'Reinventing the Bazaar,' by John McMillan, is a great and fun introduction to the wild variety and importance of markets throughout history and around the world. I finally understood how a Middle Eastern souk actually works economically and how to compare that to modern-day telecom-spectrum auctions. I love that book.
There is such a polarized discussion of economics among people like analysts, columnists, bloggers; often, they end up just saying that views other than their own should not even be discussed. I find that frustrating. There is no intellectual progress without considering lots and lots of different views.
Economics is not a discipline that comes to correct answers - economies are too complex.
If someone comes to me, any community in the Northern Territory, with a viable economic future, and says, 'We want to be part of a bold new approach,' I'll put them down as a major project, and I'll do everything I can to help them out.
For me, revolution is around young people with no skills, college education, and coming from everywhere having an economic impact on an entire system which no one notices.
If you try to put social and cultural development ahead of economic development, it doesn't work. You have to do it all together.
If the preservation of the home means the enslavement of women, economically or morally, then we had better break it.
If they are willing to give women economic freedom in that home, if they are willing to live by the standard they wish women to live by, then homes will be preserves.
Investment in education and economic prosperity is the best way to cure fanaticism and for establishing a just peace in the Middle East.
Besides being a prime cause of poor economic growth, poor governance breeds corruption, which cripples investment, wastes resources, and diminishes confidence.
