Results for “africa” 1238 found
The best sentence I read today
Mark [Lutter] has a PhD in Economics from George Mason, but don’t let that fool you into thinking he’s conventional.
Here is the full bit:
Mark Lutter (29) and Tamara Winter (23), United States
Mark and Tamara are building charter cities — a concept where cities are governed by their own charter rather than general law. Imagine a world with dozens of new cities, each with their own distinct style, governance and populace. Mark and Tamara are working to make that vibrant future a reality.Noteworthy: Mark has a PhD in Economics from George Mason, but don’t let that fool you into thinking he’s conventional. He’s a disagreeable, life-long adventurer. He decided to do his own thing after questioning the profit share in his previous company. He moved to Honduras while it was the murder capital of the world. Now he’s stumbling through Africa looking for city settlers.
They are part of the third cohort of Pioneer winners, congrats to Justin Zheng too and all the others, read through the list for some fascinating ideas and projects to come. Tamara is a Mercatus alum, follow her here on Twitter, here is Mark. Here is their institutional website. Here is various information about Pioneer — apply!
Monday assorted links
1. Rabat will have Africa’s tallest building.
3. 1970 Thomas Schelling syllabus and exam.
4. The return of Trieste to prominence?
5. Speculator-chosen immigrants.
6. Good review of Us, a movie masterpiece (the link is full of spoilers).
Monday assorted links
1. Amplifunds: “Donate to portfolios curated by expert grantmakers and amplify your impact.”
2. Do you want to live next door to The Flintstones? And would you sue them?
3. Those new service sector jobs: “Deciding whether to have kids has never been more complex. Enter parenthood-indecision therapists.”
4. Are Republicans now more anti-tech than the Dems?
6. Race biases in student evaluations in South Africa? Do also read the comments.
Tuesday assorted links
Solve for the New York equilibrium
Black lawmakers and activists are blocking a push to legalize recreational marijuana in New York, warning that Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s proposal could perpetuate the racial inequality that it purports to fight.
The lawmakers — including some of legalization’s most vocal supporters — say that unless people of color are guaranteed a share of the potentially $3 billion industry, in the form of job training, adult education and licenses in the industry itself, there may be no legalization this year.
The third cohort of Emergent Ventures recipients
As always, note that the descriptions are mine and reflect my priorities, as the self-descriptions of the applicants may be broader or slightly different. Here goes:
Jordan Schneider, for newsletter and podcast and writing work “explaining the rise of Chinese tech and its global ramifications.”
Michelle Rorich, for her work in economic development and Africa, to be furthered by a bike trip Cairo to Capetown.
Craig Palsson, Market Power, a new YouTube channel for economics.
Jeffrey C. Huber, to write a book on tech and economic progress from a Christian point of view.
Mayowa Osibodu, building AI programs to preserve endangered languages.
David Forscey, travel grant to look into issues and careers surrounding protection against election fraud.
Jennifer Doleac, Texas A&M, to develop an evidence-based law and economics, crime and punishment podcast.
Fergus McCullough, University of St. Andrews, travel grant to help build a career in law/history/politics/public affairs.
Justin Zheng, a high school student working on biometrics for cryptocurrency.
Matthew Teichman at the University of Chicago, for his work in philosophy podcasting.
Kyle Eschen, comedian and magician and entertainer, to work on an initiative for the concept of “steelmanning” arguments.
Here is the first cohort of winners, and here is the second cohort. Here is the underlying philosophy behind Emergent Ventures. Note by the way, if you received an award very recently, you have not been forgotten but rather will show up in the fourth cohort.
Saturday assorted links
1. The old blogosphere vs. current social media. (He should have blogged it, however.)
2. The Singapore chewing gum ban.
3. Training teachers how to shoot.
4. Hidden insults in an on-line Taiwanese game?
5. The golden age of the piano is now.
6. Ethiopia’s coffee ritual is being exported to China and Japan.
Saturday assorted links
1. New Megan McArdle kitchen cookery blog.
2. History of Singapore in ten dishes. Laksa included.
3. How Kodak accidentally discovered the A-bomb tests.
4. Greta Thunberg. And her FT profile.
5. Teaching in English in emerging economies — good or bad? (The Economist)
6. How Africa is creating welfare states (The Economist).
Reducing Discrimination with More Information
From Cui, Li and Zhang:
We conduct four randomized field experiments among 1,801 hosts on Airbnb by creating fictitious guest accounts and sending accommodation requests to them. We find that requests from guests with African American-sounding names are 19.2 percentage points less likely to be accepted than those with white-sounding names. However, a positive review posted on a guest’s page significantly reduces discrimination: When guest accounts receive a positive review, the acceptance rates of guest accounts with white-sounding and African American-sounding names are statistically indistinguishable.
In other words, taste based discrimination is weak but statistical discrimination is common. Statistical discrimination happens when legitimate demands for trust are frustrated by too little information. Statistical discrimination is a second-best solution to a problem of trust that both owners/sellers/employers and renters/buyers/workers want to solve. Unfortunately, many people try to solve statistical discrimination problems as if they were problems of invidious prejudice.
If you think the problem is invidious prejudice, it’s natural to try to punish and prevent with penalties and bans. Information bans and penalties, however, often have negative and unintended consequences. Airbnb, for example, chose to hide guest photos until after the booking. But this doesn’t address the real demands of owners for trust. As a result, owners may start to discriminate based on other cues such as names. Instead market designers and regulators should approach issues of discrimination by looking for ways to increase mutually profitable exchanges. From this perspective, providing more information is often the better approach. As Cui, Li, and Zhang write in a HBR op-ed:
Our recommendation is for the platform companies to build a credible, easy-to-use online reputation and communication system. Bringing information to light, rather than trying to hide it from users, is more likely to be a successful approach to tackling discrimination in the sharing economy.
Addendum: See also Tyler and I in The End of Asymmetric Information. We need to work with information abundance rather than try to push against the tide.
Thursday assorted links
2. Refugees in Denmark do much better in Copenhagen.
3. Carbon capture update (NYT, good piece).
4. Is Africa converting China?
5. “Royalties on 1983 Finance Classic ‘Trading Places’ Go Up for Bid.” “If it holds until the auction closes Wednesday, the current winning bid of $74,700 would obtain a producer’s share of the residuals generated by television rebroadcasts and streaming, worth $7,988 last year(…)”
Monday assorted links
1. “…the relatively recent increasing gender parity in association presidents of ASA and PAA but not AEA.” and “…socialization at home can explain a non-trivial part of the observed gender disparities in mathematics performance…”
2. Scott Sumner thinks about economic growth.
4. “Mr. [Robert] Ryman was perhaps peculiarly American in being an autodidact who never took a single art course. His art education consisted of seven years as a guard at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.” (NYT, and RIP)
Nigeria fact of the day
Last year more people were killed in clashes over land between farmers and cattle-herders than were slain by Boko Haram.
By the way:
On February 16th Nigerians will go to the polls in the largest democratic event in African history.
And:
In total Mr Buhari has delivered on just seven of the 222 pledges he made as a candidate, according to the Centre for Democracy and Development, a Nigerian think-tank.
Here is The Economist article.
Friday assorted links
Wednesday assorted links
1. Robert Wiblin podcast with Martin Gurri. And Russ Roberts podcast with Patrick Collison.
2. Addis Ababa airport triples its size. The article complains about amenities in the airport, but let me tell you the place has good spicy food. And can a Dutchman patent teff?
3. The golden age of Hollywood tax avoidance.
4. Ross Douthat on the Trump doctrine (NYT).
Latino approval of Donald Trump
From a recent NPR/PBS poll:
African-American approval: 11%
White approval: 40%
Latino approval: 50%
I thank an MR reader for the pointer.