Tyler Cowen on reading fast, reading well, and reading widely: “The important thing is to be ruthless with the books that are not good. Just stop reading, put them down, usually throw them away, don’t give them away – if you give them away you could be doing harm to people…So the way you read well is just by reading a lot, and by reading a lot your whole life. And then when you go to read actual books you’re like “I know that, I know that, I know that,” and you keep on going, and you read much more quickly. And that’s really the way to read a lot. There are these compounding returns to being obsessed with reading, and starting young, and never stopping.
Arvind Panagariya and Deepak Mishra on Vietnam: “From just $0.9 billion in 2009, its telephone exports rose to $21.5 billion in 2014 and to $31.2 billion in 2020. Its electronic goods exports stood at $122 billion in 2020 against India’s $12.8 billion. How has Vietnam achieved this success? Whereas Indian leaders routinely express regret at having signed free trade agreements (FTAs) even with countries accounting for minuscule proportion of the country’s trade, tiny Vietnam has boldly embraced such economic giants as China and the European Union in FTAs. It also has FTAs with every single Asian country of any significance…Producers that enter production activity in response to high protection are likely to be predominantly rent-seekers rather than risk-takers. It is a mistake to think that they would eventually turn into export powerhouses. On the other hand, risk-taking producers that enter production activity with an eye on the global market would have done so even absent protection. They are happy to share in the spoils offered by protection but do not depend on them. It is these producers who would make a success of “Make in India for the World”. ”
Watching: Agatha Christie’s Poirot and Marple series on SonyLiv
