Adrian Wooldridge on meritocracy: “Look at the history of the West and you don’t have to go back very far to find a world where jobs were handed from father to son or sold to the highest bidder. Look at the rest of the world and you can see governments riddled with corruption and favoritism. The meritocratic idea is necessarily fragile: humans are biologically programmed to favor their kith and kin over strangers. We are right to think that the modern world, with its vibrant economy and favor-free public sector, would be impossible without the meritocratic idea. But we are wrong to think that meritocracy will be with us forever if we proceed to douse its roots in poison.”
WSJ on dealing with stress: “You need to be able to hear yourself think. Ms. Myrick recommends a three-pronged approach: “Turn down the volume of the external stuff you can’t control in the news, from the people in your life, and in your own head,” she says. The news part is easy. Delete everything on your phone that isn’t essential. Turn off the notifications on what you keep. Pick a few trusted news sources. If you feel you must check social media, set a strict limit on how much time you can spend on it. You’ll also need to set boundaries with loved ones. Turn off text alerts and create periods of time when no one can reach you, unless it’s an emergency. Explain to friends and family that you’re busy or don’t have the capacity to engage at the moment and will get back to them later.”
Lawrence Summers: “I do think there is the possibility of a real take-off in India. It is not a small thing that, over all the years since 1979 until quite recently, there had not been a single year when India grew as rapidly as China but in the last several, there were years when India grew more rapidly than China. That is a hopeful harbinger of things that might come. I think if there is a country that pioneers convergence to modern, cutting edge standards of living in the information age after the industrial age, India has greater potential than any other country of size to do that in the period ahead.”
