in #TodaysReads, Ethics, mobius motors, research, Safaricom

#TodaysReads: Unaffordable Middle Class, Ethics in Research & more (13.5.14)

How the Middle Class Lifestyle Became Unaffordable If you want to understand where the economy is headed and why it’s there, you need to read this. Seriously though, I need to move out of the middle class as soon as possible.

Why have the costs of a middle class lifestyle soared while income has stagnated? Though it is tempting to finger one ideologically convenient cause or another, there are four structural causes to this long-term trend:

  1. Baumol’s Cost Disease
  2. Systemic headwinds to the current version of capitalism
  3. Dominance of global corporate capital
  4. Financialization

The key take-away here is that the first two causes are structural and cannot be changed by passing a law or funding another state bureaucracy.

Mobius Motors Not really something to read but something to check out. I mentioned it in yesterday’s reads, they had just raised some money to produce their first few cars. This is remarkable in so many ways; so so many ways. It’s a hardware startup. It’s trying to build cars. It has a mostly African team. I could go on and on. Just go check it out right now!!!

Nairobi bourse to sell up to 38 pc stake in IPO I’ve not been this excited for an IPO since Kengen. A solid company that has gone from making losses to profits and then doubling those year over year is impressive. It’s one of the biggest stock exchanges in Africa and also around the world. If I have cash, I plan to make this my very first share buy, get in on the ground floor. Most people would buy for short term gain immediately after the IPO but for me I plan for long term holding, like 10 or 15 years.

NSE’s pretax profit more than doubled to 379 million shillings last year from 2012, lifted by a surge in trading turnover after the country’s presidential election passed off peacefully in March.

Safaricom net profit rises 31pc to Sh23 billion Over one and half billion dollars in revenue. Lemme just write that again; a billion and half dollars in revenue!!! Say what you like about Safaricom the company knows how to make money. I want to own this company one day or atleast a substantial portion of it. Vision 2030.

Safaricom has reported a 31 per cent rise in after tax profit for the year ended March 2014. This is buoyed by strong performance in voice and data segments.

Ethical Questions in Research My very first post on the iHub blog. I’m feeling very smug right now. I’m enjoying work and will be posting more about it soon. This post deals with some of the moral questions we deal with as researchers.