Saturday, August 8th, 2009
Christina Romer, the head of Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, defended the government’s stimulus plan by arguing that countries without substantial stimulus had done less well than those with a stimulus plan. She included India–along with France and Italy–on the list of countries that were doing less well. I’m confused. Isn’t India expected to grow by 6-7% this year (and isn’t the US’s GDP expected to shrink)?
Also, I wonder how she calculates the size of India’s stimulus. Although it’s true that the pure fiscal stimulus provided by the government is relatively small (around $4 billion last year), the country is also spending a fortune on the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA), which, as many economists have argued, functions as a de facto stimulus, boosting income and consumption in rural areas.
Thursday, August 6th, 2009
This fascinating piece from the Economist-affiliated Intelligent Life is full of interesting tidbits. Hemingway checking out books on liver damage from the library. Cheever, newly sober, finishing a book in a year. And a strange conclusion that “maximalist” writers should never get sober.
Thursday, July 30th, 2009
Letter from India, The International Herald Tribune
KUILAPALAYAM, INDIA — The other day I went for a drive on my motorcycle and realized that my world had changed completely.
I drove along a cement road that was once a dirt path. The road leads to the ocean. I used to be able to see the ocean from the top of the road. Now the view has been usurped by new apartment buildings and guesthouses and shops.
When I was a boy, the road was bordered by emerald-green rice fields. There’s not a rice field in sight anymore, only the neon greens — and pinks and purples and oranges — of the concrete blocks that have taken their place.
The area around where I live was once an isolated rural hamlet. It was a hundred miles, along a potholed road, from the nearest big city, Chennai, or Madras, as it was called at the time. I grew up here, in the country, surrounded by five villages. I had an idyllic childhood. My life ran to the rhythms of an agrarian world: bullock carts and hand plows, bicycles, windmills. MORE–>
Saturday, July 18th, 2009
Thursday, July 16th, 2009
I’ve just stumbled across this article by Robert Nozick that tries to explain why “wordsmith” intellectuals are anti-market. I’m not sure I’m totally convinced, but his hypothesis–essentially, that they resent their low valuation in a capitalist economy–is nonetheless interesting reading. (I studied with Nozick as an undergraduate, in a course called something like “Socrates, Buddha, Jesus”!)
Tuesday, November 11th, 2008
Review of White Tiger, by Aravind Adiga, The New York Times Book Review
Monday, November 3rd, 2008
A posting about the presidential elections in America, from Granta.com
Over the last twenty months or so, as I have followed the presidential election from afar, something of my old admiration for America has been rekindled. Over and over, I have watched to my surprise as American voters have rejected the demagoguery they embraced in the two previous elections.
Tuesday, April 1st, 2008
An article on man-made beach erosion in South India, published in Granta 101.
Beaches are fragile ecosystems; what starts on one stretch continues along another. Over the years, the erosion has crept up the coast, eating away at the shoreline, swallowing the homes and boats of fishermen. Villagers have been evacuated and livelihoods have been destroyed.
Sunday, July 2nd, 2006
Review of English, August, by Upamanyu Chatterjee, The New York Times Book Review
Sunday, May 22nd, 2005
Review of Maps for Lost Lovers, by Nadeem Aslam, The New York Times Book Review
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