The economics of a traffic jam

Today, I don't want to bore you with the effervescent housing market, nor do I want to talk about inflation, let GDP forecasters crank out the numbers and comment on the movements of the markets.

Mine is a more humble task, to investigate and make a few observations regarding the economics of traffic jams in Beijing.

Perhaps a few definitions are in order, before we begin. Armed with information, and with the assumption that we are usually rational, economics is about choices that maximize our gains or minimize our losses. Observation requires seeing beyond the commonalities and becoming acquainted with what we see, as well as having the wisdom to know what to observe, how and for how long.