Benton Crane

I just finished my term project for my environmental economics class. I started out looking for a relationship between recent gas prices and hybrid sales. What I found was interesting. Check out the graphs below (click on them for a clearer picture).

You see that gas prices have a lot of seasonal fluctuation. I was only interested in the overall trend, so I applied what we call a “weighted moving average smoother” to the data–basically it just takes out the “noise” and leaves the overall trend (I used this smoother on all the graphs below). Here is what is looks Like:

Because nominal prices tell us nothing about the real cost of gas (doesn’t account for the changing value of the dollar or the level of wealth we enjoy), I also collected GDP data:

Using nominal gas price and GDP data, I created a relative gas price (gas price/GDP). It is interpreted as the cost of gas relative to our level of wealth:

Notice the relative cost of gas was falling all through the 1990s and for the most part increasing throughout the current decade. Now look at the ratio between car and truck sales in the U.S. during the same time period:

In 1990 there were about two cars sold for every truck. That ratio continuously fell until it finally bottomed out in late 2004 when there were more trucks being sold than cars (relative gas prices had already been increasing for 2-5 years).

Now look at the number of hybrids sold as a percentage of total vehicle sales:

Notice that hybrids took a sharp turn around the same time the car-truck trend switched directions.

My data does not allow me to control for consumer tastes and preferences or countless other factors that contribute to these trends. That aside, it appears that consumers react to shifts in relative gas price trends with about a 2-5 year lag (at least in terms of the type of vehicles we purchase).

In hind sight, I wish I had collected data for a larger time period. It would be helpful to see other shifts in relative gas prices (think 1970’s gas crisis). Did consumers react similarly? Was the lag in their reaction similar?

I collected GDP and U.S. automotive sales data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Gas price data came from the Energy Information Administration. And hybrid sales data came from Green Car Congress.

Share This

Britt’s parents took us to Moab. Here are some photos from the trip.

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

Share This

Britt and her mom, for quite some time, have been saying they think we are having a girl. I took an opposite stance and started telling everyone it’s a boy (because I decide of course).

I was wrong. We just got the ultrasound and we’re going to have a little girl!

Share This

I voted yesterday. I was nervous there might be things on the ballot that I didn’t know anything about. Fortunately, the only thing on the ballot is the presidential primary.

I was glad I went early for three reasons:

1. There was absolutely no line!
2. I recently moved and had to fill out a change of address form and show proof of my new address. Apparently you can’t make that change on election day.
3. I wasn’t affiliated with any party so in order to vote for Ron Paul* I had to affiliate myself with the Republican party. I guess you can’t do that on election day either.

So if you haven’t voted yet, go! All you need is your driver’s license and a few minutes (if you’ve moved since you registered to vote you will also need a piece of mail with your name and address). For those of you here in Utah County, go to the county building in Provo (Center Street and 100 E.) between 8am and 5pm. Or you can also go to the American Fork Library between 3 and 7pm. You have until Friday February 1st for early voting.

* I chose Ron Paul because ALL of his platforms are based on very simple and true principles: personal liberty and limited government. If you haven’t taken 15 minutes to listen to one of his interviews or read an article, please do. Here is a good article. You will be shocked to find a politician that makes perfect sense and is 100% unapologetic about standing for what’s right.

Share This

After deciding awhile back that I want to go into market research, I started working hard to learn econometrics and make myself qualified and prepared to enter that field. Today an opportunity opened up that I am confident will be a huge stepping stone. Professor Joseph Price hired me as a research assistant to aid him in a study that shows the effects of pornography on marriages.

I am super excited to get on the job training in data collection, interpretation, and analysis. I am even more elated that the job will place me in such an important study.

Share This

Brittany and I got the happy news about a month before Christmas, but because she was threatening miscarriage (I think that was the term the doctor used), we decided to hold off on spreading the news. On Christmas day we gave both her parents and mine some baby clothes and a note announcing the due date of their up and coming grand-child. Because of the somewhat precarious situation of the pregnancy, we asked both families to keep it a secret until things were a little more stable. Both sets of grandparents-to-be, however, couldn’t contain themselves and both extended families knew within days.

The pregnancy has smoothed out and we now have a status of “normal.” Assuming things continue to go well, we will be parents in August. Any suggestions on a name?

Share This

Over two years ago, with the help of my cousins Jeff and Neal, we came up with the idea of keeping a personal diary online. The groundwork to make this possible had already been laid by Neal, who founded FamilyLearn Inc. FamilyLearn is in the business of helping families preserve, search, share, and learn from their own stories. FamilyLearn’s main tool for doing this is MemoryPress.com (it used to be called iMemoryBook.com). MemoryPress is a web-based publishing application that enables families to colaborate in compiling memory books for and about loved ones.

Using the same technology as MemoryPress, we created Pyxlin. The non-sense name was an obvious result of a shortage of good domain names. It was derived from our tag line: “journaling in pixel and print.” Pyxlin was supposed to and did improve my journal keeping in many ways. I could access it from anywhere so I wrote more frequently. I type much faster than I hand-write, so I included much more detail. I inserted digital photos so they would be fused to the stories behind them. And thanks to the foundation laid by MemoryPress.com, Pyxlin even enabled me to publish my journal into a hardbound book.

I was really excited. I told all my friends and family. Despite my enthusiasm for the product, I’m confident I was the least qualified person working at FamilyLearn. Fortunately though, I was surrounded by gifted and helpful people. I studied everything I could about business and marketing. I used class projects as an excuse to do market research for Pyxlin. I made a package to sell Pyxlin in stores and got it into BYU’s bookstore. We ended up selling at multiple different conferences and a few universities too.

Unfortunately, the project encountered a snag, or should I say a series of snags, that took the wind out of my sails. Due to an array of technical road blocks that I don’t pretend to understand, Pyxlin was not in a position to scale and therefore could not be opened up to the public. Our bootstrapped little company was forced to put all of its resources into programming and development. With Pyxlin closed to the public and absolutely no marketing budget, I was forced to wait patiently for the programmers to find and implement their solutions. Being that I know nothing about programming, I helped where I could doing user testing and user-interface design, but the process was painfully slow.

Being a single student, I was able to squeeze by living on the few sales from the bookstore and from the different conferences. Last summer, however, I got married and immediately needed more income. I was obliged to leave FamilyLearn for a more steady income. Since then, I have been almost completely disconnected from FamilyLearn and from Pyxlin.

Today, Jeff contacted me with some very exciting news. Pyxlin is finally open to the public! Now anyone can experience the same improvements in their personal journal keeping as I did!

Share This

If anyone needs a vacuum or vacuum parts (filters, bags, belts, etc.) this might be helpful. Use Coupon Code FIVEOFF to get $5 off your next order over $50. One coupon per person. Expires 12/31/07. They gave me this code after I made a purchase, so it might be for returning customers only, but I assume it will work for anyone. If it doesn’t try GOOGLE5 for 5% off.

Share This

My wife came home from the grocery store the other day and tossed me a DVD–one of those free hand-out discs. The grocery store is apparently allowing them to be distributed near their cash registers. The disc is titled Ron Paul 2008: Hope for America. It contains video clips from an array of different interviews and debates. It also has directions to visit www.RonPaul2008.com or to call 877-RON-2008. The small-print around the edge of the disc is what surprised me: “This DVD has been provided at the expense of private individuals who support Ron Paul and his message of liberty and freedom. It has not been endorsed, sponsored, or funded in any way, by the official Ron Paul 2008 Presidential Campaign Committee.”

Last night, my wife and I were in Idaho Falls doing some Christmas shopping. It was a cold, snowy night (anyone familiar with Eastern Idaho knows it rivals Siberia). We drove through a very busy intersection where on each corner there were families of Ron Paul supporters–old and young. They were dressed like Eskimos trying to survive the cold as they waved their Ron Paul signs at the traffic. I’ve heard reports of similar scenes from my cousins in Oregon.

I don’t travel a lot, but in my journeys between Utah and Idaho as well as a quick trip to Detroit, I’ve been amazed at the number of unofficial Ron Paul support signs. I’m not referring to the official little campaign yard signs (although there are plenty of them). I’m referring to the seemingly endless “home made” looking signs. They are everywhere! I don’t remember where I heard it but someone said, “If I didn’t know who Ron Paul is, I would think he was the world’s best real estate agent.”

It appears to me that Ron Paul has more unofficial support than any candidate out there. People are fed up with the smooth-talking politicians who will only take a stand just strong enough to do what is “right,” but not so strong that they offend someone. Ron Paul is a principle based man that stands behind those principles regardless of what anyone thinks.

I’ve never given anything more than a vote to a politician because I’ve never known one to stand for true principles like Ron Paul does. Tomorrow is his TeaParty 07 fund raising event. My wife and I are both students and we don’t have much to give, but we are still going to make a donation. We hope all this unofficial support will turn into official support.

Share This

My political views have been forming for quite some time, but I recently read The Law by Frederic Basitiat. He helped me solidify my views and define the proper role of government.

Government is to protect the life, liberty, and private property of each of its citizens.

Government should not take on other roles and responsibilities or it will eventually infringe on the very rights it was intended to protect.

Ron Paul is the presidential candidate most in line with this view. In fact, he is the only candidate (as far as I can tell) that is trying to bring the government back in line with its proper role.

Share This