Musings

Mood: Thinking

The effect of the baby boomer aging is going to have a big effect
on the U.S.  economy.


I read a site called  www.safeseniorsystems.com which says that the number of seniors in the U.S is now  30 million and will be 60 million  by 2025.

This  means that there will be a million additional seniors every year.
 
Now seniors make up 10% of the population;  in 2025 they will then make up  around 19%.

Who will care of them?

This will have significant impact on the care of these people.

Why not look at the site and tell me what you think.

How will you look after your parents?

If you are a older person how would you like to live when you get older?


On a related topic, there is talk that General Motors may go bankrupt because of the cost of retirement benefits,  especially health care.
I saw the figure of $4 billion per year in healthcare benefits paid to 1 million retirees.  This is a lot of money.

The cost of health care for each vehicle built is about $1500; the direct labor cost per car

is under $500.  This is a significant problem if you want to keep building vehicles in the U.S.

But that is the size of the cost of the healthcare industry in the US;  $1400 billion in 2004.  Over $4000 per person per year.
Can this about continue to rise or will we have to come up with
better ways to stay well?

The purpose of this post is to let people think of the practical aspects of
emptying a small city,  of say one million people.

(If there is a train then this can be used also, but since the U.S. is
a car country. I will use roads for the evacuation.)

Lets think about what you need.  A road and transport.

Assume the goal is to move people 400 miles away.  If you can get the traffic to move at
50 miles an hour.  This journey  means  driving  for 8 hours to reach the destination.

If a car is used and it has 4 people then assuming the cars are spaced 2 seconds apart,
you will have 2000 cars passing a post in the road each hour. So you can  move (2000 x 4 =) 8000 people out of the city on one lane every hour.

To evacuate a city with a million by car and assuming you have 10 lanes leading out of the city you will have to move 10 x 8000  = 80,000 people per hour.
 


So in 10 hours you can move out 800,000 people ASSUMING
1. you maintain the flow.  2 you have no traffic jams
3. no breakdowns.

This also means that you will have to have 200,000 cars.

What if you use buses?  A bus can carry  50 to 80 people.
As the bus carries 80 people  but takes up the length of road that 4 cars would take
this will allow you to take out  5 times more people per lane.
This shows that using buses to move out people is definitely  possible.
If one uses buses then you have to consider having a path for the buses to
return to collect more passengers.  Note that the trip is 18 hours so find drivers
would be a requirement.  Perhaps each bus would have 2 drivers who whould switch every few hours.
One problem is finding the buses.   In an emergency situation I think that the
state could arrange to have the buses used.

Assume that you can get 1000 buses and use these to ferry the people out.
The buses will carry 80,000 per trip. But since the round trip is 16 hours, this means
using buses will only allow you to move 100,000 people per day.
So it you take 10 days to move people out using only buses.

One problem that arise using buses is how much luggage can be carried.
It also means that some  reception centre must be used to house the
people. (When those leave by car they can find places to stay over a wide
area.)

So I think that one has to use cars to move a majority of the people out.

I think it also means that you have to convert most of lanes leading from the city
to flow out from the city. i.e. turn around the lanes.

(One may have to stop people entering the highway unless the road speed is 50 mph as
other wise you run the risk of having the people stopped on the highways.)

Now that is apparent that you can move the people out - the evacuation decision must be made
 3 to 5 ways before the storm comes if you are to ensure that the traffic flow is
to be maintained.

One also must ensure that there is sufficient gas available for the journey.

The solution might be to ensure that you have adequate fuel at locations, say 200 miles from the
city.  

How much fuel?   Assuming that average car gets 30 miles per gallon,
so you have need 12 gallons per car and there are 250,000 cars.
So this evacuation will require 3 million gallons.   The police and other services will
need about 10% - an extra 300,000 gallons.  So you need 3,300,000 gallons of fuel.

So you might want to estimate the capacity of all the gas stations in and around the
city so see how much fuel will be needed.
(As a simplification I have assumed all vehicles use gas, and ignored vehicles using diesel).

If there are are points that I have missed please make suggestions.

You might want to read my original post on 3 March 2005.  
The suggestions are still valid.
This latest storm has given the opportunity to fix it faster.

The right action at the wrong time is the wrong action.

I am still disappointed that the many  people in American industry who are very  brilliant and skilled have not been given the opportunity to solve the problems - stopping the water and draining the city and restoring the services.

There are many amazing  engineering feats in the U.S.
In fact the U.S. is know for its success in creating companies the do
tasks well.   Why not get then to apply their skills.

I am reminded of the  building of the atomic  bomb. This
was an wonderful combination of science,  engineering and the army.
In fact I think that the  clever trick was that the  army was able to
create an system that got the best  work from the scientists whose
 need to have free communication had to let florish while meeting the secrecy needs
of  the war.
 
I am sure that
rescueing the city from the floods could be done quickly
if the government  wanted it to happen.

Mood: Happy.
Listening to: Pin Ball Wizard by The Who

A quote from my mother who was a teacher.
It means rhar if you praise a person that the will age well. i.e. 60 years
will seem to be only 50 years.old.

I have become more  aware of the problems that parents cause their children by not praising  often enought them
 and encouraging them when they do something well.

A child who is praised will grow up to be a credit to you.

Before you criticise your child, see if you can express it in a positive
way.

"John! That was a good attempt!  Let me show you how  to do it even better."   -  may be more effective than "No John! That is wrong!"

Sometimes I have a disagreement with my children.

I have found that sentence: "At least one of us is wrong!" is very useful.

Especially since my child - while very clever is occasionally  misinformed  and has to  be guided.   However, I do tell him that he is brilliant - which he is.

The world is not always encouraging of youth.

Try your best.   But also be realistic.   The main goal is to do your best
and have fun.

Sometimes it is good to put yourself in the other person's shoes. Then you can  often see why they have a different opinion.

This exercise will also help you deal with others.  They may not have had all the experiences (good and bad!) which you have had.

Go away now and praise the next person you see. Pick one thing that you like about them.

Does anyone  know how to contact Steve Jobs?

Mood: Planning my future.
Listening to: Imagine

I have been deeply saddened by the loss of my friend.

So I am now thinking of how to get the most important tasks accomplished.


Book:  A great book is "First Things First" by   Stephen R. Covey.
  
This is an excellent book to help you balance your life.
He has this great idea that all tasks are can be scored on two scales.

The scales are:  Urgent    -------------  Not Urgent

and              Important -------------  Unimportant.


Take a while and list that things that you are planning to do in the next week or month.

Next think about why you are doing each activity and score them on these scales.

You may find that some of the tasks you are doing are not really important and others are not urgent.  

This analysis will help you to make sure that you are doing the talks you really think should be done.   The urgent and not urgent scale  lets you postpone some tasks  so that you get more important tasks done first.


Time:
The right action at the wrong time is the wrong action.


Perhaps you should see you friend - maybe they will not be
there if you postpone it.