March 2014 – artdiamondblog.com

Better Policies Explain Why Poland Prospers More than Ukraine

“Yaroslav Rushchyshyn, a garment manufacturer, wants to end penalties when his company reports a financial loss.” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited below.

(p. B1) LVIV, Ukraine — Every kind of business in this restless pro-European stronghold near the border with Poland has an idea about how to make Ukraine like its more prosperous neighbor.

For Yaroslav Rushchyshyn, founder of a garment manufacturer, it is abolishing bizarre regulations that have had inspectors threatening fines for his handling of fabric remnants and for reporting financial losses.
For Andrew Pavliv, who runs a technology company, it is modernizing a rigid education system to help nurture entrepreneurs.
For Natalia Smutok, an executive at a company that makes color charts for paint and cosmetics, it meant starting an antibribery campaign, even though she is 36 weeks pregnant.
. . .
(p. B10) Victor Halchynsky, a former journalist who is now a spokesman for the Ukrainian unit of a Polish bank, said the divergence of the two countries was a source of frustration.
“It’s painful because we know it’s only happened because of policy,” he said, adding that while both countries had started the reform process, Poland “finished it.”
Ukraine has been held back by a number of policies. Steep energy subsidies have kept consumption high and left the country dependent on Russian gas, draining state coffers. Mr. Pavliv said the state university system, which he called “pure, pure Soviet,” was too inflexible to set up a training program for project managers, or to allow executives without specific certifications to teach courses. An agriculture industry once a Soviet breadbasket has been hurt by antiquated rules, including restrictions on land sales. Aggressive tax police have been used to shake down businesses.

For the full story, see:
DANNY HAKIM. “A Blueprint for Ukraine.” The New York Times (Fri., MARCH 14, 2014): B1 & B10.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date MARCH 13, 2014.)

“Andrew Pavliv, who runs a technology company, wants to help turn Lviv into a little Ukrainian Silicon Valley.” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited above.

Edison Sold Half-Interest in Some Patents, to Fund His Inventing

Stross discusses Edison’s inventing at age 21:

(p. 8) Edison soon sought investors who would provide funds in exchange for half-interest in resulting patents.

Source:
Stross, Randall E. The Wizard of Menlo Park: How Thomas Alva Edison Invented the Modern World. New York: Crown Publishers, 2007.

If Lack of Focus and Poverty Go Together, Which Is the Cause and Which the Effect?

Source of book image: http://www.scientificamerican.com/sciam/cache/file/BF860CC7-371A-46BB-8ACCECD4289565A8.jpg

Are the poor poor partly because they concentrate less, or do they concentrate less partly because they are poor? Samantha Power discusses one of her favorite books of 2013:

(p. C11) In “Scarcity,” Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir offer groundbreaking insights into, among other themes, the effects of poverty on (p. C12) cognition and our ability to make choices about our lives. The authors persuasively show that the mental space–or “bandwidth”–of the poor is so consumed with making ends meet that they may be more likely to lose concentration while on a job or less likely to take medication on time.

For the full article, see:
“12 Months of Reading; We asked 50 of our friends–from April Bloomfield to Mike Tyson–to name their favorite books of 2013.” The Wall Street Journal (Sat., Dec. 14, 2013): C6 & C9-C12.
(Note: the online version of the article has the date Dec. 13, 2013.)

The book that Power praises is:
Mullainathan, Sendhil, and Eldar Shafir. Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much. New York: Times Books, 2013.

Paul Ryan Warns that the Safety Net Can Be a Hammock

(p. A21) . . . Mr. Ryan said two years ago: “We don’t want to turn the safety net into a hammock that lulls able-bodied people to lives of dependency and complacency, that drains them of their will and their incentive to make the most of their lives.”

For the full commentary, see:
Krugman, Paul. “The Hammock Fallacy.” The New York Times (Fri., MARCH 7, 2014): A21.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date MARCH 6, 2014.)

The original source of the Paul Ryan quote appears to be:
“Paul Ryan Wants ‘Welfare Reform Round 2’.” The Huffington Post (posted 03/20/2012).

Ryan made similar comments in his January 25th official Republican response to the State of the Union speech:

We are at a moment, where if government’s growth is left unchecked and unchallenged, America’s best century will be considered our past century. This is a future in which we will transform our social safety net into a hammock, which lulls able-bodied people into lives of complacency and dependency.

Depending on bureaucracy to foster innovation, competitiveness, and wise consumer choices has never worked — and it won’t work now.

Source:
NPR transcript of Paul Ryan response, January 25, 2011.

Edison Helped Us See the Light

Source of book image: http://www.strategy-business.com/article/07408i?pg=all

Several biographies of Thomas Edison have appeared in recent decades. One of the strengths of Randall Stross’ The Wizard of Menlo Park is that it emphasizes how Edison’s story is relevant to current issues in the economics of invention, entrepreneurship and technology.
In the next several weeks, I will quote some of the more thought-provoking stories and observations in the Stross book.

The Stross book is:
Stross, Randall E. The Wizard of Menlo Park: How Thomas Alva Edison Invented the Modern World. New York: Crown Publishers, 2007.

Sleep Is a Dishwasher that Cleans Toxic Proteins from the Brain

(p. E8) . . . a . . . recent finding published in Science magazine suggests that sleep cleans the brain of toxic proteins “like a dishwasher,” as one of the study’s authors put it.

For the full commentary, see:
MOLLY YOUNG. “Tapping Into a Goodnight.” The New York Times (Thurs., MARCH 6, 2014): E8.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date MARCH 5, 2014.)

The Science article mentioned above is:
Xie, Lulu, Kang Hongyi, Xu Qiwu, Michael J. Chen, Liao Yonghong, Meenakshisundaram Thiyagarajan, John O’Donnell, Daniel J. Christensen, Charles Nicholson, Jeffrey J. Iliff, Takano Takahiro, Rashid Deane, and Maiken Nedergaard. “Sleep Drives Metabolite Clearance from the Adult Brain.” Science 342, no. 6156 (Oct. 18, 2013): 373-77.

“Babies Are Smarter than You Think”

Source of book image: http://www.washingtonpost.com/rf/image_296w/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/2013/12/19/Outlook/Images/booksonbooks0031387485124.jpg

Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker discusses a favorite book of 2013:

(p. C11) . . . , babies are smarter than you think, and their cognitive and moral lives, revealed by ingenious experimental techniques, show that fairness, empathy and punitive sentiments have deep roots in human development. Paul Bloom’s “Just Babies” illuminates this research with intellectual rigor and a graceful, easygoing style.

For the full article, see:
“12 Months of Reading; We asked 50 of our friends–from April Bloomfield to Mike Tyson–to name their favorite books of 2013.” The Wall Street Journal (Sat., Dec. 14, 2013): C6 & C9-C12.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the article has the date Dec. 13, 2013.)

The book that Pinker praises is:
Bloom, Paul. Just Babies: The Origins of Good and Evil. New York: Crown Publishers, 2013.

Environmentalists Seek to Silence Those Who Dare to Disagree

(p. A13) Surely, some kind of ending is upon us. Last week climate protesters demanded the silencing of Charles Krauthammer for a Washington Post column that notices uncertainties in the global warming hypothesis. In coming weeks a libel trial gets under way brought by Penn State’s Michael Mann, author of the famed hockey stick, against National Review, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, writer Rand Simberg and roving commentator Mark Steyn for making wisecracks about his climate work. The New York Times runs a cartoon of a climate “denier” being stabbed with an icicle.
These are indications of a political movement turned to defending its self-image as its cause goes down the drain.

For the full commentary, see:
HOLMAN W. JENKINS, JR. “BUSINESS WORLD; Personal Score-Settling Is the New Climate Agenda; The cause of global carbon regulation may be lost, but enemies still can be punished.” The Wall Street Journal (Sat., March 1, 2014): A13.
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date Feb. 28, 2014, and has the title “BUSINESS WORLD; Jenkins: Personal Score-Settling Is the New Climate Agenda; The cause of global carbon regulation may be lost, but enemies still can be punished.”)

The Krauthammer column that the environmentalists do not want you to read:
Krauthammer, Charles. “The Myth of ‘Settled Science’.” The Washington Post (Fri., Feb. 21, 2014): A19.

Disabled Workers Are More Likely to Be Free Agent Entrepreneurs

“Kevin Hartford, right, and a colleague at his factory. He started his business after employers failed to hire him.” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited below.

HR departments have incentives to avoid hiring risky employees. But a determined high-risk employee can hire themselves by becoming a free agent entrepreneur. If we want to truly help the disabled, we should remove obstacles to entrepreneurship, such as burdensome regulations and high taxation.

(p. B4) Mr. Hartford, the father of two sons, thrived as a business consultant in his 20s and 30s. He was used to flying first class, staying at swank hotels and advising CEOs. Then the consulting firm unraveled in the mid-1990s. When he began looking for a new job, a stuttering problem–something he had always considered manageable–put off potential employers.

“I applied for job after job after job,” says Mr. Hartford, now 58. “I was one of two finalists; I was one of three finalists. But I never got the job.”
In the end, Mr. Hartford concluded that his only shot at a satisfying job was to create a company. He is now president and co-owner of Alle-Kiski Industries, which makes parts, such as exhaust pipes for train locomotives and prototype truck wheels, for larger manufacturers, including Alcoa Inc. and General Electric Co.
Like many before him, Mr. Hartford discovered that one option for people who don’t fit into large organizations is to start a small one. That is particularly true for people with disabilities. About 11% of disabled workers are self-employed, compared with 6.5% of those with no disabilities, according to Labor Department data.
. . .
The business has grown to 38 employees from a dozen when Messrs. Hartford and Newell started in 2005. They own more than $2 million of equipment used to drill, groove and otherwise shape metal, arrayed in a 27,000-square-foot factory with an American flag hanging from one of the beams. Last year’s sales of $6 million were the highest yet, Mr. Hartford says, and the company is building a 4,000-square-foot addition to house more equipment.

For the full story, see:
JAMES R. HAGERTY. “Entrepreneur Let No Impediment Stop Him; Out-of-Work Consultant Started His Own Company After Discovering His Stutter Put Off Employers.” The Wall Street Journal (Thurs., Jan. 16, 2014): B4.
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date Jan. 15, 2014.)

Carnegie Wanted Institution to Fund “Exceptional” Scientists “Whenever and Where Found”

So was Carnegie suggesting that we should be open to the exceptional appearing in unexpected locations?

(p. 614) In his deed of trust, Carnegie declared that his research institution in Washington should “discover the exceptional man in every department of study whenever and where found… and enable him to make the work for which he seems specially designed his life work.” That notion would remain the driving philosophy behind the institution over the next century. Some of those “exceptional” scientists, supported by Carnegie money were the astronomer Edwin Hubble, who “revolutionized astronomy with his discovery that the universe is expanding,” and Barbara McClintock, whose work on patterns of genetic inheritance in corn won her a Nobel Prize.

Source:
Nasaw, David. Andrew Carnegie. New York: Penguin Press, 2006.
(Note: ellipsis in original.)
(Note: the pagination of the hardback and paperback editions of Nasaw’s book are the same.)

Hope for “a Morality that Maximizes Human Flourishing”

Source of book image: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-6zEBTa23QDo/UtsQ6rZTkoI/AAAAAAAACdI/lAdUEZDMyaQ/s1600/Moral+Tribes.png

Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker discusses a favorite book of 2013:

(p. C11) “Moral Tribes,” by Joshua Greene, explains the fascinating new field of moral neuroscience: what happens in our brains when we make moral judgments and how ancient impulses can warp our ethical intuitions. With the help of the parts of the brain that can engage in careful reasoning, the world’s peoples can find common ethical ground in a morality that maximizes human flourishing and minimizes suffering.

The book that Pinker praises is:
Greene, Joshua. Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap between Us and Them. New York: The Penguin Press, 2013.