New horizons in management science. “Managers who exhibit Type A behavior are involved in a constant struggle to achieve more and more in less and less time,” according to a press release summarizing a study in Personnel Journal. “They see their enemies as the clock and other people, and typically try to measure their accomplishments in terms of numbers and speed.” We look forward to the new-style manager who struggles to achieve less and less in more and more time.
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“The emperor governing American housing policy is stark naked and raving mad,” writes River Forest lawyer-planner Daniel Lauber in the Journal of the American Planning Association (Summer 1988). Why are rents so high? Because every time an apartment building is sold, the interest costs on its mortgage go up. “Since debt service usually constitutes 30 percent to 50 percent of the cost of operating a rental building, the mere resale of the building dictates a rent hike.” A more sane housing policy, he says, would encourage the building of “low-equity” cooperative apartment buildings that allow little or no appreciation in the value of members’ shares–thus treating housing as shelter from the elements instead of shelter from taxes.
Don’t teach your baby to swim, urges Dr. Mark Widome in Young Health (Summer 1988), a publication of the American Academy of Pediatrics. He says babies under age three can’t learn to swim safely, and some develop seizures because they swallow too much water.
What’s in an upwardly mobile name? According to the authors of Beyond Jennifer and Jason: An Enlightened Guide to Naming Your Baby, “Most names of obscenely rich television characters (Alexis, Blake, Krystle) are downwardly mobile, as are. . . . names of ridiculously expensive stores or things: Tiffany, Bentley, or Crystal, for instance. On the other hand, names used for servants in 1930s movies about obscenely rich people are now upwardly mobile. Bridget, Josephine, Rose, Tillie, Amos, and Patrick have all arrived at the front door.” Hi, folks.
