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No, any competent economist (as opposed to editorial writers for the New York Times) understands that trade deficits are completely irrelevant

We can presume then that Paul Volcker (Greenspan's predecessor as Chairman of the Federal Reserve, and former head of research at the World Bank) and the current head of the IMF, to pick two random examples, are not competent economists.

Yes, a current account deficit is not necessarily a bad thing, and a strong economy can easily carry one. The US current account deficit is, however, getting rather too large, and, more importantly, it is only continuing to grow, with no sign of levelling of or decreasing. That is bad no matter how you slice it.

If you want a nice detailed account of the US current account deficit, how it can be viewed, why it has been successfully carried in the past but may not work out so well now, try this paper which lays things out fairly well. It's old (2002), but covers the main points well.

Jedidiah.

Maybe at a nominal level, but at a real value, oil hasn't reached record highs yet. Look at this graph. You will see that we've just passed the first Gulf war price of ~$60/barrel (2005 prices), but we have some way to go yet to reach the 1990 price of ~$90/barrel.

That graph also shows that oil was at one of its lowest prices in the latter part of the nineties. Surprise surprise: a massive increase in sales of SUVs occurred then.

Unlike the tobacco products, these games aren't clearly bad for all customers (see this which was also discussed on /. here).

Its a big frenzy created by a small percentage of parents, blown out of proportion by the press and being capitalized upon by politicians. In the end we all lose another nibble of freedom.

The ongoing large-scale executions were largely in the form of starvation.

That's not an execution - you're now trying to change your claim, given that your prior claim wasn't supported. Unfortunately, this claim is equally false (see below):

In 1999, the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator estimated that 6,000 to 7,000 per month were dying due to starvation because Saddam was refusing food shipments allowed by the sanctions system.

Completely false. Here's what the coordinator, Dennis Halliday, actually had to say. Halliday resigned because he blamed *the UN*, and most specifically, the *US*, for the starvation deaths in Iraq. He reported that Iraq had been cooperating excellently with the program, and once described the country as a giant "soup kitchen".

The US invasion removed this obstacle that stood between Iraqis and their food.

Completely false. Children Pay Cost of Iraq's Chaos: Malnutrition Nearly Double What It Was Before Invasion

"BAGHDAD -- Acute malnutrition among young children in Iraq has nearly doubled since the United States led an invasion of the country 20 months ago, according to surveys by the United Nations, aid agencies and the interim Iraqi government."

Iraq Body Count reports 26,599 victims.

IBC only counts direct war deaths, and of those, only the ones reported in the media. The only count of all deaths came up with a number of around 100,000, and that was half a year ago. Note that they tossed Falluja as a datapoint to get this *low* of a number.

There are imaginary totals as high as 100,000 killed as a result of war activity since the allies struck in early 2003.

The "imaginary" totals that you refer to are determined from the same method used to do epidemiology studies in Africa, and met the scholastic standards of the Lancet. Read up about passive vs. active counts, and why the former (such as IBC) are guaranteed to undercount.

The rest of the message included grudging admissions that Iraq had WMD just before the invasion.

It includes no such thing. Please repeat your attempt at reading.

You attempt to get around this by claiming that the WMD were too few or too small.

No. As I informed you, the mustard gas referred to was found in 1998, and was under UN control since then; even that find was miniscule, and considered by the teams to have been overlooked by Iraq.

You even try to justify Saddam having "50 litres of Mustard Gas" by mentioning WW1.

I said no such thing. Look, if all you're going to do is make straw men, why should I even bother talking to you? I was putting the quantity of Mustard Gas into perspective. I stated that's what I was doing, and nothing more. On average in WWI, there was one chemical agent fatality for every ~2400 kg of chemical agent produced.

The existence of any WMD was a gross violation.

Any violations were to be decided by the inspection teams. The inspection teams declared no "gross violations", and the heads of both the IAEA and UNMOVIC both opposed the invasion.

In it, they mention 50 litres of Mustard Gas

That Was Bloody Well Found Five Years Prior, And Had Been In UN Control Ever Since. Furthermore, it was a find that the teams considered to have been overlooked, and they did not refer the case to the SC (the referal would have been in 1998 anyways). In the US, we have several *tons* of unaccounted for chemical agents, most of them in unexploded shells on munitions ranges, but probably elsewhere as well.

At least, at this point, no-one can argue that the WMD did not exist.

Nobody is arguing that the WMD never existed! They didn't exist when we invaded. Just because the UN had

Found this article.

http://economist.com/printedition/displayStory.cfm ?Story_ID=4246109

One of the charts from the bureau of justice should prove interesting.

Even if by attrition, his argument shall fail.

Now that our side is dominant and impleneting it's policies (mostly rolling back socialism in favor of classical liberalism) it is now the Democratic party yelling STOP! in an attempt to preserve their gains.

Towards classical liberalism? Really?

Since when is a $1.2 TRILLION Medicare spending bill (passed by Dubya) something that a smaller government would do?

The idea that Bush is any fiscal conservative at all is a bunch of cracksmokery.

You clearly don't read enough of the Cato Institute which called him a "Progressive President" or The Economist magazine or Reason magazine where Bush's spending record is concerned. Oh, and Bush's "lean budget" this year? It's "like being the slimmest sumo wrestler in the ring."

Soaring yearly budget deficits approaching 5% of yearly GDP are not the work of any "classical liberal"; those deficits -- as the great (and *real* classical liberal) economist Milton Friedman once wrote of deficits decades ago -- are nothing more than a tax increase on future generations. 90% steel tarriffs (ruled illegal by the WTO) are certainly not the work of any free-trading classical liberal (although to his credit, CAFTA is admittedly a nice step).

The very notion that President Bush is returning us to a more classical liberal -- a.k.a. moderate libertarian -- society is almost completely intellectually-bankrupt, whether we are discussing economics (as we are in this thread) or social policy.

We've hit Bush's economic leg, and find he hasn't one to stand on. Clearly Bush has little in the way of classical liberal leanings there (his Social Security reform aside, although even there, his plan will effectively discredit the value of private investment by greatly restricting the basket of investments into which people may invest). What about his classical liberal views on social policy?

He doesn't have a leg to stand on there either.

The real classical liberals would not have attacked a foreign nation unprovoked (Iraq), although they certainly would've fought back against the 9/11 attackers (i.e., we would have gone to Afghanistan, as we actually did). Classical liberals believe in the value of privacy; Bush does not. Classical liberals (usually) support private gun ownership; Bush supported the Assault Weapons Ban even though even the anti-gun Violence Policy Center's own leader said the AWB was of little value (the re-enactment of the AWB thankfully died in Congress, no thanks to Bush). The classical liberals of today -- like Milton Friedman -- support the legalization, or at least decriminalization of illegal drugs; Bush, like any conservative, opposes it (thanks to Ronald Reagan's promotion of the so-failed-even-some-Republicans-admit-it-now "war on drugs").

As a final nail in his socially non-classical liberal policy: on free speech, classical liberals love freedom of speech -- they wrote the First Amendment after all! We would allow full, free, and unrestricted speech on our airwaves (with exceptions perhaps only for very-specific, very limited national security instances, e.g. disallowing the announcement of the procedures and launch codes for any of our nuclear missiles, though

It's definitely cool that children in developing nations are using computers to improve their prospects, but too often in these sorts of discussions the notion is advanced that computers (and the internet) are just what developing nations need, as regards technology.

In fact, a much better investment is in mobile phones and mobile networks. Even the cheapest handsets encourage kids to learn to read and write, not to mention gain proficiency in handling technology. At the same time, adults can use mobile phones to find employment, find affordable goods, negotiate deals, conduct business. Mobile phones integrate themselves into daily life much more easily than PCs, and their impact is thus felt much faster and wider. If the free flow of information enables a market to work efficiently, then what better technology to kickstart the economy than mobile phones?

Here are a few articles with the hard numbers pitting mobile phones against PCs.
http://news.mongabay.com/2005/0712-rhett_butler.ht ml
http://usinfo.state.gov/af/Archive/2005/May/17-488 286.html
http://www.economist.com/printedition/displaystory .cfm?Story_ID=3742817
http://www.economist.com/business/displayStory.cfm ?story_id=4157618

While it's certainly heartening that open source software is having a positive effect in poverty-stricken Africa, it's also important for aidgivers to note that dollar for dollar, computers aren't the best use of limited funds.

It's definitely cool that children in developing nations are using computers to improve their prospects, but too often in these sorts of discussions the notion is advanced that computers (and the internet) are just what developing nations need, as regards technology.

In fact, a much better investment is in mobile phones and mobile networks. Even the cheapest handsets encourage kids to learn to read and write, not to mention gain proficiency in handling technology. At the same time, adults can use mobile phones to find employment, find affordable goods, negotiate deals, conduct business. Mobile phones integrate themselves into daily life much more easily than PCs, and their impact is thus felt much faster and wider. If the free flow of information enables a market to work efficiently, then what better technology to kickstart the economy than mobile phones?

Here are a few articles with the hard numbers pitting mobile phones against PCs.
http://news.mongabay.com/2005/0712-rhett_butler.ht ml
http://usinfo.state.gov/af/Archive/2005/May/17-488 286.html
http://www.economist.com/printedition/displaystory .cfm?Story_ID=3742817
http://www.economist.com/business/displayStory.cfm ?story_id=4157618

While it's certainly heartening that open source software is having a positive effect in poverty-stricken Africa, it's also important for aidgivers to note that dollar for dollar, computers aren't the best use of limited funds.

Iraq violated UN sanction after UN sanction for more than a decade.

Go check how many UN sanctions and resolutions there have been against Israel, and for how many decades.

The Economist, a fairly good news source, published an article in 2002 documenting why Iraq's sanctions were different than Israel's but with the current information gathered today, it's clear they were wrong. They believed Iraq had wmd and was hotly pursuing a nuclear program as they had in the past. But the program was shut down and wasn't restarted.

Although it's a complete threadjack to go into the reasons for the war, whether we were lied to, why it was a good idea, and why it was a bad idea, one thing is clear: the reasons for going to war (and getting americans to agree) were based on false information and spin. Plain and simple. The end result might be good for the world and the region ... but the reasons cited were not sound. You can see exactly what I'm talking about in old news articles. It makes the spin that much clearer.

But the west does not refuse doing business with the corrupt governments of those countries.

This is true.

In fact, these corrupt governments are being put in place with the help of western governments that will buy their goods and services in very low prices.

This is not always true. There are plenty of corrupt governments that are kept in place without significant Western trade. They surivive simply through the rents they extract from their own minimal economies.

On the other hand, examples of countries with corrupt governments which the West has tried to avoid trading with (such as North Korea, Cuba, Iraq, and Iran) have not appeared to collapse as a result of a reduction in trade.

Yet at the same time, the government of China, previously one of the most corrupt and economy-destroying, having used central planning to starve tens of millions, has been willing to accept free markets in part due to the willingness of the West to trade with them, leading to amazing economic growth and reduction of poverty in the country.

This seems to suggest that there isn't much the West can do to remove economically destructive governments through trade restrictions, but that trade can provide carrots (even to hardlien Chinese Communists) that can lead governments to create the environments required for effective free market economies.


Most part of the Earth's population still lives with 1 dollar per day

Your statistics are wrong. Current estimates of percent of Earth's population living on $1 per day or below range from 7% to 18%. Snce 1980, the percentage has been cut in half, with most reductions occuring in East Asia (mainly China) and South Asia (mainly India) where 400 million fewer people live under $1 a day now than in 1980. More information is available here.

I am not sure if I am permitted to quote major chunks of a paid-article, but the one from which I am copying excerpts here is very compelling and well written, and makes some good points that fall in the context of this thread.

Economist, "The Enemy Within" - July 14, 2005

Even if everyone involved in terrorising London turns out to have been British-born, it is clear that the bombers had access to sophisticated explosives, not easily available in suburban Yorkshire; and, more important, that they were influenced by ideas, images and interpretations of Islam that would continue to circulate electronically, even if every extremist who tried to enter Britain were intercepted. So the best that terrorist-hunters in Britain and elsewhere in Europe can do is to trace how disaffected people from their own tranquil suburbs form connections with ideological mentors, and ultimately terrorist sponsors, who live overseas, and how those godfathers find recruits in western countries.

...

In Britain, too, security services have concluded that these days, connections between local youths and foreign godfathers are usually formed at the youths' behest. To a surprising extent, the onus is on individual zealots (or groups of them) to find mentors. Al-Qaeda does not actively seek recruits for the jihadist cause, partly because that would attract the attention of the security services and partly because, ever since the destruction of its bases in Afghanistan, it has--in the view of well placed British observers--been too loosely organised to recruit systematically.

This highlights one of the main difficulties of the "war on terror". In 2001, when America and its allies responded to the attacks on New York and Washington by declaring war on the al-Qaeda network, it seemed an identifiable adversary, with bases, financial structures and a leadership that could be singled out and struck. Since then, it has become something much looser: not even a "franchise", as it is commonly labelled, but more an ideological community, held together above all by electronic connections, which seeks inspiration from a common source.

...

Through the web, even dead al-Qaeda fighters live on, says Mr Ulph. On one website that ceased operations last year (but has several imitators), it was possible to read the writings of senior, recently slain al-Qaeda men on everything from physical training to guerrilla tactics.

...

A group of young Muslims will often travel quite a long way down the road to violent jihad before meeting anybody with terrorist expertise. Some never find the contacts they seek, and resort to their own devices; only occasionally does this have deadly results for anybody besides themselves. One example of such amateurism is that of two Moroccan men from the Dutch city of Eindhoven, Ahmed el-Bakiouli and Khalid el-Hassnaoui, who tried to enter Afghanistan in December 2001 in the hope of fighting some Americans. Having failed, they went to Kashmir, where they were swiftly killed by Indian security forces. In Britain, several terrorist plots uncovered since 2001 have been striking for their incompetence and lack of outside expertise.

Things become far more dangerous, of course, when committed radicals come into contact with veterans of wars in Chechnya and Bosnia, or of the Afghan training camps where several hundred Britons are believed to have been schooled. These veterans either have the know-how to plan an atrocity, or can find somebody who does, and it is under their influence that hopeless missions can turn deadly. Whether this happens or not is often a matter of chance. Take the Egyptian Mohammed Atta and other members of the "Hamburg cell" that plotted the September 11th attacks. They were drawn into mega-terror after meeting someone who introduced them first to an al-Qaeda operative in Germany, and then to masterminds in Afghanistan.

I am not sure if I am permitted to quote major chunks of a paid-article, but the one from which I am copying excerpts here is very compelling and well written, and makes some good points that fall in the context of this thread. Economist, "The Enemy Within", July 14, 2005 Even if everyone involved in terrorising London turns out to have been British-born, it is clear that the bombers had access to sophisticated explosives, not easily available in suburban Yorkshire; and, more important, that they were influenced by ideas, images and interpretations of Islam that would continue to circulate electronically, even if every extremist who tried to enter Britain were intercepted. So the best that terrorist-hunters in Britain and elsewhere in Europe can do is to trace how disaffected people from their own tranquil suburbs form connections with ideological mentors, and ultimately terrorist sponsors, who live overseas, and how those godfathers find recruits in western countries. ... In Britain, too, security services have concluded that these days, connections between local youths and foreign godfathers are usually formed at the youths' behest. To a surprising extent, the onus is on individual zealots (or groups of them) to find mentors. Al-Qaeda does not actively seek recruits for the jihadist cause, partly because that would attract the attention of the security services and partly because, ever since the destruction of its bases in Afghanistan, it has--in the view of well placed British observers--been too loosely organised to recruit systematically. This highlights one of the main difficulties of the "war on terror". In 2001, when America and its allies responded to the attacks on New York and Washington by declaring war on the al-Qaeda network, it seemed an identifiable adversary, with bases, financial structures and a leadership that could be singled out and struck. Since then, it has become something much looser: not even a "franchise", as it is commonly labelled, but more an ideological community, held together above all by electronic connections, which seeks inspiration from a common source. ... Through the web, even dead al-Qaeda fighters live on, says Mr Ulph. On one website that ceased operations last year (but has several imitators), it was possible to read the writings of senior, recently slain al-Qaeda men on everything from physical training to guerrilla tactics. ... A group of young Muslims will often travel quite a long way down the road to violent jihad before meeting anybody with terrorist expertise. Some never find the contacts they seek, and resort to their own devices; only occasionally does this have deadly results for anybody besides themselves. One example of such amateurism is that of two Moroccan men from the Dutch city of Eindhoven, Ahmed el-Bakiouli and Khalid el-Hassnaoui, who tried to enter Afghanistan in December 2001 in the hope of fighting some Americans. Having failed, they went to Kashmir, where they were swiftly killed by Indian security forces. In Britain, several terrorist plots uncovered since 2001 have been striking for their incompetence and lack of outside expertise. Things become far more dangerous, of course, when committed radicals come into contact with veterans of wars in Chechnya and Bosnia, or of the Afghan training camps where several hundred Britons are believed to have been schooled. These veterans either have the know-how to plan an atrocity, or can find somebody who does, and it is under their influence that hopeless missions can turn deadly. Whether this happens or not is often a matter of chance. Take the Egyptian Mohammed Atta and other members of the "Hamburg cell" that plotted the September 11th attacks. They were drawn into mega-terror after meeting someone who introduced them first to an al-Qaeda operative in Germany, and then to masterminds in Afghanistan. If this had not happened, the Hamburg group might have ended up as cannon-fodder in Chechnya.

Actually, the most secure vault ever, at least one where someone with non-trivial firepower has tried to break into was the one at the Afghanistan Central Bank. It contained 20,000 pieces of ancient gold coins and relics and the countries gold reserves. The Taliban tried to break into it, even shooting it with rockets from an attack helicopter but they couldn't break in. They wanted to dynamite it but decided against it as they figured out that would have collapsed the whole building on top of the vault. I think that's pretty secure. Maybe they should rent co-lo space?

Story over here

* Milton Friedman, PhD Nobel Laureate economist: http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/dunnweb/rprnts.f riedman.html

* Gary Becker, PhD Nobel laureate U. of Chicago economist (still teaching!): http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/archives/2005/07 /do_corporations.html

* Judge Richard Posner, economist and U.S. Federal judge: http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/archives/2005/07 /the_social_resp.html

* The Economist magazine: http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id =3555212

Why undertake the risk of a major overhaul, especially when we know Microsoft products don't like to play nice with non-MS products? We have the money to stay with MS.

Don't worry, hedge funds are probably going to implode in the next year or two and then, if you still have a job, they will be seriously interested in what you have to say about getting the MS vampire off their neck.

I think the EU is only one factor. If being in the EU was such a boon why is Ireland one of the few EU countries booming.

Some others:

- fiscal policy, dramatic cuts in government spending
- pro growth, pro comeptition government
- peace in Northern Ireland removed a cloud over the whole island
- there was an inflow of investment from U.S. companies because, like Canada, the wage costs are low relative to the U.S.
- The Irish speak English which is a lot less pain than outsourcing to China
- Education system works better than the U.S. and U.K in particular, and a lot of well educated former emigres are returning now that Ireland's economy is no longer in the tank.

Look at the chart relative to the rest of the EU. Ireland is just about the only western country sustaining growth rates found only in Asia these days.

In 1987 Irish GDP per person was 69% of the EU average (adjusted to EU 15); by 2003, it had reached 136%. Unemployment fell from 17% in 1987 to 4% in 2003; and government debt shrank from 112% of GDP to 33%.

http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id =S'(X%2C%2BRA%3B!%200!4%0A&CFID=61581345&CFTOKEN=3 cc25fb-873315f9-96db-421b-9995-d09f0c2d2a5b&tranMo de=none

As it is premium service, I summarize the features of the global real estate bubble:

(1) high housing prices to rents, which is like a P/E ratio for real estate

(2) a majority of sales going to "investors," or short-term speculators, rather than long-term residents, i.e. buy-n-holders,

(3) and heavy incidence of flipping on new homes.

To which I add one other indicator:

(4) Lots and lots of people talking about a bubble.

The parallels to stock bubbles and hot IPO markets are rich.

National parks have shown themselves quite effective at keeping elephants alive - as it happens, several countries in Africa are advocating a partial return to trading in elephant parts (ivory, skin and meat) given the booming populations in their national parks. Whereas with elephant farming, the economic motive which leads to the factory farming of other animals would still apply.

Take a look at
http://www.economist.com/science/displayStory.cfm? story_id=1131245

Closing in for the kill?
May 16th 2002 | TSAVO
From The Economist print edition

After a decade of quiet, ivory poaching has started again in Kenya

HEAPED together, tail to trunk, ten dead elephants lie stinking in the Kenyan sun. Their last panicked huddle made them a convenient target. The poachers who killed them, though, had no such instinct. They left behind five dead men, scattered along a 150km trail. The rest, including at least one who was badly wounded, limped back to Somalia, to report on the latest skirmish of the ivory war.

This slaughter of man and beast, in Tsavo East National Park last month, was Kenya's bloodiest poaching incident since 1987. But there could soon be worse. After a decade of mostly negligible poaching, large numbers of elephants are again being killed in the country. The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) found 57 killed for their ivory last year, and 18 in the past month alone. Six black rhinos have also been taken in recent months--the first for over a decade. And these finds, the KWS admits, may represent less than 15% of the total.

The international ivory trade has been illegal since 1989. Initially, that ban caused a market collapse. Now, the markets are recovering. The penchant of European tourists in Asia for ivory earrings and phalluses is helping to fuel demand. According to a recent report by Save the Elephants, a Kenya-based research organisation and lobby group, up to 80% of Asian elephant populations have been poached in the past 14 years in order to carve such knick-knacks. Africa's herds are making up the shortfall. On camel-back and bare shoulders, tusks are being ferried along ancient caravan routes from central Africa to Khartoum's souks. There, ivory prices have reached a 13-year high.

Such rising demand is one reason why poaching is picking up. Another is an expectation that the trade ban may be lifted, at least partly, at a meeting in November of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), which governs such matters.

Kenya's elephant population is still in a precarious state. The country's herds were cut from 167,000 in 1973 to 16,000 in 1989, and have recovered only a little since then. Those in Botswana, Namibia and South Africa, however, are booming. These countries, along with Zimbabwe, whose elephant herd is in a more questionable condition, are lobbying to start trading in elephant products (mainly ivory, but also skins and meat) once again.

Even a minimal legal trade would encourage a massive illegal trade, in the view of Kenya's government

They are not asking for the ban to be lifted completely. Countries that wanted to keep their herds unculled could continue to shelter under the protection that CITES can offer: it would still be illegal to trade in elephant products from such countries in any place that had signed the convention. Kenya nevertheless opposes the southern Africans. The Kenyans do not have surplus elephants to trade, and they want to keep those they do have to encourage tourism. The government's view--shared less vociferously by Tanzania--is that even a minimal legal trade would encourage a massive illegal trade.

That belief is supported by anecdotal evidence, but it is difficult to prove. The failure of CITES to set up a proposed database known as MIKE (Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants) leaves the matter open to debate. MIKE was supposed to include biennial sur

If you're referring to the chart on that page, it's 10 years old. It may not seem like much, but the Chinese economy has been growing at roughly 10% per year. Over a 10-year period, that would make the 2005 Chinese economy 259% as large as the 1995 Chinese economy. To the extent that CO2 emissions are correlated with economic output, it can be expected there has been a dramatic rise in Chinese CO2 emissions over the last ten years, both in absolute terms and relative to Europe and North America (especially Europe, since economic growth has been so low here).

In the second place, CO2 is not the same thing as pollution in general. Apart from its contribution to climate change, CO2 isn't really a pollutant at all. I don't know of any statistics on Chinese pollution levels, but I have heard from Chinese living here (Europe), who have expressed amazement at how clean the air, water, etc are. An article I found on the Economist website seems to paint a similar picture to what I've heard from Chinese in Europe. One alarming comment fromt the article is this: according to the World Bank, China has 16 of the world's 20 most polluted cities.

I hope the Chinese are successful with their attempt to build sustainable cities. If they want their country and the world to have a future, they certainly can't continue they way they've been going. (Neither can we in Europe, of course, but our situation isn't nearly as bad.)

Actually, I hate to say it, but America is one of the least charitable nations on this planet, unless you count loans (with or without interest) as "charity", which I don't. To be clear, I mean least chartiable per capita, and of the wealthy nations. While it's true that the US gives the most in foreign aid as a total figure, we give much less per person than the citizens of most of the other rich nations, even though we are near the top of the list in per person income. (Since we also pay relatively little in taxes, it makes you wonder what we're doing with all our money, and whether we're really spending it wisely -- but that's a different subject.)

I'm not sure if this link is viewable by non-subscribers but, in short, it shows that the US gives about 0.16% of GDP as foreign aid. France gives about 2.5 times as much, per capita, as the US (about 0.41%) and some European countries, like the Netherlands, Sweden and Denmark are giving over 0.7% of their GDP -- almost 3.8 times as much as the US.

These are government figures that do not reflect private giving. Although I admit it is only anecdotal evidence, after having lived for six years in the Netherlands, I would bet good money of my own that private giving exceeds American figures by similar margins (if you don't count the money Americans give to their churches or similar close-to-home charities). People there are exposed to many more opportunities to give to charity there, and seem to do so.

Then again, the article in The Economist mentions the variety of opinion on what works and what doesn't in foreign aid, and it's clear that some poorly-directed aid goes to dictators and terrorists. Nevertheless, those who think America is a great giver (and especially those of the Christian persuasion) should consider the story of the widow's mite.

How about this.
http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu2/2/chrmem.htm
The membership of the Commission on Human Rights.
Some of the members are Libya, North Korea, China, and the Sudan?
Here is one about the fraud in the Oil for food program that the UN ran http://www.economist.com/agenda/displayStory.cfm?s tory_id=2618260
Here is one on the UN Sex Scandal. http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Artic les/000/000/005/081zxelz.asp

The UN has done some good but as far as human rights and freedom goes there track record is not great. I really do not the idea of them running the DNS. If nothing else what we have now works.

See here for more info. Or read on.

Movies to go Jul 7th 2005 From The Economist print edition

Can Netflix's Reed Hastings succeed in the battle to deliver movies online?

LATER this year, Netflix will launch a new service for downloading movies from the internet. "It will be underwhelming," promises Reed Hastings, chief executive of America's leading online DVD-rental company. Despite a recent ruling by America's Supreme Court that gives entertainment companies more ammunition to fight against illegal file-sharing, movie studios are likely to remain extremely cautious about what films they make available for a fee on the web.

For now, that suits Netflix. Mr Hastings believes that the humble DVD--and, eventually, high-definition versions of it--will remain popular for some time, not least because that is what the movie industry wants: sales of DVDs and fees from rentals are an essential source of the studios' profits from new releases. But Mr Hastings is also betting that by the time movie-download technology becomes more mature and online titles more widely available, his subscriber base for DVD rentals will be big enough to put Netflix in a strong position to prosper in the online marketplace--where he is likely to face new competitors such as Yahoo!, Microsoft, the studios themselves and, no doubt, many start-up firms offering rival download services.

Changes in technology encourage start-ups with innovative ideas to enter markets, just as Netflix did in 1999 when--having been stung with a $40 late-payment from a Blockbuster video-rental store--Mr Hastings launched its subscription service. He was already a successful entrepreneur, having built up a software company before he started Netflix. For its most popular service, Netflix charges users $17.99 a month for an unlimited number of DVD rentals. Titles are ordered via the company's website and dispatched overnight. Customers mail them back in a pre-paid envelope, which releases the next movie on a personalised list of films to see. Subscribers can have up to three DVDs out at any time. Needless to say, there are no late fees.

The Netflix business model has proved to be such a simple and highly effective combination of the online and offline worlds that it has spawned imitators in Britain, France, Germany, Australia and Japan. Netflix, which is based in Los Gatos, California, was about to launch in Britain last year when it decided it had better withdraw from going international, for now, in order to concentrate on a life-threatening war on its home front. The all-conquering retailer, Wal-Mart, and Blockbuster, the world's biggest chain of video-rental shops, both decided to offer online DVD rental at lower prices. Amazon has since started to experiment with a DVD-rental service in Britain--but has not yet launched a similar service in America, and some suspect it may instead team up with an existing competitor.

Certainly, the cost of entering the market has gone up. Netflix has slashed its own prices and launched a one DVD out at a time service for just $9.99 a month. In the past year its share price tumbled as investors saw profits being pumped into an aggressive marketing campaign (costing nearly 20% of its revenues). The company expects to make a net loss of $5m-15m this year. Nevertheless, Mr Hastings says Netflix has $175m in cash and no debt. "We can sustain this for a very long time," he adds. Indeed, Netflix is showing signs that it is getting the upper hand. In May, Wal-Mart pulled out, awarding its online DVD-rental business to Netflix. Yet, tempting as it might be, Mr Hastings declines to trumpet that Netflix beat the world's biggest retailer. Indeed, Wal-Mart's bosses say they merely took a strategic decision to focus on selling DVDs rather than renting them. Netflix and Wal-Mart will now promote each other's products.

Meanwhile, Blockbuster, which lost $1.2 billion last year, hopes

Netflix plans were also discussed in the economists this weeks issue. Here is a link to the an excerpt of the article :

http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id =S'(X((RA'%25%20P%224%0A&tranMode=none/

http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id =S'(X((RA'%25%20P%224%0A&tranMode=none

http://economist.com/people/displayStory.cfm?story _id=4149765

The best magazine for this sort of stuff is the Economist

http://www.economist.com/

Could we really do this stunt? I see no reason why we could not. Dassault has done it.

Dassault, a French company, designed and tested its new Falcon 7X entirely in a virtual reality. The company did not create a physical prototype. Rather, the first build is destined for sale to the customer.

Both copyrights and patents are befouled by the ongoing capitalist devolution.

http://www.economist.com/opinion/displayStory.cfm? story_id=4128994

It's time to revise IP entirely, but this is a mere pipe dream. In reality, modern degenerated capitalism (syndicalism?) and the pernicious illusion of democracy have simply created a new type of serfdom. This is the cusp of a new dark age. Don't bother fighting it, you'll just die embittered.

The claim that the Liberation of Iraq killed "100,000" Iraqis is another example of the Left exaggerating a single study for political purposes.

But since we're going to talk about dead Iraqis, let's talk about the 500,000 Iraqi children Clinton and Albright allegedly killed by enforcing U.N sanctions against Saddam's regime.

If we're going to believe the hyperbole and hysteria generated by the Left and parroted by the MSM as fact, then we have to acknowledge that Bush is about 400,000 Iraqi deaths behind Clinton.

Don't we?

On a related note, right after the decision by the US Supreme Court the Economist.com (Global agenda) penend a very well written perspective on the decision. ( Click here to read it.) They conclude the article by stating that, "19% of downloads, involving about 7m individuals, now happen through someone else's iPod or MP3 player." and, "around 28% take place via email" and wonder if this decision will indeed be the "silver bullet" that the music industry has been seeking. I am not so sure but it will sure slow things down.

"By off shoring of jobs in the medical, insurance and banking fields, industries that will not expand based into the developing companies, except on a macro- or highest (read stockholder) level, we're effectively gutting the middle class's support of these industries."

I wasn't aware that the medical industry was off shoring. I just read Scripps is opening a new facility in Palm Beach. Biotech is a huge industry in the United States. Also Bank of America just got into the Chinese banking business.

"If free trade is the argument, why do US (any parent country) companies routinely offer goods in these developing companies at a fraction of the cost to their US consumer counterparts in order to gain market share? How are these "loss leaders" paid for? By the US (any parent country) consumers."

Cost of labour for one. Overvalued currencies another. American consumers, by the way, are very well treated. Take a look.

"By looking at the situation with rose-colored glasses and calling it free trade, you miss the underlying effects."

I prefer Oakley, actually. But seriously, I don't call what is happening today 'free' trade. It is freer in some geographical areas, but for the most part it is one large protectionist mess. Leaders are trying to give their countries advantages that aid the incumbent megalith far more than the consumer or worker.

"The countries that are benefiting from the off-shoring don't reciprocate by exporting jobs, and overall don't usually utilize US (parent country) goods or services, instead the US (parent country) goods and services usually end up competing with government sponsored goods and services, which, by definition, must be below a competitive price point in order to be effectively subsidized."

Off-shoring, when done correctly, is more of a win-win situation. The West benefits in the long-term from the ability to create a highly specialized, educated workforce, and receive cheap consumer goods now. Emerging economies benefit from the foreign direct investment. The downside is, unfortunately, that low-paying jobs are being moved. (Aside: Government sponsored goods? In the United States? Where?)

"I agree that it is quite easy to move a "corporation" off-shore. But if a company has 15 executives and salesmen in the US and 1300 workers in another country, are they still a "US" company or should they be considered as such?

You're talking about holding corporations. Most countries with emerging economies limit the stake a foreigner can hold. In China for example, the general number is 50%. In a case as you describe, the holding company will be American while the subsidiary will be Chinese. For tax purposes, corporations general use the indecipherable mess that is US tax/support system pay as little as possible. A flat tax reform would greatly alleviate these examples of creative accounting.

"Microsoft considers itself a US company, specifically a Washington state based company, but many of it's letters of incorporation are filed in Nevada, whereby they avoid over a $140 million in local Washington state taxes a year. They are "Redmond, Washington" in name only, and the land tax breaks that Washington gave them years ago in order to bring jobs to the area are being mitigated by Microsoft's increasing off-shoring of their code work and slick legal wrangling.

I wasn't aware that Microsoft was off-shoring. Point me a link? I migh

"By off shoring of jobs in the medical, insurance and banking fields, industries that will not expand based into the developing companies, except on a macro- or highest (read stockholder) level, we're effectively gutting the middle class's support of these industries."

I wasn't aware that the medical industry was off shoring. I just read Scripps is opening a new facility in Palm Beach. Biotech is a huge industry in the United States. Also Bank of America just got into the Chinese banking business.

"If free trade is the argument, why do US (any parent country) companies routinely offer goods in these developing companies at a fraction of the cost to their US consumer counterparts in order to gain market share? How are these "loss leaders" paid for? By the US (any parent country) consumers."

Cost of labour for one. Overvalued currencies another. American consumers, by the way, are very well treated. Take a look.

"By looking at the situation with rose-colored glasses and calling it free trade, you miss the underlying effects."

I prefer Oakley, actually. But seriously, I don't call what is happening today 'free' trade. It is freer in some geographical areas, but for the most part it is one large protectionist mess. Leaders are trying to give their countries advantages that aid the incumbent megalith far more than the consumer or worker.

"The countries that are benefiting from the off-shoring don't reciprocate by exporting jobs, and overall don't usually utilize US (parent country) goods or services, instead the US (parent country) goods and services usually end up competing with government sponsored goods and services, which, by definition, must be below a competitive price point in order to be effectively subsidized."

Off-shoring, when done correctly, is more of a win-win situation. The West benefits in the long-term from the ability to create a highly specialized, educated workforce, and receive cheap consumer goods now. Emerging economies benefit from the foreign direct investment. The downside is, unfortunately, that low-paying jobs are being moved. (Aside: Government sponsored goods? In the United States? Where?)

"I agree that it is quite easy to move a "corporation" off-shore. But if a company has 15 executives and salesmen in the US and 1300 workers in another country, are they still a "US" company or should they be considered as such?

You're talking about holding corporations. Most countries with emerging economies limit the stake a foreigner can hold. In China for example, the general number is 50%. In a case as you describe, the holding company will be American while the subsidiary will be Chinese. For tax purposes, corporations general use the indecipherable mess that is US tax/support system pay as little as possible. A flat tax reform would greatly alleviate these examples of creative accounting.

"Microsoft considers itself a US company, specifically a Washington state based company, but many of it's letters of incorporation are filed in Nevada, whereby they avoid over a $140 million in local Washington state taxes a year. They are "Redmond, Washington" in name only, and the land tax breaks that Washington gave them years ago in order to bring jobs to the area are being mitigated by Microsoft's increasing off-shoring of their code work and slick legal wrangling.

I wasn't aware that Microsoft was off-shoring. Point me a link? I migh

I never joke about international trade (unless its funny, in which case, I am laughing with you).

"And you seem to think that being nationalistic is something bad?? Why would anyone NOT want their country to come out on top? This life is a constant struggle, a perpetual contest to see who can win. Life IS competition, and frankly, I'd like to be on the winning side as often as possible."

Right, but you seem to believe that the world owes you special favors because you were born in a wealthy country. Is it the responsibility of the government to guarantee your employment? To safeguard your business from foreign competitors? To subsidize your exports? Such action leads to long-term stagnation and high unemployment, as indicted by the performance of the French economy. Freer economies, like those found in the UK and US, benefit in the long-term from increased specialization (In The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith relates the size of the available economy to specialization of labor), and a higher standard of living. The poor benefit proportionally.

"And while I don't advent keeping anyone down, I certainly am not altrusitic enough to want to give to others 'till it hurts'."

Altruism has nothing to do with it. It has everything to do with the long-term gains of opening markets to transparent international trade.

"I not only don't want others to succeed at our expense, but, I can't stand the fact that our country is actively hurting our citizens by thoughtlessly shipping our tech jobs overseas for a short term gain, but, losing sight of the long term detrimental effects....

Actually, the problem is the inverse: there are long-term benefits and short-term costs of jobs. History has proven this, time and time again.

the main one being that if we don't have tech people working here, how will we continue to innovate? Already, we see the effects in that our young people are NOT working toward computer and other tech degrees as much as in the past.

The opposite is also true: if we close our borders, how will our companies have the incentive to innovate?

to a point, you are right. Sure, there are criminal types all over the world. However, different cultures have different degrees of what they consider to be crimes. It does seem that India does not view privacy ideals, and minor theft of such as great of a crime as it is in the US by statute. Sure we have people that will do the same here in the US. However, we can catch them here and prosecute them. I doubt the same can be said of India.

You're absolutely right here. The United States is the best country in the world when it comes to transparency and combating visible corruption. Corruption and creative accounting are actually one of the largest barriers to international trade and the developing world.

And lets face it...people in a country are going to be a bit more careful with treating their own people and their information than they will that of peoples of other countries. Someone that might be on the 'brink' of doing something wrong like this might think twice if it is a fellow countryman's info, rather than a foreigner's information.

Perhaps. I would suppose it has more to do with not associating #13442 with a real person who can be harmed than anything else. I will concede that was probably foolish to leave sensitive information in an unsecured facility.

And finally....you and others keep saying "In the long run, it will be better". Better for who?

For the motivated, educated worker, the future will be of fantastic opportunity. But of course, I, The Economist, and countless others, could be lying to you. Protectionism seems to working ok for Scandinavia and France, and it worked out ok for Japan, and China, right?

"I cannot see how this benefits the US at all....shipping off jobs and creating u

A way better indicator is (as another poster mentioned) is the Human Development Index. Per-capita GDP doesn't take into account things like typical standard of living, wealth inequity, etc.

Another good indicator is the Quality of Life Index.

If you want a simple, raw economic number, MEDIAN income rather than mean income is one of the better indicators of the wealth of a nation's people. Slightly better is median income scaled to purchasing power. Unfortunately I don't have tables for these. =(

Ah yes, the great libertarian fantasy that money can buy happiness for everyone, including the people who don't have any money.

Not in the least. The value of a monetary system is that it covers more needs for more people than any other system devised by man so far. To paraphrase Churchill, money is the worst economic tool, except for all those others that have been tried.

As for the rest of your screed, that's marketing, not capitalism. And while I, and people like the editors of The Economist think that marketing must undergo fundamental changes in the way the service is performed, its not on topic for this subthread.

I got a ticket from a camera for running a red light once. If I lived in that town I would have seriously considered taking out the camera. I'm surprised that I don't hear about people doing this in the UK.

Well, I don't have much sympathy for you as I completely agree with ticketing people for running a red. It's not like you got flagged for doing seventy in a sixty limit, you completely ignored a signal to stop.

That aside there is a movement to destroy speed cameras. Methods include explosives, burning tyres and angle grinders.

No, no. I'm in favor of Flat Taxes.Which are already working in Eastern Europe.

No, no. I'm in favor of Flat Taxes.Which are already working in Eastern Europe.

No, no. I'm in favor of Flat Taxes.Which are already working in Eastern Europe.

When we were developing the idea we read a lot of books and were inspired by Hernando DeSoto's The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else.

I would have been interested to hear more about how they included De Soto's ideas in their game.

From the comments on the review of Mystery of Capital, I got the impression a lot of Slashdotters totally missed De Soto's point. He doesn't advocate for or against capitalism in the book. He argues for making existing capitalist economies more inclusive. De Soto describes a method for cracking the "bell jar" that insolates the rich and excludes the poor.

And the rebuttal they sent was signed by a Beth Scott. It's BS all the way...

To make it easier, here's the source

At first glance I thought it said "Hebrew AC for under $25". I was just about to say, "Boy, are those hebrews smart.

From the article:
"I BELIEVE that God wants me to be president." What? Did George Bush really say that? Does the president imagine he has a divine mission?

Well, he was quoted to that effect by Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention. The full quote, however, does not quite sound as if Mr Bush is labouring to scrap the republic and replace it with a theocracy. "But if that doesn't happen, that's okay," the president continued, "I have seen the presidency up close and personal. I know it's a sacrifice, and I don't need it for personal validation."

He's socially conservative and fiscally incompentant, but still, he's not Tom DeLay or Bill First. Those are the scary ones.

Pfft, most of the EU will also speak English soon enough too... (though probably not the American variant, more like the Swedish Chef weirdish type :))

Seriously.

http://economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=S%2 7%29H4%2CQ17%2B%210%21%24%0A

Sounds like you might be interested in this article from last week's Economist about how businesses would do well to embrace social issues as essential to the bottom line, regardless of both the CSR fanatics on the one side and the bean counters on the other. The article is wordy as fuck-all, but you'll probably get the gist from skimming it. Hope you find it enjoyable.

"IS a monopoly" beats "is NOT a monopoly" by almost 6 to 1, if you're asking Google.

Forbes, a magazine about economics which frequently prints Microsoft press releases, reported that "U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson, [who] on Nov. 5 ruled Microsoft is a monopoly ". What exercises "monopoly power" that isn't a monopoly? Your dictionary can't help you there.

It would be a lot better for you and your profession if Microsoft weren't a monopoly. But Microsoft is a monopoly, according to The Economist, a magazine about... economics: "judges unanimously ruled that Microsoft holds a monopoly in PC operating-system software". You are an engineer, groping for an irrelevant, disingenuous, self-serving, and finally worthless semantic defense against the consensus of economists, lawyers, and most of your own profession that Microsoft is a monopoly. A status known to professional economists and lawyers better than to your dictionary, but just as well known among your fellow engineers.

That's the last research I do to prove the obvious. If you want more free lessons, ask someone else, or demonstrate that you're capable of benefitting from them.

Solution: Rent.

first Newsweek makes us American's look stupid in the eyes of Muslims

As was pointed out by The Economist, the Newsweek article was not incorrect in content (the Koran was indeed thrown in the toilet), they were just wrong about the CIA admitting it in a specific published report. (It still may be published in a different report.) Excerpt from the story:

Conservative talk-shows and internet sites have depicted Newsweek as yet another liberal, unpatriotic media outlet only too willing to criticise America's conduct in the war on terror. The magazine's defenders argue that the fact that its source couldn't pinpoint the correct military investigative report does not mean that its story was wrong in substance. Testimony from prisoners at Guantánamo, after all, backs up the assertion that guards and interrogators have mistreated the Koran.

According to Shafiq Rasul, Asif Iqbal and Rhuhel Ahmed, three British inmates who were released last year, guards have indeed thrown the Koran in the toilet. Other current detainees have also complained about religious intimidation and humiliation at Guantánamo. Last week, according to both Reuters and Agence France Presse, Southern Command began an inquiry to check if its employees have ever thrown the Koran into the toilet.

The average tax burden throughout the OECD was 37% of GDP in 1998. In the European Union it was 41.3%, whereas in America it was 28.9%. Sweden takes the prize for the highest tax burden in 1999, at 52.1%.