In Georgia today and in Europe in the past, villages owned pastures where every shepherd and cattle-herder in the community could take his animals. Grazing on these pastures was free and unrestricted. This land, owned by all villagers jointly, is traditionally referred to as the “commons” (in the last years, the term has been extended to also refer to free-to-use internet content).
The access to common land is unregulated, and consequently the villagers utilize on this resource as much as they can. Due to the heavy overuse, the common land in villages ha...
ISET Economist Blog
A blog about economics in the South Caucasus.
Oct
28
Oct
14
When economists speak about education and human capital, they usually mean formal education. It is provided in schools and universities by formally qualified teachers. These are imparting knowledge that is laid down in curricula, and the result of the learning process is testified by certificates and diplomas conferred to those students who passed exams. Hence economists usually measure the availability of human capital in a society by the average number of years citizens attended schools and universities. Yet is formal education the only source of human...
Sep
30
Evacuation is one of the most frequently used words in Georgian TV in the last two weeks, arguably due to an inflation of fibber bomb warnings. Rustavi 2, Imedi, Parliament, airport, bank offices, and schools – all were targeted by these macabre hoaxes.
In the Georgian fairy tale of Liar Shepherd, the young boy lied twice that wolfs were coming. When finally wolfs were really coming, no one believed him anymore. This is one of the main risks of bomb hoaxes – they may lead to something one might call “terrorism fatigue”.
Recently, I spoke with somebody wh...
Sep
27
In the very first class on the Principles of Economics we teach our students how beneficial trade is. We explain that voluntary exchange (trade) increases overall welfare and is mutually beneficial. Economists tend to regard this basic “principle of economics” as an axiom, providing the basis for many other principles of economics and, most importantly, the notion (or fallacy) that “the markets know best”…
Perhaps paradoxically, despite the many beneficial features of trade, merchants (i.e. professional traders), rarely enjoy social esteem. One reason fo...
Sep
21
Few events in Georgian history had consequences that were as far-reaching as the infamous Treaty of Georgievsk of 1783. In the end of the 18th century, Erekle II. (1720-1798) handed over his kingdom of Kakheti and Kartli to the Russians, aligning the fates of Georgia and Russia for the next two centuries. In the middle of what today is called the Age of Imperialism, when European countries, including Russia, were dividing the globe among themselves, Georgia was offered to Catherine the Great on a plate. Of course, she did not reject.
Being a colony of a ...
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