Capitalism makes people taller writes Ian Birrell:

• A century ago South Korean men ranked 150 on the list of tallest on the planet.
• Today they have risen 99 points to 51.
• The average South Korean woman is 1.62 meters – 20.2 centimeters (8 inches) taller than her counterpart a hundred years ago.
• Meanwhile a study of male North Korean defectors has found that they are up to 8 centimeters shorter than their southern brethren.
• The defectors are typically from the communist regime’s elite – it’s likely that the average North Korean is a lot shorter.

Read more on the Foundation for Economic Education.

Sydney Parker looked at police uniform design:

• Women often find their police uniforms don’t fit them – from pants with crotches that are too low – to bulletproof vests that leave their sides and abdomens exposed.
• When one complained about the fit of a vest, the manufacturer fixed it by cutting out holes for the breasts. Upon further complaint, the manufacturer covered the holes with two sown on cones, Madonna style.
• Females typically have smaller belts, able to clip on fewer items. A drop holster around the leg expands their capacity but some departments block that because it looks too tactical.
• 13% of law enforcement officers are women, and so police uniforms are typically designed with men in mind.
• This forces some women to pay out of their own pockets to have their clothes tailored to fit them better.

Read more on Racked.

Sara Randazzo wrote about the latest trend in wedding bouquets:

• Couples are planning weddings with an eye to the photos that will result – hoping to have a standout image that’ll define the wedding.
• The latest unit enlisted in the drive for a showstopper is the wedding bouquet, which can now weigh 6kg and include branches, vines, fruits, and vegetables with the flowers.
• Some brides make it trendier by ensuring everything is locally sourced and organic.
• The arrangements are expensive and can cost over $350.
• Because they’re impractical to throw, brides will sometimes have a smaller, throwing bouquet to maintain tradition.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal.

Via: Marginal Revolution

Mike Pearl considered a tax on meat:

• Meat causes health problems and according to the WHO can be a level 1 carcinogen – just like tobacco.
• The farm animals that become meat contribute to global warming – in 2009 they were responsible for 18% of greenhouse gas emissions.
• And meat is helping make bacteria more resistant to drugs, leading to the emergence of “super-bugs” that conventional medicines are unable to treat.
• A tax on meat would reduce people’s consumption thus mitigating these consequences.
• They would also raise revenue that governments can use to fight the problems.
• Unfortunately taxes on food are regressive – they affect the poor more than the rich – since the poor spend a greater proportion of their income on food.

Read more on Vice.

In a wider article about India’s brothels, Poulomi Banerjee wrote that red light districts are being disrupted:

• Email and escort websites mean people no longer have to visit red light districts, and can instead agree on meetup locations across cities.
• Gentrification around the edges of brothels has slowly eroded away the size of red light districts as rising real estate prices make it uneconomical to operate in them.
• Some brothels have tried to extract more from their clients by blackmailing them. The aggrieved couldn’t go to the police without reporting where they were, and this made brothels even less appealing.
• In New Delhi’s primary red light district, the number of brothels and sex workers today is estimated to be 25% of 2001’s numbers.

Read more on Hindustan Times.

Via: Marginal Revolution

Rae Paoletta wrote about the importance of good financial planning:

• According to Betterment, an automated investing service, 22 people have already set up accounts to save for a trip to Outer Space.
• A couple of those accounts are set up to gather $1,000 a month, and one has even managed to amass $60,000 for the purpose.
• Elon Musk has promised a trip to Mars for the bargain price of just $200,000 in the coming years.
• If you want to start planning early, Paoletta estimates that if you set aside $263 a month, and assume standard market returns, you’ll be ready to take off in 30 years.

Read more on Gizmodo.

People used to get in line for Apple’s products. Now Apple is getting in line for trees, wrote Melia Robinson:

• Apple’s new headquarters is set to open this year, and was meant to have 9,000 trees on site. They’re 3,000 short.
• They’re getting competition from a San Francisco bus terminal that’s also planning to prominently feature trees.
• Landscapers for the two are competing against one another, and have gone as far as Portland to reserve trees at nurseries before the other can get to them.
• Beth Hyatt thinks that the end of California’s recent drought is contributing to the problem as there is a sudden uptick in demand for trees by landscapers.
• Happily, Jesse Russell writes that Apple has done a better job of planning the apple trees that will, fittingly, feature prominently. They were planted and stored in nurseries back when construction began.

Read more on Business Insider.

Maureen Shaw wrote about the surprisingly(?) successful history of female sex strikes:

• The original and most famous fable comes from the Greek play Lysistrata, where the Peloponnesian War was ended thanks to a sex strike.
• But their success is more than just myth. In the 1600s Iroquois women won the right to veto future wars through a sex strike.
• In 2003 Leymah Gbowee won a Nobel Prize for ending Liberia’s civil war, in part through the organization of a strike.
• In Kenya women used the strategy to end political infighting and establish a stable government in 2009.
• And in 2010 women in one Colombian city used the same tactic to bring down the murder rate by 26.5%.
• Sex strikes have also brought peace in The Philippines.
• To be successful sex strikes need to have specific demands in smaller, well-knit communities.
• One hopes, however, that we’ll eventually live in a world without sexism, where women can exercise power through formal mechanisms.

Read more on Quartz.

In an article from 2012 Rajkumar Venkatesan and Paul Farris looked into the economics of coupons:

• In 2010, 3.3 billion coupons were redeemed, saving people $3.7 billion.
• These massive numbers only represent 1% of all coupons printed. 99% are never used.
• But that 99% is valuable. People who received coupons but didn’t use them still increased their purchases of the brand.
• Those who use coupons are only responsible for 40% of an increase in sales after a coupon campaign. 60% of the increase in sales come from the 99% who don’t use a coupon.
• Even if they’re not used, coupons help boost awareness of a brand, and serve as little marketing leaflets.
• Redemption rates still matter. A coupon which is used by few people might be a sign of a badly designed coupon.
• This is good news for companies like Groupon who have been criticized for not generating sustained business growth for companies.

Read more on the Harvard Business Review.

Perhaps we shouldn’t worry so much about technological progress leading to widespread unemployment. Why, just look at the washing machine, wrote Justin Fox.

• In 1766 the man credited with inventing the washing machine wondered whether his invention would put clothes washers out of a job.
• He concluded that it would not – his washing machine would increase the number of clothes they washed, as they could now handle more – and with less strain on their bodies.
• He was proved right – as the capacity of washing machines increased, people started buying more clothes, creating more demand.
• And younger, poorer people started to outsource their laundry to clothes washers, who had lowered their price per article of clothing.

Read more about the history of the humble washing machine on Bloomberg.

Via: Marginal Revolution