“If you take down your clothesline and buy an electric clothes dryer, the electric consumption of the nation rises slightly,” Baer wrote. “If you go in the other direction and remove the electric clothes dryer and install a clothesline, the consumption of electricity drops slightly, but there is no credit given anywhere on the charts and graphs to solar energy, which is now drying the clothes.” The Clothesline Paradox is a tool for seeing the economy with fresh eyes, essential if we are to correctly rewrite the rules. It is another of those general-purpose concepts that is an aid to seeing
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