A Cody News Spot: Life is Better?!

Life Is Better; It Isn’t Better. Which Is It?

By DAVID LEONHARDT
Published: September 20, 2006

When the first snow falls on the North Shore of Chicago this winter, Robert Gordon will take his Toro snow blower out of the garage and think about how lucky he is not to be using a shovel. Mr. Gordon is 66 years old and evidently quite healthy, but his doctor has told him that he should never clear his driveway with his own hands. “People can die from shoveling snow,” Mr. Gordon said. “I bet a lot of lives have been saved by snow blowers.”

If so, most of them have been saved in the last few decades. A Canadian teenager named Arthur Sicard came up with the idea for the snow blower in the late 1800’s, while watching the blades on a piece of farm equipment, but he didn’t sell any until 1927. For the next 30 years or so, snow blowers were hulking machines typically bought by cities and schools. Only recently have they become a suburban staple.


What an awesome "Flip It" this one is -- the world is better for most Americans (really?!)...and also -- after all the whining about hedonic adjustments by our bureaucrats understating inflation, Leonhardt explains how they might be dramatically OVERSTATING inflation. Provocative ariticle.