Hawaiian islands.  Each group consists of a princess and her attendants, plus several male outriders or escorts, all of them (including the horses) wearing the colors and flowers of the island they represent. The word Pa'u means "skirt" and refers back to the tradition started in the 1800's for women riders to wear long flowing skirts to protect their fancy clothing when they were riding to a party or celebration.  The flowers are incorporated into leis and hatbands and are appropriate to the island -- for our Hawai'i Island the riders wear red and the flowers are lehua blossoms woven into leis of maile and other ferns.  The horses wear leis, too, and usually bands of flowers in their harnesses.

Horses have been in Hawaii only for about 200 years.  They were introduced in 1803, when a mare and foal were brought by Richard Cleveland as a gift to King Kamehameha I.  Hawaiians had of course never seen such an animal -- the only mammals in the islands until humans arrived were the monk seal and an indigenous species of  bat.  The Hawaiians introduced dogs and pigs from Polynesia  (and maybe accidentally the palm rat), and in 1793 Captain George Vancouver presented King Kamehameha I with 5 black longhorn cattle. The cattle multiplied wildly, and in 1832 John Palmer Parker worked with King Kamehameha III to bring Mexican vaqueros with riding and roping skills to help with his booming cattle ranching business.  The vaqueros adapted well to Hawaii, where they were called paniolos (a Hawaiian interpretation of "espanol"), and introduced the cowboy culture here even before it was developed on the mainland U.S.  Of course here the cowboys do the hula instead of the two-step.  In the early 1900's Portuguese immigrants were recruited as ranch workers and they added their own cultural flavor to the mix, including the invention of the ukelele.

Poop Patrol

A parade with nearly a hundred horses is going to generate considerable fertilizer.  One of the cutest parts of the parade are the teams of pooper-scoopers that follow each of the Pa'u units.  They pull small wagons often decorated as colorfully as the Pa'u groups, and the scoopers do their job with a humorous flourish.  For example, this year the team following the riders representing Koho'olawe, a small island off the coast of Maui that was used for many years by the U.S. military as a bombing range, called themselves "The Bomb Squad,"  a double nod to the historic military reference and to the still-steaming missiles on the street. One of my favorites a few years back was a group whose highly decorated poop wagon had a large sign saying "Hot Malasadas!"  We residents in the crowd had to explain to visitors that malasadas are Portuguese doughnuts, a delicious favorite pastry found in bakeries all over the island.

For me the parade captures the character of Hawai'i very well:  A mix of Hawaiian, European, Asian, and Polynesian cultures displaying the complexity and diversity of influences on our history,  all in a physical setting that is hard to match.

Punishing the Victims?

[***Warning***  This blog contains material known to be toxic to the majority of members of the House of Representatives.]

Okay, let me get this straight.  The Republican/Tea Party's plan to solve the country's economic problems is to lower taxes for corporations and the wealthy while simultaneously cutting spending for social programs, such as Medicare, Transportation, Education and welfare assistance.  The conservative approach would also give corporations a boost by repealing an act that requires companies receiving federal contacts to pay workers at least at the level of prevailing local salaries and benefits.  This would allow those companies to pay workers less than they do now.  In short, we should increase the income of corporations and the wealthy but cut the income and benefits of middle and lower class workers.  Hooookay.

Doesn't this strategy put the burden for fixing the economy on the people who are suffering the most from the current recession?  That is, the ordinary people who are losing their houses, their jobs, and their health care?

The Republican/Tea Party argument is that the maximum marginal income tax rate (currently 35%) is the main obstacle to economic recovery and that cutting it would stimulate growth and reduce unemployment.  The wealthy would then have even more money to spend, which would trickle down to the less-wealthy, and corporations would have more funds to invest in expansion and hiring.   Sounds good, except there are some very large holes in this argument.

First, the current maximum tax rate is actually lower than it has been for most of the past 100 years, including periods when our economic situation has been far better than it is now.  There is simply no credible evidence that this rate is tied to economic growth.

Second, no one actually pays the highest rate.  Being a marginal tax bracket means that it applies only to income above a certain level, not to all the income of a person or corporation.  And it is levied only after all tax breaks and deductions have been applied, resulting in a much lower effective  tax rate.  For large corporations this is about 25% and for the wealthy about 18% on average.  For small businesses, according to the SBA, the effective range is from 13% to 27% depending on how they are structured.  And many corporations pay little or no tax at all. For example, in 2010 GE had a profit of  $5.1 billion and paid no Federal income tax, and is expected to have only a small tax bill again for 2011 (for an analysis of how they do this, see Forbes or Reuters). From 2008 to 2010 General Electric Co, American Electric Power Co Inc, DuPont Co and nine other companies had a negative 1.5 percent tax rate on $171 billion in profits according to a study reported by Reuters.

Third, a more direct way of linking tax rates to the nation's economic productivity is to calculate the percentage of taxes relative to the Gross National Product.  As economist Bruce Barlett notes in a recent NYT article:

By this measure, federal taxes are at their lowest level in more than 60 years. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that federal taxes would consume just 14.8 percent of G.D.P. this year. The last year in which revenues were lower was 1950, according to the Office of Management and Budget.The postwar annual average is about 18.5 percent of G.D.P. Revenues averaged 18.2 percent of G.D.P. during Ronald Reagan’s administration; the lowest percentage during that administration was 17.3 percent of G.D.P. in 1984. In short, by the broadest measure of the tax rate, the current level is unusually low and has been for some time. Revenues were 14.9 percent of G.D.P. in both 2009 and 2010.

I readily admit that sacrifice and budget cuts are necessary to get us out of the economic mess we are in.  But to me the burden has to shared by everyone,  rather than mostly by those who can least afford it.  To cut spending and increase revenue through taxes and/or closing tax loop holes on corporations and wealthy Americans isn't being unreasonably progressive -- it's just fair.

The Benefits of Dangerous Travel

How do you know when you're in danger?  Sometimes it seems perfectly clear:  a truck barreling down on you as you cross a street;  hiking on a narrow ledge with a 500-foot fall;  a nervous mugger pointing a gun at you; an angry mob around you chanting anti-American slogans when you are in a foreign country.  In these examples the imminence of harm and the source of the threat are certain and unambiguous.

But many times assessing danger requires making an inference, an attribution, or an interpretation that isn't so clear.  As we begin to cross a street, we make inferences regarding the local norms involving drivers versus pedestrians and the likelihood a car or truck will yield to us.  When we encounter a high ledge while hiking we look at its riskiness based our assessment of our physical abilities and experience in comparable situations.  In planning a trip abroad we judge the likelihood of being the target of resentment or anger in a foreign country based on current news reports and personal accounts of other travelers.  We usually feel confident that we have correctly determined the threat or danger -- that we know whether we are in danger -- but in truth we have only really guessed.

I wrote last February that my wife and I were considering going ahead with our plans to visit the Middle East, despite the turmoil there (see my blog of February 15th) .  We did indeed make the trip, and recently returned from a month in Jordan, Syria, and Egypt.  We were there from April 12 to May 12, during the regional upheaval journalists and politicians have now dubbed the "Arab Spring"  or "Arab Awakening" (I suppose these are appropriate labels, but in this case Springtime and Awakening are associated with bullets, tanks, and firebombs).  We certainly hadn't planned to be involved in these momentous events, and new developments along the way forced us to assess danger far more than normal in our travels:  protests in Syria intensified and so did the brutal government crackdown on them;  just as we were about to enter Syria, the Jordan/Syria land border was closed, though it was still possible to fly between countries, which we did;  shortly after entering Syria the U.S. State Department issued a warning advising U.S. citizens to leave the country immediately (we didn't);   in Libya the UN stepped up its military action against the government; about halfway into our trip Osama Bin Laden was killed by U.S. forces; while we were in Egypt there were violent clashes between Christian and Muslim groups.

Were we in danger?  You might infer from the list of events above that we were standing in the middle of the street with a truck barreling down on us -- the clearly harrowing situation I suggested at the beginning.  And to be honest, if all these things happened right before we left home we might have cancelled.  But we're now convinced that would have been a mistake, that we were in fact not in significant danger, and that whatever level of risk present was far outweighed by the positive benefits of the trip.

We weighed the information we received from news sources and from the State Department along with our own direct observations, which contrasted sharply. Everywhere we went people of all walks of life, ages, and social position were genuinely welcoming and friendly -- particularly when they found out we were Americans.  Although we stood out like sore thumbs (it is not possible to blend in there, especially when you're two of only a handful of tourists), we never felt like targets of resentment or anger.  Naturally our inferences might have been wrong, but the probability of our misjudgment has to be considered in the context of 40 years of mostly independent travel that has exposed us to a variety of social situations and interactions requiring us to assess the sincerity and honesty of people's motives.  Based on that experience, we have to regard this as one of the safest trips we have ever taken and probably one of the most enjoyable.

Some of you reading this may wonder why we would travel to a place where there is even a chance of danger -- what's the great attraction that makes the inconvenience and potential hassles worthwhile?  This is tough to answer. In response to a good friend who challenged our motivation for this trip, I said that our rewards for travel here were the same as they always have been for us:  acquiring a deeper understanding of different cultures, including those under the thumb of notorious, disgusting regimes; seeing first-hand the layers of history embodied in the art and architecture of past civilizations and current societies;  appreciating the ecology and geology of other parts of the world.

Paul Theroux put it a bit more eloquently in a recent NYT article on traveling during turbulent times, and I'll close with his words:

"In the bungling and bellicosity that constitute the back and forth of history, worsened by natural disasters and unprovoked cruelty,  humble citizens pay the highest price. To be a traveler in such circumstances can be inconvenient at best, fatal at worst. But if the traveler manages to breeze past such unpleasantness on tiny feet, he or she is able to return home to report: 'I was there. I saw it all.' The traveler’s boast, sometimes couched as a complaint, is that of having been an eyewitness, and invariably this experience — shocking though it may seem at the time — is an enrichment, even a blessing, one of the life-altering trophies of the road. 'Don’t go there,' the know-it-all, stay-at-home finger wagger says of many a distant place. I have heard it my whole traveling life, and in almost every case it was bad advice. In my experience these maligned countries are often the most fulfilling."

Jogging the Memory of a Geezer

[**Warning**  This blog is another in my "Geezerhood" series.  Past entries have included "Embracing Your Inner Geezer," "How to Compress Your Morbidity," "The Power of Negative Thinking," and "So, What Do You Do All Day?".   Those readers who have decided they are immune from Geezerhood may find this material irrelevant and are urged to use discretion in reading further.]

As the saying goes, "Growing old isn't for whimps."  Besides the challenge of coping with physical changes, as discussed in my blog of  2/1/11, there is also the challenge of possibly losing your mind, or at least not being  able to remember where you put it.  Sad personal reminders of this are several academic colleagues of mine who are now in various stages of Alzheimer's, a disease made all the more tragic for these people because they were all bright, well-educated intellectuals with incisive minds. 

Alzheimer's is the most prevalent form of dementia, followed by dementia produced by strokes.  And it is indeed prevalent. According to the Alzheimer's Association, 5.4 million Americans have the disease.  At age 65 the estimated lifetime risk of developing Alzheimer's or some other form of dementia is 20% for women and 17% for men.  For those who make it to 85, the risk is much higher -- 43%.   And it is indeed deadly.  Alzheimer's is currently the 6th leading cause of death in this country, 5th for those over 65.  It is estimated that 61 percent of people with Alzheimer’s at age 70 will die before age 80 compared with 30 percent of people at age 70 without the disease.

An optimistic take on these grim statistics is that most geezers won't be stricken by Alzheimer's or other forms of dementia during their "golden years" -- if  20%  are afflicted, then the other 80% won't be, right?  While this optimism is justified in the strictest sense,  there is now a substantial body of scientific evidence that even "normal" geezers will experience some degree of cognitive decline due to changes in neurological processes and brain structure that are an inevitable result of aging.  These physical changes will likely be manifested in difficulties in learning, reasoning, decision making, cognitive task performance, and memory.   The evidence also shows, though, that there is a wide range among individuals in the type and degree of difficulties they experience, even among those with the same degree of  neurological degradation.  A more realistic approach then, is to ask "how much cognitive decline will I experience and is there anything I can do about it?"

The most recent research bearing on these questions has been nicely summarized and evaluated by Christopher Hertzog in a monograph published by the Association for Psychological Science (Hertzog et.al., 2008).  Hertzog's analysis of the available data suggests that there are a number of identifiable factors that influence a person's degree and rate of decline, and that there are certain interventions that can -- within limits -- alter an individual's position within the possible range of functioning.

It is important to note that the evidence for some of these "enrichment effects" is not very strong or is controversial, while for other factors the research seems much clearer and stronger.  For example, it is somewhat surprising that the common sense idea of staving off cognitive decline by leading an intellectually active lifestyle (the "use it or lose it" hypothesis) -- while it has received consistent empirical support -- must be tempered by the fact that the strength of the effect is not as strong as it is for other factors and may be open to alternative explanations  (Hertzog et. al., 2008).  Nonetheless, research over the last 10 years indicates that continued engagement in mentally stimulating activities (reading books, attending plays, playing chess, writing, playing a musical instrument, attending public lectures, taking courses, etc.) can reduce the debilitating effects of "normal" cognitive decline, and even lower the risk of dementia and Alzheimer's disease (Wilson et. al, 2007).

Another approach to cognitive enrichment is based on what might be called the "mental pushup" model., where older people are exposed to interventions that involve specific training in memory, reasoning, or problem solving.  For example,  in a study by Ball et al. (2002), 2500 participants over 65 went through training sessions in one of three cognitive domains:  memory, reasoning, or visual search.  The results showed marked gains for each training group that persisted over a 5-year follow up period.  As encouraging as these results seem, it was also found that the enhancement effects didn't transfer to performance-based measures of everyday problem solving or everyday speed of processing -- in other words, the benefits were restricted to the specific training domains and didn't generalize to other kinds of tasks.   A number of other studies have reached the same conclusion -- very little generalization of the cognitive gains achieved by training specific skills or processes (Hertzog et al., 2008).

However, there have some very recent attempts to develop training strategies involving more complex mechanisms that do show generalization.  One example is training in quickly switching between different tasks or between different sets of cues relevant to the same task,  both of which are abilities involving cognitive control that usually decline significantly with age.  In a study by Karbach & Kray (2009)  this type of intervention not only significantly improved older adults' task-switching performance,  but also produced generalized improvements in verbal and spatial memory, and reasoning skills.

Another promising new approach is "metacognition"  training.  "The essential feature of metacognitive interventions is to train individuals to assess processing demands of task contexts and to select, implement, and evaluate strategies during performance" (Hertzog et al., 2008, p. 20).  For example, one metacognitive approach trains people on using mnemonic memory techniques coupled with self-testing to determine when material has been learned well enough to permit later retrieval (Dunlosky et al., 2007).  Research indicates that the generality of this technique enables older people to apply it to everyday situations outside the experimental context.

As promising as some of these training strategies are, there is one type of intervention that recent research shows is hands down the most effective in lessening cognitive decline associated with aging:  physical activity.  It even seems to "compress cognitive morbidity" so that the period of diminished mental capacity is shorter, even among those with Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia (I discussed compression of morbidity regarding physical aspects of aging in an earlier blog).

The fitness fanatics out there no doubt are vigorously nodding their heads in agreement as they read this before their spinning class or after their 15-mile run.  But the real news in this research is that (a) the level of physical activity required to achieve significant benefits is really quite modest, and (b) beneficial effects can be achieved even when the physical activities are initiated later in life. This is particularly encouraging for those geezers who have physical limitations or injuries that prevent them from engaging in high impact aerobics, or for those who weren't physically active in their younger years.

For example, in a study by Kramer et al. (1999) older adults who were in good health but sedentary were randomly assigned to either a training condition in which they walked briskly for 1 hour per day 3 days a week for 6 months, or a condition in which they performed stretching and toning exercises for the same amount of time.  Those in the walking condition but not the stretching and toning condition showed generalized improvement in various aspects of cognitive functioning, including the ability to selectively process task-relevant information while ignoring irrelevant information, the ability to override inappropriate responses, and the ability to switch rapidly between multiple tasks.

In another example, the activity levels of 6,000 women aged 65 and older were assessed (e.g, blocks walked per week, flights of stairs climbed per day, frequency and duration of  various exercise and sports activities) and then levels of cognitive functioning were measured 6-8 years later (Yaffe et al., 2001).  Those who were more active were 30% less likely to show cognitive decline, even after adjusting for education level, health status, and other rival explanations.  Interestingly, walking distance was related to cognitive functioning whereas walking speed was not, suggesting that even moderate levels of activity have a beneficial effect.

Finally, a number of studies have found that modest physical activity and exercise can reduce the probability of severe cognitive problems in later life.  Rovio (2005), for instance, found that physical activity in middle age consisting of as little as 20-30 minutes twice per week of exercise vigorous enough to produce breathlessness and sweating reduced the risk of dementia 20 years later by 52%. 

After evaluating all of the available research regarding cognitive functioning in older adults, including the studies focusing on physical activity, Hertzog et al. (2008) offers this optimistic conclusion:

"What is most impressive to us is the evidence demonstrating benefits of aerobic physical exercise on cognitive functioning in older adults. Such a conclusion would have been controversial in the not-too-distant-past, but the evidence that has accumulated since 2000 from both human and animal studies argues overwhelmingly that aerobic exercise enhances cognitive function in older adults.  The hypothesis of exercise-induced cognitive-enrichment effects is supported by longitudinal studies of predictors of cognitive decline and incidence of dementia, but also by short-term intervention studies in human and animal populations.  The exercise-intervention work suggests relatively general cognitive benefits of aerobic exercise but indicates that cognitive tasks that require executive functioning, working memory, and attentional control are most likely to benefit."  (p.41)

Geezerhood is tough.  But thanks to increases in our scientific understanding of aging, we are seeing some real advances in practical ways to come to terms with it.  Cognitive decline may be inevitable, and for some us it will be devastatingly severe.  But thankfully there are ways we can lessen the degree to which the quality of our lives are impacted by the relentless march of time.



References:

Ball, K., Berch, D.B., Helmer, K.F., Jobe, J.B., Leveck, M.D., Marsiske, M. (2002.  Effects of cognitive training interventions with older adults:  A randomized controlled trial.  Journal of the American Medical Association, 288, 2271-2281.

Dunlosky, J., Cavallini, E.,  Roth, H.,  McGuire, C.L., Vecchi, T., & Hertzog, C. (2007).  Do self-monitoring interventions improve older adults' learning?  Journal of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences, 62B (special issue I), 70-76.

Hertzog, C., Kramer, A.F., Wilson, R.S.,  & Lindenberger, U. (2008).  Enrichment effects on adult cognitive development:  Can the functional capacity of older adults be preserved and enhanced?  Psychological Science in the Public Interest, (9).

Karbach, Julia, & Kray, Jutta (2009). How useful is executive control training? Age differences in near and far transfer of task-switching training.  Developmental Science,  978-990.

Kramer, A.F.,  Hahn, S., Cohen, N.J., Banich, M.T., McAuley, E., Harrison, C.R., et al. (1999).  Aging, fitness and neurocognitive function.  Nature, 400, 418-419.

Rovio, S., Kareholt, I., Kelkala, E.I., et al. (2005).  Leisure time physical activity at midlife and the risk of dementia and Alzheimer's disease.  Lancet Neurology, 4, 705-711.

Yaffe, K., Barnes, D., Nevitt, M., Lui, L.Y., & Covinsky, K. (2001).  A prospective study of physical activity and cognitive decline in elderly women.  Archives of Internal Medicine., 161, 1703-1708.


Wilson, R.S., Scherr, P.A., Schneider, J.A., Li, Y., & Bennett, D.A. (2007).  The relation of cognitive activity to risk of developing Alzheimer's disease.  Neurology, 69, 1911-1920.

It's a Guy Thing

My sister recently forwarded me a story that has been circulating on the internet for quite some time, though I have never seen it before.   I'll quote it below, then make some comments about whether it is true or not.  Right now, though, you should know that I was gasping for breath from laughing when I read it.  In short, you have been forewarned that this is my kind of humor (see What, Me Worry? for an analysis of what makes me laugh):

Pocket Tazer Stun Gun, a great gift for the wife. A guy who purchased his lovely wife a pocket Tazer for their anniversary submitted this:
Last weekend I saw something at Larry's Pistol & Pawn Shop that sparked my interest. The occasion was our 15th anniversary and I was looking for a little something extra for my wife Julie. What I came across was a 100,000-volt, pocket/purse-sized Tazer.

The effects of the Tazer were supposed to be short lived, with no long term adverse affect on your assailant, allowing her adequate time to retreat to safety...??

WAY TOO COOL! Long story short, I bought the device and brought it home... I loaded two AAA batteries in the darn thing and pushed the button. Nothing! I was disappointed. I learned, however, that if I pushed the button and pressed it against a metal surface at the same time, I'd get the blue arc of electricity darting back and forth between the prongs.

AWESOME!!! Unfortunately, I have yet to explain to Julie what that burn spot is on the face of her microwave.

Okay, so I was home alone with this new toy, thinking to myself that it couldn't be all that bad with only two AAA batteries, right?

There I sat in my recliner, my cat Gracie looking on intently (trusting little soul) while I was reading the directions and thinking that I really needed to try this thing out on a flesh & blood moving target.

I must admit I thought about zapping Gracie (for a fraction of a second) and then thought better of it. She is such a sweet cat. But, if I was going to give this thing to my wife to protect herself against a mugger, I did want some assurance that it would work as advertised.

Am I wrong?

So, there I sat in a pair of shorts and a tank top with my reading glasses perched delicately on the bridge of my nose, directions in one hand, and Tazer in another.
 The directions said that:
a one-second burst would shock and disorient your assailant;
a two-second burst was supposed to cause muscle spasms and a major loss of bodily control; and
a three-second burst would purportedly make your assailant flop on the ground like a fish out of water.

Any burst longer than three seconds would be wasting the batteries.

All the while I'm looking at this little device measuring about 5" long, less than 3/4 inch in circumference (loaded with two itsy, bitsy AAA batteries); pretty cute really, and thinking to myself, 'no possible way!'

What happened next is almost beyond description, but I'll do my best.

I'm sitting there alone, Gracie looking on with her head cocked to one side so as to say, 'Don't do it stupid,' reasoning that a one second burst from such a tiny lil ole thing couldn't hurt all that bad.. I decided to give myself a one second burst just for heck of it.

I touched the prongs to my naked thigh, pushed the button, and...

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD. WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION. WHAT THE... !!!

I'm pretty sure Hulk Hogan ran in through the side door, picked me up in the recliner, then body slammed us both on the carpet, over and over and over again. I vaguely recall waking up on my side in the fetal position, with tears in my eyes, body soaking wet, both nipples on fire, testicles nowhere to be found, with my left arm tucked under my body in the oddest position, and tingling in my legs! The cat was making meowing sounds I had never heard before, clinging to a picture frame hanging above the fireplace, obviously in an attempt to avoid getting slammed by my body flopping all over the living room.

Note:
If you ever feel compelled to 'mug' yourself with a Tazer,
one note of caution:

There is NO such thing as a one second burst when you zap yourself! You will not let go of that thing until it is dislodged from your hand by a violent thrashing about on the floor!
A three second burst would be considered conservative!

My bent reading glasses were on the mantel of the fireplace.

My triceps, right thigh and both nipples were still twitching.

My face felt like it had been shot up with Novocain, and my bottom lip weighed 88 lbs.

I had no control over the drooling.

Apparently I had crapped in my shorts, but was too numb to know for sure, and my sense of smell was gone.

I saw a faint smoke cloud above my head, which I believe came from my hair.

I'm still looking for my testicles and I'm offering a significant reward for their safe return!

PS: My wife can't stop laughing about my experience, loved the gift and now regularly threatens me with it!
 

If you think education is difficult, try being stupid!!!!

This story has been circulating since 2004, and although it has never been determined for sure that it is just a wildly funny made-up tale, there are strong hints that it is just that.  Most telling is that the story has changed over the years by being updated and expanded -- for example, in the original story it was Jessie Ventura who was the pro-wrester instead of Hulk Hogan.  You can compare the version above with the original available on  Snopes.com, my favorite site for researching stuff like this.  Despite the strong possibility it didn't really happen, it is still very funny indeed.  Oh, and a little quick Googling reveals that such devices do, in fact exist.  For example,  at BestStunGun.Com you can buy one for about $70 that is the size of a pen, generates 800,000 volts, and requires just two small 3-volt CR2 batteries.

Incidents that really have happened and which showcase human (usually male) stupidity are collected and presented at another of my favorite sites, The Darwin Awards.  The Darwin Awards "...salute the improvement of the human genome by honoring those who accidentally remove themselves from it..."   Here's just one example, called Dying to Go:

Dying To Go
2009 Darwin Award Nominee
Confirmed True by Darwin

(12 April 2008, Florida) Traffic was moving slowly on southbound I-95. Shawn M. had recently left a Pompano Beach bar, and now he was stuck in traffic. As the saying goes, you don't buy beer--you just rent it, and Shawn couldn't wait another moment to relieve himself. "I need to take a leak," he told his friends. Traffic was deadlocked, so the waterlogged man climbed out, put his hand on the divider, and jumped over the low concrete wall... only to fall 65 feet to his death. "He probably thought there was a road, but there wasn't," said a Fort Lauderdale police spokesman. The car was idling on an overpass above the railroad lines. His mother shared her thoughts. "Shawn didn't do a whole lot for a living. He got along on his charm, just like his father." Though his death was tragic, Shawn's downfall proves the old adage: Look before you leak!

Definitely more of my kind of humor.

Watching The World From Cyberspace

Movietone News. Remember?  This was how many people got a chance to see images of current events before the days of T.V. news, YouTube, webcams, and smartphone video transmissions.  I remember as a kid going to a movie theater and before the feature film began watching a cartoon and then an episode of Movietone News.  I was fascinated by the filmed depictions of  people, places, and events that I had previously read or heard about.  The lag on these films was at least a couple of weeks, but it really didn't seem to matter -- things moved more slowly back in those days.

Fast forward to the last few weeks.  It would be hard to imagine a clearer illustration of how internet technology has changed the way we acquire knowledge of the world and the way we relate to people, places, and events than the role of technology in covering (a) the popular uprisings in the Middle East,  (b) the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, and (c) closer to home, the sudden change in the ongoing eruption of Kilauea Volcano in Hawaii.

Unlike the days of Movietone News,  from anywhere in the world you could watch the demonstrations and confrontations in Egypt live , as they were happening, thanks to webcams streaming video images to internet sites.   Or you could access YouTube clips uploaded minutes after events happened.  Interpreting the meaning of what you were seeing was perhaps problematic,  but there was nevertheless a feeling of immediacy that was unmistakeable, and a feeling of being connected  to the people in this far away place.  For those providing the images there was no doubt a feeling of connection as well, and also a feeling of empowerment and influence.

The video coming from Japan has been a stunning, near real-time display of the destructive power of nature and the fragility of human existence.  I've seen movies and still photos of tsunamis before, but the current depictions have had an effect on me at much higher level of magnitude.  I think this is due to the range of video sources, the immediacy of the images, and to their internet accessibility.  As with the popular uprisings in the Middle East,  my empathy seems stronger because the images are depicting the events right now, not as they were sometime in the past.

My third example is the role of internet technology in covering the recent change in the eruption of Kilauea Volcano, about 90 miles from where I live here on the island of Hawai'i.   The current eruption has been going on for over 20 years, but it has changed in character several times during that period.  For the past couple of years the main activity has been from a side vent of Kilauea, which feeds lava to a system of tubes that carry it several miles to the ocean.  Although the side vent is in a remote part of Volcanoes National Park and volcanic gases make hiking to it very dangerous, real time images of it have been available from a webcam placed on the rim of the vent.  A webcam is also positioned over the summit caldera in a spot accessible only to geologists, and until just recently the summit camera showed fascinating images of a lava lake just below the rim. 

These live views of an erupting volcano, available to anyone in the world with access to the internet, illustrate my point very nicely.  But even clearer is the role of internet technology in providing an immediate experience of the change in the eruption which happened a couple of weeks ago.  Suddenly all activity at the summit and the side vent ceased,  and lava began fountaining from a crack near the vent.  Within hours the geologists had placed additional cameras near the crack to provide spectacular views of the event.  In this case technology allowed a real-time experience of something happening that would be too dangerous and too difficult to observe in any other way.  Like the tsunami, witnessing this event via the internet deepened my appreciation of the power and unpredictability of nature in a way a Movietone News clip could never have done.

It is certainly debatable whether constant connectivity with events around  the world is a good thing in all cases.  But there is little doubt that this technology has irreversibly altered our relationship to each other and to the world around us.

Tax Tips for Tea Time

Ah, the joys of spring. Snow melting. Birds nesting. Flowers blooming. Warmth & sunshine. The promise of renewal, growth, and better times.

And getting your income tax refund.

The average refund is about $3,000.  Last year the total was $328 billion paid to 109,376,000 taxpayers, well over 50% of those filing. Note that this is more than 5 times the total budget cuts recently proposed by the Republican/Tea Party controlled House of Representatives. I find it a smidge interesting that those who regard themselves as fiscally astute and critical of government spending would be willing to give the government a $328 billion interest-free loan. As Roberton Williams, a senior fellow at the Tax Policy Center puts it,

"While the majority of Americans receive refunds and many taxpayers look forward to getting that check in the mail, it's sometimes easy to forget that it's your own money to begin with. All you did was overpay the government during the year. In one sense people like to get a refund because it's nice to know that refund is eventually coming -- they can file their taxes and not think about it again. But really, it's just an interest free loan to the government."

So tip number one if you're upset about taxes is don't overpay them by $328 billion! During the year that the Fed has your money interest free you could better use it to, say, pay your mortgage, buy food, or reduce your high-interest credit card debt.   By paying just the taxes actually owed and no more, the average taxpayer would have an extra  $250 available per month ($3000/12).  Of course, there would be no pseudo-windfall in April. But instead of giving the Fed an interest free loan, you could be avoiding paying  a high-interest loan yourself.

Tip #2: Become a CEO. Most have negotiated their contracts so that their taxes are paid by the company.

Tip#3: Become a witch. Actually, for some Tea Party members, like Christine O'Donnell, this wouldn't be much of a stretch. Although O'Donnell hasn't engaged in witchcraft since high school (according to Fox News), she could probably brush up in short order. Those tax-and-spenders in Congress could then be cursed and hexed into line, as witches in Romania did last January: "Everyone curses the taxman, but Romanian witches, angry about having to pay up for the first time, hurled poisonous mandrake into the Danube River on Thursday to cast spells on the president and government" (NYT).

Tip #4: Calculate your effective tax rate. This is very simple. Take your total income and divide it into your total tax bill.  You may find this is much lower than the marginal rate which gets higher as you have more income. People often forget that the higher rates don't apply to all of your income, only the portion that exceeds certain limits -- for most of us only a small chunk, if any, gets taxed at the higher rates. It is true, of course, that for CEO's in the U.S., who receive an average of $4 million per year in compensation, a much higher portion falls into the upper brackets. But see Tip #2.

Tip # 5: As you steam and burn at having to pay taxes that go to fund programs "X" and "Y," remember that there are some people who are quite happy to pay for those, but who don't want to pay for "W" and "Z," which just happen to be the only things you think government ought to be providing.....