I also read long ago about the United States and the Soviets stealing much technology from Germany. And I agree.

But something that has always turned me off about German technology is their love for over engineering things: cameras, cars, etc. They pack them with so many neat features a regular user would never need anyway.

I had American cars for many years and I have grown accustomed to simplicity in design. Last year I got a Mini Cooper, I love the car, but it’s a complicated life to replace a flat tire, the interior door handles use a different mechanic system that looks nice but easily breaks and it’s made of plastic, etc.

My brother got a BMW a few years ago and he ran into pretty similar problems, American and Japanese cars for example, use the same windshield wiper systems, which you can replace for less than 10 dls and it only takes a second, but the BMW fellows came up with some specially developed windshield wiper and now my brother had to pay more than 50 dls to replace them. What’s the use of engineering a “superior” product if you end up paying more.

There’s an interesting story comparing WWII tank development and manufacturing strategies by Americans and Germans, here:

http://www.productbeautiful.com/2006/11/17/the-perils-of-over-engineering/comment-page-1/#comment-1831

Not just that. We expropriated all their patented processes when we got into World War I. We declared the German patents to be enemy assets and sold them off to US firms. This was a gigantic blow to Germany.

Germany had made up for its lack of a large and climatologically diverse empire (like Britain) or continental land mass (like the USA) by pioneering in chemistry, to make substitutes for naturally occurring tropical and subtropical products. The Germans had an economic incentive that the Anglosphere countries did not. They then surged ahead in these new fields. Germany’s capacity to carry on World War I despite a tight economic blockade came as a shock to Britain and to other observers. The USA grabbed much of what they had done and leap-frogged to the cutting edge.

A remarkable tale which is told in Hugill, P. and V. Bachmann. 2005. The Route to the Techno-Industrial World-Economy and the Transfer of German Organic Chemistry to America before, during, and immediately after World War One. Comparative Technology Transfer and Society 3(2): 159-186. This article is not, unfortunately, free online, but it is very much worth tracking down.

England, and after Union, Britain, had a single internal market. Pre-revolutionary France had myriad internal customs barriers, so that to get goods across France you would have to pay customs duties numerous times. Even though France was far bigger than Britain, the latter had a single large internal market to support production and innovation.

Guilds monopolized production by law and typically were hostile to innovation as threatening their members’ monopoly rents. But the guilds only held power in chartered cities. British entrepreneurs set up shop in unchartered towns and rural areas to avoid guild restrictions — two of these little towns were Manchester and Birmingham; James Watt avoided guild restrictions by working on university premises, which were autonomous from the city government. France did not permit this sort of regulatory arbitrage. Just as today many Silicon Valley entrepreneurs are fleeing to Nevada and other low-tax, low-regulation areas.

Finally, science was not all that useful to technological entrepreneurs in the initial periods. Even when science got the main point right, they often could not model the effects they theorized about well enough to provide useful guidance to technologists. N.A.M. Rodger describes how French scientists laid out the foundations of hydrodynamics in the late 18th century, but when they tried to apply their new understandings to ship design, they just couldn’t model the forces accurately enough. So French ships were too long and thin, and tended to break up too easily in heavy seas. The British continued to use empirical rules of thumb, which produced better, more practical ships. Eventually, science started to deliver — sugar from beets, chemical dyes, electrical equipment. Germany developed the concept of the research university feeding into systemic industrial R&D, which allowed them to surge ahead or into peer status in the late 19th century, until the Americans imitated their system and caught up.

In the 17th century, there were new dynasties in both countries. The English Stuarts were protestants, and James continued Elizabeth’s religious policy. But his son Charles, was arrogant, tried to make the Scots conform, and the English live without Parliament. When his subjects rebelled at his machinations, he lost and eventually lost his head.

The French Bourbons were Catholic and capable. When rebellion broke out at mid-century, they used the opening to become absolute monarchs. Later in the 17th century, they abandoned the toleration of Protestantism established to end the civil wars of the 16th century.

At the beginning of the 18th century, France was the dominant power in Europe. England did not challenge it until mid-century (French and Indian Wars, a/k/a 7 years war) or pass it until the collapse of Napoleon’s Empire.

England was better off by its 17th century settlement, but that would not become apparent, nor explicable, until the 19th century.

I think it came largely from the permissive law enforcement policies and social policies of the left. New York is a pretty good example. Crime soared in the 70s and declined after OW Wilson’s theories were adopted.

The single parent household is a consequence, in large part, of Great Society policies in welfare. The original AFDC was intended for windows with children. It was transformed by policies that were condemned by Moynihan in 1965. His advice was ignored.

There is a book out now that sounds interesting. It’s titled “Searching for Whitopia”. I wonder if he has any insight.

I grew up in Chicago in the 1940s and 50s, then left for college and never lived there again. I still have a lot of family there and have watched the trends. It’s pretty grim, as is Los Angeles and both are firmly in the hands of the left elite. I live south, behind the “Orange Curtain” as some call it. My daughter moved to Los Angeles and her car insurance tripled. Just one small indicator.

Thanks for the link to Christmas presents for next year. How about your recommendations for this one?

Where did that urban underclass come from?

On the point of decentralization, Joel Kotkin (I think) had an article about the decline of all other centers of wealth, power, culture and influence in the USA, and the rise of DC to a centralized, imperial capital like Rome or Bourbon-era Paris. As the country becomes more of a bureaucratic leviathan, the only avenue to wealth, power or success will be access to government power. Hence talent and ambition migrate to the center of political power. This is a disaster which cuts against a thousand years of Anglospheric history and practice. It is a process that will only end in some sort of catastrophe, which I would prefer not to live through, though my grandchildren (hypothetical at this point) might be better off if we go through such a “time of troubles” and cut Leviathan down to size.

Most likely, we are going to sink slowly into the mud of despotism, bit by bit, with seemingly good reasons for each step. shine, perishing republic.

But this is America after all, and it ain’t over ’til it’s over.

I don’t have it at hand, but somewhere in Mill’s “On Liberty” he makes the point that multiple decentralized groups are favorable to the discovery of truth, because (humans being imperfect by nature) it is more likely that an unusual (but true) idea will be able to flourish in a small group for a time while it is proving its value. A centralized system, which by definition narrows liberty, will be slower to advance to the truth.

Just a conversational thought.