State Capitalism

Didnt really get the comic but close enough

Here we have an article about the argument (mostly) against State owned Capitalism; e.g. companies in China, Petrobras etc. Let's get straight to the point; it argues that State owned Companies are ineffecient, breeds corruption and cronnyism, with strong manipulation and control by the government. Not to be a socialist / communist myself, but I think in some critical areas / sectors of a country (e.g. Energy & Utilities, Food Supply) it could be rather useful for a country to manage it from afar by owning a majority of the shares. I blatantly disagree if you were to say that all entities should be privatized as if you did it; you'll end up being like America.

The questions is why? and how?

You want to talk about corruption and cronnyism? What about all those companies and corporations who sponsor Presidential Campaign ads, only in turn, make the President of one of the world's economic powerhouse their puppet - much like corruption? sounds like cronnyism to me too. Companies being ineffecient? Ineffecient in terms of making money; but not necessarily ineffecient in terms of serving the people socially. Manipulation and control by the government is essential since to me, I find that no coporation should be more powerful than the government; else people would suffer; simple cases, America, United Kingdom, South Korea. Fine they have a larger GDP Per Capita - but look at how the underprivellaged are treated (those with no money) and look at how they spend?

But of course, this is a contentious issue.

Still open to discussion.

Why He Needs To Come Back

Ex-PM, 86 Years Old, still runs it Like A Boss

Despite being past his prime, he still exerts a strong influence over the country, while at the same time displaying hit wit and wisdom (with a tinge of criticism) in his latest public appearance. Always brings out goods points (but arguably not all the time); but I've always been an advent supporter of his Look East policy, condemning the West for their extravagant spending, and the mentality that they will always be rich.

Come back to us bro.

Overdependancy On Credit Rating Agency

Oh relax Sarkovsky. It just means that a woman can manage their finances better than you.

This is a good article on how investors should not rely too much on Credit Rating Agencies - much like how professional violinist, olympic judges, and wine critics lack consistency in their judgement. Humans by nature are prone to bias hence, we shouldn't solely rely on other individuals as a proxy to our own critical thought process and judgement.

Trade Protectionism; Do They Actually Benefit Anyone?

Thats is, come closer, come closer

I've been rather intrigued, no, actually concerned. In the past month, I have been placing emphasis on reading policies set by other governments around the world on trade. Where some countries opt to free their markets further through FTA, others have been skewed more towards protectionist measures (based on Global Trade Alert). A paper done by Simon Evenett also questioned WTO's role in restraining protectionism; although I somewhat agree to the fact that WTO's role all this while seems to be focusing on liberalizing international markets, they should somehow place efforts in hastening their Trade Dispute Settlements, or create a clear guidance on the level of protectionism a country is allowed to take when attempting to protect national interests.

But another issue was also raised by Richard Baldwin is Murky Protectionism. What Baldwin discussed in his compilation paper was that certain countries (particularly developed ones) tend to create protectionist policies masquaraded as Green Policies under the guise of increasing quality standards or protecting the environment (under the pressure of their domestic contingencies). To be fair, their concerns on both national interests as well as increasing quality standards is justified however, what I believe is rather absurd is the timing as well as unnecessary clauses in their policies which would further increase costs to exporters and extend processing time (among others). Such policies would have a high probability result in companies passing the cost to consumers, further aggravating and dampening trade between nations.

In the globalized world we live in, vertical specialization has resulted regions, no, the world's production chain to be fully integrated. As explained briefly in his report, Richard Baldwin illustrated the supply chain for Hard Disk Drives, clearly showing how each part and componenet was derived from each of the ASEAN countries - from here we can infer that should one country implement a protectionist-skewed measure against any of the componenets, it would have drastic effect on other countries within the region due to the movement of parts and components. Putting all this aside, the main question still remains; do Trade Protectionist Policies actually benefit countries, companies, consumers or anyone in that matter?

Personally I don't.