Thursday, December 02, 2010

How to recover from lost work days

There have been many reports about lost work days due to illness, goofing-off, bad weather, football, ballroom dancing, cheese tasting, etc. And, all these types of loss have one thing in common: they call cost our poor economy ONE BILLION POUNDS EACH DAY! You may wonder how all these different causes can result in the same amount of financial loss each day (there are sound technical reasons why which appear in many different places which we won't go into here).

That's a lot of money that we are losing!

But, there is a solution. A tank of economists have come up with the solution of moving the financial end of the year forwards. This means that for each day of loss due to some laziness (to use the economist term) the end of the financial year (here 31/Mar) would moved forwards by:

days to move forwards = (number of days lost) * 1000 * exp(4.9/3)**2

There are technical reasons as to why the amount of money lost in a day does not equal the amount of money earned in a day (this is explained in any standard economics book). 

So, if we loose say 1 day we must move Mar/30 forwards by approx 26,000 days (give or take a few days). This should help to recover the lost revenue in a simple, easy to use manner.  

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Understanding the Global Economy

Just how does this global economy work? It's a question that many people ask and it's one that many with a firm, wide-ranging grasp of finance and economics do their best to avoid answering. And, with good cause as it's really quite trivial. But, if you missed out on 3rd grade (what is that anyway) education then this reasoning should help:

We are in a global market. And, as everyone knows global means circular (if you're two dimensional) or spherical (if you have more dimensions) which of course means we are in a circular market. This circular market is consumer-based. This means that when I buy something in store 1 then store 2 has to buy something from store 1 and all the way down the line until store N buys what I brought from store 1. Of course, the process isn't perfect and usually I end up selling the item for roughly 0.0001% of what I brought it for.

That's of course putting it quite simplistically in reality there are about 10 stores with about 20 million people buying things in store one etc and all these items are usually different (ipops, jelly babies, gobstoppers etc).

Now with this understanding it's easy to see what has gone wrong with the current system: we have run out of paper - more specifically we have run out of blue ink. So, in order for the people in store X to buy from store Y they need to the currency of store Y and detailed analysis by economists and fund managers (technically called mis-managers) have identified that the currency of store Y is predominantly blue in colour and store X does not have any blue ink with which to make the currency to make the purchase.

Once we manage to find some blue ink - which isn't cheap and typically costs around 4 Trillion pounds or dollars we should be able to get the market circulating again according to economic forecasters it could be a Tuesday.

Sunday, November 21, 2010

Ornamental Transport

You can tell when you are in a highly civilised and affluent society because there are many attributes superfluous to basic living. Take for example the public transport system. As everyone knows in a highly civilised society there is no need for public transport as everyone is out of a job. The more civilised the society the more redundant the transport system.

In the society I live in we have a problem. A portion of society (the affluent and civilised part) believe we have achieved utopia whilst a smaller and, dare I say, insignificant portion believe we are as close to the stone-age as we have ever been. Fortunately, the civilised portion of society have a majority of control and are busy dismantling the trappings of baser society in order to make room for evidence of true civilisation. The current project approaching completion is the creation of an ornamental transport system - whose purpose is purely for decoration. 

Unfortunately, the smaller baser portion of society insist on assuming the transport system is not ornamental and is meant for actual usage and are therefore constantly disappointed at the price and function of the system. Once this smaller useless portion of society realise the ornamental nature of the system and thus the true beauty of the fragile infrastructure they will (a) gladly pay small fortunes to support the system (d) realise the system is not for under-privileged and under-civilised drones and stop using it.

Saturday, October 30, 2010

Improving Performance

Our fantastic public transport system has hit upon a brilliant approach to improving performance without sacrificing staff. The key is to out-source. Well actually, more like sell-off the poor performing routes. Then you can announce 100% improvement in the performance and have saved some money for yourself as well.

This only works if you sell-off the poor performing routes.

The current plan for our fantastic public transport system is to degrade the high-performing routes so they become low-performing routes through a number of measures:

  • Rail improvement works - the methodology is to slowly improve the route such that it doesn't work anymore. Technically this is called degrading the route, but the clever public transport scientists have realised that by using the phrase Rail degradation works hedge fund traders would get wind of the idea and immediately amass huge numbers of options on the route that they can sell at a massive profit when the route is sold off.
  • Personnel improvement - by decreasing the number of personnel at a station and ensuring the automation process that replaces the personnel is faulty this ensures that the station also becomes a poor performer and can be sold off. This technique works especially well for the buses where elimination of the ticket collector increased the un-safeness factor and then reducing/eliminating the bus drivers should ensure many buses do not run increasing the poor performance factor and hence the sell-off desirability.

In this way the sold off routes do not enter into the efficiency equation and daily reports can be announced to the grateful, stranded public that the public transport system is running a fantastic service. This should also guarantee justification for increasing the fares above the rate of decency to further carry out rail improvement works to further sell off and improve the service. 100% efficiency should be attained when the public transport system runs no routes.

Sunday, August 29, 2010

Coffee time

I recently went into one of those chain coffee houses. I was mis-directed, I needed a new light-bulb and was helpfully directed to the nearest super-coffee-house. Indeed they do sell light bulbs (I thought only that only the burger bars sold them). It set me thinking about these coffee houses and why it is that they increase their repertoire of drinks.

Well, I believe I have discovered the reason: it is a well known fact that life is quantised and, everything has an infinity of possibilities until after the event (in which case it was obvious that it would be that and why would we think any different). Taking the quantum doctrine the coffee houses have determined that by offering a huge range of drinks (many unnatural) there is the remote possibility that one or two of them may turn out to be coffee. 

Based on this finding it should be easy for you to get the best coffee by following this simple procedure:

1) Wait until the number of drinks reaches no less than 5**e.

2) Wait until the queue length approaches infinity (a good approximation is roughly 15 persons). 

3) When making your order change your drink choice no less than 5 times and no more than 12 times.

4) Misspell your name by using all the characters of the previous person in the queue.

 

This recipe has been tested in 12 independent countries with statistically conclusive results (although your mileage may randomly vary since this is quantum).

Sunday, July 04, 2010

How to reduce spending

Here where I live in the UK the Government is concerned. Apparently we have to save money. We need to save 40%. That may sound a lot, but there are ways to do it that are totally painless. Government think-tank (withoutAClue) have come up with the ingenious, thinking-outside-the-box idea of a scheme to achieve this cuts and even more. They have deduced a 40% cut in spending means spending 40% less a year. So, rather than spending for something now, if departments wait 40% longer they will have made a saving of 40%. For example, if I need to buy a pencil today what I do is to wait until tomorrow morning and then buy the pencil thus incurring a 40% saving.
If I wait little bit longer (say 70% of a day so I wait until tomorrow evening to buy my pencil) then I will save even more.

And the icing is: if the Government departments generate 40% more paperwork when purchasing something it will clearly take 40% longer to buy something. AND, we can employ 40% more people to make the saving. The logic and economics are flawless.

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

World cup Football

I have been watching the world cup and according to my analysis the French appear to have won. Well done. I very much enjoyed it. The tactics from the coach were excellent. He was right: if you argue you go home or you don't play. My way or the highway. I think that was right. Everyone chose the highway except for little Mercure (the very fast winger from Bordeaux) who was the only player not to choose the highway because he doesn't speak French and had to play South Africa on his own. Which was ok, but he didn't understand the
directions from the coach.
He scored 389 own-goals and 3 goals. I hope they will be back again.

Sunday, May 16, 2010

What a Party!

Here in the UK we had an election. The system we have in the UK is called majority dictatorship and we have typically three companies that take part in this majority dictatorship. When a company wins the election there is no obligation to implement the contents of the manifesto (usually, they are written by the company lawyers with opt-outs and exceptions in case they win the election) and they have a mandate to run (or ruin) the country according to their own agenda. Their agenda usually consists of amassing as much money or power (which equates to money) as quickly as possible. That's the history and it works.

But, now something went wrong with part of the system and no company won. This could have been a problem, but the major shareholders in the UK had already foreseen such a possibility and had implemented additional systems that kick-in in this case. The new systems execute merger procedures which entail the company that won the most and the company that won the least to go into merger processes. This might seem a little strange since you may think that there are ideological differences. But, fortunately there are not. The merger processes first start with sitting around a large table with sandwiches and chanting 'what are we going to do now' 10 times. Only after that time does the merger start in earnest. The merger entails each manifesto being placed on a chairs roughly 10m apart. The party leaders run from chair to chair whilst music is playing and when the music stops they tear out a page of the manifesto and eat it. Only when one of the party leaders throws-up does the game stop. The vomiting leader is the deputy prime minister and the non-vomiting one is the leader. At this point the rest of the team take off their jackets and roll up their sleeves and each tear out pages from the manifestos and eat them until the entire manifestos are consumed.
At this point the merger is formed and the new merger company can now ignore the manifesto and get down to majority dictatorship in the interests of the country.

Monday, March 22, 2010

Famous 140 character quotes

In our modern age the internet has provided great wonders. It has provided us with the Steam Engine, the Saturnian rocket, grass growing in neat straight lines and, of course the written word. On this anniversary of the internet invention of the word we have trawled the internet to look for the most famous short quotes that can fit into our attention (so here's 5):

"This case is a real hum-dinger. The accused certainly looks guilty otherwise they wouldn't be here."
(from Judge Hangem)

"Sending a short message at 120mph in a builtup area sure takes concentration."
(Detective Inspector Lockemup)

"Heavy night. Very hung-over. Really hope this operation goes well. Hands shaking a little"
(Dr. Surgicallyremove)

"It's Friday, must sell all shares in companies beginning with D."
(G. Hedgefunder)

"I'm late where's my book of lies. Anybody know what page we're on?"
(S. Politico)

Interestingly, researchers have observed a periodic error from the short message device system. The source has been tracked down to coming from 17345.26987.1431786.u which maps uniquely to a Mr
 
Zeekowenivoareechikatt87agubria0934=89yuvhotcsvty7395chgjattuggira90-234$adge@cghh};ghaa#?<fghvxeadry>¬ghealprugoetnbgafdfret457294512=d8&8iobjhbyhgy657643dfghhd

who has been trying to contact Earth to point out that we are not alone and the kindly, benevolent peoples of Saturn are eager to make contact via the short messaging system. Sadly, Mr Z has signed the message so Earthlings know where the message came from thus pushing the message above the strict 140 character limit causing irritation to the short messaging system. An opportunity missed.

Tuesday, March 02, 2010

So, where has all this obesity come from then?

Have you noticed in the press that there appears to be an epidemic of obesity. People are getting larger. There's no getting away from it. But, where is all this obesity coming from? You could be mistaken for thinking that all this obese stuff is coming from the planet and the planet is getting smaller. Far from it! In fact the planet is also getting obese. I have studied this and can prove that the cost of traveling on the public transport from my home to where I work takes (a) longer, and is (b) more expensive. Since, by natural law, the price of travel can never go up and, also by natural law, the time taken to get from my house to work is a constant the only inescapable conclusion is that the distance from home to work has increased which logically means that the planet is increasing. And it's increasing, by my calculations by roughly 10% per year!

So, if all this obesity stuff isn't coming from the Earth then where is it coming from??

According to my calculations it's coming from the Universe. The Earth apparently has a great appetite for something called Dark Matter which it is consuming at rough 10% per year - which also explains why it's difficult to find this Dark Matter out there. Clearly, at some point the Earth will run out of Dark Matter and either (a) slim down, or (b) create an appetite for something else.


Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Do you have thoughts?

Do you sometimes have crazy thoughts that you are scared to tell people about? Such crazy thoughts that you fear people may doubt your sanity? Do you wonder where those thoughts end up?

Well, wonder no more. Almost all of these thoughts are vacuumed up and safely stored in think-tanks where they are allowed to mature. Only when they reach epic craziness are they harvested by the studious custodians of the think-tank and lovingly crafted into a 500 page document that is presented to politicians to be digested and regurgitated as sound thinking that should be enacted and instituted.

So, the next time you have a random, insane thought you can rest assured that it is not lost and will probably appear within your lifetime as a law or way of life.

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

The Killer Financial Instrument

Where I live we have a big central bank called the Bank of England. It controls much of the economy. Well, actually, it controls a small part of the economy in reality - the rest of the economy is out of control in private financial banking hands.

Anyway,  our central banking shop has the killer instrument to solve all banking problems. Whenever our finances go belly-up and we have to sell our trousers our head banking person deploys the killer instrument. This killer financial instrument is a letter to the chief Government Financial guy. It's written in red crayon on ruled paper and the hand-written words slant at a 30 degree angle to the lines and are printed.

This letter has magical properties. It's capable of reducing blood-pressure, increasing GDP and stabilising the economy. The letter is used as a last resort, only when war and invasion and wholesale firings of all employees have been tried. Indeed the letter is so powerful that it has to be treated reverentially. It is too dangerous to employ as the head banking person someone that can write letters (or write at all) and so we trawl society and employ the most illiterate person we can find.

The financial sector is picking up on this and is actively employing the best illiterates it can find to fill senior financial positions with the sole responsibility of writing letters in red crayon to the chief Government Financial guy (and each other) in order to avert financial ruin.

This powerful, effective instrument will soon begin to reap benefits once the financial sector has obtained the address of the chief Government Financial guy. Only when these letters are written and delivered will we see the economy start to depart from Financial Disaster station and head towards Financial Euphoria.


Monday, February 08, 2010

Predictions for 2010

Many people these days are looking at the future. It's very possible that it's because the present is not too good (or the past wasn't too good). Or, it could be because the present is fantastic and it's dangerous to have too much of a good thing.

Anyway, regardless lots of people are looking at the future. There are many approaches that help predict the future. The most common one, and indeed the most successful one, has been developed by the financial industry. Its predictive power is truly awesome, without fault and totally accurate. It's a little wonder that the financial institutions have been and continue to be fantastically successful.

The approach requires placing a small stone (technically a pebble) of reddish-grey colour and smooth (sort of almond shape) in a glass of still mineral water and then waiting. By the osmotic process future events are transferred from the pebble and amplified by the water into your brain (if you put the pebble in the water otherwise the future events will go into some other persons brain and may cause an accident if they are not expecting them).

The predictive power is so accurate that we have decided to use it here to determine the future events for the coming year so we can all plan for the big events. Here's the top ten future events:

1) Government imposes tax on ants provoking a prolonged war with the social insects.

A bill is passed unanimously through Parliament supported by all sides and the roof to impose a tax on ants after a right-thinking think-tank determines the revenue would offset the cost of the increased size of the tax collection department (approx number of employees 80million). Ants rebel and provoke war by tripping up the Royal family and the entire government. Ant leader claims no citizen will be able to walk down the street without cutting their knees. Government in crisis.

2) First sheep satellite launched.

After the discovery of the sheep's incredible aptitude for storing information and efficiently relaying it back the global telecommunications industry launches the first sheep into orbit. The added bonus being the sheep eating the atmospheric CO2. Tests indicate the sheep capable of increasing bandwidth by 800% heralding the mobile networks to display non-stop, continuous reality shows.

3) Discovery of connection between Cows and earthquakes.

After much research the connection between cows and earthquakes is firmly established. Careful placement of cows completely neutralises earthquakes. Spurs a completely new industry of Cow Feng-shui experts paid large sums of cash to determine the optimal placement of cows.

4) Herrings accurately identify successful Governments.

Intense study determines that shoals of herrings accurately determine successful government when placed within approximately 1meter of the candidate government. Necessitating the immersion of Parliament in the North Sea to determine the successful government.

5) Shellfish replace passports

Exploiting the fact that shellfish are able to store the entire biometric information of a person they have spent the evening in a bar with the Homeland security agencies abolish passports in favour of shellfish. The added calming benefit of having a shellfish on your person reduces security incidents at airports.

6) Worms replace coinage

The discovery that the number of worms in a country is in one-to-one correspondence with the number of banknotes in the country spurring the replacement of the easy-to-counterfeit banknote with the impossible to replicate worm. Exchange rates are catered for by worms dying or reproducing when traveling abroad.

7) Slugs replace credit cards

The discovery that a slugs slime-trail is (a) unique, (b) lasts forever causes banks to replace unreliable plastic credit cards with slugs. The added benefit being that a financial transaction takes approximately 15days to complete (the time a slug takes to produce a standard 1m trail) factors in a 'cooling off' period reducing the number of impulse buys.

8) Snails ensure secure internet financial transactions

The holy grail of a secure, foolproof method of internet transactions is finally found in the humble snail. The discovery that the snail can upload complex pieces of information securely in its shell and download them to a designated recipient ensures tamper-proof transport of sensitive information (e.g. money, personal information). Even the eating of the snail will not force it to give up the vital information it contains.

9) Cauliflower replaces high-definition television

Researchers successfully transmit the popular reality television show 'dancing on a balloon' to a Caulifower allowing an entire household to enjoy the high-definition-3D-surround-sound experience from their Cauliflower.

10) Flies replace the smartphone and cellphone

Researchers successfully train a herd of bluebottles to store conversations and other information and relay them to the intended recipient. Sparks the mobile providers to collect up all the blue bottles in existence and sell them at a premium to customers. Downside being the flies can only hold approximately 1 hour of inane mobile-phone conversation before committing suicide by flying at high-speed into a glass window.

Researchers determine in December 2010 that wasps are much more effective communication carriers with the added benefit of stinging the cell phone owner if the conversation is found to be pointless.

Wednesday, February 03, 2010

Dissolving the Financial Crisis

Recently many countries have had a few problems (it could be a few countries had many problems I may have got that bit wrong). Anyway, it seems that there are a few problems around of a country-wide scale. One, or all of these problems are to do with the financial peculiarities.

Actually, most countries don't like the statement 'financial catastrophy' or 'financial disaster', or 'financial depression', and have got their best brains to hunt for a better more apt statement. They discovered the statement 'credit crunch' which avoids negative impressions and also avoids any connection with anything financial or anything disastrous. Coupled with the stroke of genius of not defining the statement removes any worry about the statement being misunderstood. In fact, most people enjoy something crunchy and credit has always a positive impression. So, the two words together make it something doubly desirable! In the not too distant future we will see many citizens handing over large quantities of cash to obtain a credit crunch.

But, that's beside the point.

So, we have this credit crunch which is causing a little concern as it appears we have borrowed rather a lot of money from somewhere to pay for something and now wherever we borrowed the money from we need to pay it back.

Now, the way it can be figured is we owe something like 1 trillion (million million) pounds. Which works out to roughly 16 thousand pounds per person in the UK. That sounds like a lot of money for each person to pay. But, if we pay the government 1000pounds per person and then we each need to find roughly 15 thousand pounds per person. From my studies it seems that if we each do a sponsored walk, or a sponsored silence, or sponsored holding-our-breath then the way I figure it at 1pound per mile, or minute we'd need to walk roughly 15thousand miles or hold our breath for roughly 250 hours (roughly 10 days) or be silent for roughly 10 days. The sponsored walk could possibly work as could the sponsored holding-our-breath, but the potential winner could be the sponsored silence for 10 days.

So, in summary we can get out of the current credit crunch by (a) each paying 1000pounds and (b) being silent for 10 days and being sponsored by some folks from the EU or elsewhere to do it. If we can do that we can clear our debt.