Category: Development

Suicide! Suicide! — Part 2

This is a follow up to the post “Suicide! Suicide!”

Of shoes and ships . . .

Let me tell you a story. This happened many years ago on a train journey. A couple of children were running around the compartment playing. The father of one of the kids, busy talking to a fellow traveler, would every now and then stop his son and tie the kid’s shoelaces. He repeatedly retied the laces but in a few minutes they would mysteriously come untied. I watched with growing frustration and anger at the senselessness of what the man was doing. Continue reading “Suicide! Suicide! — Part 2”

On Aurangzeb

I have it on good authority that Satyameva Jayate is India’s national motto. The English translation of the Sanskrit is “Truth Alone Prevails.” Is that claim itself true? Can it really prevail in a land where some people are afraid to speak what they perceive to be the truth because some others confront that expression with violence?

Thomas Jefferson claimed over 200 years ago that “it is error alone that needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself.” I agree only partly. I don’t think that without courageous people truth has a chance. Truth, in the abstract, of course exists. But for it to triumph, surely it has to be expressed by humans and be part of the mental makeup of at least one human being. The world is spherical is a truth in the abstract. But at some point in the history of human civilization it became a concrete truth. But it required courage to express a truth that in some parts of the world was considered against god and morality.

Truth would have a hard time prevailing in a nation of people cowed down from fear and threat of violence. A recent example of violence shutting out an attempt at finding the truth occurred in Chennai. A bunch of people shut down an exhibition which revealed Aurangzeb to be a tyrant. The police were also involved in the vandalism. The state was involved in suppressing the expression of a viewpoint that some considered unpalatable. Most of the newspapers did not report this.

Isn’t it true that India’s motto basically pokes fun at India’s public actions?

Link: Details of what happened and Kanchan Gupta’s opinion piece.

[Follow up post: B Raman on “Aurangzebs of Today.”]

Your Vote for My Money

A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until a majority of voters discover that they can vote themselves largess out of the public treasury.
— Alexander Tytler

Some numbers are well beyond human comprehension. We can talk glibly about millions and billions of this or that but we cannot intuitive grasp what they actually mean. Evolution has equipped us with fine brains but those brains never needed to deal with thousands — leave alone millions — of anything. So we have to do some mental gymnastics to get a fleeting glimpse of what very large numbers represent.
Continue reading “Your Vote for My Money”

Infinite Information, Infinite Ignorance

Information, Not Plastics

The world has come a long way since the 1960s when the future was defined by one word – “plastics” – as Mr McGuire advised the young graduate Ben. Now the future is defined by another word and the word is “information.” Plastics was a wonder product of the world of industrial technology which fundamentally transformed the world of objects. Information is the new thing, the product of information technology, which is going to transform the world of ideas. Actually, information is not a “thing” in the usual sense of the term. So it is the new non-thing which defines the new and exciting future.
Continue reading “Infinite Information, Infinite Ignorance”

Reality Disconnect

There appears to be a thriving cottage industry which is primarily engaged in churning out shallow pieces of journalistic garbage. The pieces detail a particular person’s or family’s struggles and then juxtapose it in some dramatic way with perceived overall prosperity. The implicit argument is that there is an immense injustice being perpetrated against the poor, that it is all the fault of those who are not poor, and that the poor have absolutely no responsibility for the miserable state of affairs. These articles reveal a lot without intending to. They plainly state that the author did not quite learn the lesson that stared them in the face when they were investigating the story.
Continue reading “Reality Disconnect”

Why is India poor?

Don’t read Tavleen Singh’s column “Educating the Education Minister” in the Indian Express today if you wish to continue being puzzled by the question why India is poor.

Basic decency and propriety prevents me from suggesting what should be done to the Indian minister she writes about. Shame on you, Dr Manmohan Singh. Please, in the name of everything decent and human, resign.

Of Lavatories and Laptops

Over four years ago I had written a post titled “Choosing between WCs and PCs” — it is one of my favorite posts and features my friend CJ. Put that on your reading list. I am reminded of that post by an Economist article of last week titled “Limits of Leapfrogging.” The article concludes with this:
Continue reading “Of Lavatories and Laptops”

Of Kakistocracies, Principals, and Agents

Enclaves of Private Luxury

Just off the expressway from Mumbai, on the road leading into Pune, you see huge billboards advertising new housing developments with fancy names like “Whispering Pines” and “Orchard View” crowding each other, promising idyllic lifestyles of lavish comfort. They convey very urgently a palpable sense of how rapidly the market for private luxury dwelling is blossoming thanks to increased salaries and easy housing loans.

These billboards reflect the increased aspirations of the growing upper middle-class in India. Curiously, one set spoke to a deeper and disturbing reality. One billboard said, “Power Cuts? No problem. We have 24-hour generator backup.” Another one down the road said, “Water Shortage? Have a shower. We have our own water supply.”
Continue reading “Of Kakistocracies, Principals, and Agents”

Debunking Myths about China and India

Pranab Bardhan, a professor of mine at UC Berkeley, whom we have met before here (see Crouching Tiger, Lumbering Elephant, and Pranab Bardhan on the Indian Economy, for instance) has an excellent article in the Boston Review titled “What Makes a Miracle: Some myths about the Rise of China and India.” (Hat tip: Yuvaraj Galada.)

He states the standard view explaining the rapid growth of the two countries:

What explains this strikingly rapid growth? The answer that continues to dominate public discussion in the United States runs along the following lines: decades of socialist controls and regulations stifled enterprise in India and China and led them to a dead end. A mix of market reforms and global integration finally unleashed their entrepreneurial energies. As these giants shook off their “socialist slumber,” they entered the “flattened” playing field of global capitalism. The result has been high economic growth in both countries and correspondingly large declines in poverty.

Continue reading “Debunking Myths about China and India”

Why is the US so Cheap?

A Simple Question

A friend of mine in California asked me one of those questions which seem simple on the surface yet is anything but. One of the “top women in storage” as a leading business publication had rated her, she had gone home to Ireland for the Christmas holidays. In an email detailing how everyone was and what happened in Ireland, she concluded by asking, “So, Mr Economist, tell me why is the US so cheap?” The context of her question included the price-levels of various places she is familiar with such as the US, Western European countries, NZ, and Australia. My own comparison of Indian and US prices adds further validity to that question since I find that the US is cheap relative to India. Why is it so?
Continue reading “Why is the US so Cheap?”