1 South Africa’s jobs challenge (Linda Yueh on BBC) With
most of the results from South Africa's general election in, the African
National Congress (ANC), in power since 1994, looks set for a commanding
victory with over 60% of the vote. When parliament re-convenes, it looks like
Jacob Zuma will be installed as president of South Africa for a second
five-year term.
Under the ANC's tenure in the past
two decades, South Africa's economy has grown at an average rate of 3.3% per
year. However, growth has generally lagged behind other emerging economies,
which have averaged over 5%. Crucially, growth has not been fast enough to
alleviate high rates of unemployment. The unemployment rate in South Africa is
a staggering 24%. In fact, the unemployment rate has not been below 20% for the
past 17 years.
Of particular concern is the high
rate of youth unemployment. According to the International Labour Organization
(ILO), the unemployment rate of those aged 15-24 is around 50% - the third
highest in the world after Greece and Spain, which were both stricken by the
euro crisis. A poll carried out in the week before the election among young
South Africans found jobs to be the biggest concern among half the respondents.
Education was the next largest worry - mentioned by a quarter of those
interviewed.
According to the Global
Entrepreneurship Monitor, creation and survival rates of SMEs in South Africa
are among the lowest in the world. In many emerging market economies, the
informal sector is an important source of employment. In South Africa, the
informal economy accounts for less than 20% of the labour force, with its
development hampered by access to credit, access to land, high crime and red
tape.
http://www.bbc.com/news/business-27337520
2 The rich and the myth (Paul Krugman in The New York
Times) Institutional Investor’s latest “rich list” in its Alpha magazine, its
survey of the 25 highest-paid hedge fund managers. Before we dismiss the report
as nothing new, let’s think about what it means that these 25 men (yes, they’re
all men) made a combined $21 billion in 2013. In particular, let’s think about
how their good fortune refutes several popular myths about income inequality in
America.
First, modern inequality isn’t about
graduates. It’s about oligarchs. Apologists for soaring inequality almost
always try to disguise the gigantic incomes of the truly rich by hiding them in
a crowd of the merely affluent. Instead of talking about the 1 percent or the
0.1 percent, they talk about the rising incomes of college graduates, or maybe
the top 5 percent. The goal of this misdirection is to soften the picture, to
make it seem as if we’re talking about ordinary white-collar professionals who
get ahead through education and hard work.
But many Americans are well-educated
and work hard. For example, schoolteachers. Yet they don’t get the big bucks. Second,
ignore the rhetoric about “job creators” and all that. Conservatives want you
to believe that the big rewards in modern America go to innovators and
entrepreneurs, people who build businesses and push technology forward. But
that’s not what those hedge fund managers do for a living; they’re in the
business of financial speculation.
Finally, a close look at the rich
list supports the thesis made famous by Thomas Piketty in his book “Capital in
the Twenty-First Century” — namely, that we’re on our way toward a society
dominated by wealth, much of it inherited, rather than work. At first sight,
this may not be obvious. The members of the rich list are, after all, self-made
men. But, by and large, they did their self-making a long time ago. As
Bloomberg View’s Matt Levine points out, these days a lot of top money
managers’ income comes not from investing other people’s money but from returns
on their own accumulated wealth — that is, the reason they make so much is the
fact that they’re already very rich.
But why does all of this matter?
Basically, it’s about taxes. America has a long tradition of imposing high taxes
on big incomes and large fortunes, designed to limit the concentration of
economic power as well as raising revenue. These days, however, suggestions
that we revive that tradition face angry claims that taxing the rich is
destructive and immoral — destructive because it discourages job creators from
doing their thing, immoral because people have a right to keep what they earn.
But such claims rest crucially on myths about who the rich
really are and how they make their money. Next time you hear someone declaiming
about how cruel it is to persecute the rich, think about the hedge fund guys,
and ask yourself if it would really be a terrible thing if they paid more in
taxes.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/09/opinion/krugman-now-thats-rich.html?src=me&ref=general&_r=0
You probably will be asked why you chose to leave. Employers often want to know what they could do to keep talented employees. Keep your answer short and to the point. This can be dangerous, because you have an audience for all the frustrations, and you may be tempted to air some dirty laundry, which could come back to haunt you later in your career. Avoid the temptation.
If you have been asked to leave a company, the way you make your exit will benefit your future career path in several ways. 1. The employer you are leaving is left with a positive impression, as you show respect, even though you might disagree with the employer’s decision. 2. It improves your chance for the positive reference letters you may need for your next employer. 3. Your colleagues are calmed by your positive reactions to unpleasant circumstances. The saying, “one’s character comes out during the time of crisis” is so true.
If you leave coworkers with a positive impression, you may find them ready to help you network in your job search. And fifth, if emotions are too raw, don’t make important decisions. Wait until you can regroup a bit, if possible, before having key conversations. Ironically, all the positive aspects of your employment can be minimized if you leave on a negative note. In today’s world of rapidly changing work environments, learning to live with beginning and the end of each step on your career path is an important step in managing your career.
A total of 597 million Indians go outside when they have to go, according to the report. That is close to 50 million fewer people than the number in 1990, but still many more than the rest of the world combined. “Over the past 22 years the number of people practicing open defecation fell by a remarkable 21% from 1.3 billion in 1990 to one billion in 2012,” the report said. “Those one billion people – with no sanitation facility whatsoever – continue to defecate in gutters, behind bushes or in open water bodies, with no dignity or privacy.”
The man who many consider the front-runner to become India’s next prime minister, Narendra Modi of the Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, has also tried to stress the importance of better sanitation during his campaign, saying he intends to build toilets before temples.
Economic growth and growing appreciation of hygiene has helped make South Asia the most improved developing region in terms of sanitation. The percentage of people forced into outdoor defecation fell to 38% in 2012 from 65% in 1990, the WHO report said. That compares to a world-wide average of 24% in 1990 and 14% in 2012.
http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2014/05/09/half-billion-indians-still-need-better-access-to-toilets/
No comments:
Post a Comment