PSD Blog - The World Bank Group

Where does it pay to be a politician?

Apparently, the answer is Kenya. According to an article in allAfrica.com:

Members of Parliament each receive total monthly salary, allowances and benefits of Sh 1,435,846. This is an average figure. Some MPs may get more, some may get less. Considering it is mostly tax free, this equates to monthly remuneration in excess of Sh 2,000,000.

The Sh 2,000,000 figure amounts to roughly USD25,000 per month. I don't think I'd be going out on a limb to say that it would be difficult to attain that kind of income in Kenya's private sector.

Update: Chris Blattman makes some interesting points about the potential upside of paying politicians well.  

Brain train

Writing on the World Bank People Move blog, Sonia Plaza reports that U.S. Census numbers show that non-natives residing in the U.S. are more likely to hold a masters degree than native-born U.S. citizens.* This leads her to ask the following questions in a post on "Brain drain" and the global mobility of high-skilled talent:

• What are the challenges for the U.S. in developing, finding, and retaining talent?
• Will foreign students continue to choose the U.S. as a place to study or will they prefer other countries?

But perhaps this is an outdated way of looking at the issue. Jane Knight, an expert on international education issues and a professor at the University of Toronto, recently described the migration patterns of the highly educated as a 'brain train'. This seems to be a better description of a globalized workforce than older notions of brain drain or even brain gain:

Many countries invest in major marketing campaigns to attract the best and brightest talent to study and work in their institutions to supply the “brain power” for innovation and research agendas. The complexities and challenges of academic and professional mobility should not be underestimated—nor should the benefits. But, it is impossible to ignore the latest race for attracting international students and academics for brain power and income generation. The original goal of helping students from developing countries study in another country to complete a degree and return home is fading fast as nations compete for retaining human resources.

Many are cold, but few are frozen

For months, I imagined that I would write a post in the dead of winter describing my sufferings in the bitter cold. It is bitter cold: right now (10:00 am) it's -29°c. But I'm not suffering, at least not anymore.

At first, the cold was a major shock. If you're not dressed properly, you will definitely suffer. I remember walking to a meeting in December. I had a warm hat and a decent coat, but I had forgotten about my legs. In minutes, the cold bit sharply through my trousers, stinging the skin on my thighs until they went numb. I had to keep my hands in my pockets; even with gloves, my fingers turned to ice.

One weekend, it got down to -37°c, almost to the point where Fahrenheit and Celsius temperatures are identical (-40°c). I would not leave the house, or go near the windows and doors. I survived on rice and boiled eggs, and interacted with the outside world through text messages and the Internet. Thank goodness for Facebook.

DFID embraces private sector development

The economic crisis is a global problem. The effects on developing countries are being felt, and are likely to get worse. Up to 90 million people could remain in, or be pushed into extreme poverty as a result. This means governments around the world are focusing as a matter of urgency on how to attract investment and create the best conditions for growth.

The role of business in development is not new. The private sector is the engine of growth in the poorest of countries, and that growth drives development. Jobs are the best way out of poverty, and nine out of ten jobs in the developing world are in the private sector. The private sector, of course, means not only big corporations, but all those market traders, entrepreneurs and farmers who sell their goods and services in the market economy.

That's DFID Minister Mike Foster writing on the Business Fights Poverty blog. Foster's post coincides with the release of DFID's Private Sector Development Strategy. Also check out materials from the launch event, held in London on January 20.

Doing Business in Bhutan

One blogger thinks it's time to make it easier to do business in Bhutan:

Meanwhile, our vision of strengthening the private sector and making it the “engine” of growth remains just that – a distant vision. And, in spite of the impressive numbers, our economy is actually very weak, which manifests quite clearly in rising inequalities, youth unemployment and widespread poverty.

So what should we do? Make it easier to do business in Bhutan. Make it easier to for our people to realize their full entrepreneurial potential. Make it easier for businessmen and women to contribute to the economy. Review rules and regulations. And make them business friendly.

(Hat tip: Jason Resendez)

Doing Business - Smart policies for competitiveness

Last month the German Development Institute held a workshop on the Doing Business agenda. The two-day event featured none other than Penelope Brook, Director of the Indicators Analysis Department (responsible for the Doing Business project), as well as a number of other staff from the World Bank. Follow the links to check out their presentations:

• Penelope Brook on Gender and the Business Environment
• Rita Ramalho on Do Regulatory Reforms Matter?
• Thorsten Beck on Finance as Binding Constraint for Entrepreneurs

(Hat tip: Christian von Drachenfels) 

Bill Easterly, blogger

Bill Easterly, author of the White Man's Burden, and many op-eds besides, has entered the world of blogging. Be forewarned, it looks like Aid Watch won't be pulling any punches.

Update: Shanta Devarajan, World Bank Chief Economist for Africa, responds to Easterly's post on Robert Zoellick's op-eds in the New York Times and the Financial Times. 

(Hat tip: Chris Blattman) 

P2P lending, coming soon to an OECD country near you

It looks like person-to-person (P2P) lending is no longer just for the developing world. Kiva, the originator of the P2P model, now has at least one imitator in an OECD country. Smava, a German-based company, now offers P2P lending in Germany and starting this year in Poland as well. Perhaps finally the financial crisis will stimulate a bit more of the 'creative' side of creative destruction. 

OLPC smackdown

Jon Evans, a writer for The Walrus magazine, brings the smackdown on the One Laptop per Child project: 

Meanwhile, the rest of the world has already lapped them. My Acer Aspire One netbook is faster, has more memory, a better screen and keyboard, connects to encrypted Wi-Fi networks, renders Wikipedia correctly, and has a user-friendly interface with many useful applications. There’s no comparison: it’s miles better, for a comparable price. As far as I can tell, the OLPC team so wanted to be revolutionaries that they insisted on reinventing everything at once, and as a result, failed everywhere. (Although to be fair they did inadvertently spur the growth of the netbook market that has since entirely overtaken them.)

Google as development agency ctd.

Is Google the newest development agency? They keep impressing me with their new initiatives. This time it's an SMS service that allows mobile phone users to request and receive information off the web free of charge. This could prove to be of huge benefit to the now vast number of mobile phone users in the developing world who don't have access to an internet connection. From Joe Mucheru writing on the Google Africa Blog:

In Africa, we've learned that mobile phones are easier to get to than internet connections and PCs, and that working towards our mission means working through mobile phones. At the beginning of 2008, there were over a quarter of a billion mobile subscribers on the continent. Mobile penetration has risen from just one in 50 people at the beginning of this century to almost one third of the population today. To that end, we are excited to launch a test of Google SMS Search in Ghana and Nigeria.

Google SMS Search provides access to information through a mobile phone without internet. You simply create an SMS message about what you are looking for and send it to the Google number (4664 or "GOOG") and wait for a response by SMS.

So far it looks like Google is only offering the service in Ghana and Nigeria. Maybe an enteprising PhD student could talk to Google about implementing a randomized evaluation when it's extended further?