When speaking about unemployment, arguably the sorest problem in many market economies, “better education” is one of the standard remedies proposed by economists. This recommendation is given to rich and poor countries alike. Yet since I am in Georgia, I am increasingly skeptical about this recipe. To what extent can the education and training of people, or, to use the economic term, the accumulation of human capital, foster economic development?
In Georgia, you may have studied law and you really know your trade, but there is an oversupply of lawyers, a...
ISET Economist Blog
A blog about economics in the South Caucasus.
May
10
Apr
29
Would you like to buy in a supermarket where the supermarket owner decides what you will get for your money after you made the payment? Such a supermarket would arguably not attract many customers. Yet although this is an odd allegory, a good deal of our consumption we all make in exactly this way – and we are even forced to buy! We pay taxes to the government, and afterwards politicians decide what we get for this money.
Sellers serving private customers have to deliver value for money. You won’t buy a second time in a grocery store if the food was spoi...
Apr
23
There is no arguing that during the ten years since the Rose Revolution, the Georgian economy registered an impressive growth performance, averaging 6.6% per annum. Summing up Georgia’s post-2004 growth experience, a recent ISET-PI study (Babych and Fuenfzig (2012)), finds it “remarkable not only in light of the 5.3 percent average growth rate in the 1995-2002 period, but also considering that the average GDP growth rate for European and Central Asian developing countries was about 5.1 percent in the period between 2003-2010.”
Yet behind the gliste...
Apr
12
Georgia has one of the most liberal immigration policies worldwide. Everybody can enter Georgia with an airport visa that is valid for one year. Permanent residency status is granted as soon as one has found employment. Yet compared to other capitals, one encounters rather few foreigners when walking through Tbilisi’s streets. How can Georgia sustain its liberal policy without being overrun by immigrants?
There are two rather trivial reasons. Firstly, there is no incentive to “immigrate into the welfare state”, simply because Georgia does not have one. A...
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