Views of a Nepali Economist

Over the past 30 years, China’s total fertility rate....has fallen from 2.6, well above the rate needed to hold a population steady, to 1.56, well below that rate...... Because very low fertility can become self-reinforcing, with children of one-child families wanting only one child themselves, China now probably faces a long period of ultra-low fertility, regardless of what happens to its one-child policy.......Shanghai reported fertility of just 0.6 in 2010—probably the lowest level anywhere in the world. According to the UN’s population division, the nationwide fertility rate will continue to decline, reaching 1.51 in 2015-20........

The political and cultural issues around independence are hotly debated. Yet fittingly, in the birthplace of Adam Smith economic arguments seem to weigh heaviest. Opinion polls suggest that they will determine whether or not Scots go for independence. One poll found that just 21% of Scots would favour independence if it would leave them £500 ($795) a year worse off, and only 24% would vote to stay in the union even if they would be less well off sticking with Britain. Almost everyone else would vote for independence if it brought in roughly enough money to buy a new iPad, and against it if not.

...."Certain individuals exchange public money, public goods, public office and public affairs for personal gain, flouting the law and party codes of conduct, even resorting to verbal abuse and threats, clandestine plots and set ups," he said. "They physically attack loyal and upstanding officials, kidnap and blackmail party leaders, and drag in their superiors to act as human shields. They deploy all of the tricks of the mafia trade within the army itself." The way Liu describes it, the web of military cliques, factions, and internal knots of organized crime sounds more like the workings of warlord armies before the communist revolution than the rapidly modernizing force that is currently rattling China's neighbors.

....the newly-elected UP CM said the 550km-long border with the state requires special policing arrangement to put a check on any possible anti-national activity....

Labels: border, china, corruption, economy, India, scotland

# posted by Mukesh Khanal @ 4:08 PM