Thursday, August 31, 2006

Official and unofficial

Which Indian cricketer has the distinction of scoring a century on debut in an unofficial Test (against Sri Lanka in 1975-76) and following it up with a ton in his debut official Test (against New Zealand)? (Clue: famous name in Indian cricket)

Friday, August 25, 2006

One more connect

From BL archives:

Which name 'connects' the illustrious successor of the not-so-famous fictional character Meadowes and the Web-based company founded by Garrett Gruener and David Warthen in 1996?

Thursday, August 17, 2006

Now, privatisation

Why workers oppose privatisation? This paper by Harvard Economics Prof Sendhil Mullainathan explores, among other things, the psychology behind such opposition. It stems from a phenomenon called 'loss aversion', he says.

The paper cites an experiment by Kahneman, Knetsch, and Thaler to point out that people who "are given objects very quickly appear to value them more than those who were not given the objects." In the case of privatization, the people who "are given the objects" are the incumbent workers.

This is what Sendhil has to say: "The insight about loss aversion can also help understand why policy change is so difficult in developing countries.

"Consider market reforms that transfer resources from one group to another with an efficiency gain. For example, suppose privatizing a firm will result in gains for customers while resulting in losses for incumbent workers.

"Under this perspective, such reforms are fought so vigorously partly because the losses are felt far more sharply by the workers. One implication of loss aversion is, at the margin, to pursue strategies that preserve the rents of incumbents rather than ones that try to buy out incumbents.

"All other things equal, a strategy that offers a buyout for incumbent workers will be far more costly than one that grandfathers them in. The buyout requires the government to compensate the workers for their loss, and this can be much greater than simple utility calculations
suggest.

"In contrast, a strategy that guarantees incumbent workers a measure of job security would not need to pay this cost. Many situations of institutional change require some form of redistribution. The recognition of loss aversion suggests that successful policies may require protecting the losses of incumbents."

Monday, August 14, 2006

Film and the book

From BL archives:

'Connect' a pioneering effort with a commercial success: A 1923 British committee recommended the merger of existing airline companies into one. Thus was born Imperial Airways Ltd. In 1925, it became the first airliner to screen an in-flight movie . This movie, based on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s work, shares its name with the sequel of one of the most successful books of the ’90s. The book and its sequel were subsequently made into blockbuster movies. What's the title that they share?

Thursday, August 10, 2006

e-democracy?

Stalling Parliament costs the taxpayer Rs 20,000 per minute, said this article in Rediff recently. Reading it, I was wondering if we could have an e-Parliament in the future! What do you think? Or at least there could be video conferencing or something of that sort.

By getting into Parliamentary debates from their own constituencies, the MPs can avoid costs under the following heads:

* Travel to and fro to Delhi
* Food, accomodation, benefits, servants while there

Plus, the country can save from

* Not needing an army of secretaries, administrative staff
ensuring the function of Parliament

Actually, such an arrangement could free up enough time for the MPs to think and debate meaningfully. They will have enough time to talk to people, getting to understand their issues rather than running around, delivering one speech after another (They can do that now too, but with e-democracy it will free more of their time, and remove all excuses).

Debates can really be more independent of the party line and can emerge out of individual knowledge and perception, untainted by a group mindset. And this feature can really energise the collective intelligence of a group. (That's the funda behind James Surowiecki's 'The Wisdom of Crowds')

Even if the favourite tactic of the Opposition - walkouts - continues to be used, the loss to the nation in monetary terms will be considerably less that way!

In 1951, the loss per minute was Rs 100, it seems (it's now Rs 20,000). In other words, the money pumped in per minute to run the Parliament. The per capita income (income per Indian) was about Rs 275 in 1951. It has grown to just over Rs 20,000 currently. Clearly, the growth in income has been lower.

Does it indicate the falling productivity of the Parliamentarians! Hope not.

Five-letter answer

Remember having come across this crossword clue (or something like this):

Train or part of it (5)

Quite simple but nice! What's it?

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

A Burroughs Wellcome trademark ...

From BL's archives (slightly modified):

Which single word connects the following:

a) A Burroughs Wellcome trademark, registered on March 14, 1884. The word took its name for the process of making compressed pharma preparations.

b) The nickname of a Sopwith biplane during the First World War.

c) Due to the negative connotations of the word, 'compact' is preferred by some.