I've spent several days reflecting on my chairman's reaction to public grief over Michael Jackson's death:

I, for one, am no more touched by Mr. Jackson's death than I am by the death of any of the thousands of other Americans who died last week, all of whom - like Mr. Jackson - are strangers to me and to the vast majority of people now so self-indulgently and flamboyantly grieving for a man they never met.

Americans' proclivity to mass hysteria causes me to want government to have as little power as possible.  I neither can nor wish to stop other persons from doing with their lives as they wish.  But I also damn sure despise the fact that, through their votes, so many persons prone to such childish sentiments and displays have a say in how I lead my life.

I agree with Don Boudreaux's basic point: If people get hysterical about a man they never met, it seems dangerous to put real power in their hands.  At the same time, though, it's worth pointing out that this particular manifestation of "mass hysteria" is not only understandable, but benign. 

Understandable: Michael Jackson's music really did touch the lives of millions of people.  Sure, they didn't personally know him, but who doesn't feel a connection to one impressive stranger or another?  I never met Julian Simon, but I feel his loss.  The story of the architect of Hitler's failed assassination brings tears to my eyes.  I'd be ever-so-happy for Emily Whitehurst if she became a superstar.  What's so bad about these feelings-at-a-distance?

Benign: If people have the kinds of emotional needs that Don criticizes, what is the best - or least bad - way to express them?  They could express them in politics, with the usual awful results.  They could express them in religion, with results that are at best mixed.  Or they could express them by idolizing singers, movie stars, novelists, bloggers, etc.  It's hard to see the downside.

I'd actually go further: Fandom would play an important role in a free society.  What role?  Harmlessly dissipating the emotions that, wrongly directly, lead to dangerous hysterias.  In fact, as Tyler Cowen explains in his unjustly neglected What Price Fame?, idolatry serves as a non-cash payment to the creative geniuses who give us far more than we pay them.  Samuel Johnson once wisely observed that, "There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money."  I'd like to add that "There are few ways in which a man can be more innocently hysterical than in grieving over a celebrity."

Here's one of mine, from Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window. It's about one of the most important things economics deals with--incentives. Lisa (played by Grace Kelly) and Jeff (played by Jimmy Stewart), are listening to a man in another apartment play one of his songs on a piano:

LISA: Where does a man get the inspiration for a song like that?
JEFF: From his landlord -- once a month.

What are some of your favorites?

Here's one of mine, from Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window. It's about one of the most important things economics deals with--incentives. Lisa (played by Grace Kelly) and Jeff (played by Jimmy Stewart), are listening to a man in another apartment play one of his songs on a piano:

LISA: Where does a man get the inspiration for a song like that?
JEFF: From his landlord -- once a month.

What are some of your favorites?

How do economists and other social scientists influence public policy?

Yesterday, I recommended Jeffrey Friedman's article on the financial crisis. Its theme is regulatory hubris, and Friedman disparages "economism," which might be described as a belief that wise economists can guide government policies to correct market failures. Note the echo of Hayek's disparagement of scientism.

Also yesterday, Mencius Moldbug wrote,

By far the most significant source of decisions in the modern American system of government is something called public policy. In the 20th century, it was discovered that the task of governing, thought in all previous centuries to be an art requiring wisdom, talent and experience, is in fact a science, like chemistry or card-counting. This set of sciences is often described as the social sciences, a slippery name if I ever heard one.

However, in a review of a book by John H. Wood on the history of macroeconomic policy, David C. Wheelock writes,

Economists have rationalized more than influenced policy, Wood contends, and the direction of influence between economic theory and practice is primarily from the latter to the former.

That would be closer to my view on public policy in general. To find that review, I followed a trail from Pete Boettke to Peter Klein.

The main science of political economy is the science of obtaining and retaining power. As far as expertise goes, the pollster, the fundraiser, and the media expert are all fundamental to the operation. The public policy expert is for decoration. If you want to be an economic policy adviser when you grow up, then my advice is to learn to rationalize the methods used by leading politicians to obtain power.

Is health care reform about health care? No, it is about seizing and retaining power. Was the stimulus about stimulus? No, was about seizing and retaining power. Is cap and trade about global warming? No, it is about seizing and retaining power. Was TARP about saving the financial system? No, it was about seizing and retaining power.

The social scientist's role in the political process is to say, "X is a problem. Government must solve X. Here are some solutions." The solutions that rationalize seizing and retaining power will bubble to the top.

Suppose you believe that regulators cannot possibly have the wisdom to direct human activity. Suppose you believe that politicians spending other people's money tend to choose less wisely than people spending their own money. If you want to get anywhere as a public policy adviser, keep those beliefs to yourself.

The second Boot Camp II assignment will be easier than the headshot assignment, logistically. But calorically speaking, it will be far more dangerous.

And since you will not have to wrangle a model for this shoot (not a living one, at least) we are going to up the difficulty level by tightening up the deadline a bit.

Hit the jump for the details -- and some internal and external resources to help you out.
__________


A Little Belt Tightening

It's probably safe to say that many of us are eating out less often than we were at this time last year. But that is not the kind of belt tightening of which I am speaking.

For me, it is not so much the belt itself that is getting smaller, but rather that the job the belt has to do has gotten larger. Me and food, we were made for each other. And we have had an especially close relationship over the last six months or so, when I have been on the road more than off. So this summer I am practicing a little girth control.

Which is why I am already questioning the wisdom of the second BCII assignment -- to photograph a gastronomic subject so well that it will cause me to go off the wagon.

The vast majority of you are using small lights, and they are especially well-suited for this kind of an assignment. In fact, as we showed last week, you can create very elegant light for food with one bare speedlight and some household paper products.

But don't settle on a thrown-together quickie of some tomatoes -- those were just done as a convenient example to work with the light. For this assignment, you should be looking to create a mood -- to make a photo that would look at home on the cover of a high-end food magazine.


Complicate Things at Your Own Peril

The trick, of course, if to balance the mood-setting stuff with what is probably the most important axiom in food photography: Keep it Simple, Stupid.

Before you even choose what you are going to shoot, spend some time looking at a lot of examples of food photography and see what you like. It's not like there isn't a lot of inspiration out there, so your first stop will probably be Google.

Don't try to shoot a whole turkey, or a crown roast or anything like that unless you are insane. You'll do yourself a big favor by aiming for something you can pull off with style and simplicity.

Lighting-wise, whether you use an umbrella, a soft box or a DIY "lunch box," you will want to at least consider lighting your food from the top/back. It creates depth and texture, and gets you a long way toward a nice photo with little risk. Not that that style is required, of course, but many people who have not shot food before will make the mistake of assuming you would light it from the same angle you'd light a portrait.

Also, be sure to be in control of your shadow detail. Not that it has to be flat -- and there is no rule that there has to be any shadow detail, to be honest. But you want to be in control of it. The easiest way will be through the use of small reflectors.

Again, the scale of the subject works for you here. They can be folded sheets of paper, aluminum foil, whatever. If you are from the UK, maybe the mere act of standing near your subject will suffice. (I can say that, because I wear shorts all summer and am still pasty on Labor Day...)


Food for Thought

I did promise an opportunity to do good with each assignment, and this one is no different. The following is not a requirement for the assignment, but rather a chance for your effort not to go to waste -- even if it does end up going to waist.

The fact that you are probably eating out less frequently probably means that some local restauranteurs in your area are feeling the pinch, too. So, you may wish to double up on this assignment by shooting your favorite dish at a small, independent restaurant.

The owner probably does not have the excess cash flow to be funding food shoots these days, and you might be able to be of help. Sometimes all a restaurant website needs is one, killer food shot. That could be you.

What's in it for you, other than an excuse to go out to eat? Well, I am thinking that food is gonna styled pretty well when it leaves the kitchen. Probably better that you would have done it. And no stylist's bill to deal with, either.

A little advice -- call first and let them know what you are up to. Try to sked it in the middle of the afternoon, when you won't interfere with meal rush time and will have your pick of tables to shoot at. We used to shoot all of our restaurant reviews at The Sun in the 2:30-3:30pm neighborhood.

If you explain what you are doing (and why) and offer to share your photos with them, you will probably find yourself in a very collaborative situation -- with a nice environment in which to shoot. Especially of you are a regular there who genuinely wants to make an image of some value for the restaurant.

I am starting to feel like we are putting Roberto's kids through college, as often as we eat at our favorite Italian place. And that is exactly where I would head if I were doing this assignment.

Again, the restaurant tack is not required. But it could solve some problems for you very symbiotically. From experience, I would suggest that the chef keep things very simple, as their first instinct is to throw in every visual thing but the kitchen sink. Bring some examples of food photography that you really like (it will probably be simple and sparse) and show it to them as an example.


Home-Grown is Okay, Too

You are more then welcome -- especially you foodies -- to do it all in-house, so to speak. No brownie points or demerits either way.

And for clarity's sake, let's make this one pretty broad. If it is food, or drink, it's eligible. Some of you international types might even take this as a point of pride, featuring something that is a special delicacy in your country.

(Please -- no haggis.)

But whatever you do, keep it simple. Consider the photographic shelf life of your food. Grilled and roasted items are especially hard -- typically significantly undercooked and sculpted with char-marks by using a blow torch. Don't make it harder than it has to be.

Non-frozen desserts are pretty stable, for example. Don't make things harder on yourself than they have to be. Simple comfort foods can be great subjects.


Resources Abound

A quick Google of "food photography" brings up lots of useful stuff:


DPS: Food Photography -- An Introduction
Still Life With: Food Photography Blog
Vegan Yum Yum: Food Photography for Bloggers


Those were right off of the front page of Google results, so there is no shortage of information if you are willing to look.

Of course, photographers are visual people. So sometimes it actually helps to watch a seasoned professional at work:




(Lest you take yourself too seriously.)


How to Enter

As with the first assignment, you enter the photo through Flickr, by placing it in the Strobist Flickr Group pool, and by tagging it thusly:


SBC2ASSIGN2

If you need technical help on the Flickr stuff, try this thread. Please read the thread before asking any questions, lest someone reply that "your father smelled of elderberry" (or words to that effect.)

(UPDATE: They have already started in with the general craziness, so you can skip to the more relevant stuff by jumping to this point if you like.)

If you are successful, your photos should appear in this search within a few minutes. Please, only submit one entry. As we are hoping to create an inclusive slideshow, please do not tag photos which are not appropriate to this assignment with the SBC2ASSIGN2 tag.

For the same reason, please do not turn in any photos which are NSFW.

In fact, the more I look at this Cheeto shot, the more inappropriate it is starting to look. But maybe that's just me. As we noted yesterday, breaking these rules will get (at least) your photo removed from the Strobist pool, and thus, this assignment. Thanks much.

Please note that your photo must be tagged correctly and in the Strobist group pool to show up in the search.

And please, this is a lighting blog. So even tho you obviously can do a lot of amazing food photography with natural light, use flash for this one. You are free to combine it with ambient, tho. And, as always, put your lighting info in the caption of the photo.

If you want to ask questions, or otherwise discuss this assignment, you can do so in this thread.

And you can check out some of the other bloggers following along, here.


And the Winner Is ...

One winner will be chosen from qualified entries. That person will receive the following, shipped anywhere:


• One Strobist Lighting Seminar 8-DVD boxed set (more info)

• One set of Strobist Trade Secret Cards (more info)

and, I am very excited to say that our external prize this week is:

• An Orbis Ring Flash Adapter, which turns just about any speedlight into a ring flash.

Not coincidentally, the latter is something I have found to be pretty darn useful for small object photography, including food shoots. (Think awesome, shadowless fill to smooth out your edgy, sculpted light from other sources...)


Don't Overcook It

Since this shot is the simplest of the four (deceptively so, some might say) the deadline for completion will be end of day, your local time, on Saturday, July 11th.

You procrastinators will want to make sure you get started by about dinnertime on that date...


And, Just to Keep Things Honest

While it is very possible that you may have some beautiful, pre-existing food shots in your portfolio, we are not interested in those. So just to make sure we get the one you shot after this assignment was released, the winner will have to produce a shot very similar to the winning entry -- with two coins somewhere in the foreground of the shot.

So, don't forget your verification shot -- just in case!
__________


Full, "On-Assignment" posts for the food shots featured above can be found at:


:: Lemon Cake ::
:: Flavored Vodkas ::
:: Macaroni Shells ::
:: Cheeto (and various other Munchie Porn) ::

Like some commenters, I found Bryan Caplan's post on health care today to be one of his best. And he's already set a high bar. But, believe it or not, given that Bryan is a more-radical libertarian than I am, I think he sold freedom short.

In his point #1, Bryan wrote:

If the problem with free-market health care is just that poor people can't afford health care, then the smart response is simply to give poor people more money (or possibly a cash voucher), and leave insurance companies alone. Think about how we usually handle hunger among the poor. We don't set up byzantine regulations for grocery stores. We give the poor welfare checks and/or food stamps, and leave the grocery stories alone.

His first sentence is absolutely correct. The smart response is to give them more money or health care vouchers. But in the last three sentences, he used the word "we" where he really meant "the government." The government is not us. It's some of us, but it's not us. Many of us do give money to poor people to provide various things and, as Russell Roberts documents in his article on Charity, a large fraction of charitable contributions, before the government started massive welfare programs in the 1930s, was to poor people. Notice Russ's Table 1 showing that as the Great Depression deepened before the New Deal, charitable contributions to poor people rose. Government welfare rose too but it rose massively during the first years of the New Deal and then charitable contributions to poor people fell.

Because Bryan used "we" where he meant "the government," he got himself in a box with his point #4. He wrote:

My most controversial point: While redistribution is the most logical response to the health market's performance, I still oppose it. In the grand scheme of things, poor people in the First World are doing fine.

What happened to his idea that the smart thing to do is to give poor people money or health care vouchers? Did it quit being the smart thing to do? It's clear from context that by "redistribution," Bryan meant forced distribution by government. I oppose it too. And here's where I think he sold freedom short. If he hadn't used "we" to mean the government but had instead used it to mean "Americans" or "people who live in America," then he wouldn't have had to take the position he took in the part of point #4 that I quoted above. If Bryan opposes giving money to poor people in America, then, fine, he doesn't have to and, if he so chooses, he can persuade other people not to. But there will be some of us who still want to give money to poor people in America knowing full well that Bryan is right that we are helping people who, in the larger picture, are already quite wealthy. That's what's so great about freedom: everyone can choose whom to help and whom not to.

The problem all came about because Bryan used the "we" word inappropriately. For more of the hot water that can get you in, see my "Who is 'We'?" and "Who is 'We'? Part Two."

Critical Review is publishing a special issue on the financial crisis. I have uploaded Jeffrey Friedman's introduction. I strongly recommend the entire issue. The paper by Acharya and Richardson is the one that most closely reflects my own views.

Friedman's introduction is much more than a summary. He writes,

if we take seriously the possibility that market participants are making cognitive rather than incentives-based errors, the case for regulation loses considerable force.

His point is that regulators made the same cognitive mistakes as financial executives--trusting the rating agencies, for example.

He says,

Indeed, what may have saved the world from complete economic chaos in 2008 was the fact that the regulations were loose enough that many investors and many bankers had resisted buying the "safe" securities that most banks seem to have bought. Heterogeneous behavior like that, however, is allowed for, encouraged, and rewarded by capitalism; and is either discouraged or prohibited by regulation, depending on
how tight the regulations are.

Which is more vulnerable to catastrophic failure: a relatively unregulated system, in which participants pursue diverse strategies; or a strongly regulated system? For Friedman, the latter is more vulnerable, because of the risk of promoting homogeneous behavior, so that one mistake affects everyone.

All of us have our intellectual hobby horses. Friedman's hobby horse seems to be the existence of cognitive weakness or ignorance. He is constantly asking what happens if leaders have cognitive biases or information gaps. In general, I think when you take that problem seriously, you fear strong government.

Over at U.S. News and World Report, Matt Bandyk has a follow-up question for my last post on mandatory insurance and adverse selection:

Here's my question to Dr. Caplan: But far from being populist anti-intellectualism, isn't the objection that "poor people will not be able to afford health care in a free market and so the sick ones will die" a very real challenge that requires a response? Does the fact that, by Caplan's own admission, a free market in health insurance would underserve sick people show a real problem with the laissez-faire approach?

There are several layers of responses to this question.  I'll start with the textbook answer, then move on to successively more controversial observations:

1. The smart response to market failure varies sharply depending on what the market failure is supposed to be.  If the problem with free-market health care is just that poor people can't afford health care, then the smart response is simply to give poor people more money (or possibly a cash voucher), and leave insurance companies alone.  Think about how we usually handle hunger among the poor.  We don't set up byzantine regulations for grocery stores.  We give the poor welfare checks and/or food stamps, and leave the grocery stories alone.

2. On further reflection, the fact that health insurance is too expensive for the poor is actually an important argument for deregulation of the health industry in order to bring costs down.  For starters, there are many regulations on the books that specify what health insurance companies have to cover - mental health being the most notorious.  In a free market, insurance companies could offer more restrictive policies that the poor might actually be able to afford. 

More importantly, though, health insurance is expensive because regulation sharply raises the cost of health care itself.  Medical licensing regulations, for example, sharply raise the cost of medical labor.  Economists like Milton Friedman have been arguing for decades that mere certification, or even reputation, could give you the same protection at much lower cost.  And while you probably want an M.D. to do your brain surgery, licensed physicians are over-qualified for much, if not most, of the work they do - as you might have noticed if you ever saw a dermatologist for acne.

3. On top of all of this, almost everyone familiar with the data admits that at least in First World countries, the difference in health between rich and poor has little or nothing to do with access to medical care.* It's easy to find anecdotes of poor people who suffered or died because of inadequate medical care, but when you look at the big picture, you realize that these anecdotes must be quite rare.  So despite response #1, more redistribution wouldn't actually help the poor's health very much.

4. My most controversial point: While redistribution is the most logical response to the health market's performance, I still oppose it.  In the grand scheme of things, poor people in the First World are doing fine.  If they weren't, why would millions of people be delighted to immigrate here to take low-skilled jobs?  For thoughtful humanitarians, the quest to improve the health care of the U.S. poor is a red herring.  The crusade that deserves our support is open immigration.

Matt also asks me to reply to a point from Ezra Klein:

I would pose to Caplan a question that Ezra Klein, a good representative of the anti-free-market view on health care, asked on his blog recently:

Are we really sure we want a bustling market in how to cleverly revoke the insurance of people who prove to be sickly?

If you read Ezra's post, there are actually two distinct complaints about free-market health care.  The first is that insurers engage in near-fraud - rescinding coverage on flimsy pretexts when people get seriously (and expensively) ill.  If this were more than an anecdotal problem, which I doubt, I don't see why lawsuits or advertising couldn't handle it.

Ezra's second complaint, though, is "insurers rid themselves of unprofitable accounts by slapping them with intentionally unrealistic rate increases,'" a business practice known as "purging."  Frankly, this story makes no sense.  If a customer is expensive, a company might want to raise his rate so he'd be profitable to insure.  As long as there's competition, though, firms have no reason to raise the rate higher. 

Of course, if the problem is that you want to buy insurance against the possibility of becoming a high-risk customer, you should pick a company that lets you lock in your rate.  See e.g. life insurance, where you can get a fixed low rate for life if you buy your policy when you're young.

Any more questions, Matt?

* Start reading the link on p.181.

Patri Friedman launches secession week, a discussion of secession.

In one of my forthcoming books, Unchecked and Unbalanced, I discuss a number of mechanisms for limiting the power of government. You can think of these as mechanisms for achieving virtual secession, although I do not use that term.

The problem with physical secession is that it is very difficult to achieve critical mass. There is probably not much overlap between the people you want to live with and the people who want to choose your particular form of government. The vast majority of us put up with government we dislike in order to live in proximity to people with whom we want to work and play.

With virtual secession, you could still live in San Francisco or Manhattan or Silver Spring while seceding from much of the government at the city, state, and Federal level. You and your next-door neighbor might belong to very different governmental units.

Suppose, for example, that instead of having your taxes allocated for you by legislators, you were given a list of programs and could choose how to allocate your taxes. What percent of your taxes should go to TARP? What percent should go to fund the mohair subsidy? What percent should fund DC school vouchers? What percent should go to Barney Frank's affordable housing initiatives?

In its 26-year modern history, Vanity Fair has photographed some of the world’s most recognizable bodies (Gisele, Angelina, Brad … Borat?) on beaches from Malibu to Amagansett. Unfold the umbrella, slap on some sunscreen, and enjoy the view.