Analysis
The unforgivable cost of state-protected monopolies
Written by Gavin Chait
“A monopoly granted either to an individual or to a trading company has the same effect as a secret in trade or manufactures. The monopolists, by keeping the market constantly understocked, by never fully supplying the effectual demand, sell their commodities much above the natural price, and raise their emoluments, whether they consist in wages or profit, greatly above their natural rate,” wrote Adam Smith in 1776.
Job creation, innovation and the Apple iPad
Written by Gavin Chait
It was a speech much-awaited, driving speculation and controversy before it even started. No, not Steve Jobs in San Francisco but Barack Obama in Washington.
It has been a bad few weeks for the US President. More than one in 10 Americans is unemployed and Obama has used up much of the goodwill that catapulted him into office on a controversial health reform program. His first State of the Union address was hoped to put some fire back into the US economy.
Read more: Job creation, innovation and the Apple iPadGoogle and the Cold War that businesses must play
Written by Gavin Chait
“What the hell do you think spies are? Moral philosophers measuring everything they do against the word of God or Karl Marx? They're not! They're just a bunch of seedy, squalid bastards like me: little men, drunkards, queers, hen-pecked husbands, civil servants playing cowboys and Indians to brighten their rotten little lives.”
The line belongs to Alec Leamas, from the movie, The spy who came in from the cold. The Cold War, a sordid world of espionage, sabotage, assassination and deception; where governments attempted to outcompete each other through war and other means. It certainly wasn’t all James Bond and vodka martinis.
Read more: Google and the Cold War that businesses must playAfrica, prosperity and its ever-seeking union
Written by Gavin Chait
In 1940, in order to put a warm glow over their war efforts, the Japanese Imperial Army announced that the reason they were hacking their way through Asia was the pursuit of a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.
The Imperial Army were not demolishing local governments and murdering people, they were simply chasing out Western imperialists and promoting regional economic union.
The reason this was a complete failure was that “union” - either political or economic - requires that the parties to that union actually want to be together. A shotgun wedding works as well as a shotgun economy.
Read more: Africa, prosperity and its ever-seeking unionAnd the eyes are always on us
Written by Gavin Chait
“One can't help thinking wistfully of our father's day, when the world hadn't grown so small. But one could move about in it without being watched so closely. Nowadays, we're treated like demented or delinquent children. And the eyes are always on us,” said Orson Welles in 1955.
Since then, much has happened. Technology has allowed free speech to spread as easily as the seasonal flu. It has also allowed governments to track individuals like never before. Despite this tracking, those who would do others harm seem to have little obstruction to causing that harm.
Read more: And the eyes are always on usPage 1 of 45
