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You know how when there's a congestion in a road, the traffic moves backwards slowly? Example: https://i.imgur.com/7p43YV7.gifv https://i.imgur.com/7p43YV7.gifv
by adtac 5y ago
You know how when there's a congestion in a road, the traffic moves backwards slowly? Example: https://i.imgur.com/7p43YV7.gifv https://i.imgur.com/7p43YV7.gifv
Will this happen with the supply chain problems that we've had this year? For how long?
- halestock 5y agoYep, that is known as the bullwhip effect: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullwhip_effect
- spacemannoslen 5y agoNice, my Georgia tech OMSA classes have finally reached real world instance of hearing something I learned about. Thx
- quietbritishjim 5y agoThat looks quite different. According to the article, the key feature of the bullwhip effect is that it goes both too high and too low.
- marcosdumay 5y agoExactly. It's a very different phenomenon from group velocity. Both commonly happen after supply chain disruptions. Bullwhip effect happens over the entire chain, while group velocity happens on a single stage of it.
- the_mitsuhiko 5y agoThe supply chain situation is much worse because individual actors are trying to optimize for themselves for an advantage at the cost of everybody else.
- JoBrad 5y agoTragedy of the Supply Chain?
- whatshisface 5y agoIn contrast to the selflessness and charity of rush hour commuters?
- the_mitsuhiko 5y agoI don’t know how self aware rush hour commuters are about their situation. Also the animation linked does not involve decision making. Right now a lot of companies are aware of supply chain issues and counter acting them for instance by greater stockpiling which in turn worsens the situation for others.
- whatshisface 5y agoIf you're against stockpiling, then you're in favor of the zero inventory cost cutting practice that got us in to this mess to begin with.
- bfdm 5y agoYup, turned out that inventory isn't pure capital waste after all. It's an insurance policy, an investment in stability. Bring back inventory.
- mschuster91 5y agoAnd in ten years, when the pandemic has passed, the MBA beancounters and/or "activist investors" will ask the question "do we need stockpiles of inventory???" again. And then history will repeat itself - many years of profit, followed by a crisis of some kind and then we will have another "delivery crisis".
- alfiedotwtf 5y ago> It's an insurance policy That's a really good way of putting it.
- ed_balls 5y agoThere is also a train congestion in Kazakhstan. A few articles mentioned end of summer 2022, but I guess this was assuming no extra disruptions.
- AtlasBarfed 5y agoWell, maybe we shouldn't make the supply chain so long. Shipping things 5000 miles should not be cheaper than making them closer to home. Although shipping is astonishingly efficient, a retroactive carbon tax (not just for the current emission, but one that doubles it for back-charges) should be instituted on shipping worldwide in bulk. That will incentivize local sourcing. It's not just for long-term global warming. We are a medium-scale disaster (small asteroid stike, supervolcano explosion, megatsunami) from worldwide starvation due to supply chain disruption. I'm really glad alternative energy is so competitive, because it is local generation, and not just in the local powerplant sense. Poor places actually are a lot more resilient to disruption because everyone has a cow in the backyard and a garden. Similarly home solar and storage are so much more disaster resilient. Perverse economic incentives aren't just on the liberal side. "Free market" economics with its unfunded externalities is another kind of perverse incentive that has led to these ridiculous rube goldberg supply chains.
- 14 5y agoI don’t agree with all you write but I will say I have been thinking about building a solar LED green house with battery pack to run it winter or at night. In summer just run it off the sun but as winter approaches fire up a LED grow light for extra light hours. Then I could cut my cost of food a lot but most importantly be resilient to supply chain disruptions.
- hattmall 5y agoI would really like to see some math / data on what amount of power / battery etc you need and what crops to grow and survive off of. Basically how much greenhouse space and electricity do you need per person and what would you be eating. We grow a seasonal garden, much larger than most people I know, about 3 acres and we don't keep tedious records or really optimize it but it seems like it would fall far short of being enough food to live off of.
- howLongHowLong 5y ago3 acres could definitely provide one with most enough to live on if one keeps animals, preserves surplus, and expands their definition of seasonal. "Four-Season Gardening" by Elliot Coleman, a great book on the subject, shows a green house strategy that involves no added energy (in Maine, no less). I imagine thoughtful addition of active control could improve output. The hardest part is growing enough protein, which is why livestock is sort of a necessity for subsistence living unless you live someplace with accessible and abundant fish or game. One past solution was collectively owned and worked acreage devoted to beans, milk or similar, though I suppose it could be argued that leads us back here, eventually, once someone gets the idea to sell the surplus of that. (It did once, already) TL;DR Check out "Four-season Gardening" by Elliot Coleman for interesting ideas on expanding your growing season without adding electricity
- mhb 5y agoMaybe I'm not understanding, but I don't see traffic moving backwards in that example.
- yelnatz 5y agoThe traffic isnt moving backwards but the traffic jam is.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- ncallaway 5y agoThe wave of condensed cars is moving opposite of the direction of travel of the cars. The high density region of cars is moving backwards.
- picsao 5y agoIf a part cant take off cargo and the orders are stuck, the factory stops producing?
- dataflow 5y agoI think you mean the shockwave moves backwards, not the traffic.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- Kye 5y agoThe confusion in replies is a great example of what happens when the forest and the trees get mixed up.