Wednesday, August 1, 2012
The Wrong Lesson...
Bruce Schneier has a nice piece up on CNN (of all places!), all about drawing the wrong lessons from horrific events. This was prompted by the Aurora shootings, of course...
More Curiosity...
U.K. colleague Paul H. sends along this nice BBC piece and the animation below:
And here's another variation, with William Shatner:
And here's another variation, with William Shatner:
Milton Friedman...
Doug S. wrote to ask for my thoughts on Dr. Milton Friedman. He didn't say, but I assume what prompted him was that yesterday was the 100th anniversary of economist Dr. Friedman's birth. There was a veritable blizzard of Milton Friedman centenary commemoratives yesterday. He died almost six years ago, at age 94, having lived long enough to see many, many fruits of his intellect.
What are my thoughts about him? Dr. Friedman is one of my heroes, quite simply. His politics were essentially libertarian, largely in correspondence with my own, and I believe that was a result of his study and observation of economics – where he frequently and eloquently pointed out the negative effects of government interference. His economic writings and advice were strong influence on two generations of governments. In the U.S. this was most notable in President Reagan's administration. He also worked with foreign governments, most famously in Chile in the '70s.
I had the privilege of watching Dr. Friedman's economic theories actually being put into practice in a modern country. This happened in Estonia, starting in 1991 when Estonia won back its independence from the disintegrating Soviet Union. Three successive companies I worked for from the early 1990s through 2005 had software development subsidiaries in Tallinn, Estonia (and also nearby St. Petersburg, Russia), and in that period I made many trips over there. During those trips I traveled extensively all over the country, met hundreds of people in all walks of life, and made some lifelong friends. It's fair to say that I got to know the country quite well.
In 1992, Mart Laar became the first elected Prime Minister of Estonia after they regained their independence. In the early '90s, Estonia was a nearly unknown destination. On one of my trips, I was invited to an informal dinner at the U.S. embassy put on by our trade representative to introduce Mr. Laar to the U.S. business people already there (with the obvious objective of encouraging more business, which Estonia desperately needed). I had a chance to speak with Mr. Laar for a few minutes; he was very interested in businesses developing intellectual property, seeing them as the big future opportunity for Estonia (as opposed to manufacturing). I was astonished at his detailed understanding of the software development business, and especially at his understanding that Estonia had a very valuable resource in their large, well-educated group of software engineers – no matter what those engineers earned. He (correctly) saw their then-low salaries as a temporary matter, and insignificant to their attractiveness in the long run.
That conversation provoked me into doing a bit of research on Mr. Laar, and in that research I learned of the large influence that Dr. Friedman had had on his economic and political thinking. This influence wasn't actually hidden at all – Mr. Laar frequently quoted or otherwise invoked the thinking of Dr. Friedman. But more importantly, he actually drove some of Dr. Friedman's most important ideas to implementation. Probably the most famous example of this (but far from the only one) is Estonia's flat income tax, constructed in exactly the way Dr. Friedman proposed. It is widely acknowledged to be the single most important driver of Estonia's economic success, earning it the nickname of the “Baltic Tiger”.
I long for the day – that happy day! – when the U.S. will actually put the advice of its preeminent economist to work in our own country. I do believe that day will come. The only question is whether it comes via the ballot box or via a revolution of some kind...
What are my thoughts about him? Dr. Friedman is one of my heroes, quite simply. His politics were essentially libertarian, largely in correspondence with my own, and I believe that was a result of his study and observation of economics – where he frequently and eloquently pointed out the negative effects of government interference. His economic writings and advice were strong influence on two generations of governments. In the U.S. this was most notable in President Reagan's administration. He also worked with foreign governments, most famously in Chile in the '70s.
I had the privilege of watching Dr. Friedman's economic theories actually being put into practice in a modern country. This happened in Estonia, starting in 1991 when Estonia won back its independence from the disintegrating Soviet Union. Three successive companies I worked for from the early 1990s through 2005 had software development subsidiaries in Tallinn, Estonia (and also nearby St. Petersburg, Russia), and in that period I made many trips over there. During those trips I traveled extensively all over the country, met hundreds of people in all walks of life, and made some lifelong friends. It's fair to say that I got to know the country quite well.
In 1992, Mart Laar became the first elected Prime Minister of Estonia after they regained their independence. In the early '90s, Estonia was a nearly unknown destination. On one of my trips, I was invited to an informal dinner at the U.S. embassy put on by our trade representative to introduce Mr. Laar to the U.S. business people already there (with the obvious objective of encouraging more business, which Estonia desperately needed). I had a chance to speak with Mr. Laar for a few minutes; he was very interested in businesses developing intellectual property, seeing them as the big future opportunity for Estonia (as opposed to manufacturing). I was astonished at his detailed understanding of the software development business, and especially at his understanding that Estonia had a very valuable resource in their large, well-educated group of software engineers – no matter what those engineers earned. He (correctly) saw their then-low salaries as a temporary matter, and insignificant to their attractiveness in the long run.
That conversation provoked me into doing a bit of research on Mr. Laar, and in that research I learned of the large influence that Dr. Friedman had had on his economic and political thinking. This influence wasn't actually hidden at all – Mr. Laar frequently quoted or otherwise invoked the thinking of Dr. Friedman. But more importantly, he actually drove some of Dr. Friedman's most important ideas to implementation. Probably the most famous example of this (but far from the only one) is Estonia's flat income tax, constructed in exactly the way Dr. Friedman proposed. It is widely acknowledged to be the single most important driver of Estonia's economic success, earning it the nickname of the “Baltic Tiger”.
I long for the day – that happy day! – when the U.S. will actually put the advice of its preeminent economist to work in our own country. I do believe that day will come. The only question is whether it comes via the ballot box or via a revolution of some kind...
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