Stationary Bandit

A Novel Approach to end Gang Crime

Basic economic theory suggests that if you raise the costs of engaging in an activity, then an individual will reduce the amount of the activity.  Wives and girlfriends of gang members in Colombia are applying this basic idea in an unconventional way to reduce gang activity.

Wives and girlfriends of gang members in one of Colombia's most violent cities have called a sex ban in a bid to get their men to give up the gun.  Dozens of women are said to be taking part in what is being called the "strike of crossed legs", a move backed by the mayor of Pereira.

Story here.

Can the Gates Foundations End Famines?

The Gates Foundation (with the Rockefeller Foundation) has begun a new initiative to reduce hunger and malnutrition in Africa.  Here is the story.  It is based on the Rockefeller Foundation supported Green Revolution.  The Gates Foundation will provide financial support for adoption of disease resistant seeds and better education.  This, they hope, will increase agricultural production.  It may very well work.  They also hope it will end famines.  The approach assumes that famines result from insufficient food supplies.  But, as Amartya Sen so eloquently argued in Poverty and Famines, this is not always the case.  Famines occur even when food is available.  Sen demonstrated that famines arise because the poor do not have the resources to purchase food because for a variety of reasons.  Furthermore, the program assumes that questions about governance do not matter.  The political leaders want to end hunger and not manipulate the food delivery system so hunger becomes a policy tool.  In many countries in sub-Saharan Africa, this is an open question.

Random Thoughts by Thomas Sowell

Thomas Sowell's randon thoughts column has long been one of favorite reads.  Here are few notable thoughts from his latest:

Some people are so busy being clever that they don't have time to be intelligent.

Increasing numbers of people seem to think that it is "name-calling" if you refer to someone as a liberal. There are no inherently negative connotations to the word "liberal." If it has acquired negative overtones, that is because of what liberals have done and the consequences that have followed.

Are Law Breakers Rational?

In general, I believe that criminals act rationally.  They weigh the expected costs and benefits of their actions and do what they think is best.  But sometimes, I come across some evidence that makes me rethink their rationality.

A bungling German thief stole a pair of shoes in two different sizes and was caught when he went back to the shop to fix his mistake -- decked out in the very clothes he had stolen, authorities said Friday.

Police in the western city of Bielefeld said the shop owner recognized the 20-year-old shoplifter because the white shoes and sports jacket he wore were available only in his shop, and had been stolen just two days earlier.

Story here.

Housing in Zimbabwe

Not surprisingly, the government of Zimbabwe has not built homes for those individuals who were destroyed by the government last year.

Amnesty International today condemned the Zimbabwean government's much publicised housing programme set up ostensibly to help the victims of Operation Murambatsvina, a programme of mass forced evictions which left hundreds of thousands homeless.

Operation Garikai/Hlalani Kuhle (Better Life) was launched in June 2005, with the government claiming that it would provide better housing to those who lost homes during Operation Murambatsvina.

One year after the mass forced evictions, Amnesty International returned to Zimbabwe to investigate what, if any, action had been taken by the Zimbabwean government to restore the human rights of the hundreds of thousands of victims of Operation Murambatsvina.

Story here.

Civilizing Effects of Commerce

Can commerce mitigate the effects of ethnic tensions?  Classical liberals in the 17th and 18th centuries argued it could.  Now, this old hypothesis is being tried in Rwanda.

Coffee is being used in Rwanda to relaunch the economy as well as heal old wounds following the genocide.  The Rwandan government is encouraging the creation of coffee plantations where people from both sides of the ethnic divide work together.  This daily contact is seen as a means of speeding up reconciliation by fostering relationships and building communities.

Story here.

The Times They are A-Changin

China's economic transformation appears to have caused changes in the education system.

When high school students in Shanghai crack their history textbooks this fall they may be in for a surprise. The new standard world history text drops wars, dynasties and Communist revolutions in favor of colorful tutorials on economics, technology, social customs and globalization.

Socialism has been reduced to a single, short chapter in the senior high school history course. Chinese Communism before the economic reform that began in 1979 is covered in a sentence. The text mentions Mao only once — in a chapter on etiquette.

Story here.