Development in Turkmenistan

Dennis de Tray, former World Bank country director for Central Asia 2001-06, writes on the passing of Turkmenbashi and the development prospects of Turkmenistan.

Bangladesh and Polar Bears

Will the US now act on global warming?

These days..

I haven’t been updating here since I’ve been consumed by applications for graduate school. I’ll be going to India in a few days so things will probably not get back on track here until around mid-January.
Christmas was spent in Rangpur so the menu this year was chicken curry, rice, dal, fried vegetables and rotis. [...]

Taxes for happiness

From Professor Mankiw:

To the extent that people have problems with self-control, sin taxes can be welfare-enhancing. Economists Jonathan Gruber and Sendhil Mullainathan report evidence that smokers are happier when cigarette taxes are higher. Of course, non-smokers won’t object to shifting the tax burden to others. Maybe we should consider higher taxes on smoking, drinking, gambling [...]

Consuming for happiness

Economists have started to attempt (again) to measure happiness and use that to evaluate peoples decisions. And some of the new research says..

Have fun
What sumptuary advice do they offer? In general, the economic arbiters of taste recommend “experiences” over commodities, pastimes over knick-knacks, doing over having. Mr Frank thinks people should work shorter hours and [...]

Building up Africa

Economic growth in Africa is getting healthier according to this graph from the World Bank.

Things, big and small

From Tyler:

The One-Minute Rule
How about this for advice?
This is an incredibly easy, incredibly effective rule—but it must be followed consistently if I want to see results.  And it does take work.
It’s very simple: I must do any task that can be finished in one minute.  Hang up my coat, read a letter and toss it, [...]

Public health success: Iodine for IQ

The NYT reports:

Valentina Sivryukova knew her public service messages were hitting the mark when she heard how one Kazakh schoolboy called another stupid. “What are you,” he sneered, “iodine-deficient or something?”
….
Kazakhstan has become an example of how even a vast and still-developing nation like this Central Asian country can achieve a remarkable public health success. [...]

Off the Books: The Underground Economy of the Urban Poor

Any book that gets this kind of recommendation from Tyler goes automatically to my list. The newest one is Off the Books: The Underground Economy of the Urban Poor.

Work hard or party?

From the NYT, via MR:

Kivetz interviewed 63 subjects and asked half of them to recall a time in the previous week when they had to choose between work or pleasure — and then to rank how they felt about their decision on a scale from “no regret at all” to “a lot of regret.” Then [...]