Great Empire or Grand Illusion?
Sohail Rabbani July 2, 2003
#61 Posted by zeemax on July 9, 2003 12:49:27 am
SR,
I see Mr. tahmed32 is, as usual, posting his laconic and cynical remarks rather than contributing anything of substance. Not to worry my friend. I think your article as well as your posts that follow are knowledgable and revealing.
I have particular interest in the following phenomon which you have pointed out:
``The Baby Boom generation shall begin to retire and become entitled to Social Security benefits in five years. In eight years they will also start collecting Medicare benefits. By the time all 76 million Baby Boomers retire, the US retiree population will have doubled but the additional tax payers who carry the financial burden will have increased by a mere 15%.``
The Baby Boomers have dictated the consumer industrial/marketing policies since the 60s. What do you think is next? Certainly there`ll be an enormous burden on the US exchequer. so US will create more Dollars to cover them. I guess sales of golf kits will also have a phenominal jump. You`re right in asserting it all apears so ridiculous.
Rgds
I see Mr. tahmed32 is, as usual, posting his laconic and cynical remarks rather than contributing anything of substance. Not to worry my friend. I think your article as well as your posts that follow are knowledgable and revealing.
I have particular interest in the following phenomon which you have pointed out:
``The Baby Boom generation shall begin to retire and become entitled to Social Security benefits in five years. In eight years they will also start collecting Medicare benefits. By the time all 76 million Baby Boomers retire, the US retiree population will have doubled but the additional tax payers who carry the financial burden will have increased by a mere 15%.``
The Baby Boomers have dictated the consumer industrial/marketing policies since the 60s. What do you think is next? Certainly there`ll be an enormous burden on the US exchequer. so US will create more Dollars to cover them. I guess sales of golf kits will also have a phenominal jump. You`re right in asserting it all apears so ridiculous.
Rgds
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#60 Posted by ZahraJ on July 8, 2003 10:11:42 pm
An informative article. I like the writer`s style since he narrates examples as if he is addressing curious little kids. It`s a sweet way of engaging your audience.
I hate to do that, but I simply cannot resist applauding the wit and humor in select interActs.
Glad to read that the interActors are alive and kicking contributors vs. passive readers :)
I hate to do that, but I simply cannot resist applauding the wit and humor in select interActs.
Glad to read that the interActors are alive and kicking contributors vs. passive readers :)
#59 Posted by sac on July 8, 2003 7:29:26 pm
re einsteinwallah #53:
I am afraid the statistician was correct and you are wrong. You`ve correctly identified each person carrying a bomb as an independent event. However, the probability of two independent events happening when they don`t affect each other is obtained by multiplying individual probabilities. So, if you assign a small number like .01 to the probability of each event, then the probability of both of them happening would be .01x.01=.0001 which as the statistician pointed out would be a smaller number than .01.
I don`t understand what you are trying to convey by your formula.
later
-sac
I am afraid the statistician was correct and you are wrong. You`ve correctly identified each person carrying a bomb as an independent event. However, the probability of two independent events happening when they don`t affect each other is obtained by multiplying individual probabilities. So, if you assign a small number like .01 to the probability of each event, then the probability of both of them happening would be .01x.01=.0001 which as the statistician pointed out would be a smaller number than .01.
I don`t understand what you are trying to convey by your formula.
later
-sac
#58 Posted by tahmed32 on July 8, 2003 2:37:13 pm
SR #56 You made an error of $1.3 trillion and think just sorry will do!! Think of the folks who now stand to lose their pension funds as a result of this incorrect data that you supplied!! Those poor widows and orphans who will now starve thanks to YOUR mistake. Entire nations will now go bankrupt thanks to your disinformation. Finance ministers have already started submitting their resignations. Investors from New York to Tokyo Hong Kong to London to Frankfurt have started jumping from out of windows from their high-rise office buildings. The IMF has already been alerted and is burning the midnight oil trying to figure out how to prevent the collapse of the world monetary system as a result of YOUR mistake.
And all you have to say for yourself is...sorry. I shall not stand for this!!
And all you have to say for yourself is...sorry. I shall not stand for this!!
#57 Posted by nasah on July 8, 2003 11:06:23 am
Now what did I say about Buffoon Bush.....Texas `dimwitted cowboy`
Here is today Nicholas Kristoff of New York Times say about Bush and Blair -- and how Bush has pratically assured the Booting out of Blair and the Labor from 10 Downing Street.
In Blair We Trust
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
LONDON
One of the saddest results of our war in Iraq is that it may finish off Tony Blair before Saddam Hussein.
Everywhere I go in Britain, people dismiss Mr. Blair as President Bush`s poodle. Mr. Blair`s Labor Party has fallen behind the Conservatives in the latest poll, for only the second time in 11 years.
``The Iraq critics think that the prime minister has betrayed his country to a Texas gunslinger,`` William Rees-Mogg noted in The Times of London.
So it`ll sound foolish when I suggest that President Bush should study Mr. Blair and learn a few things. But on the other hand, everybody likes Mr. Blair but the Brits.
A poll by the Pew Research Center found that Mr. Blair was the world leader Americans trusted most (Mr. Bush ranked second), respected by 83 percent of Americans, and he was also highly esteemed in countries as diverse as Australia and Nigeria.
More interesting, Mr. Bush and Mr. Blair took very similar positions over the last couple of years, and both exaggerated the Iraqi threat — and yet Mr. Blair is perhaps the leading statesman in the world today and Mr. Bush is regarded by much of the globe as a dimwitted cowboy.
Or, as an Oxford don put it to me after perhaps too much sherry, ``a buffoon.``(NYT)
thanks Nick.
Here is today Nicholas Kristoff of New York Times say about Bush and Blair -- and how Bush has pratically assured the Booting out of Blair and the Labor from 10 Downing Street.
In Blair We Trust
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
LONDON
One of the saddest results of our war in Iraq is that it may finish off Tony Blair before Saddam Hussein.
Everywhere I go in Britain, people dismiss Mr. Blair as President Bush`s poodle. Mr. Blair`s Labor Party has fallen behind the Conservatives in the latest poll, for only the second time in 11 years.
``The Iraq critics think that the prime minister has betrayed his country to a Texas gunslinger,`` William Rees-Mogg noted in The Times of London.
So it`ll sound foolish when I suggest that President Bush should study Mr. Blair and learn a few things. But on the other hand, everybody likes Mr. Blair but the Brits.
A poll by the Pew Research Center found that Mr. Blair was the world leader Americans trusted most (Mr. Bush ranked second), respected by 83 percent of Americans, and he was also highly esteemed in countries as diverse as Australia and Nigeria.
More interesting, Mr. Bush and Mr. Blair took very similar positions over the last couple of years, and both exaggerated the Iraqi threat — and yet Mr. Blair is perhaps the leading statesman in the world today and Mr. Bush is regarded by much of the globe as a dimwitted cowboy.
Or, as an Oxford don put it to me after perhaps too much sherry, ``a buffoon.``(NYT)
thanks Nick.
#56 Posted by SR on July 8, 2003 11:00:26 am
ERROR CORRECTION
Dear ALL
While going through some source documents I have just discovered a factual error that I had transcribed in my notes which I used as quick reference while writing the article.
The Gokhal and Smetters study that I`ve referred to in the article put the present value of the government`s fiscal imbalance at $43.4 Trillion.
Please see: http://irm.wharton.upenn.edu/WP-Testimony-Smetters.pdf
In the article I have presented that number, in error, as $45 Trillion. I sincerely regret this misreporting.
...SR
Dear ALL
While going through some source documents I have just discovered a factual error that I had transcribed in my notes which I used as quick reference while writing the article.
The Gokhal and Smetters study that I`ve referred to in the article put the present value of the government`s fiscal imbalance at $43.4 Trillion.
Please see: http://irm.wharton.upenn.edu/WP-Testimony-Smetters.pdf
In the article I have presented that number, in error, as $45 Trillion. I sincerely regret this misreporting.
...SR
#55 Posted by soysauce on July 8, 2003 8:29:52 am
#50 SR
I don`t mean to hijack your thread. Just wanted to make an observation. [I did send in something relevant to this thread a few days ago but Chowk`s censors (thank you Ana Doborah!) seem to have decided it wasn`t profound enough to make it.]
You say:As an example, suppose someone here claimed that you were a liar and a thief. They said you were stealing from your employer. They make this statement on the observation that you lurk around Chowk.com reading and typing messages all day long when you are supposedly at work. They may thus conclude that you were not being honest to your employer and were virtually stealing money by not earning it while you were supposedly at work. Now would that be reasonable? I think not. For all that person knows you could be an independently wealthy gentleman of leisure who could do with his time as he damn well pleases.
Methinks there are a lot of independently wealthy gentlemen about in the Chowk..
I don`t mean to hijack your thread. Just wanted to make an observation. [I did send in something relevant to this thread a few days ago but Chowk`s censors (thank you Ana Doborah!) seem to have decided it wasn`t profound enough to make it.]
You say:As an example, suppose someone here claimed that you were a liar and a thief. They said you were stealing from your employer. They make this statement on the observation that you lurk around Chowk.com reading and typing messages all day long when you are supposedly at work. They may thus conclude that you were not being honest to your employer and were virtually stealing money by not earning it while you were supposedly at work. Now would that be reasonable? I think not. For all that person knows you could be an independently wealthy gentleman of leisure who could do with his time as he damn well pleases.
Methinks there are a lot of independently wealthy gentlemen about in the Chowk..
#54 Posted by einsteinwallah on July 8, 2003 8:29:52 am
[#53 by einsteinwallah on July 8, 2003 0:56am PT
...
dP = r * P * dt + sigma * dB (P=Price, t=time, r=return rate, sigma= square root of a variance-like quantity)]
Correction. The equation should read as follows:
dP = r * P * dt + sigma * P * dB
...
dP = r * P * dt + sigma * dB (P=Price, t=time, r=return rate, sigma= square root of a variance-like quantity)]
Correction. The equation should read as follows:
dP = r * P * dt + sigma * P * dB
#53 Posted by einsteinwallah on July 8, 2003 12:56:45 am
[#46 by SR on July 7, 2003 0:49am PT
...
The statistician advised him to carry a bomb in his brief case at all times because that way his probability of being in a plane with TWO bombs would be far, far smaller. ]
A statistician could not have made such a statement. This clearly shows that you do not know even basic probability theory.
If ``p`` is probability of an unknown terrorist planting a bomb in an aircraft, then that ``p`` is probability of an event which is completely different from a traveller always carrying a bomb. A traveller always carrying bomb means that probability of 1 bomb on aircraft is 1. And probability of an unknown terrorist planting a bomb over and above the one carried by the traveller remains ``p``, because these two events are independent.
Statistics is mainly misused by politicians and those who do not understand it correctly.
The Snow`s statement in your article mentions ``risk-adjusted return`` which is also a statistical concept. (Having said that Snow might have used it in the conference more for hype than anything else.)
Any investment which grows at a random exponential rate ``r`` has always expected unadjusted rate of return inflated by half of a variance-like number if underlying model of price is Geometrical Brownian Motion (GBM). GBM is often represented by a Stochastic Differential Equation like following:
dP = r * P * dt + sigma * dB (P=Price, t=time, r=return rate, sigma= square root of a variance-like quantity)
where dB is differential of a ``unit`` Brownian Motion (a random thing). Japanese Mathematician Ito developed this brand new ``calculus`` for manipulating such equations. Basic result is:
E(P(t + 1) / P(t)) = r (unadjusted rate) (Here E(.) is expectation, another of ill understood statistical concept)
But:
E(ln(P(t + 1) / P(t))) = r - ( sigma * sigma ) / 2 (risk adjusted rate)
The number ( sigma * sigma ) is variance per unit of time of (random) return rate of P. When sigma is zero return is governed by famous exponential growth equation:
dP = r * P * dt (which is not Ito-type equation, so college Calculus is sufficient here)
which has a solution:
P(t) = P(0) * e ^ (r * t) (where ``e`` is exponential ``e``)
...
The statistician advised him to carry a bomb in his brief case at all times because that way his probability of being in a plane with TWO bombs would be far, far smaller. ]
A statistician could not have made such a statement. This clearly shows that you do not know even basic probability theory.
If ``p`` is probability of an unknown terrorist planting a bomb in an aircraft, then that ``p`` is probability of an event which is completely different from a traveller always carrying a bomb. A traveller always carrying bomb means that probability of 1 bomb on aircraft is 1. And probability of an unknown terrorist planting a bomb over and above the one carried by the traveller remains ``p``, because these two events are independent.
Statistics is mainly misused by politicians and those who do not understand it correctly.
The Snow`s statement in your article mentions ``risk-adjusted return`` which is also a statistical concept. (Having said that Snow might have used it in the conference more for hype than anything else.)
Any investment which grows at a random exponential rate ``r`` has always expected unadjusted rate of return inflated by half of a variance-like number if underlying model of price is Geometrical Brownian Motion (GBM). GBM is often represented by a Stochastic Differential Equation like following:
dP = r * P * dt + sigma * dB (P=Price, t=time, r=return rate, sigma= square root of a variance-like quantity)
where dB is differential of a ``unit`` Brownian Motion (a random thing). Japanese Mathematician Ito developed this brand new ``calculus`` for manipulating such equations. Basic result is:
E(P(t + 1) / P(t)) = r (unadjusted rate) (Here E(.) is expectation, another of ill understood statistical concept)
But:
E(ln(P(t + 1) / P(t))) = r - ( sigma * sigma ) / 2 (risk adjusted rate)
The number ( sigma * sigma ) is variance per unit of time of (random) return rate of P. When sigma is zero return is governed by famous exponential growth equation:
dP = r * P * dt (which is not Ito-type equation, so college Calculus is sufficient here)
which has a solution:
P(t) = P(0) * e ^ (r * t) (where ``e`` is exponential ``e``)
#52 Posted by Ali87 on July 8, 2003 12:34:54 am
SR, Tahmed, Inqurier others,
good article. It is amusing to see those who are settled here quite upset about anything that points to the future coming problems of the US.
From a economic point of view what your article points is largely true.
The efficeincy of the US Industry is also cited for its accumulation of riches. It is often seen coming from the first mass production in the world ie of ford.
However recent prodctvity increases are largley attributed to in the retailing part of the economy. Walmart is suppossed to be responsible for a major portion of this productvity improvement. Similarly the other gaint ie GE under Jack Welsh showed immpressive increase in growth and profits. Some analayse this due to the aggressive(first among the large companies)outsourcing of manufacturing to china. It is estimated that 70% of the manufacuring done by GE now comes from China or other location of outsourcing.
If this is the source of the current strength of the US economy vi a vi the other developed economies we know very well what the future can hold for the US
The other aspects ie of demographics, past achivements, persent social system etc. It is intresting to analyse these. Some one was quoting the presence of nobel prize winners, intellectual capital etc. yes we can look at absoute figures and make conclusions. The art of predicting is not based on current but on relative paramaters. Let us take the case of circa 1950 and crica 2003. US a large land with inherent landbased wealth plus the intellectual wealth of a advanced eurpoean based knowledge system further enchanced by fleeing intellecutals, technocrats etc from europe was a leader in this aspect in the world. Add to this a large economy you have things going very well. On the other hand there was asia, practically poor in every sense especially in education and technical knowledge and of course no large economy to compare with the US.
Cut to present. Would it be an exxegaration to say that the combined number of educated, tehchnological component people in china, India, Japan, ASEAN outnumber those in the US in sheer numbers in quality perhaps they dont but that is not because of capability but perhaps because of lack of opprotunity ie large local economy to service which is what demands innovations, absorbs the cost of research and provides access to market to experiment with new ideas and technologies.
But all this set to change. Japan already is a developed nation. China a large manufacturing base as is ASEAN, both innovation as well as research is possible as the internal economies become rich India is getting there ie with other than manufactruing and by exporting intellectuals who will certainly provide(and are providing)impetus to innovation as the market in India becomes capable of taking all those inputs.
But where does US stand in all this? Is the population increasing? are the number of technicaly compentet people in US increasing dramatically? Is the capability for Innovaiton a sole preserve of US? some thing that will not change in future?
On the other hand the recent position of US as expounded by the current administration has been taken note of by all governments in the world. As you will see that many rearrangemts are takign place in many countries in their startegic thinking vis a vi US. Some economists with chinese background call for china to ask for payments for its goods in near future(decade or two)in Yuan(therefore instead of china buying or recivigd dollars it will demand yuan)Is this possible scenario? yes it is.(wether it happens or not is a differnt case especially considering the current political situation). With other countries having recongnised the value of euro or other payments(mainly to redude the possibility for arm twisting from US) It will certainly become a trend I dont think that US will forever be able to use its military to settle such issues. Mahatir Mohammeds attempt for creation of gold dinar has found symphteic ears in some countries. As as his alterantive of using barter for trade as far as possible(some thing that India welcomes too.) One cant fight Ideas with the gun forever successfully.
There are nearly 3 billion people in Asia compared to the 280 million in US(increasingly getting old) Poor as these people are I dont doubt that they will be better off in future (which may be 2-4 decades away) will they not be a bigger market than the US even if they are just 1/4 th as rich?
This is not to say that US will become poor suddenly. It has invested very wisely in infrasturcture which will be very valuable for it in times of need. It will only loose its premminent role in the world.
The biggest danger in future will not be the internal demographics as some one says here but the ability of the US to accept this futrure in which it does not have a dominant role as it has now. Its military will not disappear over night neither will its thousands of nuclear weapons. We are seeing a future conflict where a instrangient US will not accept its new place in the world and loaded with the thousands of Nuclear Weapons and no political or moral compusion not to use them.
Let us enjoy our present realtive calm what will come next will be very horrific.
past achivemnts are not a garuntee for future comfort and the social system of the US is not based on any moral value but on the capabilty of the rich to provide an shot at the purisut of happiness. Ie the socitey as clamied by the founders of the US is not based on moral values but on the social contract of the rich to the poor in which the poor are given a chance go gain better life and at times get rich this is what will keep order in the socitey.
What happens when the rich are not able to fullfil their side of the contract?
It will be intresting to see what happens a similar question was asked by a collumist in a southern californina newspaper who did not offer any conclusion.
Let us say Ill be buying gold and investing in education of people for the next few decades.
good article. It is amusing to see those who are settled here quite upset about anything that points to the future coming problems of the US.
From a economic point of view what your article points is largely true.
The efficeincy of the US Industry is also cited for its accumulation of riches. It is often seen coming from the first mass production in the world ie of ford.
However recent prodctvity increases are largley attributed to in the retailing part of the economy. Walmart is suppossed to be responsible for a major portion of this productvity improvement. Similarly the other gaint ie GE under Jack Welsh showed immpressive increase in growth and profits. Some analayse this due to the aggressive(first among the large companies)outsourcing of manufacturing to china. It is estimated that 70% of the manufacuring done by GE now comes from China or other location of outsourcing.
If this is the source of the current strength of the US economy vi a vi the other developed economies we know very well what the future can hold for the US
The other aspects ie of demographics, past achivements, persent social system etc. It is intresting to analyse these. Some one was quoting the presence of nobel prize winners, intellectual capital etc. yes we can look at absoute figures and make conclusions. The art of predicting is not based on current but on relative paramaters. Let us take the case of circa 1950 and crica 2003. US a large land with inherent landbased wealth plus the intellectual wealth of a advanced eurpoean based knowledge system further enchanced by fleeing intellecutals, technocrats etc from europe was a leader in this aspect in the world. Add to this a large economy you have things going very well. On the other hand there was asia, practically poor in every sense especially in education and technical knowledge and of course no large economy to compare with the US.
Cut to present. Would it be an exxegaration to say that the combined number of educated, tehchnological component people in china, India, Japan, ASEAN outnumber those in the US in sheer numbers in quality perhaps they dont but that is not because of capability but perhaps because of lack of opprotunity ie large local economy to service which is what demands innovations, absorbs the cost of research and provides access to market to experiment with new ideas and technologies.
But all this set to change. Japan already is a developed nation. China a large manufacturing base as is ASEAN, both innovation as well as research is possible as the internal economies become rich India is getting there ie with other than manufactruing and by exporting intellectuals who will certainly provide(and are providing)impetus to innovation as the market in India becomes capable of taking all those inputs.
But where does US stand in all this? Is the population increasing? are the number of technicaly compentet people in US increasing dramatically? Is the capability for Innovaiton a sole preserve of US? some thing that will not change in future?
On the other hand the recent position of US as expounded by the current administration has been taken note of by all governments in the world. As you will see that many rearrangemts are takign place in many countries in their startegic thinking vis a vi US. Some economists with chinese background call for china to ask for payments for its goods in near future(decade or two)in Yuan(therefore instead of china buying or recivigd dollars it will demand yuan)Is this possible scenario? yes it is.(wether it happens or not is a differnt case especially considering the current political situation). With other countries having recongnised the value of euro or other payments(mainly to redude the possibility for arm twisting from US) It will certainly become a trend I dont think that US will forever be able to use its military to settle such issues. Mahatir Mohammeds attempt for creation of gold dinar has found symphteic ears in some countries. As as his alterantive of using barter for trade as far as possible(some thing that India welcomes too.) One cant fight Ideas with the gun forever successfully.
There are nearly 3 billion people in Asia compared to the 280 million in US(increasingly getting old) Poor as these people are I dont doubt that they will be better off in future (which may be 2-4 decades away) will they not be a bigger market than the US even if they are just 1/4 th as rich?
This is not to say that US will become poor suddenly. It has invested very wisely in infrasturcture which will be very valuable for it in times of need. It will only loose its premminent role in the world.
The biggest danger in future will not be the internal demographics as some one says here but the ability of the US to accept this futrure in which it does not have a dominant role as it has now. Its military will not disappear over night neither will its thousands of nuclear weapons. We are seeing a future conflict where a instrangient US will not accept its new place in the world and loaded with the thousands of Nuclear Weapons and no political or moral compusion not to use them.
Let us enjoy our present realtive calm what will come next will be very horrific.
past achivemnts are not a garuntee for future comfort and the social system of the US is not based on any moral value but on the capabilty of the rich to provide an shot at the purisut of happiness. Ie the socitey as clamied by the founders of the US is not based on moral values but on the social contract of the rich to the poor in which the poor are given a chance go gain better life and at times get rich this is what will keep order in the socitey.
What happens when the rich are not able to fullfil their side of the contract?
It will be intresting to see what happens a similar question was asked by a collumist in a southern californina newspaper who did not offer any conclusion.
Let us say Ill be buying gold and investing in education of people for the next few decades.
#51 Posted by tahmed32 on July 7, 2003 9:21:00 pm
SR #50 I hope for the sake of your real life that you are a fast typist (given the length of your post). You make two basic points, I think: (a) That democratic practices were prevalent in other societies and before the US, although the American Revolution represents a significant milestone; and (b) That I was wrong in writing that you hate the US.
Fair enough. I did go too far on (b), and I am glad to see you got folks proudly serving in the US Navy.
PS: On (b) can I at least claim that you hate the Federal Reserve members, and particularly Mr. ``Interest-free Economy`` Greenspan on down? You think Greenspan could be a mullah, lowering interest rates until they disappear?? Notice that you never see him and Mullah Omar together at the same place (like superman and Clark Kent)...I consider that very suspicious!!
PPS: Thanks for the tip on chowk popularity. Considering I shall be running for Senate in the Democratic Republic of Chowkistan next year, with dreams of running for President of Chowk four years from now, this tip is most timely.
Fair enough. I did go too far on (b), and I am glad to see you got folks proudly serving in the US Navy.
PS: On (b) can I at least claim that you hate the Federal Reserve members, and particularly Mr. ``Interest-free Economy`` Greenspan on down? You think Greenspan could be a mullah, lowering interest rates until they disappear?? Notice that you never see him and Mullah Omar together at the same place (like superman and Clark Kent)...I consider that very suspicious!!
PPS: Thanks for the tip on chowk popularity. Considering I shall be running for Senate in the Democratic Republic of Chowkistan next year, with dreams of running for President of Chowk four years from now, this tip is most timely.
#50 Posted by SR on July 7, 2003 4:20:46 pm
#48 rsridhar [“…tone down … ultra-bold headings? They are … jarring to the eyes…”]
Please accept my regrets. It was an unintended error. Not being proficient with HTML I failed to ‘switch off’ the large font size of the ultra-bold heading. It was supposed to have high-lighted only one word of that. As for normal font size bold letters, they are used sparingly and then only to stress upon a point. I also use them to highlight snippets of the other InterActor’s message in “…quote…” marks. This is meant to make it easier on the eye but if other inter-actors feel that it is hard on the eye, I’ll gladly cease and desist.
#47 tahmed [“…(a) there were pockets of democracy prior to the American Revolution - those pockets did not spread very far either in time or in space.
Ancient Rome … had democratic beginnings … any flames of democracy were quickly snuffed out…
Ancient India contributed much … but democratic … institutions were not one of them. Any democracy that existed was like the ``democracy`` we have in the tribal areas - which is more of a gerontocracy.
…even Athenian democracy died out …”]
I have neither the time nor the inclination to argue over the ‘democracy’ in ancient India, which I contend was the first in the world and was longer lasting and more widespread than ancient Greece. For starters I recommend you look up the following two links:
www.infinityfoundation.com/ECITdemocracyindiaframeset.htm
And :
www.infinityfoundation.com/mandala/h_es/h_es_muhlb_democra.htm
The Greek ‘democracies’ also lasted for many centuries and Rome was a republic for over five hundred years until the mid first century BC. During the Republic days Rome ruled over what is present-day France, Lower Countries, Spain, Italy, Malta, Corsica, Siscilly, Malta, Cyprus, Solvenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Albania, Greece, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, Egypt, North Libya, Tunesia, North Algeria and North Morrocco.
Now let’s be reasonable, Mr. Amhed. I wouldn’t exactly describe this as “not spread very far either in time or in space… and …quickly snuffed out…” !! Would you??
The American republic, by contrast, has not even hit the 250 year mark as yet.
[“…(b) modern democratic institutions (characterized by separation of powers of the three arms of government) find their roots in the US…”]
The idea of ‘separation of powers’ are not uniquely a product of the American Revolution. These ideas also have their roots in the Revolt of Parliament in England during the mid-1600s. Before that the early Dutch and Swiss ‘democracies’ also believed in independence of judiciary. All this was happening before anyone had even heard of the Boston Tea Party.
I never disputed that the American Revolution was a great watershed, all I said was that you should not make sweeping statements based on limited information.
[“…(c) Your strong (and ultimately irrational) feelings of hatred for the US blind you …
If you really believed that you had facts … (then)… you would not need to use these huge fonts …”]
Again, you are making statements about things you have not the least idea. All you are doing is airing your prejudice. What do you know about my (or anyone else’s) love or hate with anything or anybody, be it rational or otherwise? What gives you the right to imagine that you have such wisdom?
And what is this illogical rubbish that since I chose a certain font size I don’t really believe that I have any facts to support my stance? Huh? Are you all right?
I despise the political establishment and the vested interests in the huge bureaucracies. I believe that the US Federal Reserve is one of the great evils on Earth. And let me give you a clue as to why I believe that.
The academics who run central banks but have never made a penny`s worth of profit in the marketplace and are totally pay-check dependent for their livelihoods are not the best qualified to run the world’s monetary system. College professors and university economists running central banks are not the one`s who can provide answers. Clueless idiots like Greenspan, who personal careers were disastrous failures in the private sector and went scurrying for the safety of their government jobs now have power and influence to create a total mess which they are creating as anyone with common sense and a perspective on history can see. They have power in a corrupt and doomed system and that power is mistaken for capability and genius. It`s a tragic-comedy. The world monetary system is going to hell in a handbasket and these morons are doing the same thing that caused the problem in the first place, i.e., creating more and more credit. That is just like giving a heroin addict more and more heroin in the hope of preventing his collapse.
I am a US citizen as are my offsprings. My child’s mother, that is my wife, was born and raised in America as were her parents. I live, eat, drink, breath, socialize, love, hate, laugh and cry among Americans. One of my wife’s siblings is in the Navy as were other relatives. My strong criticism against the evils in the American system are not based on any Jehadi hatred nor does it make us blind to any facts. A thinking person can distinguish between criticism and hatred. But there is a colonial slave mentality of people, sometimes seen on Chowk, who think that criticism of the establishment’s prevailing system can only mean an “irrational hatred” that makes the critic “blind to any reason.” Such people usually have irrational blind loyalties to their particular choice brand of religion or nationalism or culture or ideology.
So in future think before you make statements based on assumptions.
Let me ask you this. Would it be reasonable for someone to make assumptions about what you think or feel?
As an example, suppose someone here claimed that you were a liar and a thief. They said you were stealing from your employer. They make this statement on the observation that you lurk around Chowk.com reading and typing messages all day long when you are supposedly at work. They may thus conclude that you were not being honest to your employer and were virtually stealing money by not earning it while you were supposedly at work. Now would that be reasonable? I think not. For all that person knows you could be an independently wealthy gentleman of leisure who could do with his time as he damn well pleases. Thus by calling you a thief that person will have only expressed his closed minded prejudice against you for totally different reasons. Perhaps that person had a dislike towards you because he may consider you obnoxious, irritating, boring, repetitive, unimaginative and generally disagreeable, irrelevant and nonsensical. It would, indeed, be unfair of this hypothetical person to have judged you thus. Perhaps he may be projecting his own deficiencies on others. He might just have an inferiority complex and a sense of sexual inadequacy because he had a small penis and he was just taking out his frustrations by being uncivil to others. The point is that such a person would be utterly out of line to make any assumptions about you and make assertions based on them.
Therefore, I hope, Ahmed sahib, you will refrain from making prejudicial assumptions about others’ thoughts or feelings. Please, think about it Ahmed sahib. It may even help your popularity.
...SR
Please accept my regrets. It was an unintended error. Not being proficient with HTML I failed to ‘switch off’ the large font size of the ultra-bold heading. It was supposed to have high-lighted only one word of that. As for normal font size bold letters, they are used sparingly and then only to stress upon a point. I also use them to highlight snippets of the other InterActor’s message in “…quote…” marks. This is meant to make it easier on the eye but if other inter-actors feel that it is hard on the eye, I’ll gladly cease and desist.
#47 tahmed [“…(a) there were pockets of democracy prior to the American Revolution - those pockets did not spread very far either in time or in space.
Ancient Rome … had democratic beginnings … any flames of democracy were quickly snuffed out…
Ancient India contributed much … but democratic … institutions were not one of them. Any democracy that existed was like the ``democracy`` we have in the tribal areas - which is more of a gerontocracy.
…even Athenian democracy died out …”]
I have neither the time nor the inclination to argue over the ‘democracy’ in ancient India, which I contend was the first in the world and was longer lasting and more widespread than ancient Greece. For starters I recommend you look up the following two links:
www.infinityfoundation.com/ECITdemocracyindiaframeset.htm
And :
www.infinityfoundation.com/mandala/h_es/h_es_muhlb_democra.htm
The Greek ‘democracies’ also lasted for many centuries and Rome was a republic for over five hundred years until the mid first century BC. During the Republic days Rome ruled over what is present-day France, Lower Countries, Spain, Italy, Malta, Corsica, Siscilly, Malta, Cyprus, Solvenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Albania, Greece, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, Egypt, North Libya, Tunesia, North Algeria and North Morrocco.
Now let’s be reasonable, Mr. Amhed. I wouldn’t exactly describe this as “not spread very far either in time or in space… and …quickly snuffed out…” !! Would you??
The American republic, by contrast, has not even hit the 250 year mark as yet.
[“…(b) modern democratic institutions (characterized by separation of powers of the three arms of government) find their roots in the US…”]
The idea of ‘separation of powers’ are not uniquely a product of the American Revolution. These ideas also have their roots in the Revolt of Parliament in England during the mid-1600s. Before that the early Dutch and Swiss ‘democracies’ also believed in independence of judiciary. All this was happening before anyone had even heard of the Boston Tea Party.
I never disputed that the American Revolution was a great watershed, all I said was that you should not make sweeping statements based on limited information.
[“…(c) Your strong (and ultimately irrational) feelings of hatred for the US blind you …
If you really believed that you had facts … (then)… you would not need to use these huge fonts …”]
Again, you are making statements about things you have not the least idea. All you are doing is airing your prejudice. What do you know about my (or anyone else’s) love or hate with anything or anybody, be it rational or otherwise? What gives you the right to imagine that you have such wisdom?
And what is this illogical rubbish that since I chose a certain font size I don’t really believe that I have any facts to support my stance? Huh? Are you all right?
I despise the political establishment and the vested interests in the huge bureaucracies. I believe that the US Federal Reserve is one of the great evils on Earth. And let me give you a clue as to why I believe that.
The academics who run central banks but have never made a penny`s worth of profit in the marketplace and are totally pay-check dependent for their livelihoods are not the best qualified to run the world’s monetary system. College professors and university economists running central banks are not the one`s who can provide answers. Clueless idiots like Greenspan, who personal careers were disastrous failures in the private sector and went scurrying for the safety of their government jobs now have power and influence to create a total mess which they are creating as anyone with common sense and a perspective on history can see. They have power in a corrupt and doomed system and that power is mistaken for capability and genius. It`s a tragic-comedy. The world monetary system is going to hell in a handbasket and these morons are doing the same thing that caused the problem in the first place, i.e., creating more and more credit. That is just like giving a heroin addict more and more heroin in the hope of preventing his collapse.
I am a US citizen as are my offsprings. My child’s mother, that is my wife, was born and raised in America as were her parents. I live, eat, drink, breath, socialize, love, hate, laugh and cry among Americans. One of my wife’s siblings is in the Navy as were other relatives. My strong criticism against the evils in the American system are not based on any Jehadi hatred nor does it make us blind to any facts. A thinking person can distinguish between criticism and hatred. But there is a colonial slave mentality of people, sometimes seen on Chowk, who think that criticism of the establishment’s prevailing system can only mean an “irrational hatred” that makes the critic “blind to any reason.” Such people usually have irrational blind loyalties to their particular choice brand of religion or nationalism or culture or ideology.
So in future think before you make statements based on assumptions.
Let me ask you this. Would it be reasonable for someone to make assumptions about what you think or feel?
As an example, suppose someone here claimed that you were a liar and a thief. They said you were stealing from your employer. They make this statement on the observation that you lurk around Chowk.com reading and typing messages all day long when you are supposedly at work. They may thus conclude that you were not being honest to your employer and were virtually stealing money by not earning it while you were supposedly at work. Now would that be reasonable? I think not. For all that person knows you could be an independently wealthy gentleman of leisure who could do with his time as he damn well pleases. Thus by calling you a thief that person will have only expressed his closed minded prejudice against you for totally different reasons. Perhaps that person had a dislike towards you because he may consider you obnoxious, irritating, boring, repetitive, unimaginative and generally disagreeable, irrelevant and nonsensical. It would, indeed, be unfair of this hypothetical person to have judged you thus. Perhaps he may be projecting his own deficiencies on others. He might just have an inferiority complex and a sense of sexual inadequacy because he had a small penis and he was just taking out his frustrations by being uncivil to others. The point is that such a person would be utterly out of line to make any assumptions about you and make assertions based on them.
Therefore, I hope, Ahmed sahib, you will refrain from making prejudicial assumptions about others’ thoughts or feelings. Please, think about it Ahmed sahib. It may even help your popularity.
...SR
#49 Posted by bharatvaasi on July 7, 2003 8:12:41 am
something is wrong with the interacts here. This should be a pretty strong topic for the likes of Jay and co, the should be able to bring their special wisdom and apply it here. God, never thought I would say this but I sure am missing their invaluable input here.
Hey just kidding.....was pleasently surprised and all that....no jay and no mishrajis around. Even the ever present ever effervescent Arjum_m is missing. Have their fingers got tired and lost their hand eye coordination! Have they been banned by the chowk_pc_police_wannabes!
Hey just kidding.....was pleasently surprised and all that....no jay and no mishrajis around. Even the ever present ever effervescent Arjum_m is missing. Have their fingers got tired and lost their hand eye coordination! Have they been banned by the chowk_pc_police_wannabes!
#48 Posted by tahmed32 on July 7, 2003 7:25:31 am
SR #46 While there were pockets of democracy prior to the American Revolution, the examples you provide simply confirm what I wrote - those pockets did not spread very far either in time or in space. Ancient Rome may have had democratic beginnings as you say, but any flames of democracy were quickly snuffed out. Ancient India contributed much to mankind, but democratic ideals or institutions were not one of them. Any democracy that existed was like the ``democracy`` we have in the tribal areas of Pakistan nowadays - which is more of a gerontocracy. The case for Ancient Greece is stronger, but even Athenian democracy died out and was replaced by kingships and Grecian ideas of free speech and so on lay buried for thousands of years. Modern democratic ideals that are now generally accepted all across the world, and modern democratic institutions (characterized by separation of powers of the three arms of government) find their roots in the US. The only serious challenge posed to these ideals is among the half-brained Islamic fanatics, who still live in a world of the Divine Right of Caliphs.
Your strong (and ultimately irrational) feelings of hatred for the US blind you to such simple facts. If you really believed that you had facts that proved that the American Revolution was not the first significant blow to the institution of kingship, you would not need to use these huge fonts (the internet equivalent of trying to shout someone down).
Your strong (and ultimately irrational) feelings of hatred for the US blind you to such simple facts. If you really believed that you had facts that proved that the American Revolution was not the first significant blow to the institution of kingship, you would not need to use these huge fonts (the internet equivalent of trying to shout someone down).
#47 Posted by rsridhar on July 7, 2003 7:25:31 am
re:#46 by SR
Thanks for your informative post. I enjoyed the part related to statistics.
One request. Can you please tone down the bold letters and ultra-bold headings? They are kind of jarring to the eyes.
Sridhar
Thanks for your informative post. I enjoyed the part related to statistics.
One request. Can you please tone down the bold letters and ultra-bold headings? They are kind of jarring to the eyes.
Sridhar
#46 Posted by SR on July 7, 2003 12:49:31 am
#32 tahmed [“…the american revolution represented the first time that the globally accepted institution of kingship was challenged and overthrown. …”]
There you go again, Ahmed sahib, making sweeping statements that border of hyperbole.
Unquestionably, the American Revolution represents a great triumph of political institution building and a “great step forward” for human society, but please don’t go so far as to claim that it was the first time. A republic as opposed to a monarchy may have been relatively new to the Anglo-Saxon, but others have know republics since time immemorial. It can be argued, with some justification, that the Indian subcontinent has the world’s oldest tradition of democracy and/or republicanism. (Let us not credit the British for giving “democracy” to India.) India had its indigenous democracies even before the ancient Greek republics of the sixth century BC. Early Rome was also a republic and down through the late Middle Ages many societies through Scandinavia, the Lower Countries, and Germanic states had various forms of republics with varying degrees of political power sharing arrangements among several leaders of the community. Likewise there were non-monarchial systems of governance in parts of Asia, Africa and among Native American people.
#33 faisaluno [“…(a) political side of the ledger is not looking too good either
(b)… what makes america great… (is)… that it has enough people in position of authority who are willing to act on their conscience even if it means going against popular opinion and against official state sponsored ideology.
(c)…compare this with what goes on in pak. …”]
(a)…Political system cannot be immune to economic pressures and as the economy goes further out of whack there will be, inevitably, greater political disaffection.
(b)…Yes, this has traditionally been the greatness of America, or indeed of any other society that had such political tolerance. But I wonder if this great quality is not receding to some degree as the American society becomes increasingly paranoid and closed minded.
(c)…Please!! There is NO comparison. America would have to get ten times more fascistic and militant while Pakistan would have to improve ten fold (both unlikely occurrences) before one could even begin to draw any parallels.
#38 Romair [“…Would you happen to have the background of doing an analysis of Pakistan`s economy, without any political/democratic biases, its present and future, in comparison to where it was three years ago..”]
First, please let me make no bones about it. I am not an economist, accountant or financial professional. I am merely a layman albeit a keen observer and a devoted student of the markets and the economy. For full clarification please go to Chowk FOMC column page and click on confession, history, structure, bias and philosophy to read about my lack of formal credentials.
I have very little reliable objective information on Pakistan and what little I do know is anecdotal, and therefore insufficient to draw meaningful conclusions about the current economic situation there compared to three years ago. Furthermore, there are several “confounding factors” that have come into play over the last three years that substantially change the background against which one could judge any improvement or deterioration.
Regardless of who runs that country, over time, the macroeconomic picture is substantially effected by global forces that are at work in the background. It is quite possible that anything going on in Karachi or Islamabad would amount to little more than rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
Bankers, industrialists, bureaucrats, politicians, merchants, foreign consultants and investors will each have their own perspective on “the economy,” but they are like the six blind men describing an elephant while each fumbles over a different body part –trunk, ears, leg, tusk, body, tail-- of the beast.
To me, however, the important yard-stick for a country like Pakistan is the standard of living and quality of life of the average person. If that, in the aggregate, is not getting better then all the super highways, bridges and buildings or all the balances of payment, IMF loan re-scheduling and central bank reserves or stock market gains or factory outputs or new airport terminals or Aid packages are hollow and meaningless.
There is no question that more people have more available to them than before, but by the same token there are more people in the country now than there were before, so has anything changed? I certainly don’t know. But on my visits there I make an effort to make some observations and meet with as diverse a sample of people as possible.
Having traveled to some off the beaten track places it is my distinct impression that the average poor person’s life is getting harder year after year, and that is a continuous process, irrespective of who masquerades as the nation’s messiah in Islamabad and regardless of what the six blind men tell us about the economy’s health.
Not only that, there is another ugly reality. All else aside, Pakistan has two monumental problems which are potentially catastrophic within the next three decades, and they seem to have no visible solution. If my some magic or miracle all existing ethnic, religious, political, educational and Pak-Bharat dushmani problems were solved today, even then the future is bleak and the outcome catastrophic because of those two primary problems. They are (1) demographics, and (2) fresh water shortage. This is a long subject and one which I cannot go over in this space-time.
#40 Maharana [“… sometimes it is good to follow the written word without paying attention to the spirit it was written in.”
Further in the same vein...
``But life shows her irony, through islamists doing the same, with contrary results``.
I`d deliberately refrained from writing this additional statement for fear of dragging this thread to a Hindu-Muslim mudslinging. …”]
I greately appreciate your wisdom of avoiding the risk of starting a Hindu-Muslim fasaad in this space. I was also going to give an anecdote that may have provoked an angry response from some quarters, so I restrained myself. When I was defending Jefferson despite the fact that he’d been less than a perfect angel in his personal conduct it occurred to me to give the example of a great religious leader whom many of the devoted hold in the utmost high reverence. I consider him a great man and a successful leader. But I do not hold some of his obvious personal weaknesses against him which his harsh critics scream and yell about. And thus they get in mudslinging matches with his faithful followers.
#41 nasah [“… a delinquent dyslexic dimwit …who the hell he thinks will pay for all this -- his dad?
… this MORON has to go in Nov 2004 -- moral bankruptcy we can live with -- but financial bankruptcy?
... get this monkey off our back -- AND -- our wallet …”]
From your mouth to the ears of God. Amen.
#42 rsridhar [“… (a) much of America`s prosperity has to do with unleashing private enterprise…
(b) the important role of immigrant population towards economic prosperity …America still needs a large number of immigrant population for economic growth.
(c) USA is today not only the sole superpower but also an economic power.
(d) U.S. industrial production is six times larger than in 1950…”]
(a)…Agreed with your statement fully.
But the tragedy is that today the burden of government interference and cronyism on the economy has become so great that at this rate a day will come when this will start resembling the Soviet Union more than the glorious America of yore.
(b)…Again agreed, but that too is changing as xenophobia and paranoia is beginning to set in, immigration laws are being tightened and this trend is actually being encouraged by the likes of Herr Johannas Ashcroft, Herr Adolf Juliani and Herr Rumsfeld.
(c)… The future of the US economic power is at a high risk because of the criminal deeds of the political mafia in Washington DC that has spared no effort in manipulating and distorting the world’s most robust and efficient economy for their own narrow and short-sighted interests.
(d)… I hope you don’t believe everything the pimps of The Creature From Jackall Island (the Fed) write and say. If you think Enron & WorldCom pulled wool over America’s eyes, wait till you find out how much lie the Fed and the Treasury & the White House feed the gullible and trusting citizens of the country.
Half truths can be worse than outright lies. This six fold increase in Industrial production since 1950 is just such a half truth which has obviously smart and educated people like you convinced.
What metric is being used here? How does it translate? Are they measuring “production” in terms of widgets or dollars? How about as a percentage of GDP? How about a percentage of worldwide output compared to the 1950s? We all know that today even a poor clerk is richer than a king in the Middle Ages. So absolute numbers cannot be a relevant measure when comparing two points in time centuries or even decades apart. How about production in terms of percentage of total demand for those widgets compared to 1950? Are they using a hedonic factor in their measurement?
Yes, that’s a good one: HEDONIC FACTOR. Let’s talk about this for a minute. This is one of the many, many ways the government lies to the people without anyone realizing it. I’ll explain:
We’ve all heard the Fed chief pimp, Alan Greenslime, extol the virtues of “enhanced productivity” in the US. I’ll tell you how they get those huge productivity gains that absurdly magnify the (much smaller) real productivity gain by creative use of statistical wizardry. I had once thought these things only happened in Pakistan. Mr. Bhutto, for example, increased the country’s literacy rate substantially by the simple trick of redefining the term “literacy.” What genius.
There is a joke about the misuse of statistics. A rich businessman hired a statistician and asked him to calculate his odds of being in a plane with a bomb on board. The statistician calculated the odds but the businessman thought they were too high. So he asked the statistician if there was anything he could do to improve his odds since he was a frequent flyer and wished to reduce risk of being on a plane with a bomb.
The statistician advised him to carry a bomb in his brief case at all times because that way his probability of being in a plane with TWO bombs would be far, far smaller.
Similarly, in the US during the early 1990s the government statisticians were faced with a puzzling question regarding productivity measurement.
Computer power was increasing at an astonishing rate. The politicians wanted to somehow quantify and capture the qualitative improvements in the technological products. So the statisticians came up with a two pronged approach.
First, they increased the weighing of technology products in the GDP calculations so that an enhancement in technology would have a proportionately greater impact on the GDP numbers.
Second, they invented the “hedonic factor.” To explain what the hedonic factor is let me give an illustration.
Suppose we have a worker who is paid $10 per hour. In one hour he produces one microchip. This is a 40 Mega Hertz microchip. Now let us fast forward one year and go back to the same worker. We see that he is now getting paid $12 per hour and he is still making one microchip during that one hour. The difference is that because of improvements in technology this new microchip is a 400 Mega Hertz chip. Now therefore, we do some jantar-mantar-choo-mantar and calculate an algebraic equivalent of his salary so that we account for the technological advance. By equalizing the 40 MH chip with the new 400 MH chip we back calculate that our worker is actually making only $1.20 per hour. Thus compared to $10 an hour last year we’ve seen a huge increase in productivity. Never mind the fact that the actual dollars he is taking home to buy groceries with are $12 per hour. This is the magic of hedonics. I prefer to call it a WHITE LIE.
The government LIES and LIES and LIES. And those who don’t believe it should go out tomorrow and invest all their life’s savings in government bonds.
#44 ferozk
Thank you for breaking your code of silence (has it been two weeks?) and leaving a good word.
...SR
There you go again, Ahmed sahib, making sweeping statements that border of hyperbole.
Unquestionably, the American Revolution represents a great triumph of political institution building and a “great step forward” for human society, but please don’t go so far as to claim that it was the first time. A republic as opposed to a monarchy may have been relatively new to the Anglo-Saxon, but others have know republics since time immemorial. It can be argued, with some justification, that the Indian subcontinent has the world’s oldest tradition of democracy and/or republicanism. (Let us not credit the British for giving “democracy” to India.) India had its indigenous democracies even before the ancient Greek republics of the sixth century BC. Early Rome was also a republic and down through the late Middle Ages many societies through Scandinavia, the Lower Countries, and Germanic states had various forms of republics with varying degrees of political power sharing arrangements among several leaders of the community. Likewise there were non-monarchial systems of governance in parts of Asia, Africa and among Native American people.
#33 faisaluno [“…(a) political side of the ledger is not looking too good either
(b)… what makes america great… (is)… that it has enough people in position of authority who are willing to act on their conscience even if it means going against popular opinion and against official state sponsored ideology.
(c)…compare this with what goes on in pak. …”]
(a)…Political system cannot be immune to economic pressures and as the economy goes further out of whack there will be, inevitably, greater political disaffection.
(b)…Yes, this has traditionally been the greatness of America, or indeed of any other society that had such political tolerance. But I wonder if this great quality is not receding to some degree as the American society becomes increasingly paranoid and closed minded.
(c)…Please!! There is NO comparison. America would have to get ten times more fascistic and militant while Pakistan would have to improve ten fold (both unlikely occurrences) before one could even begin to draw any parallels.
#38 Romair [“…Would you happen to have the background of doing an analysis of Pakistan`s economy, without any political/democratic biases, its present and future, in comparison to where it was three years ago..”]
First, please let me make no bones about it. I am not an economist, accountant or financial professional. I am merely a layman albeit a keen observer and a devoted student of the markets and the economy. For full clarification please go to Chowk FOMC column page and click on confession, history, structure, bias and philosophy to read about my lack of formal credentials.
I have very little reliable objective information on Pakistan and what little I do know is anecdotal, and therefore insufficient to draw meaningful conclusions about the current economic situation there compared to three years ago. Furthermore, there are several “confounding factors” that have come into play over the last three years that substantially change the background against which one could judge any improvement or deterioration.
Regardless of who runs that country, over time, the macroeconomic picture is substantially effected by global forces that are at work in the background. It is quite possible that anything going on in Karachi or Islamabad would amount to little more than rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
Bankers, industrialists, bureaucrats, politicians, merchants, foreign consultants and investors will each have their own perspective on “the economy,” but they are like the six blind men describing an elephant while each fumbles over a different body part –trunk, ears, leg, tusk, body, tail-- of the beast.
To me, however, the important yard-stick for a country like Pakistan is the standard of living and quality of life of the average person. If that, in the aggregate, is not getting better then all the super highways, bridges and buildings or all the balances of payment, IMF loan re-scheduling and central bank reserves or stock market gains or factory outputs or new airport terminals or Aid packages are hollow and meaningless.
There is no question that more people have more available to them than before, but by the same token there are more people in the country now than there were before, so has anything changed? I certainly don’t know. But on my visits there I make an effort to make some observations and meet with as diverse a sample of people as possible.
Having traveled to some off the beaten track places it is my distinct impression that the average poor person’s life is getting harder year after year, and that is a continuous process, irrespective of who masquerades as the nation’s messiah in Islamabad and regardless of what the six blind men tell us about the economy’s health.
Not only that, there is another ugly reality. All else aside, Pakistan has two monumental problems which are potentially catastrophic within the next three decades, and they seem to have no visible solution. If my some magic or miracle all existing ethnic, religious, political, educational and Pak-Bharat dushmani problems were solved today, even then the future is bleak and the outcome catastrophic because of those two primary problems. They are (1) demographics, and (2) fresh water shortage. This is a long subject and one which I cannot go over in this space-time.
#40 Maharana [“… sometimes it is good to follow the written word without paying attention to the spirit it was written in.”
Further in the same vein...
``But life shows her irony, through islamists doing the same, with contrary results``.
I`d deliberately refrained from writing this additional statement for fear of dragging this thread to a Hindu-Muslim mudslinging. …”]
I greately appreciate your wisdom of avoiding the risk of starting a Hindu-Muslim fasaad in this space. I was also going to give an anecdote that may have provoked an angry response from some quarters, so I restrained myself. When I was defending Jefferson despite the fact that he’d been less than a perfect angel in his personal conduct it occurred to me to give the example of a great religious leader whom many of the devoted hold in the utmost high reverence. I consider him a great man and a successful leader. But I do not hold some of his obvious personal weaknesses against him which his harsh critics scream and yell about. And thus they get in mudslinging matches with his faithful followers.
#41 nasah [“… a delinquent dyslexic dimwit …who the hell he thinks will pay for all this -- his dad?
… this MORON has to go in Nov 2004 -- moral bankruptcy we can live with -- but financial bankruptcy?
... get this monkey off our back -- AND -- our wallet …”]
From your mouth to the ears of God. Amen.
#42 rsridhar [“… (a) much of America`s prosperity has to do with unleashing private enterprise…
(b) the important role of immigrant population towards economic prosperity …America still needs a large number of immigrant population for economic growth.
(c) USA is today not only the sole superpower but also an economic power.
(d) U.S. industrial production is six times larger than in 1950…”]
(a)…Agreed with your statement fully.
But the tragedy is that today the burden of government interference and cronyism on the economy has become so great that at this rate a day will come when this will start resembling the Soviet Union more than the glorious America of yore.
(b)…Again agreed, but that too is changing as xenophobia and paranoia is beginning to set in, immigration laws are being tightened and this trend is actually being encouraged by the likes of Herr Johannas Ashcroft, Herr Adolf Juliani and Herr Rumsfeld.
(c)… The future of the US economic power is at a high risk because of the criminal deeds of the political mafia in Washington DC that has spared no effort in manipulating and distorting the world’s most robust and efficient economy for their own narrow and short-sighted interests.
(d)… I hope you don’t believe everything the pimps of The Creature From Jackall Island (the Fed) write and say. If you think Enron & WorldCom pulled wool over America’s eyes, wait till you find out how much lie the Fed and the Treasury & the White House feed the gullible and trusting citizens of the country.
Half truths can be worse than outright lies. This six fold increase in Industrial production since 1950 is just such a half truth which has obviously smart and educated people like you convinced.
What metric is being used here? How does it translate? Are they measuring “production” in terms of widgets or dollars? How about as a percentage of GDP? How about a percentage of worldwide output compared to the 1950s? We all know that today even a poor clerk is richer than a king in the Middle Ages. So absolute numbers cannot be a relevant measure when comparing two points in time centuries or even decades apart. How about production in terms of percentage of total demand for those widgets compared to 1950? Are they using a hedonic factor in their measurement?
Yes, that’s a good one: HEDONIC FACTOR. Let’s talk about this for a minute. This is one of the many, many ways the government lies to the people without anyone realizing it. I’ll explain:
We’ve all heard the Fed chief pimp, Alan Greenslime, extol the virtues of “enhanced productivity” in the US. I’ll tell you how they get those huge productivity gains that absurdly magnify the (much smaller) real productivity gain by creative use of statistical wizardry. I had once thought these things only happened in Pakistan. Mr. Bhutto, for example, increased the country’s literacy rate substantially by the simple trick of redefining the term “literacy.” What genius.
There is a joke about the misuse of statistics. A rich businessman hired a statistician and asked him to calculate his odds of being in a plane with a bomb on board. The statistician calculated the odds but the businessman thought they were too high. So he asked the statistician if there was anything he could do to improve his odds since he was a frequent flyer and wished to reduce risk of being on a plane with a bomb.
The statistician advised him to carry a bomb in his brief case at all times because that way his probability of being in a plane with TWO bombs would be far, far smaller.
Similarly, in the US during the early 1990s the government statisticians were faced with a puzzling question regarding productivity measurement.
Computer power was increasing at an astonishing rate. The politicians wanted to somehow quantify and capture the qualitative improvements in the technological products. So the statisticians came up with a two pronged approach.
First, they increased the weighing of technology products in the GDP calculations so that an enhancement in technology would have a proportionately greater impact on the GDP numbers.
Second, they invented the “hedonic factor.” To explain what the hedonic factor is let me give an illustration.
Suppose we have a worker who is paid $10 per hour. In one hour he produces one microchip. This is a 40 Mega Hertz microchip. Now let us fast forward one year and go back to the same worker. We see that he is now getting paid $12 per hour and he is still making one microchip during that one hour. The difference is that because of improvements in technology this new microchip is a 400 Mega Hertz chip. Now therefore, we do some jantar-mantar-choo-mantar and calculate an algebraic equivalent of his salary so that we account for the technological advance. By equalizing the 40 MH chip with the new 400 MH chip we back calculate that our worker is actually making only $1.20 per hour. Thus compared to $10 an hour last year we’ve seen a huge increase in productivity. Never mind the fact that the actual dollars he is taking home to buy groceries with are $12 per hour. This is the magic of hedonics. I prefer to call it a WHITE LIE.
The government LIES and LIES and LIES. And those who don’t believe it should go out tomorrow and invest all their life’s savings in government bonds.
#44 ferozk
Thank you for breaking your code of silence (has it been two weeks?) and leaving a good word.
...SR
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