God’s handiwork on brilliant display.

University of Wisconsin Arboretum.

Damon Lavrinc:

Nearly every automaker is working on some form of autonomous vehicle technology, but according to a new study, consumers are more interested in a self-driving car from Google than General Motors.

The study, conducted by U.S. audit and advisory firm KPMG, polled a diverse group of drivers from both coasts and in between, pulling samples from Los Angeles, California; Chicago, Illinois; and Iselin, New Jersey.

The focus groups were asked about their willingness to use an autonomous vehicle every day, and rank their trust in the company producing the car on a scale of one to 10. While high-end automakers like Mercedes-Benz received a median score of 7.75, tech companies like Google and Apple scored an eight, and mass-market brands (Chevrolet and Nissan) came in at five.

“We believe that self-driving cars will be profoundly disruptive to the traditional automotive ecosystem,” said Gary Silberg, KPMG auto expert and author of the report. The company’s polling bears that out, although KPMG is quick to add the caveat that while “focus group discussions are valuable for the qualitative, directional insights they provide; they are not statistically valid.”

Still, the study bore some interesting — if not entirely surprising — results.

Related: Google to Sell Users Endorsements.

Kopin Tan:

Can’t such policies go on for a while? After all, we still don’t have inflation…

According to the U.S. government! But you must buy some things: insurance, food, even paper. The price of nearly everything is going up. We have inflation in India, China, Norway, Australia—everywhere but the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

I’m telling you they’re lying. Go to a restaurant in New York, or a grocery store, and tell me that there’s no inflation. [Rogers starts tapping on his laptop]. Look here: In 2001, it cost $9 to go to the top of the Empire State Building. Now it’s $27 to go to the 86th floor, $44 to go to the top, and $67 to go express. The Museum of Modern Art in 2001 was $10, now it’s $25. A cab from Kennedy airport to Manhattan in 2001 was $30 plus tolls. Now it starts at $52.

Frances Coppolla:

The London property market is booming. Property prices have risen by 9.7% in the last year and there is no sign of any decline. Such large price rises are, of course, only happening in London, not the rest of the UK, where property price rises are lower the further you are from London (in Scotland prices are actually falling). But the same is happening in other large cities such as New York. Prime real estate in big cities has never been so expensive – and so desirable.

Yet people are leaving London. Both the FT and the NY Times carry opinion columns by disgruntled journalists who have decided the cost of property in London is way too high and are moving elsewhere. And they report that others are doing so too. Here’s Michael Goldfarb in the NYT:

“Matt, who had been looking for a house for more than three years, summed up the reason for leaving best: “I don’t want to be a slave to a mortgage for the next 25 years.” Given the astronomic rise in house prices here, he wasn’t speaking metaphorically.”

So if people are leaving London, how do we explain such enormous price rises? Ordinarily we would expect what the NYT calls “London’s great exodus” to cause prices to fall, not rise. But there is a simple reason, and it is due to the new role of property in the global economy. London’s prices are rising at the same time as its residents are leaving for one simple reason. Property in these city centres no longer exists to provide homes for ordinary people. It exists to provide safe, high-yielding assets for the rich. As Michael Goldfarb points out: