Fluid ounce (US)

Abstract: A stitch in time saves nine,” the old saying goes. “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” In software, these expressions translate into the common observation that the longer a defect stays in process, the more expensive it is to fix.1 Industry reports about the magnitude of the cost increase have varied over the years. The highest ratio I’ve seen published came from Barry Boehm and Philip Papaccio in 1988.2 They reported that requirements defects that made their way into the field could cost 50 to 200 times as much to correct as defects that were corrected close to the point of creation. Of course, “50 to 200 times” is a rough average, and in the worst cases, the sky is the limit for defect costs—literally. The US space program had two highprofile failures in 1999: in both, correcting a defect “in the field” was not possible, and the software errors that went undetected until the software was in the field ended up costing hundreds of millions of dollars. I’ve previously presented a rough rule of thumb that early, upstream defects generally cost 10 to 100 times as much to remove late downstream as they do to remove close to the point where they are created.1 These observations have been used to justify a focus on upstream quality assurance activities such as extensive requirements work, design work, and technical reviews. These old sayings and rules of thumb have come under attack in recent years. Some people claim that software defects aren’t as expensive to correct as they used to be; costs don’t increase as quickly as they used to. In other words, an ounce of prevention is not worth a pound of cure, but perhaps only an ounce of cure.3 Some claim that we are expending more effort on prevention than we would by fixing the defects later—that we’re spending a pound of prevention to avoid an ounce of cure.

Abstract: The price premium associated with organic babyfood is estimated by applying a hedonic model to price and characteristic data for babyfood products collected in two cities: Raleigh, North Carolina, and San Jose, California. The price per ounce of babyfood is modeled as a function of a number of babyfood and store characteristics. The estimated organic price premium is generally equal to 3 cents to 4 cents per ounce. To the extent this premium reflects consumer willingness to pay to reduce pesticide exposures, it could be used to infer values for reduced dietary exposures to pesticide residues for babies.

Abstract: When this essay was published, nearly thirty years ago, America was in the midst of the Bretton Woods system, a Keynesian international monetary system that had been foisted upon the world by the United States and British governments in 1945. The Bretton Woods system was an international dollar standard masquerading as a “gold standard,” in order to lend the welldeserved prestige of the world’s oldest and most stable money, gold, to the increasingly inflated and depreciated dollar. But this post-World War II system was only a grotesque parody of a gold standard. In the pre-World War I “classical” gold standard, every currency unit, be it dollar, pound, franc, or mark, was defined as a certain unit of weight of gold. Thus, the “dollar” was defined as approximately 1/20 of an ounce of gold, while the pound sterling was defined as a little less than 1/4 of a gold ounce, thus fixing the exchange rate between the two (and between all other currencies) at the ratio of their weights.

Abstract: Importance Because moisturizer use is critical for the prevention and treatment of numerous dermatological conditions, patients frequently request product recommendations from dermatologists. Objective To determine the product performance characteristics and ingredients of best-selling moisturizers. Design and Setting This cohort study involved publicly available data of the top 100 best-selling whole-body moisturizing products at 3 major online retailers (Amazon, Target, and Walmart). Products marketed for use on a specific body part (eg, face, hands, eyelids) were excluded. Main Outcomes and Measures Pairwise comparisons of median price per ounce on the basis of marketing claims (eg, dermatologist recommended, fragrance free, hypoallergenic) and presence of ingredients represented in the North American Contact Dermatitis Group (NACDG) series were conducted using Wilcoxon rank sum tests. The effect of vehicle type (eg, ointment, lotion, cream, butter) was assessed using the Kruskal-Wallis test. Cross-reactors and botanicals for fragrances were derived from the American Contact Dermatitis Society’s Contact Allergen Management Program database. Results A total of 174 unique best-selling moisturizer products were identified, constituting 109 713 reviews as of August 2016. The median price per ounce was $0.59 (range, $0.10-$9.51 per ounce) with a wide range (9400%). The most popular vehicles were lotions (102 [59%]), followed by creams (22 [13%]), oils (21 [12%]), butters (14 [8%]), and ointments (3 [2%]). Only 12% (n = 21) of best-selling moisturizer products were free of NACDG allergens. The 3 most common allergens were fragrance mix (n = 87), paraben mix (n = 75), and tocopherol (n = 74). Products with the claim “dermatologist recommended” had higher median price per ounce ($0.79; interquartile range [IQR], $0.56-$1.27) than products without the claim ($0.59; IQR, $0.34-$0.92). Products with the claim “phthalate free” had higher median price per ounce ($1.38; IQR, $0.86-$1.63) than products without the claim ($0.59; IQR, $0.35-$0.91). Lotions (median, $0.49; IQR, $0.31-0.68) were statistically less expensive per ounce than butters (median, $1.20; IQR, $0.76-$1.63), creams (median, $0.80; IQR, $0.69-$1.25) and oils (median, $1.30; IQR, $0.64-$2.43). For products with a claim of “fragrance free,” 18 (45%) had at least 1 fragrance cross-reactor or botanical ingredient. Products without any ingredients in the NACDG (median, $0.83; IQR, $0.47-$1.69) were not statistically more expensive per ounce than products with 1 or more allergens (median, $0.60; IQR, $0.35-$1.06). Conclusions and Relevance Best-selling moisturizers vary widely by price and product characteristics. Given the lack of readily available comparison data on moisturizer efficacy, dermatologists should balance consumer preference, price, and allergenicity in their recommendations.