Why happy couples cheat? Esther Perel
Why we love, why we cheat? Helen Fisher
Saturday, 29 August 2015
Friday, 28 August 2015
The Elite Opt-out - 'Government officials should send their children to government schools'
Manish Sabharwal in The Indian Express
Earlier this month, the Allahabad High Court gave the state chief secretary till the next academic session to require anybody drawing a government salary to send their children to only government schools. The order also specified that the promotions and increments of violators should be deferred, and required that any fees paid to private schools by government servants be deducted from their salary and paid into the state treasury. The judge felt this extreme step was the only way to improve government schools. Is this judgment absurd or wonderful common sense?
This judgment pulls me in two different directions because of who I am (son of government servants who sent me to a private school) and what I do (our company hires only 5 per cent of the children who come to us for a job because their schools let them down). Who I am believes this judgment is absurdity. What I do believes it is wonderful common sense. Why this divergence?
The first reaction is because this judgment violates the fundamental rights of all children of government employees by limiting where they can go to school based on their parents’ profession. I know my professional progress is a child of my private school education; I would not be where I am if I had been forced into a government school in Uttar Pradesh (where my parents are from) or in Jammu and Kashmir (where my parents worked). It’s also unfair to hold every present government servant accountable for the actions and outcomes of a small number of past and present education department bureaucrats. It hardly seems fair that the judgment should not be applied to past politicians who have grossly distorted government school-teacher recruiting, compensation and performance management, or past judges whose judgments have distorted the governance of educational institutions. The problem with holding the current government-employee cohort accountable for school outcomes is the long shadow cast by education policy decisions, where toxic effects show up only after a decade.
But my second reaction is rooted in a recognition of human nature. Wouldn’t Employee’s State Insurance hospitals improve if we forced government servants to use them and abolished their exclusive Central Government Health Scheme? Wouldn’t EPFO reform have happened years ago if every government servant was forced to deal with the organisation for their pensions? Wouldn’t ministers standing in line for security and boarding at airports have forced security forces to reduce lines by junking the meaningless stamping, and checking of stamping, of hand baggage tags and boarding cards? Wouldn’t there have been more urgency for power reforms if distribution companies were prohibited from creating VIP areas where power is uninterrupted? Wouldn’t we have better urban planning, housing and public transport if government servants were not given houses and cars and all their benefits were monetised instead?
Given India’s poor service-delivery outcomes; it’s certainly a tantalising possibility to subject government servants to the consequences of their actions. This judgment is obviously the product of an interesting mind — Justice Sudhir Agarwal — but it is also a child of broader trends in society and merely reflects the rising aspirations and expectations of millions of Indians. India’s poor and youth are no longer willing to be held hostage to poor government provision. They recognise that “elite opt-out” accelerates the decline of the public system because powerful and loud voices don’t care. My parents retired to Kanpur, where the fastest growing industries are private bottled water, private security, private generators, private healthcare and private schools; the poor in UP are buying what should be public goods because their rights as consumers are greater than their rights as citizens. India is reaching the point where government sins of commission (what it does wrong) are not as toxic as government sins of omission (what it does not do). Alexander Hamilton wrote that the courts are the weakest of the three branches of government because they control neither sword nor purse. India’s courts cannot sustainably fix public service-delivery. Government schools can only be fixed by politicians obsessed with execution, not inputs.
The execution problem goes beyond schools. The Indian state has been designed for less complexity, scale and accountability than it faces. Going forward, the state must do fewer things, but do them well. It must retreat where the market works but act muscularly where the market fails. It must separate its role as policymaker, regulator and service-provider in all areas. It must create the hope of rising and fear of failing for the permanent generalist civil service and supplement them with specialist lateral entry. Fixing government schools is crucial to economic democracy; I work for a company that has hired somebody every five minutes for the last five years, but only hired five per cent of job applicants. You can’t teach kids in one year of vocational training at the exit gate of K-12 education what they should have learnt in the 12 years of school. An unskilled or unemployed Indian is not a free Indian. So — with all the hypocrisy of somebody whose turn for a government school education under this judgment is past — I hope the wonderful common sense that this judgment represents is upheld.
Earlier this month, the Allahabad High Court gave the state chief secretary till the next academic session to require anybody drawing a government salary to send their children to only government schools. The order also specified that the promotions and increments of violators should be deferred, and required that any fees paid to private schools by government servants be deducted from their salary and paid into the state treasury. The judge felt this extreme step was the only way to improve government schools. Is this judgment absurd or wonderful common sense?
This judgment pulls me in two different directions because of who I am (son of government servants who sent me to a private school) and what I do (our company hires only 5 per cent of the children who come to us for a job because their schools let them down). Who I am believes this judgment is absurdity. What I do believes it is wonderful common sense. Why this divergence?
The first reaction is because this judgment violates the fundamental rights of all children of government employees by limiting where they can go to school based on their parents’ profession. I know my professional progress is a child of my private school education; I would not be where I am if I had been forced into a government school in Uttar Pradesh (where my parents are from) or in Jammu and Kashmir (where my parents worked). It’s also unfair to hold every present government servant accountable for the actions and outcomes of a small number of past and present education department bureaucrats. It hardly seems fair that the judgment should not be applied to past politicians who have grossly distorted government school-teacher recruiting, compensation and performance management, or past judges whose judgments have distorted the governance of educational institutions. The problem with holding the current government-employee cohort accountable for school outcomes is the long shadow cast by education policy decisions, where toxic effects show up only after a decade.
But my second reaction is rooted in a recognition of human nature. Wouldn’t Employee’s State Insurance hospitals improve if we forced government servants to use them and abolished their exclusive Central Government Health Scheme? Wouldn’t EPFO reform have happened years ago if every government servant was forced to deal with the organisation for their pensions? Wouldn’t ministers standing in line for security and boarding at airports have forced security forces to reduce lines by junking the meaningless stamping, and checking of stamping, of hand baggage tags and boarding cards? Wouldn’t there have been more urgency for power reforms if distribution companies were prohibited from creating VIP areas where power is uninterrupted? Wouldn’t we have better urban planning, housing and public transport if government servants were not given houses and cars and all their benefits were monetised instead?
Given India’s poor service-delivery outcomes; it’s certainly a tantalising possibility to subject government servants to the consequences of their actions. This judgment is obviously the product of an interesting mind — Justice Sudhir Agarwal — but it is also a child of broader trends in society and merely reflects the rising aspirations and expectations of millions of Indians. India’s poor and youth are no longer willing to be held hostage to poor government provision. They recognise that “elite opt-out” accelerates the decline of the public system because powerful and loud voices don’t care. My parents retired to Kanpur, where the fastest growing industries are private bottled water, private security, private generators, private healthcare and private schools; the poor in UP are buying what should be public goods because their rights as consumers are greater than their rights as citizens. India is reaching the point where government sins of commission (what it does wrong) are not as toxic as government sins of omission (what it does not do). Alexander Hamilton wrote that the courts are the weakest of the three branches of government because they control neither sword nor purse. India’s courts cannot sustainably fix public service-delivery. Government schools can only be fixed by politicians obsessed with execution, not inputs.
The execution problem goes beyond schools. The Indian state has been designed for less complexity, scale and accountability than it faces. Going forward, the state must do fewer things, but do them well. It must retreat where the market works but act muscularly where the market fails. It must separate its role as policymaker, regulator and service-provider in all areas. It must create the hope of rising and fear of failing for the permanent generalist civil service and supplement them with specialist lateral entry. Fixing government schools is crucial to economic democracy; I work for a company that has hired somebody every five minutes for the last five years, but only hired five per cent of job applicants. You can’t teach kids in one year of vocational training at the exit gate of K-12 education what they should have learnt in the 12 years of school. An unskilled or unemployed Indian is not a free Indian. So — with all the hypocrisy of somebody whose turn for a government school education under this judgment is past — I hope the wonderful common sense that this judgment represents is upheld.
Financial markets are not free – they're one of the last bastions of socialism
Larry Elliot in The Guardian
You can’t buck the market, Margaret Thatcher once said, but the world’s policymakers have been giving it their best shot. Photograph: PA/PA
You can’t buck the market, so said Margaret Thatcher back in the late 1980s. Maybe you can’t, but the world’s policymakers are giving it their best shot.
Let’s just consider the context. During August there was a big sell-off in shares amid concerns that the Chinese economy was in trouble. The declines, however, followed a long bull market in which prices were supported by the quantitative easing programmes pursued by central banks rather than by underlying economic strength. A true believer in free markets would have seen the recent sell-off as both inevitable and healthy.
But financial markets are by no means free. They are, on the contrary, one of the last bastions of socialism left on earth. Everything possible is done to boost asset prices and when overstimulation leads to bubbles bursting it is all hands to the pump to prevent them from falling too far.
So, in the last couple of days we have seen the chief economist of the European Central Bank musing openly about the possibility of additional QE. We have had the president of the New York Federal Reserve dropping the biggest possible hint that an interest rate rise will be delayed. And we have had the authorities in Beijing buying up shares on the Shanghai stock market.
And guess what? It has worked. Shares have been going up around the world because investors have been given guarantees that they will be protected from the consequences of their own folly. Despite the upward revision to US growth figures, all that Wall Street needs to do to prevent a Fed rate rise is to have another flash crash between now and mid-September. The Fed will then back off. If things get really bad, it will need to consider a fourth dose of QE. Yes, really.
George Saravelos, of Deutsche Bank, says there is a reason western central banks, starting with the ECB and the Bank of Japan, might need to again resort to the electronic printing presses: China’s use of its foreign exchange reserves to defend the external value of the yuan.
Effectively, China has been selling a chunk of its holdings of foreign bonds, such as US Treasuries. QE involves buying bonds, so what the People’s Bank of China has been doing is QE in reverse or, as Saravelos puts it, quantitative tightening or QT.
Ostensibly, QT has always been part of the plan. When central banks embarked on their asset-buying programmes, the intention was that they would be sold back to the markets when things had returned to normal. The problem is that things have never returned to normal and, judging by recent events, never will.
Zero interest rates were supposed to be temporary. They are now the norm. QE was an unconventional measure for use in an emergency only. It is here to stay, albeit subject to the law of diminishing returns.
Clearly then, you can buck the market. Corrections can be delayed and halted, even reversed, by determined policy action. But, as the history of bubbles from Dutch tulips to subprime mortgages has shown, only for a while. In the long run, Mrs T was right.
You can’t buck the market, so said Margaret Thatcher back in the late 1980s. Maybe you can’t, but the world’s policymakers are giving it their best shot.
Let’s just consider the context. During August there was a big sell-off in shares amid concerns that the Chinese economy was in trouble. The declines, however, followed a long bull market in which prices were supported by the quantitative easing programmes pursued by central banks rather than by underlying economic strength. A true believer in free markets would have seen the recent sell-off as both inevitable and healthy.
But financial markets are by no means free. They are, on the contrary, one of the last bastions of socialism left on earth. Everything possible is done to boost asset prices and when overstimulation leads to bubbles bursting it is all hands to the pump to prevent them from falling too far.
So, in the last couple of days we have seen the chief economist of the European Central Bank musing openly about the possibility of additional QE. We have had the president of the New York Federal Reserve dropping the biggest possible hint that an interest rate rise will be delayed. And we have had the authorities in Beijing buying up shares on the Shanghai stock market.
And guess what? It has worked. Shares have been going up around the world because investors have been given guarantees that they will be protected from the consequences of their own folly. Despite the upward revision to US growth figures, all that Wall Street needs to do to prevent a Fed rate rise is to have another flash crash between now and mid-September. The Fed will then back off. If things get really bad, it will need to consider a fourth dose of QE. Yes, really.
George Saravelos, of Deutsche Bank, says there is a reason western central banks, starting with the ECB and the Bank of Japan, might need to again resort to the electronic printing presses: China’s use of its foreign exchange reserves to defend the external value of the yuan.
Effectively, China has been selling a chunk of its holdings of foreign bonds, such as US Treasuries. QE involves buying bonds, so what the People’s Bank of China has been doing is QE in reverse or, as Saravelos puts it, quantitative tightening or QT.
Ostensibly, QT has always been part of the plan. When central banks embarked on their asset-buying programmes, the intention was that they would be sold back to the markets when things had returned to normal. The problem is that things have never returned to normal and, judging by recent events, never will.
Zero interest rates were supposed to be temporary. They are now the norm. QE was an unconventional measure for use in an emergency only. It is here to stay, albeit subject to the law of diminishing returns.
Clearly then, you can buck the market. Corrections can be delayed and halted, even reversed, by determined policy action. But, as the history of bubbles from Dutch tulips to subprime mortgages has shown, only for a while. In the long run, Mrs T was right.
Thursday, 27 August 2015
Herath's cold summer at Staffs
Scott Oliver in Cricinfo
The United Nations is yet to release the definitive figures on this matter, but there cannot be many countries with a higher per capita average of hours spent smiling each day than Sri Lanka. At the risk of ethnic stereotyping, they are a happy bunch. Not Rangana Herath, though, at least not when he's bowling. At least not when I was fielding to his bowling.
If you were to manufacture a range of international-cricketer teddy bears, Herath Mudiyanselage Rangana Keerthi Bandara Herath would surely be the biggest seller. But don't let those cartoonishly cute and pudgy contours fool you. Herath's on-field manner is that of a prickly, pernickety upcountry bureaucrat, who, for his own barely acknowledged pleasure, is going to keep you occupied for hours doing something of little consequence. Just business, see.
This air of sternness frequently escalated into a full-fledged scowl during his sole, truncated North Staffordshire and South Cheshire League campaign for Moddershall in 2009, when a combination of lacerating Atlantic winds, green pitches and abysmal close catching left him with the unflattering statistics of 112-27-333-14 from eight league outings. That's an average of 23.79. To put that into context, his current Test bowling average in his homeland stands at24.86.
As with his eventual emergence from the shadow of Muttiah Muralitharan to be Sri Lanka's strike spinner, Ranga had fairly big boots to fill. He had been signed to replace South Africa's Imran Tahir - 80 wickets at 11 in our title-winning campaign the previous summer - and if you were to ask the club's ultras which of the two would go on to become the world's second-ranked Test bowler, it would have been a no-brainer: Tahir went through sides like a cheap samosa, Herath like porridge.
But then, the logic behind the signing was a little counter-intuitively tilted towards batting prowess. Rigorous online scorecard perusal duly threw up a recent 88 not out for Sri Lanka A in a 50-over game in Benoni against South Africa A, coming in at 94 for 6 and seeing them past the victory target a further 200 runs ahead. Box ticked, although subsequent first-hand evidence revealed a biffer with three main shots in his repertoire: pull, sweep, slog (and hybrid forms of those strokes). The posh side was only really used for leading edges.
Said research also disclosed that he had a carrom ball, a fact gleefully divulged to the local media, as was a list of Herath's high-profile victims, all incorporated into an artfully casual observation-cum-de facto press release designed to tweak the fret glands of the league's batsmen: "Anyone who's got Trescothick, Chanderpaul, Ponting, Kallis, Inzamam and Steve Waugh out has to be able to bowl a bit, so the club's delighted with the signing, particularly if the long-range forecasts for a hot, dry summer are correct."
Neither the weather nor the performance forecasts proved accurate, sadly, although clearly he could "bowl a bit". That said, we didn't want Herath to bowl so well that he would be picked up by a county (as Tahir had been the previous July by Hampshire, where he was retained for 2009) or picked by his country, for whom he had played the most recent of his then 14 Teststhe previous December, taking 1 for 115 against Bangladesh, which was, I suppose, both a good and bad omen.
Herath took 2 for 92 on debut, followed by 2 for 71. He bagged his solitary five-for the following week in a low-scoring win on a sticky dog, and just five more scalps over the next four weeks. His only game on a dustbowl turned out to be his final game, in which the wiles of former England batsman Kim Barnett, aged 48, (dropped second ball by yours truly) held him at bay, although Barnett did adjudge Herath the third best spinner he'd faced, after Warne and Muralitharan.
Where the plumbers, plasterers, policemen and pot-washers of North Staffs had succeeded against Herath, the Pakistani batsmen of 2009 failed miserably © AFP
While I remained confident he'd eventually come good should the summer ever arrive, we had expected a whole lot more. Alas, it was a tale of moist pitches and missed chances. The tracks were just too green and greasy, rendering his carrom ball the proverbial ashtray on a motorbike. Indeed, his subtle variations were so subtle, it seemed that they no longer really counted as variations. Rather, the batsmen didn't perceive them as variations, which was problematic since the whole point was to get them to see things that weren't there as though they were.
Yes, the returns were meagre and the supporters increasingly restless, yet we refrained from resorting to that occasional club cricket expedient of "accidentally" trapping his fingers in the door. And a good thing too, for in the dregs of a damp June Herath received a phone call from the Sri Lankan selectors: Murali had a shoulder injury, and he was needed.
Where the plumbers, plasterers, policemen and pot-washers of North Staffs had succeeded, the Pakistani batsmen failed miserably. Just hours after stepping off the plane, Herath would bag his first Test Man-of-the-Match award, in Galle, adding a decisive second-innings spell of 11.3-5-15-4 to a couple of useful cameos with the bat as Sri Lanka won by just 50 runs. In thenext game, another victory, he pocketed a maiden Test five-for as Pakistan ceded nine wickets for 35, and he followed it up with another five-for in the third game. So much for our two-wickets-per-game pro! Perhaps, ultimately, it was just a warm-weather thing - you know, needing to have feeling in his fingers, neshness such as that.
Anyway, the Moddershall hardcore may have groused at the comparison with Tahir, yet watching Herath dismiss Virat Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane and Rohit Sharma in Kumar Sangakkara's farewell series, perhaps they would have understood, belatedly, how in that busy, shuffling approach and snappy, narrow pivot; in the chest-on delivery imparting all the revs (and the curve, the drop) from the shoulder; in the clever use of the crease (something Tahir, less guileful, more heavy artillery, didn't do) and round-arm variation that either undercut or would spin sharply; and in the lesser-spotted carrom ball, there were the makings of a useful operator. It's a shame, I guess, that he kept his best performances for the Test arena.
The United Nations is yet to release the definitive figures on this matter, but there cannot be many countries with a higher per capita average of hours spent smiling each day than Sri Lanka. At the risk of ethnic stereotyping, they are a happy bunch. Not Rangana Herath, though, at least not when he's bowling. At least not when I was fielding to his bowling.
If you were to manufacture a range of international-cricketer teddy bears, Herath Mudiyanselage Rangana Keerthi Bandara Herath would surely be the biggest seller. But don't let those cartoonishly cute and pudgy contours fool you. Herath's on-field manner is that of a prickly, pernickety upcountry bureaucrat, who, for his own barely acknowledged pleasure, is going to keep you occupied for hours doing something of little consequence. Just business, see.
This air of sternness frequently escalated into a full-fledged scowl during his sole, truncated North Staffordshire and South Cheshire League campaign for Moddershall in 2009, when a combination of lacerating Atlantic winds, green pitches and abysmal close catching left him with the unflattering statistics of 112-27-333-14 from eight league outings. That's an average of 23.79. To put that into context, his current Test bowling average in his homeland stands at24.86.
As with his eventual emergence from the shadow of Muttiah Muralitharan to be Sri Lanka's strike spinner, Ranga had fairly big boots to fill. He had been signed to replace South Africa's Imran Tahir - 80 wickets at 11 in our title-winning campaign the previous summer - and if you were to ask the club's ultras which of the two would go on to become the world's second-ranked Test bowler, it would have been a no-brainer: Tahir went through sides like a cheap samosa, Herath like porridge.
But then, the logic behind the signing was a little counter-intuitively tilted towards batting prowess. Rigorous online scorecard perusal duly threw up a recent 88 not out for Sri Lanka A in a 50-over game in Benoni against South Africa A, coming in at 94 for 6 and seeing them past the victory target a further 200 runs ahead. Box ticked, although subsequent first-hand evidence revealed a biffer with three main shots in his repertoire: pull, sweep, slog (and hybrid forms of those strokes). The posh side was only really used for leading edges.
Said research also disclosed that he had a carrom ball, a fact gleefully divulged to the local media, as was a list of Herath's high-profile victims, all incorporated into an artfully casual observation-cum-de facto press release designed to tweak the fret glands of the league's batsmen: "Anyone who's got Trescothick, Chanderpaul, Ponting, Kallis, Inzamam and Steve Waugh out has to be able to bowl a bit, so the club's delighted with the signing, particularly if the long-range forecasts for a hot, dry summer are correct."
Neither the weather nor the performance forecasts proved accurate, sadly, although clearly he could "bowl a bit". That said, we didn't want Herath to bowl so well that he would be picked up by a county (as Tahir had been the previous July by Hampshire, where he was retained for 2009) or picked by his country, for whom he had played the most recent of his then 14 Teststhe previous December, taking 1 for 115 against Bangladesh, which was, I suppose, both a good and bad omen.
Herath took 2 for 92 on debut, followed by 2 for 71. He bagged his solitary five-for the following week in a low-scoring win on a sticky dog, and just five more scalps over the next four weeks. His only game on a dustbowl turned out to be his final game, in which the wiles of former England batsman Kim Barnett, aged 48, (dropped second ball by yours truly) held him at bay, although Barnett did adjudge Herath the third best spinner he'd faced, after Warne and Muralitharan.
Where the plumbers, plasterers, policemen and pot-washers of North Staffs had succeeded against Herath, the Pakistani batsmen of 2009 failed miserably © AFPWhile I remained confident he'd eventually come good should the summer ever arrive, we had expected a whole lot more. Alas, it was a tale of moist pitches and missed chances. The tracks were just too green and greasy, rendering his carrom ball the proverbial ashtray on a motorbike. Indeed, his subtle variations were so subtle, it seemed that they no longer really counted as variations. Rather, the batsmen didn't perceive them as variations, which was problematic since the whole point was to get them to see things that weren't there as though they were.
Yes, the returns were meagre and the supporters increasingly restless, yet we refrained from resorting to that occasional club cricket expedient of "accidentally" trapping his fingers in the door. And a good thing too, for in the dregs of a damp June Herath received a phone call from the Sri Lankan selectors: Murali had a shoulder injury, and he was needed.
Where the plumbers, plasterers, policemen and pot-washers of North Staffs had succeeded, the Pakistani batsmen failed miserably. Just hours after stepping off the plane, Herath would bag his first Test Man-of-the-Match award, in Galle, adding a decisive second-innings spell of 11.3-5-15-4 to a couple of useful cameos with the bat as Sri Lanka won by just 50 runs. In thenext game, another victory, he pocketed a maiden Test five-for as Pakistan ceded nine wickets for 35, and he followed it up with another five-for in the third game. So much for our two-wickets-per-game pro! Perhaps, ultimately, it was just a warm-weather thing - you know, needing to have feeling in his fingers, neshness such as that.
Anyway, the Moddershall hardcore may have groused at the comparison with Tahir, yet watching Herath dismiss Virat Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane and Rohit Sharma in Kumar Sangakkara's farewell series, perhaps they would have understood, belatedly, how in that busy, shuffling approach and snappy, narrow pivot; in the chest-on delivery imparting all the revs (and the curve, the drop) from the shoulder; in the clever use of the crease (something Tahir, less guileful, more heavy artillery, didn't do) and round-arm variation that either undercut or would spin sharply; and in the lesser-spotted carrom ball, there were the makings of a useful operator. It's a shame, I guess, that he kept his best performances for the Test arena.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)