whythawk ratings: measuring effective development

1.
(Comments)

...s and how and what happens to the excess. Even sitting in the US I cannot get health insurance at any price, and was $15,000 a year when I could (just for me). Though I live better than 99% of the ...

2.
(Comments)

... an evolving theory. I wouldn\'t go to Wikipedia for a current answer. Most of what I\'m discussing is price theory; in which, should politicians choose to do so, they can price things that are impo...

3. Overcoming the Conservation of Energy
(Analysis/Analysis)

...num producers have been frustrated by their inability to up production to take advantage of the platinum price's stellar $1,900/oz. Private hospital administrators are in a similar fix. There is...

4. The hazard of market dominance
(Analysis/Analysis)

...nteeism or other unexpected acts, it can cause bankruptcy. The only way to make up that loss is through price rises. Small problems can become large corrections. Prices are set on the margins, rath...

5. When no-one is held accountable, everyone suffers
(Analysis/Analysis)

In November 2007, Tiger Brands was fined R 98.8 million for collusion in fixing the price of bread. This was only 5.7% of their revenue; other manufacturers – who didn't fez up in time - fa

6. Netscape, the Internet and Creative Destruction
(Analysis/Analysis)

...995, when Netscape Communications listed on the Nasdaq technology exchange in New York. The shares were priced at a rather optimistic $28 each. Within minutes of the listing the shares shot up to $7...

7. Electricity Redux - Electricity Quotas Will Work About As Well As Race Quotas
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ased the right to sell electricity to Californians were constrained in a very unusual way. Their retail price was capped at 6.7 US cents per kilowatt hour, but – should any shortfall arise &nda...

8. Of Chiefs and Presidents
(Analysis/Analysis)

...e has been urged on by his supporters to continue ruling the country. This, coupled with increasing fuel prices, sparked massive demonstrations in Cameroon, leading to the deaths of over one hundred p...

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

...t well? Secondly, it is quite clear that, while state services may appear free, they are in reality overpriced rubbish. It is time to recognise that the state is quite incapable of running any servi...

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

...ir savings as their money becomes worthless in their hands. Another way is to raise interest rates; the price attached to borrowing future money. Our Reserve Bank has raised interest rates by 4% ove...

11. Higher food prices mean downgrading that Turkey to a Chicken
(Analysis/Analysis)

Food prices our outrageous. But you didn't need me to tell you that. According to Stats SA the current inflation rate for vegetables is now 25.6%, and that of grain products – a staple for

12. The Speculator: Pricing in the Future
(Analysis/Analysis)

Hands up if you drive your car to queue up and fill your tank on the night before a petrol price increase? Congratulations, you're a hedge-fund trader. Depending on the circumstances, you could

13. Searching for objective measures of value
(Analysis/Analysis)

...;s economy. It was complex. Gold was fixed at $35 / ounce and all other currencies were pegged to that price via the US dollar.  The US became the reserve currency of the world. The problems f...

14. Perlemoen and the Tragedy of the Commons
(Analysis/Analysis)

...quickly as possible before anyone else did. Modern free markets have a solution to such shortages. The price goes up. Medieval commons had no such mechanism. Everyone owned the right to graze, and...

15. Slaves to land, the policies of Land Affairs
(Analysis/Analysis)

...sant farmers who are now indefinitely tied to their land. Land does not confer wealth creation. House prices have risen steadily over the past decade but not as a consequence of simply being houses...

16. The Miracle of Investment
(Analysis/Analysis)

...No, it isn't being discussed. But it has happened elsewhere. The government declared that medicine prices were too high and fixed them. Marginal pharmacies went out of business, new investment ...

17. Killing the Golden Goose, a lesson in Economic Freedom
(Analysis/Analysis)

...vincing her that this isn't necessary. The result is that consumers lose. Without free competition prices are fixed artificially higher than they would otherwise be. One argument against free m...

18. China, Toys And The Tragedy of Xenophobia
(Analysis/Analysis)

... the world's largest toymaker, has recalled more than 20 million of their products, including Fisher Price and Barbie. The cause? Toys with paint containing too high a lead content and poorly at...

19. Investment cannot happen if the market isn't private
(Analysis/Analysis)

Imagine that government decides that coastal property prices are sky-high and that the reason is that Jo'burgers are driving up prices. It seems logical. Jo'burgers earn greater salaries tha

20. Black Economic Empowerment, like charity, is not investment
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ich should have gone into capacity building has gone into empowerment.” He pointed out that rising prices at the till have a lot to do with production shortages.  Companies should have been...

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

...horror to more horror Since then the following has happened: Mugabe unilaterally declared that all prices must be halved; the immediate run on goods emptied stores and transferred all goods to t...

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

...s, vacuum cleaners and industrial processes. Ever increasing efficiency speeds up processes and lowers prices. Certainly, there are executives who are corrupt, just as there are corrupt politicians ...

23. Zimbabwe: recovering the irrecoverable
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ts at their word. Over 1 300 business owners have been arrested across Zimbabwe. Their crime? Raising prices. For the past decade Robert Mugabe has accepted every tenet of the anti-globalist anti-...

24. The war of informal markets against central states; a bellwether of support
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ower. The recent crackdown by Zimbabwean troops to enforce their government's decision to halve all prices (in effect, to revalue the Zimbabwe Dollar) is part of that war. Sadly for Mugabe, thos...

25. Getting Home in Zimbabwe: The impossibility of public transport
(Analysis/Analysis)

... of a taxi-ride home from work in Harare will have doubled. Zimbabwe, which continues to subsidise fuel prices, has had fuel shortages for the past seven years. A shortage of foreign currency has dra...

26. Dave Bullard and Graham Knox: "We can't walk on water so why not try wine?"
(Analysis/Analysis)

...This leads to decision-making by farmers rather than by marketers and so they are driven by the ethos of price only. Other countries are better constituted to adopt a price strategy; they have long f...

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

... In conversation with Stewart Cohen, one of the founders of the South African clothing retail chain, Mr Price, he describes where they started in 1985. "We couldn't afford our own stores bac...

28. Guess which South African cellular company offers the best contract tariffs?
(Analysis/Analysis)

... of calls are made to other networks, while (for Cell C and Virgin) 80% of calls are made to others. The prices below include "free" phones for all except Virgin. The phones themselves may v...

29. Sarkozy's French Election: when elephants fight only the grass gets trampled
(Analysis/Analysis)

... When a country promises massive benefits to its citizens, or to its major corporations, that raises the prices of the goods that are produced in that country.  Raise minimum wage and the cost ge...

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

...are you willing to pay more for appropriately certified products; or do you wish to sacrifice safety for price? Don’t blame China – they just sold you what you wanted.  Caveat emptor....

31. Unlearning helplessness: how donors reinforce poverty and dependency
(Analysis/Analysis)

...oduct, dilute it and repackage it in smaller quantities and then sell it on under your name at twice the price of what consumers should be paying. This regularly happens with everything from sugar, t...

32. What market is worth R 100 billion a year and is growing at 10.9%?
(Analysis/Analysis)

...rket to radically alter your business environment?  What happens when your competitors reduce their prices – not by 5% or 10% - but by 50 times? Unlocking the Fortune at the Bottom of the...

33. Leveraging your good name; the power of a positive credit rating
(Analysis/Analysis)

...rwise get if you were an unknown.   Ratings act to improve competitiveness since companies usually price in a typical default rate for their industries into the products they sell.  If it i...

34. From Linux to Mozilla: donations mean that open-source isn't really free
(Analysis/Analysis)

...s to information, they would be able to supply ITC with a better quality of product at a better range of prices. Intermediaries under-paid farmers, mixed the soya beans together in a jumble of low an...

35. The US$ 5 trillion market at the bottom of the pyramid
(Analysis/Analysis)

...” says Prahalad, “but you have to completely rethink your strategy to get a 50x reduction in price.” It is essential to build new strategic capital and disruptive business models.&n...

36. Aggregation and collaboration: a guide to making money and doing good in poor nations
(Analysis/Analysis)

... Moola, the MxIt currency, where R 100 buys 200 Moola points.  One point for one message.  The price has triggered an explosion of messaging where MxIt’s 2 million subscribers send 5 m...

37. Joost minds the baby: what happens to state control when technology passes them by?
(Analysis/Analysis)

...e-based communications are already used in lieu of local telephone exchanges across Africa.  As the price for these services comes down it gets easier and easier to use the new online services. ...

38. The redistribution of poverty
(Analysis/Analysis)

... government declares – in an effort to cut the cost of basic foods to urban poor – that food prices are fixed at below their production cost, then farmers will stop farming to take advanta...

39. We're from Mars and we want to help: four lessons in development
(Analysis/Analysis)

... governments irrespective of their poor governance or state-led control of their economies; iv) and that prices be "stabilised" by price fixing. In other words they are denying developing n...

40. World Cup 2010 asks for big sacrifices from the poor
(Analysis/Analysis)

...e serious wealth destruction. The economy has seen tremendous increases in property values as investors price in potential gains from tourism.  The future value to the economy has already been p...

41. Coffee, the miracle of poverty, and other wonders
(Analysis/Analysis)

Coffee has become a symbolic flashpoint for consumer and civil-society action.  Oxfam believes the price is too low and demands that consumers pay more through their Fair Trade scheme.  All

42. So how exactly do you invest in the Fortune At The Bottom Of The Pyramid?
(Analysis/Analysis)

...uppliers, employees or customers.  In formal markets there is a wealth of data on product movement, price changes, legislative challenges and all sorts of other data.  Many developing countr...

43. Should charitable organisations be allowed to compete with businesses?
(Analysis/Analysis)

...sewing training selling its students stock against past graduates of its school.  But at much lower prices, since the fabric, sewing machines and infrastructure are sponsored and the profits aren...

44. What do toilet paper and state monopolies have in common?
(Analysis/Analysis)

...nbsp; CEO Tom Glocer said his company was reluctant to do the same in SA because of Telkom’s high prices and poor bandwidth. This is the real cost of state monopolies.  Not only isn&rsquo...

45. Africa falling ever further behind, says UN
(Analysis/Analysis)

...e in inflation owing to food shortages, currency depreciation and/or stronger pass-through of higher oil prices to producers and consumers." There is much that can be done.  Inefficient sta...

46. Rating Copyright and Terms of Use
(FAQs/Rating FAQs)

...ndation to use or support any development organisation. Ratings do not comment on the adequacy of market price, the suitability of any organisation for a particular client, or the tax exempt nature or...

47. Does the new Apple iPhone cause poverty?
(Analysis/Analysis)

...llular technology has allowed sophisticated banking services to be offered in developing countries at a price that the poor can afford.  MTN Banking, in South Africa, replaces a physical bank w...

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

...ip gave it an astonishing advantage.  The ((Common Agricultural Policy)) dramatically increased the prices of its agricultural products and gave them free access to mainland Europe.  It also...

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

...f developing countries who lack the navies to protect them.  Carbon credits are an attempt to put a price on pollution. Yet any attempt to place a value on fresh water, clean air or available se...

50. X Challenge: Develop the cheapest most effective school
(Analysis/Analysis)

...t carriers managed this miracle?  The simple expedient of having a wide range of competition lowers prices.  More importantly, though, budget airlines simply keep their planes in the air for...