jra's thoughts

Category: Economy

  • Community Finance in West Africa

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    Vasco Pyjama talks about community finance. The ROSCA is known as a “sou-sou” in west Africa, or at least in Nimba county, Liberia. Sousous run for a fixed term, based on the number of members. If there are 10 members and the contribution is $10, each month one of the members will get $90 (9…

  • Fishy Accounting Business

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    Listen to this Planet Money episode, it’s got a really clear example of how banks are allowed to book profits based on people losing confidence in them. It’s really mind bending, and shows two things: one, how the finance industry is a hall of mirrors, and two, how talented Planet Money is at breaking down…

  • The Economics of being a Hostage

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    Wow. Here’s an incredible inside view of the piracy business. What’s incredible is that NPR’s Channa Jaffe Walt managed to get a CEO of a shipping company on the phone and hear the inside story of the negotiations. Here’s what’s really interesting. The first thing the CEO says is, “I never thought for a moment…

  • Heard in Europe

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    Overheard here in England (which was, last I checked, a European country): I found a really interesting partnership we could join, but we’d have to make friends with a bunch of Europeans. Insert sound of my jaw dropping the floor here…

  • Repair vs Replace

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    What are the economic effects of the repair vs replace decision? Interesting question, that. If you missed “more local employment of the blue collar type”, go read this: There is a slight diversion of purchasing strategy, repair rather than replace. This feeds a blue collar industry in the local region. It used to be, when…

  • The Savior

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    Check out the image at the bottom of this post. Obama with a halo. Cute.

  • My favorite things, all at once!

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    Yay for old friends, economics, and technology! All at once! kc wrote a blog posting with her humble ideas on how to use IP address space tax. Wait… there’s a tax on address space? Yes, because it has become a scare quantity, because people are too lazy to move to IPv6, IPv4 address space is…

  • Negative Feedback

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    Planet Money is talking about the new Systemic Regulator, and also talking about other theoretical ways of regulating the banks. It occurs to me that one thing that’s missing, and not just a little bit missing, but radically missing, from the current system is negative feedback. Wouldn’t it be interesting if we could set things…

  • Twin Peaks

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    This is the scariest evidence yet that this recession is not a normal one: This was brought to my attention by an excellent This American Life episode. The conclusion of Alex and Adam’s story at the top of the program is chilling… there’s several ways to read the tea leaves, and none of them are…

  • A Secret of the Economics of Manufacturing

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    I saw this quote in an article on E-Ink: If you ever want to make a billion of anything cheaply, you print it.  What an interesting observation! With such interesting far reaching consequences: Nano Solar is on the right track, crystaline solar is not. Diamond Age-style nano-assembly is not quite a sure bet, and mass-customization…