December 2011
19 posts
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Organ sales: Paying to live →
So what can be done, apart from donating your own organs? Mr Berger suggests lifting the ban on organ sales, a solution that assaults the moral senses of many Americans. […] A market for organs would rely on vulnerable people desperate to get out of their economic straits, they argue. […] It is odd that we consider this ethical dilemma when presented with the idea of organ sales, yet...
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CEOs need to join the 20 times club now (FT) →
Like young people lusting after trainers, chief executives found themselves on a “hedonic treadmill”, always anxious to have whatever the others had.
[…]
As Drucker said: “A 20-to-one salary ratio is the limit beyond which [managers] cannot go if they don’t want resentment and falling morale to hit their companies.”
Is there a chief executive ready to say he or she will move to a 20...
November 2011
19 posts
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Durban: The early skirmishes →
A Japanese diplomat recently showed me a chart he’d drawn up where the positions of various countries and blocs were marked on a two-dimensional grid.
One axis showed how keen they were on taking more emission cuts under the Kyoto Protocol (KP), the other how keen they were to see negotiations begin on a new global instrument covering emissions by all nations.
Japan itself sits at one...
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UK Home Affairs Committee to review drugs policy →
This is amazing news!
The Committee will undertake a comprehensive review of drugs policy in the new year. The Committee will examine the effectiveness of the Government’s 2010 drugs strategy and the UK Government’s contribution to global efforts to reduce the supply and demand of illicit drugs. Specifically, the Committee will consider:
The extent to which the Government’s 2010 drug...
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Countries to discuss the possibility of beginning... →
“Those countries that are currently talking about deferring an agreement [to come into force] in 2020 are essentially saying we are taking you from high risk to very high risk in terms of the effects of global warming. This is a choice – a political choice.”
The UK government’s contention is that if countries know a new agreement is due in 2020, they will need to take...
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“The ECB risks being remembered by historians as the magnificently orthodox...”
– via The Economist and The FT
I don’t suppose anyone would be interested in protesting against ECB policy, would they? There’s no point arguing about how the spoils of growth are divided if there isn’t to be any.
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Time for NGOs to talk about drugs →
A great article.
While it may have been arguable up to now that the impact of the war on drugs only affected a handful of countries, ie Colombia, Mexico, Afghanistan and Pakistan (never a good argument as the power of organised crime, once established, has a global reach), the displacement of the trade to west Africa means everyone should wake up to the threat. What will Mali look like in...
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Onshore wind energy to reach parity with... →
(even without accounting for externalities)
The cost of electricity from onshore wind turbines will drop 12% in the next five years thanks to a mix of lower-cost equipment and gains in output efficiency, according to new research from Bloomberg New Energy Finance.
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Taking these factors together, the levelised cost of energy – the cost of energy before any subsidies or support...
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Bruce Anderson: There is no alternative to... →
It manages to shoehorn in a load of other Conservative themes, but it’s great to see this on Conservative Home. It packs a lot of arguments into one article.
Maybe the tide really is turning…
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Average UK family wastes £680 of food each year →
Despite the drop, this remains horrific if the figures are to be believed. £2 a day?! Isn’t that more than what half the world’s population earns (and therefore more than the total they have to compete with us in the food market)?
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Are the “English” less secure about the world than... →
The latest edition of Prospect Magazine has a fascinating article by YouGov president, Peter Kellner, on a new YouGov poll that shows differing views of the world by those who consider themselves “British” and those who think of themselves as “English”.
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Is it a good or bad sign when drugs are seized? →
[Minister Damian Green]’s unexpected press release last week hailed the [false] rise [in seizures] as evidence of “a success” for the UKBA. “These seizures show our investigators are keeping pace with the ever changing methods of criminal gangs”, the Minister said.
but:
Sometimes a fall may be seen as good news. Indeed, Mr Green claims just that in reflecting...
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Poisoned Apple
I have discovered that the Bluetooth on the Mac Pro is so poor that it’s unusable for wireless headphones unless you buy a separate dongle, put your head beside the case, or… take off the Mac’s side panel. Putting the transceiver inside a thick metal box might not have been one of Apple’s best moves.
This may also explain why my Bluetooth keyboard was such a nightmare.
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Fears grow over US pension crisis as Rhode... →
This doesn’t sound good.
These recession-thingies are remarkably full of positive feedback.
According to Rhode Island’s calculations, the unfunded liabilities for their local and state workers’ pensions total $9.2bn. Unfunded liabilities are the costs a pension plan faces after its assets have been stripped out. Norcross, a municipal pension expert who has testified to...
Anonymous asked: Not only do I like your blog (haha I found it) but I also am OBSESSED with you secretly. Ok here we go.. I got this idea from a Tumblr spam I got once lol.. I think you like me too and you were always too shy to admit it :3 go to crushmatches(dõt)com (wtf it wont let me link regular) and make an account there. Then look up the profile 'gottagetme19' (me obviously) I left body...
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The European Central Bank as a Lender of last... →
If, like me, you’ve been wondering why so many experts are calling for the ECB to be a sufficient lender of last resort to Eurozone countries and yet Germany and the ECB keep rejecting the idea, this link is very helpful.
Edit: And while we’re all very glad the UK didn’t join the Euro, and some have written about how bad the situation would now be if we had, perhaps the UK would...
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