SOME OBSERVATIONS on "Carmageddon."

There are several broader lessons from this. First, why don’t people in LA change their behavior to get this result all of the time? Simple: the ordinary range of congestion is not intolerable, despite what people say. (This is what economists call “revealed preference.”) In other words, LA probably has on average the optimal amount of congestion. Second, it means all the dreams and schemes of planners and do-good social engineer/interveners are irrelevant, when they aren’t counterproductive (which is most of the time). Third, humans aren’t as stupid as our elite minders like to think.

The lessons to be (not) learned (yet again) are that (1) it's never as bad as the doomsayers would like us to believe; (2) all the schemes of do-good social engineers are irrelevant (counterproductive is more like it); and (3) humans aren't as stupid as our elite minders would like us to believe.

These are lessons for politicians, both liberal and conservative, and if they are not learned soon, I'm looking forward to a political "karmageddon" in November 2012.