> I'm waiting for someone to tell me why US Dollars are such a wonderful idea.

Because it is a stable currency, actively managed to maintain a fairly constant value. If a business needs 2000# of steel to build a car, they build a car and get paid in a currency that gives them the required profit, but if when they go buy the materials for the next car, they can only afford to buy a 1000# of steel, then they are out of business solely because of the currency they choose to use. Everyone using bitcoin currently is more or less used for fun money, if lost they can all feed their family still. Bitcoin is not the money I get paid for working for a week, then use it to feed my family the next.
The other reason you have to have the ability to loan money to have a growing economy. Loaning money creates the need for money growth, and regulation that is enforced. In a economy where 10,000 bitcoin exist and 100 people loan their 100 bitcoin out for 5% return in a year. They have doubled the amount of bitcoin in existence temporary (bank counts that loan as a asset, that loans is spent to buy something, and that person counts it as a asset as well) Then when that bitcoin is paid back, they need to pay back 10500 bitcoin, more than exists. This is why the Fed prints money when banks stop loaning, because money disappeared. This is why the fed enforces reserve limits on anyone doing banking. This is why I can be confident I can retire someday with the money in my bank account... And I realize bitcoin allows for constant growth, but constant doesn't maintain a constant volume, as lending levels, etc change.

Overseas would be OK. Had it not been more about taking advantage of indentured, and child labor than creating good jobs for people in need.

True, but even if you compare that 1991 to a 2001 mustang, they took away all that crap load of cables, and went to a throttle position sensor. Both still have a single stepper motor, granted it is a much quicker stepper motor than was needed for cruise control. If your going to run a car with cruse control, software can still apply the throttle, you might as well have the simpler system without all the cables. I am putting that 91 motor in a kit car currently, and am debating about going to a mega-squirt ECM and switching to the 01 pedal/throttle valve just in case I decide I want cruise someday.

If you want to meet emissions while reducing fuel flow, you will need electronic control of throttle. More the thing is, it is much safer and less complicated to do throttle by wire than a secondary path. Just because one manufacture screwed up throttle by wire doesn't prove that mechanical is safer. Especially since most cars have cruise control. So it truly is much less complicated to have one stepper motor and throttle by wire, than, for example, what my 91 mustang had. It had 3 cables, connected to springs, and a stepper motor for cruise control, then a solenoid controlling a vacuum operated idle control valve (and I still haven't covered the EGR part). Then you have a mass flow meter determining how much flow is going through all of that crap to determine fuel flow, spark advance. Then using Vacuum to determine the throttle position to shift the transmission (however I did remove the auto for a manual.)
Compare that to my current 2006 electronic throttle Diesel, it has a throttle position sensor that it reads to determine how much fuel to inject (and a mag pickup to determine when ton inject.) Done.

It is wrong to claim a 747's software being bug free. More so the complicated parts have at least 3 independent systems, and mechanisms to switch them, and highly trained operators trained to react to any bug. I am guessing the FMEA for the Toyota was more, if the throttle sticks, the operator will shift to park, or stop the car with the brakes, which are more powerful than the engine. That the driver would drag the brakes until they burn up... I do think more automotive standards need to be put in place for drive by wire, but requiring the same level of redundancy for a 4 passenger car as for a 400 passenger plane isn't one of them. It seams obvious (in retrospect) that electronic throttle should have it's own dedicated cpu, and thus a simple control logic (it could be integrated into a shared ECM case, and comms link, but not a shared cpu.) But I am not sure we would need 3 separate ECM's... Also I would like to see more fact based required driver re-education, we got people who either haven't been taught how to drive since carburetors and no ABS, or are being taught by people who teach the same way they were taught. Not the car most are actually driving.

Would work for road tolls as well. I debated doing that when I stopped for fuel and food in one of the overpass McDonalds. They had separate parking lots for each direction, but while walking by a car with the ticket in the window from the other direction, and my ticket in hand. If I just swapped we would have both saved over $5. Most of the toll both funneled both directions into the same both on exit.

I am saying the US has a standard for printing measuring tools, that is more robust. Metric is actually less standardized. IE, people do make less precise, skipping marks... that requires counting marks. The US system has a standard that is more flexible. Similar is true with metric Bolts, they lack a standard. Every manufacture marks bolt hardness differently, the US standard has the marks defined. Similar for head sizes on bolts, every 7/16 bolt has a 5/8 head, and a 5/8" nut. you get a dozen 10mm bolts, it could have 4 different wrench sizes to loosen it. Believe it or not, having 1 country maintain a standard, works better than many.

US ruler is marked in fractions of 1/32, metric in fractions of 10. So metric wins if your dividing by 5, or by 10. US standard wins if your dividing by 4,8,16,32. *they tie if dividing by 2.

Also look at a dual ruler http://www.myonlineruler.com/ What you'll see the US one is much cleaner, this one doesn't go down to 1/16", but you can make one 2* as accurate that you can still easily transpose readings to one 2* denser. All of the lines are a different length on the US side, that is a standard, any carpenter can pick any measurement without counting each mark, despite having 1/16" marks unlabeled.
see http://www.newwoodworker.com/basic/graphics/abttpmsrs/3mrks250.jpg
    The metric one looks ok, but try to pick 13.3cm, you will be counting each line, but also it is too busy in cm to be marked on many woodworking tools, definitely cant stamp into steel anything denser than cm, because you cant do mm, nothing in-between on the metric side.

Not OP, but the US tape measures are much better than the metric equivalent. US has a large mark every half inch, a slightly smaller mark at 1/4 inch, 3/4 inch. then all the remaining marks slightly smaller at 1/8, and then smallest every 1/16". Without any numbers, you can do many many more iterations than divide by than 1/10th can do for framing, building houses, etc it is truly better. Especially that squares can skip the 1/8", and 1/16" marks that can't be so easily stamped into them for endurance, yet you can easily transfer measurements from this device with 1/4 as many marks as the tape measure back and forth, just looking for identical marks. 1/10 just doesn't scale like that, you can't skip half the decimal marks and not be lost, you can't just look at a tape, and no the difference without counting from 0.2 to 0.3.
in your example, 0.25 your going to be approximating on a metric tape, where is half way between .2, and .3, so you will be counting each mark, 1,2,3 ok half way between the 2 and 3. With the US tape, if your a carpenter used to it, you know what a 1/4 mark looks like, so you can just see it and mark it. May not seam like much, but it truly save a second on every measurement. And it works for all the marks, what 15/32", the 1/2" mark is obvious, move up one of the smallest marks, want 9/16", go up by one of the 1/16 marks.

> A tie means
It would also set the precedent for second place to bet 100% every time. Could help on his long term strategy as well, reduces the strategy for second place to bet for him to get the final answer wrong when the score is less than a double.

regenerative breaking charges the batteries on the car.
    Moving a 2000kg car up a 2000 meter mountain requires 36 MJ of energy to overcome gravity, and the EPA says it requires 0.8 MJ per Km to move the Tesla under typical driving.
Basically if you drive the Tesla from the base of a 0.2km high mountain, over the mountain then back down traveling a total of 10km. Starting on the Journey you would need 40MJ of battery power, but should end up at the base with 32MJ in the battery. To reach the peak driving, you would need 36 MJ to overcome gravity, and 4 MJ to overcome friction. At that point you would have 0MJ in the battery, and 36 MJ of potential energy stored in added altitude. On the way down, you would loose another 4 MJ to friction, but could recover the excess 32MJ into the batteries. But if when you were at the peak of the mountain, you added 500kg (rocks water, etc from the mountain) you would transfer their potential energy to the Tesla, adding 9MJ of potential energy. Thus at the peak of the mountain you would now have 45 MJ of potential, you could actually drive back to the bottom of the mountain recharging the batteries from regenerative braking, drop the extra weight off at the bottom, and now have 41MJ of battery charge (1MJ more than you started with.) The stuff you carried down now has 9MJ less potential energy, the car has 1 MJ more charge in it's batteries, and you created 8MJ of heat lost to the atmosphere.

The Tesla EPA rating says it consumes 237.5 WÂh (853kJ) per kilometer. So the energy from driving 189kg of water down 1.3km of altitude (2.2MJ) would give me almost 3 km of forward travel.
So probably one jug gets me down the hill at 30km/hr, one more jug to get me back up at 30 km/hr, and a 3rd jug gives me 853kJ to play (assuming 100% efficiency, and a 2000 kg car carry 600kg of water. )
Darn.

I would be curious if the car is efficient enough to charge with say a 50 gallon inflatable water bladder in the trunk. IE could I drive to the top of the 9000' mountain pass with a stream, use a electric pump to fill the bladder with stream water, drive to the bottom using the regenerative brakes and empty the bladder. Would I have more energy than I started with? Obviously a steep enough grade, a few passes would eventually charge the battery enough for a few extra miles anyway. Could reduce the range anxiety getting through the mountains a bit, but wasteful on water use (unless you could dump back into the same stream.)

>our major costs (housing, food) should be the same percentage of your salary

Not true according to economic theory. If a company could move to Alabama and reduce costs, they would. So for the most part the average payroll should be similar, just the majority of employees are willing to pay more for the privlege of living in the big city. My company gives me cost of living to move me, mostly because its more there desire. It can also be the few drag many. IE if a CEO worth 25M won't move from chicago for any amount, having to pay 50 lower people 40,000 more may still lower the overall payroll (or fill a payroll that couldn't be filled elsewhere.)

I take it your not familiar with manufacturing. for example if you need a piston (be it for a brake master/slave, engine, etc.) You don't start machining on a 5x5 square aluminum block. You start with a blank where the critical machined locations have extra material. (If starting with a plastic mold from a printer) you can then sand cast from that plastic part, then machine away the extra material you added to the prototype.