meek-investor

Just imagine this. You earn a salary of $ 25m a year. And then you go on strike demanding improved wages. Believable ?? You better believe it. Kobe Bryant (arguably the best basketball player in the world, for those readers not familiar with sport), earns that salary, but is on strike from tonight. Actually not just Kobe. Every basketball player who plays in the NBA ( unsporting types - that's the National Basketball Association, which runs the League in the US of A.) The NBA is a private league. Players have formed a union and there is a collective bargaining agreement every few years. The last agreement expires today. Negotiations with owners of the teams has broken down. No deal; so there is a lock out. The team owners are losing money. The players claim they aren't getting enough money. Despite the wild popularity of the game. Unlike other American sports such as Football (the American variety) and Baseball, which have limited appeal outside the country, basketball  is wild...

This blogger is not enamoured of traveling now, the consequence of over exposure to this activity over many years.   In this forum, there has been many a rant against airlines, fellow fliers, roads, and even cows. But I discover that there hasn’t been a full throated rant against an important abomination that is an inevitable component of the aforesaid activity – the hotel. This post rectifies the imbalance. Does anywhere else in the world, the day start at 12.00 noon, I ask you. I can understand that the lazy Senior Division Clerk at Chennai Telephones believes that day starts at 11.00 AM. But 12.00 noon ? or 2.00 PM ? or even at one place 4.00 PM ?   You arrive at a new city after some 12 hours of being frozen in a Nataraja pose (after extensive research, airlines have learnt that it is the best “seating” arrangement in which you can squash the maximum number of people). The blasted flight has landed at 5.00 AM. You leg it to the hotel, to be told that the day starts at...

Is Gils living in Angola or Mongolia ?? He isn't, but he very well could be. He is in the state of Tamil Nadu in India, but in terms of GDP he would be no different to living in Angola and in terms of per capita GDP, he would be the same as a Mongolian. This, according to a lovely chart by the Economist, which you can see here . They say a picture is worth a thousand words (something this blogger evidently doesn't believe because he regularly inflicts 1000 words on the reader, without a photo in sight). Surely a chart like this is worth 10,000 words. Brilliant, as the Economist usually is. Vishal can chose between Turkmenistan and Latvia. Sandhya can opt for Croatia or the Philippines. When she goes home, Reflections , who is now wonderfully active in the blogosphere after extensive bouts of laziness, can chose to be a Tunisian or a Papua New Guinean. Wow. All of a sudden, India doesn't seem to be that great an economic powerhouse, does it ? Each state by itself seems f...

Journalists and others concerned about the status of the news industry in North America and Europe keep arguing that we are getting poorer journalism because of the economic state of the industry. But when you ask them “what makes good journalism?” they find it nearly impossible to articulate the concept. Those trying to articulate the elements good journalism tend to use comforting and immeasurable platitudes and to describe it through attributes based on professional practices: pursuit of truth, fairness, completeness, accuracy, verification, and coherence. These are not a definition of quality, but a listing of contributors to or elements of quality practices. Each attribute alone is not sufficient for good journalism and degree to which each contributes is unclear. In practice, most of us settle on identifying journalistic quality by its absence or by its comparison to poor or average quality journalism. Thus we know it when we don’t see it or we describe by...

On June 16th, IBM turned 100. Yes, 100 years old. That is a colossal achievement by any standards. As with living beings, so with corporations - the primary motive, and a great achievement,  is survival. Time to bring out the cake and sing Happy Birthday. The company started life in 1911 as Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation, formed by a merger of three small companies. A decade or so later it changed its name to a more catchy International Business Machines, the name by which it is still known. And over the decades it has weathered many a storm, made many a significant achievement and today, even at a ripe old age, is strong, robust and dancing. That is has done so in the field of information technology, where the pace of change is far more rapid than in other sectors, adds a special gloss to the achievement. Look at the inventions it has to its credit. The punch clock to record time, the electric tabulating machine, the ATM, the floppy disk, the hard disk, the magnetic st...

Indian roads are hell; right ? Well, Yes and No. This blogger has characterised them as the most dangerous place on earth, even more dangerous than Iraq or Afghanistan here . But that's only part of the story. They can also be delightfully brilliant. Really ? Yes. Some years ago, a wise old man , who was the then Prime Minister of India, conceptualised the Golden Quadrilateral (GQ) . The cities of Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore and Mumbai would be linked by world class highways. This is now a reality. Driving on them can be a breeze. Even 5 years ago you could not have dreamt that the words driving, breeze and Indian road could feature in the same sentence. These four lane highways are truly world class. Not a pot hole in sight. No speed breaker too. Its actually a greater pleasure to drive on them than say in Europe or China, simply because the roads are often empty. These are toll roads, a concept still new to India and trucks haven't got used to the idea that they have t...

On a walk the other day, I spied a shop that was a "fair price shop". There are many of them dotted around cities and towns in India. They are usually shut with a "No stock" board hanging in front. They are part of government initiatives to sell foodgrains and vegetables at "fair prices". They are not ration shops, mind you, which are designed to sell subsidised grains to the poor. These are shops where you and I can buy as well. At "fair prices". Begs the question, fair to whom ? Here's Economics 101 for the economically challenged. Prices are fixed by supply and demand. A willing seller and a willing buyer together fix the price. As long as there are many sellers and buyers and as long as there is information on what everybody is buying and selling at, the price that is so determined freely is what is a "fair" price. But to Rajalakshmi, a fair price is a low price. Nothing wrong with buyers wanting the lowest possible price, but t...

This Wednesday, Monday night stops by the Business. Monday Night Foreplays that is. Since debuting in November 2009, ForePlays has premiered more than 50 performances, serving up a (farm) fresh female perspective to the SF comedy scene. ForePlays has recently showcased special performances at “SF ImprovFest” and “SF SketchFest” at the Eureka Theater, “WomenROCK” at The Independent, “Comedy Brains” at The Marsh and “A Funny Nig ht for Comedy” at Actors Theatre of San Francisco. ForePlays is committed to creating smart and original comedy while providing a consistent platform for talented female writers, actors, musicians and stand-up comedians in and near San Francisco. Part of the behemoth Piano Fight sketch conglomerate, Monday Night Foreplays staged it's Spring performance series "Spring EGGstravaganza" on Monday nights this past April here at the Dark Room. The Business is excited to welcome it's stage-mates from the other side of Tuesday. And as ...

If you are in the UK this coming autumn, you better brace yourself for a series of strikes. Public sector unions are calling for a series of sustained strikes. Throwback to the 80s perhaps ?? Maybe. My view is that these planned strikes are completely unjustified and the unions are living in cuckooland. The problem is pensions. Readers of this blog are young enough to completely switch off at the mere mention of this word. But this is one of the biggest problems in business today. The problem is that, years ago, stupid HR types, gave away a perk called "defined benefit" pensions. This meant that when you retired you were eligible for a pension which was a high percentage of your last drawn pay. To add insult, these would be inflation indexed and accrue to you till you die. That's all fine, but who's going to pay for all this. The even more stupid accounting types, blissfully ignored the ramifications of what they had promised and simply ignored this future promise. Wh...

The call had come to the village. The ship had come. It was anchored in the deep seas, some distance away. Where it was sailing to, nobody knew. Even if they knew, it would have meant little; world geography wasn't their strong point All they knew was that it was going far far away. And that the white sahib was promising work for any able bodied man or woman who was willing to sail. The terms were simple. Or at least, this is what they understood. The white sahib would feed them and house them. He wouldn't charge them for the ship journey. They were to work for about five years or so. They wouldn't be paid any wages, but they would be given food and shelter. After five years they were "free" ; could come back home (they would have to pay for the trip) or stay or whatever.  This was to be their "contract". When they landed , the white man would thrust a paper in front of them to that effect. They were to sign the contract. Of course they didn't know ...

The Business is back at in LA again this month on Friday June 24th! This will be our last show at The Improv Lab, and we want to thank them for everything...and go out with a BANG! so bring all your folks and their folks and let’s do this! Alex will not be making it this month, but Chris, Sean and Bucky will. And we have a few ringers up our sleeve to more that make up for it. Plus the Medically Transported Burrito Raffle returns! http://www.improv.com/Come dyClub/Hollywood http://thebusinesscomedy.b logspot.com/ http://www.facebook.com/pa ges/The-Improv-Comedy-Lab/ 78488692860 To quote Keane: " Last time, the Medically Transported Burrito was a carnitas burrito from El Farolito. Life is like a Medically Transported Burrito Raffle: you never know what you're going to get. And sometimes you have to make an effort to heat things up."

The Unites States spends some $700 bn on defence. Its spending is more than the combined total of the next 17 countries - a list that includes China and Russia (See The Economist's chart on defence spending here ) . It's none of this blogger's business to question whether it should be having so many bombs - that's for American citizens to decide for themselves, although we can have a mild interest as to whether it is sensible to fire a AGM Hellfire II from a drone above North Waziristan at a cost of some $70,000 to hit a donkey in its ass ! This blog, having some pretensions to economic bias, instead ruminates on the sheer scale of cost effectiveness that is possible on defence spending. Without reducing the number of bombs that is. You see, the traditional ingredients by which businesses attack costs are simply not present n the field of defence. There is very little competition. The best way to reduce costs is competition. But there is little chance of that with US de...

Evidently, Nato Green is also a shade of camouflage. Our Nato Green however rarely conceals his position ( when it comes to politics) Bucky's taking a well-deserved night off, but Chris, Alex, and Sean are back, with two very special guests. First off, we have Nato Green, creator of Iron Comic, co-founder of Laughter Against the Machine, and frequent guest to The Business. His appearances are so frequent and beloved, he's earned the coveted title of "Fifth Businessman", which originally belonged to Billy Preston. A former union organizer turned full-time comedian, Nato promises to delight friends of The Business, though he himself might prefer to perform at The Worker-Owned Cooperative. We also have a s pecial mystery guest visiting from Los Angeles. We can't reveal his or her identity, but we can offer these clues: - bigger than a breadbox - smaller than a bread truck - has visited The Business before - not Gallagher - name rhymes with "Shave Gaze...

When you reach a certain age, you start to think of the legacy that you wish to leave behind. What would you like to be known for ? What would history judge you by ? Generation X , to which I belong, is the post baby boomer generation in the Western world. The generation of transition from Mao to modern China in the Middle Kingdom. The generation that came of age post the Indo-Pak-China wars in India. Our best years may have gone by, but we are young enough to still influence our legacy. So what would history judge us as ? Alas, my conclusion has to be that of a wasteful generation. A generation that went on a binge and is leaving a debt to its children. Every major country in the world is saddled with mounting public debt, created because we of Generation X wanted instant gratification, but were not prepared to pay for it. Be it health, or pensions, we wanted it all, but are leaving the bills to be paid for by our children. Alas. We were wasteful also with the environment. More than ...

Guess which country is this ? The decision on where a company should locate a new factory is made by the unions and the government. The company, which thought it could decide for itself,  is rapped on the knuckles for presuming this right. Where could this be in this day and age - North Korea ? Zimbabwe ? Libya ? Alas, none of these. It is actually the US of A. The company in question is Boeing. For long it has had factories in the Pacific NorthWest - in the states of Washington and Oregon. It now needs additional manufacturing capacity for making the Dreamliner - the new 787  series that is being launched worldwide.  It set up an additional factory in South Carolina. The unions representing the Washington and Oregon plant workers filed a complaint with the National Labour Relations Board (NLRB). The NLRB upheld the complaint - Boeing was wrong to open a factory in South Carolina !! The case boggles the mind. Boeing did not shut down any factory or lay off any workers. On...