whythawk ratings: measuring effective development

1.
(Comments)

... still be business as usual. I mentioned elsewhere a Gadget that displayed UN data about quality of life (among other things) it tells a very different story than the one you lay out above....

2.
(Comments)

...ishing growth in India and China. Walton, you are watching a miracle taking place right here, in our lifetimes. Hundreds of millions of people are working their way out of poverty without the help...

3. Of Chiefs and Presidents
(Analysis/Analysis)

... limit of presidential terms were removed from the constitution. Bongo was accused of wanting to become life president. Accusations of corruption have long been levelled against Bongo. Also in 2003, B...

4. Funding departments instead of people cheats everyone
(Analysis/Analysis)

The entire private hospital sector, including Netcare, Life and Medi-Clinic, is worth about R 63 billion a year. Yet this large number is only 4.6% of the total South African economy. State spendin

5. Jacob Zuma, Inflation Denialist?
(Analysis/Analysis)

...eally doing is purchasing future money. You are promising that you will use that money to improve your life and pay off your debts. If the promises people make about their future wealth don't c...

6. This festive season: the accumulating effects of individual activity
(Analysis/Analysis)

...e goods. There is the support of individual craftsmanship, high-quality originality, and ensuring that life doesn't become a mass of hum-drum sameness. Declaring that "hand-made" is mo...

7. Contradictions resolve in ways you don't intend
(Analysis/Analysis)

...eanours in between is ignorant. It is no more likely than waking up on your fortieth birthday, after a life of indolence and fatty foods, and completing the Comrades Marathon. The same is true of a ...

8. The spectre of loyalty over ability
(Analysis/Analysis)

...nt to independent private thought and action there are no jobs available for anyone who wants more from life than to be a mere robot. Mbeki is the most obvious proponent of the cult of sycophancy &nd...

9. Ending poverty means abandoning charity and accepting reality
(Analysis/Analysis)

... muscles. He has to do it himself. It will be hard and it will require that the wheelchair – the life of indolence – be abandoned. There is no bridge from paralysis to movement that does...

10. Scrogues Converse: Open-space, Identity and the Missing Web
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ou wish. A friend of mine - in her 50s - enjoys playing a teen vamp and picking up boys all over Second Life. But having all sorts of different identities doesn't mean that you shouldn't be ab...

11. Atlas Shrugged at 50
(Analysis/Analysis)

...e years, you have been asking: Who is John Galt? This is John Galt speaking. I am the man who loves his life. I am the man who does not sacrifice his love or his values. I am the man who has deprived ...

12. Zimbabwe: the Hollow State
(Analysis/Analysis)

...zens are in exile and working in the UK and South Africa 4 million people need food aid; the average life-expectancy of Zimbabweans is 37 for men, and 34 for women Official inflation is approac...

13. Science gone wrong: when self-delusion leads to death
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ot pushing in. And those self-same protestors at anti-globalisation gatherings have their pensions and lifesavings invested in those same companies they're protesting against. Pensions are &quot...

14. South Africa's two tiers
(Analysis/Analysis)

...costs of running a business. It can be debated endlessly as to whether these things result in a better life for all. What is beyond doubt is how much the informal and formal sectors have hardened in ...

15. The tragedy of innovation: how brilliant ideas are criminalised
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ative of Oxfam and Greenpeace, we discover who is behind this savage and deliberate policy of poisoning life on earth and destroying the environment. It is global organisations like the World Bank, a...

16. Suburbanise! How aid and trade obliterate unique cultures
(Analysis/Analysis)

...and seeing the wonderful diversity of self-expression; from music to food to architecture to fashion to lifestyle. I have always felt it would be a terrible shame if this diversity was reduced to tha...

17. The Golden Pen, Yahoo, and the worst country in the world to be a journalist
(Analysis/Analysis)

...st becoming accomplices in repression." Shi's mother then read a poem from her son: My whole life Will never get past “June” June, when my heart died When my poetry ...

18. The efficiency of markets and how protectionism leaves the poor behind
(Analysis/Analysis)

...hoice); or they can work the same and earn more (the US choice). In both cases, though, the quality of life and working environment improve to a degree never before experienced, except for the super-...

19. Melamine, China, and the peril for emerging markets
(Analysis/Analysis)

...essed-foods act of terrorism; they feed this stuff to their own people as well.  Their attitude to life is just different. I would suggest that a more measured, long-term, and sustainable respons...

20. Have you paid your car guard today?
(Analysis/Analysis)

...legislating against them? We all seem to choose the laws we will break based on how the law effects our lifestyle.  Smoking in public, not paying your TV licence, these are the laws the rich brea...

21. The Last King, the Centralised State, and Democracy
(Analysis/Analysis)

...w kind and compassionate a leader is, no matter how tolerant and sophisticated, they can never run your life as well and efficiently as you can.  They are not you. By insisting on negotiating on...

22. Rating to create a market; questions and answers
(Analysis/Analysis)

...hy should we take it for granted that the organisations themselves are any better? As in everything in life, we would expect a diversity of approaches and results; some outstanding and innovative, so...

23. Lies, damned lies, and curriculum vitae; or why ratings may be the future of education
(Analysis/Analysis)

...trusted and familiar brand; and they had rated your skill for the task at hand. Wouldn't that make life easier?...

24. The redistribution of poverty
(Analysis/Analysis)

... from a sick friend, you may have been coughed on in a public place by a total stranger, you may have a lifestyle that leads you into regular illness.  The former issues are unfortunate but you w...

25. "On your left is an Orc fighting a Troll" - travels in hyper-reality offer lessons for the poor
(Analysis/Analysis)

...xist. Synthravels specialises in leading new entrants through the vast online gaming worlds of Second Life and World of Warcraft.  This travel company proves that the number of ideas available ...

26. May I have the bill, please? A lesson in wilful ignorance ...
(Analysis/Analysis)

...re servers glide effortlessly past you as you wave your arms about like the nearly drowned attracting a life-guard.  Each a microcosm of business disregard for their patrons. “I wonder if ...

27. The ANC government of South Africa declares its comfort with violence and brutality
(Analysis/Analysis)

In 1964 Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela was imprisoned for life by the then Apartheid government in South Africa.  They moved rapidly to disband democracy movements in that country and imprison all the

28. The other losing battle: Africa's war on talent
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ical ((skills)) – then you’re probably working harder than you’ve ever worked in your life while earning well. In a recent international survey, the Corporate Executive Board polle...

29. Is the ownership of property at odds with the needs of the poor?
(Analysis/Analysis)

...d redistribution of these assets achieve? The most important inalienable property that you own is your life.  Your liberty is the freedom to use your life.  No other person, or group of peo...

30. Zackie Achmat, campaigner for HIV antiretrovirals, charged with genocide
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ut health professionals the world over are convinced that antiretrovirals can significantly prolong the life of HIV positive individuals.  Most people can live a long and normal life on the drugs...

31. No matter how hard you try bad environments lead to bad results
(Analysis/Analysis)

...se, and you weren’t prepared to go against the state, then you became a refugee and started a new life in a more accommodating place.  In other words, you changed your environment. Across ...

32. The end of wild seafood and the myth of "free"
(Analysis/Analysis)

There are very few things in life that are free: air, water, seafood … not free in the sense that you don’t pay for them (water out the tap, fresh fish in the markets) but the product its

33. The carnage on South Africa's roads
(Analysis/Analysis)

...year (based on previous figures).  This, at a total budget of R 50 million a year, means that each life saved costs the state R 185 000.  That would mean that saving everyone would cost arou...

34. The danger of wanting to believe in the power of good intentions
(Analysis/Analysis)

...purious feeling of "doing good" and ensure that any intervention in another human being's life really does produce tangible benefit for that person. Gifter.org may be wildly successful ...

35. Interpreting Emerging Market Risk Curves
(Static Content)

... Exporting Goods: the ease and cost with which goods can cross the border Wealthiest 20%: Quality of Life: the standard of living of the wealthiest, and the distribution of wealth beyond the politi...