Bernstein, Asaf and Gustafson, Matthew and Lewis, Ryan, Disaster on the Horizon: The Price Effect of Sea Level Rise (May 4, 2018). Journal of Financial Economics (JFE), Forthcoming. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3073842 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3073842 – “Homes exposed to sea level rise (SLR) sell for approximately 7% less than observably equivalent unexposed properties equidistant from the beach. This discount has grown over time and is driven by sophisticated buyers and communities worried about global warming. Consistent with causal identification of long horizon SLR costs, we find no relation between SLR exposure and rental rates and a 4% discount among properties not projected to be flooded for almost a century. Our findings contribute to the literature on the pricing of long-run risky cash flows and provide insights for optimal climate change policy.”
Disaster on the Horizon: The Price Effect of Sea Level Rise
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Wayne Hassay: Embracing Legal Services Plans Is Good for Lawyers, Good for Access to Justice
In Attorney at Work’s new Q&A series, Mary Juetten checks in with leaders and entrepreneurs working to solve the access to justice problem. This time: Wayne Hassay of Maguire Schneider Hassay discusses his firm’s focus on providing more affordable legal services through participation in LegalShield. Getting to Know Wayne Hassay I met Wayne Hassay, managing partner of Maguire Schneider Hassay (MSH), last year when he presented at Elevate by LegalShield. Hassay, who was licensed in 1991, signed on as an associate with MSH, a midsize law firm in Columbus, Ohio, in 1998. Now managing partner, his stated mission is to bring innovation and a technology focus to the practice, including using technology to broaden access to justice. To that end, he works closely with group legal services plan LegalShield. (Learn more about group legal services plans from both the lawyer and consumer perspective at www.glsa.com.)…
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Legal Recruiting: I’m looking for lawyers who are hungry
Someone recently asked what kind of lawyers I hoped to recruit. I believe the person wanted to know what practice areas, what locations, whether I wanted to recruit associates or partners. I answered that I want to recruit lawyers who are hungry and dreaming big dreams about what they can become. A few years ago Sherman Smith posted a blog: You Got To Be Hungry!!!. He began the post with three great questions: How HUNGRY are you in order for you to have longevity in your business? What are you willing to give up in order to achieve success? Are you unsatisfied with how things are and want to make a change for the better? How hungry are you to become a successful lawyer with clients who appreciate your help? If you are really hungry to learn, I can assure you from experience that nothing is more fun professionally than figuring out how you can be a more valuable lawyer and better serve your clients. The post Legal Recruiting: I’m looking for lawyers who are…
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Building your practice by playing with matches
You can’t build a campfire by trying to ignite big logs. You have to start with kindling–twigs and leaves and small branches. Get the fire going, add some small logs, and when the fire is big enough you add the big logs. That’s how most of us started our law practice. Most of us didn’t start by renting a big office and hiring a big staff, we started by finding a desk and a place to see clients and going out and getting a few. We got some experience, made some contacts, and brought in some income. That’s the kindling. When we had something going, we added some logs. Eventually, we got (or will get) the big office and staff. And it’s the same way with marketing. You don’t start with $50,000 a month in ad spends. You start with $200 on some pay-per-click ads and see what you can see. You set up a one-page website or a landing page and an autoresponder and start building an email list. You invest a couple of hours at a networking function…
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Practical Steps for Motivating Change in Your Law Firm
In our most recent post, we broke down the art of persuasion, and looked at the styles for change that you may be seeing within your firm. I should also add that there’s really a fourth style too, and that’s the belief that no change is necessary – I didn’t cover this in any depth, and won’t, because the group that believes no change is necessary is unlikely to change their minds any time soon, and it’s not worth the investment of your time to try to force them to. At some point, they’ll either retire, or self-select out, and you’ll be left with the remaining three categories, all of which you can successfully work with. So what are some practical things you can do when implementing change? As you’re getting started, I heartily recommend doing some research for support – one of the books I read that gave me some great food for thought was Tribal Leadership: Leveraging Natural Groups to Build a Thriving…
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LC – A Library for You – Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden
Library of Congress Blog: “A quiet place for study and reflection” is one answer that might spring to mind. If you take advantage of story times and author talks, you might say, “A social place for programs and gatherings.” Our view here at the Library of Congress is the image of a treasure chest, filled with limitless information and services, ready to explore and amaze if you open it up. So today, the Library of Congress is introducing a new visual brand that seizes on this concept and amplifies it. It can change to feature different collection items, stories, images and sounds. The potential is limitless, like the Library itself. What does this mean for you? The launch of this new visual brand coincides with the upcoming release of the Library’s new strategic plan, a user-centered plan that will drive the Library’s direction over the next five years. The plan aims to make the Library’s collections and services more accessible to more…
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Click Americana – Memories and Memorabilia
“More than three thousand articles deep, ClickAmericana can best be described as a labor of love — one person’s drive to allow others to revisit half-forgotten recollections of days gone past. But it’s also a bid to honor those who created American history — from the architects to the artists, photographers and pop culture icons, soldiers and slaves, capitalists and consumers, the inventors and industrialists — and all who witnessed the ups and downs life in these United States over the years. In particular, though, this site relies largely on those who documented the past through words and pictures that allows us to refresh our memories. You’ll find vintage ads, recipes like your grandmother (or your parents) used to make, together with videos, music, articles, photos and more. Hope you’ll take some time, look around and remember… while we keep preserving the past, one page — one photo — one memory at a time. …
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Trump Administration Just Ended Obama’s Rule For Cleaner Power Plants
BuzzFeedNews: “Coal plants will be able to release more pollution into the air thanks to a new policy revealed Tuesday by the Trump administration, a highly anticipated replacement to Obama’s signature climate rule. Called the Affordable Clean Energy rule, the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposal largely defers to states on how to curb coal plant pollution, the second-largest source of climate emissions in the US. The plan covers only coal plants, not natural gas or oil ones, and emphasizes making such plants more efficient. It also redefines EPA’s authority to regulate emissions under the Clean Air Act in a narrower way and overhauls a permit process for big facilities. “The ACE Rule would restore the rule of law and empower states to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and provide modern, reliable, and affordable energy for all Americans,” EPA Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler said in a statement. The US is the second-largest emitter of…
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10 Libraries That Should Be On Every Booklover’s Bucket List
BuzzFeedNews: “Italian photographer Massimo Listri has spent his career capturing some of the most magnificent and unexpected interiors in the world. His signature style of large-scale and highly detailed pictures is most often shot without a single person in the frame, allowing viewers to fully immerse themselves within the magnitude of details that each space offers. For his new book, The World’s Most Beautiful Libraries, Listri has traveled the world to capture the interiors of 55 libraries in 16 countries — places that the artist describes as “cathedrals of knowledge.” For Listri, these are spaces that have a special meaning. “I’ve been photographing architecture and interiors since I was 18 years old,” Listri told BuzzFeed News, “but I’m also a bibliophile — everything about libraries attracts me. The smell of dust, the wood, the leather, the curiosity to open every book.” “For me, libraries are…
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New bill would require paper ballots to secure election results
CNET – The bill, submitted by nine senators on Tuesday, would also mandate election audits. “The Russians can’t hack paper. On Tuesday, twelve Senators introduced a bill [ [The Protecting American Votes and Elections Act] that would require state and local governments to use paper ballots in an effort to secure elections from hackers. The bill would also require rigorous audits for all federal elections to ensure that results match the votes. “Leaving the fate of America’s democracy up to hackable election machines is like leaving your front door open, unlocked and putting up a sign that says ‘out of town,'” Sen. Ron Wyden, a Democrat from Oregon, said in a release. “Any failure to secure our elections amounts to disenfranchising American voters.” The Protecting American Votes and Elections Act of 2018 was drafted amid intense scrutiny of voting systems ahead of the mid-term elections in November. Russian interference…
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Do People Look at Legislation on Their Phones? Yes, They Do!
In Custodia Legis: The following is a guest post by Leah K. Ibraheem, the web metrics analyst in the Office of the Chief Information Officer of the Library of Congress. “Natalie shared the news when we hit a big metrics milestone last year of more than a million page views and visits in a single day. I track metrics across the Library of Congress websites including Congress.gov. One interesting trend is the changing nature of its traffic coming from mobile devices. From the beginning, Congress.gov was built using responsive design to take advantage of mobile traffic. For example, here’s the breakdown of mobile vs. non-mobile traffic from Jan 2014 – May 2018″…
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Google Data Collection research – Android phone running Chrome communicates location info to Google continuously
“While the public has been focused on the ongoing Facebook and Cambridge Analytica scandal, Google has largely avoided public scrutiny about its data collection practices despite having the ability to collect far more personal data about consumers across a variety of touchpoints. There have been efforts to document individual practices by Google such as their efforts to circumvent controls on Safari. More recently, an investigation by the Associated Press revealed that Google continues to track location data even after a consumer has turned off the setting. While these research efforts have been important to the public policy dialogue, no research exists which looks at the breadth and depth of data collected by Google. In “Google Data Collection,” Professor Douglas C. Schmidt, Professor of Computer Science at Vanderbilt University, catalogs how much data Google is collecting about consumers and their most personal habits across all of its products…
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What to Expect from Legal Project Management Coaching (Part 1 of 3)
By Jim Hassett and Tim Batdorf As explained in our white paper, The Keys to Legal Project Management Success, the five most effective ways to increase legal project management (LPM) results are to: (1) focus on changing behavior and solving problems, (2) aim for quick wins to create internal champions, (3) publicize successes within the firm, (4) use just-in-time training materials, and (5) take action now and follow up relentlessly. In over a decade of research and consulting with hundreds of law firms, we’ve seen that one-to-one LPM coaching is the most effective way to change behavior and achieve quick wins. There are a number of ways that LPM coaching programs can be structured by internal staff or external consultants. Our own approach has evolved over the last ten years, as we found that some tactics worked better than others. This series of posts explains how our approach works, what lawyers can expect if they sign up, and actual successes…
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Get Ready: EmpowerLegal Offers Lawyers a New Way to Prep Clients
Lawyers spend lots of time and money on professional development, even in the few remaining states where continuing legal education is not mandatory. It’s because they want to be as prepared as possible to perform for their clients at the highest level. That makes sense. But, if you asked the average lawyer how much time she’s spent actively engaging in improving her client’s performance, the tally would pale in comparison with the number of hours the same lawyer spent prepping herself. In the best-case scenario, the attorney-client relationship is a partnership. So, maybe law firms should consider expending more resources in relation to client performance beyond the traditional preparation measures, which may not be the optimal choice for modern clients. Enter EmpowerLegal, a video-based client preparation tool for law firms and their clients. EmpowerLegal Employs Videos to Help Guide Clients EmpowerLegal grants lawyers access to proprietary video content…
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Procrastination might be your friend
In an interview, Ray Bradbury spoke about writer’s block, noting that it’s a warning that you’re doing the wrong thing: “What if you have a blockage and you don’t know what to do about it? Well, it’s obvious you’re doing the wrong thing, aren’t you? . . . You’re being warned, aren’t you? Your subconscious is saying I don’t like you anymore. You’re writing about things I don’t give a damn for. . . If you have writers’ block you can cure it this evening by stopping what you’re doing and writing something else. You picked the wrong subject.” So, trust your gut. Could the same be said whenever we find ourselves procrastinating? I think it could. But things aren’t that simple. If you’re doing work for a client, the work has to be done. You can’t change the work just because your gut’s telling you something’s not right. But that doesn’t mean we should…
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Comments on Trump’s Empty Tweetstorm Threatening Social Media Providers
by Michael Reeve [Over the weekend, a reporter asked me to provide up to 300 words about Trump’s weekend tweetstorm threatening to regulate social media provider due to their alleged bias against conservatives. In light of subsequent events, it’s now clearer that Trump was rage-tweeting to deflect attention from the new revelations that were imminent. Still, I’m sharing my brief thoughts about the tweetstorm FWIW.] As he does daily, Trump made a factual claim without credible evidence. Beyond anecdotes (of which there are many on all sides of the political spectrum), there is no evidence that social media providers are systematically biased towards any political ideology. Instead, Trump’s tweetstorm is consistent with his standard misdirection tactic of creating a fake crisis and portraying himself as the savior. He is trolling us. Again. Social media providers are protected by the First Amendment’s Freedoms of Speech and Press. This isn’t a…
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How Washington, D.C. residents are tackling rising rents
Christian Science Monitor – “Affordable housing is proving difficult to come by in the nation’s fast-developing capital. But some residents are finding a solution through housing cooperatives where tenants can collectively purchase their building, enabling low-income people to remain within city limits. But resident Linda Leaks pays only about $1,000 a month, half the area’s average in Washington, D.C. She lives in a housing cooperative in which members collectively own the building, pay a low “share price” – of $2,000 to $3,000 – to move into their unit and then pay a small amount each month to cover utilities and management of the building. Ms. Leaks created the Ella Jo Baker cooperative over a decade ago for community activists “who did not have a lot of money.” “When people move in, they are here for a long time,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation from her flat on a quiet, rowhouse-lined street.…
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Independent site chronicles news and shares videos on global protest movements
“Global Uprisings is an independent news site and video series dedicated to showing responses to the economic crisis and authoritarianism. Since 2011, Brandon Jourdan and Marianne Maeckelbergh have been travelling, researching, and making documentary films. Their short films detail social movements in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Egypt, Greece, Portugal, Spain, Turkey, the UK, and the US. Their films cover strikes and demonstrations in the UK, the large-scale housing occupations and street mobilizations in Spain, the various general strikes, protests, and factory occupations in Greece, the revolution in Egypt, the Gezi Park uprising in Turkey, the 2014 social explosion in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the revolt against austerity in Portugal, and the occupy movement in the United States. Throughout the project, they have also collaborated with collectives and media makers such as the Mosireen collective, Grit TV, Deep Dish TV, Big Noise Films, Democracy Now, and David…
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NARA – Records Management Annual Report Released
NARA Records Express – “We are pleased to announce the publication of NARA’s Federal Agency Records Management Annual Report, 2017. It is now available on our website. In 2017, we required Federal agencies to submit three annual reports: the Senior Agency Official for Records Management (SAORM) Report, the Records Management Self-Assessment (RMSA), and a supplemental Federal Email Management Report. This consolidated report provides a summary analysis of the state of Federal records management programs across the Federal Government. Overall, the great majority of Federal agencies reported they are working towards transitioning from maintaining the costly separate policies, practices, and physical infrastructures in traditional (analog) formats to managing records electronically. As a result, they have improved their ability to follow recordkeeping requirements prescribed by Federal statutes and regulations. These are critical steps to improve records…
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How Facebook might make MRIs faster
CNNTech: Facebook’s artificial intelligence lab is working with New York University’s medical school to make MRI exams 10 times faster, which, if successful, would allow radiologists to complete a test in minutes. “Doctors use MRI — shorthand for magnetic resonance imaging — to get a closer look at organs, tissues and bones without exposing patients to harmful radiation. The image quality makes them especially helpful in spotting soft tissue damage, too. The problem is, tests can take as long as an hour. Anyone with even a hint of claustrophobia can struggle to remain perfectly still in the tube-like machine that long. Tying up a machine for that long also drives up costs by limiting the number of exams a hospital can perform each day. Computer scientists at Facebook (FB) think they can use machine learning to make things a lot faster. To that end, NYU is providing an anonymous dataset of 10,000 MRI exams, a trove that will include as many as three…
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More Pages to Explore .....
