Write, darn, write!
By Kevin
As part of the phenomenon described by Anne Trubek in 'We are all Writers Now', I cannot help but agree with Anne that we are really doing so much more writing than we were years ago. I used to have really long phone chats with friends but they are now all replaced by long email correspondence if not 5-hour MSN chats interwoven with meals, occasional restroom breaks and possibly a trip to downstairs to get something for Mum. More importantly, I'm blogging more actively, and have more friends with blogs. I still remember the time when blogging was a relatively new phenomena amongst teens around the 2000s; for me, I was introduced to it only in 2002. Blogger was newly emerging and free blogs providers were all but common.
Another good read on More Intelligent Life related to writing and blogging includes 'Shakespeare would have had a blog' about innovations in lingo brought about by the aforementioned writing trend. There an article on 'Age of Mass Intelligence' that might also interest you too. More Intelligent Life functions as a blog sort of online publication with articles linked to each other via hypertext of their content, making it really a great place to explore a series of related articles.
Healthcare & Business
By Kevin
All the noises about American healthcare costs and the policies President Obama is coming up to try and ease the high cost problem is attracting me to read up on the topic. It turns out that there's lots of economics involved in the phenomenon of high (and often fast-rising) cost of healthcare in America. The Economist's Leader section article, 'This is going to hurt' provides an overview of the problems with healthcare in America and its more elaborate article 'Heading for the emergency room' gives statistics to demonstrate the incentive problems that forms the basis of high cost of healthcare.
The Economist provides good reads for those concerned with the macro picture of healthcare in America but comparisons made between America and other countries often makes it seem that the whole of America is consistently on the wrong track for the healthcare industry at least when considered at a policy level. The New Yorker, however, has an excellent article by Atul Gawande published earlier this month titled 'The Cost Conundrum'. It goes really in-depth into the issue via a rather intimate study of the healthcare industry in a particular city in Texas, McAllen. Frankly, this is not the first time I am impressed by the rigour of reporting essays in The New Yorker. I highly recommend reading their essays on an eclectic array of topics for those with spare time on their hands and a love for reading non-fiction material (the latter point applies to me though, rather unfortunately, not the formal).
Keynesian Potential
By Kevin
This couple of days I've been reading Goh Keng Swee's Wealth of East Asian Nations and I found that his insights into Keynesian economic policies are pretty important in today's context. He emphasized that Keynesian economic policies in the 1950s and 1960s worked very well because of the presence of new product frontiers. The adoption of colour television, transistor radios, the various consumer electrical appliances during that time made sure that consumption was high and subsequently the economic boom encouraged borrowing and further consumption. The same, I believe, happened when computers became a consumer appliance and also for the proliferation of mobile gadgets and devices. These are the new product frontiers that drove the boom during the period after the dot-com boom.
In this period, the absence of new product frontiers suggests that Keynesian economic policies, in the form of all sorts of stimulus may not exactly be as effective as we wish it would be. Nevertheless, I believe that every country actually as a 'Keynesian Potential', an imaginary figure that determines how effective Keynesian economic policies can help to drive growth when they are done correctly. Goh Keng Swee suggests that his work to set Singapore on the development path in the beginning was in retrospect rather easy because it was merely about catching up and importing things that he knew would work in Singapore given political will and careful steering of the different policy instruments. Today, I believe he would think that our work is much harder - we will have to be without the guidance of others' experience of economic development unlike the past and in the current situation when we have to break new grounds and explore a way for us to continue to thrive.
In many sense, Goh Keng Swee is kind of like my idol; it was he who got me interested in Economics and studying in London School of Economics. I've never met him in person, not even seen videos of him talking but reading about him as well as his works, I can't help but admire his intellect, wit and clarity of thought. I hope to be able to contribute to the country and perhaps to the world like he did during his time. Other books collecting his works includes The Practice of Economic Growth and Economics of Modernization.
Left Out
By Kevin
Today's articles about the world too often focus on the more globalized activities as if the world is made up of only the globalized players (and perhaps a couple other high profile states for not-so-pleasant reasons) whose names ring relentlessly on news programmes nightly. When asked to give a general report about the world today, one would most probably discuss the 'big' stuff like bankruptcy of General Motors, the signing of trade agreements between 2 countries, some big accident that occurred in a country miles from us but an important trading partner.
Occasionally, it'll be good to really look at the rest of the world (which could easily be more than half the world population) and find out how they are doing. In LEXEAN's Globalisation's Forgotten Few, the situation at the 'other' part of the world is described and the author included an explanation for the state they're in. It's a good read for those who are not exactly interested in Globalization and wishes to write essays on stuff that are outside the realm of globalization (something not easy when you talk about current affairs). The article brought out interesting facts about length of civil wars and their impact on the different poor countries as well as the effects of being landlocked in Africa.
I don't usually read LEXEAN (I was rather surprised it is a Singapore magazine) although my dad somehow laid his hands on a copy of the first issue which is some special edition. But I guess it's great to read a wide variety of publications especially when they have free articles online for you to browse through.
I'd like to highlight another 2 publications that might be of interest to readers: Intelligent Life by The Economist Group as well as The New Yorker, which really offers very insightful, facts-filled writings. These are high-quality writings that focuses on an issue rather than a fact or a news unlike the typical newspaper. These are the sort of readings would aid in GP.
Topics
- Anecdotes
- Article Featured
- erpz News
- Headlines
- Lifehack
- Mind Tricks
- Reading Packs
- Reviews
- Stuff
- Tackling Tests
Study Resources
- Caught In Geog
- Cliffs Notes
- Economics Help
- Fiveless A Levels Notes
- Mastering Maths
- Mises Institute
- Mr Koh's Maths Site
- Progress in GP
- SparkNotes
- Tutor2u
Friends' Sites & Blogs
Writer's Blogs
- Dan Gilbert's Blog
- Freakonomics Blog
- John Kay
- Julian Baggini's Blog
- Malcolm Gladwell
- Michael Perelman
- Paul Krugman
- Robert Skidelsky
- Tim Harford
Academic Blogs
- Becker Posner Blog
- Daily Capitalist
- Marginal Revolution
- Modeled Behavior
- The Good News Economist
- Tran Harry Economics 101
- Twenty Cent Paradigms
Recent Comments
- Morality & Incentives « ERPZ on The Question of Pay
- Kevin on The Question of Pay
- Derrick Tan on The Question of Pay
- Daily SG: 8 Sep 2011 « The Singapore Daily on Failure of Competition
- georgeyeo -not that guy on From Sarcasm to Absurdum