One or two years ago, a Lavazza’s take-away coffee shop opened on the side of Georgia’s east-west highway in the area of Zestaponi. You always could find plenty of coffee shops in Tbilisi, but it was a novelty to have them next to the highway. Soon afterwards, another coffee bar opened along the road, and surprisingly, it was again set up close to Zestaponi. And today, there are even more take-away coffee points along that road, and they all cluster at Zestaponi.
Travelling from Tbilisi to Kutaisi or Batumi, you will notice other such clusters. You can b...
ISET Economist Blog
A blog about economics in the South Caucasus.
Dec
06
Dec
02
In the 1930s, the American linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf put forward the hypothesis that people of different mother tongues perceive the world differently. According to linguistic relativity or Whorfianism, both the grammatical structure and the vocabulary of a language influence the way how people think. Proponents of political correctness, aiming to ban the usage of certain words that are considered to be derogatory or discriminatory, ultimately base their ideas on Whorfianism. Saying “little person” instead of “midget” may have an impact on how one thin...
Nov
29
Lifetime is one of the most precious assets. People are paying huge amounts of money to extend their lifespans, sometimes for gaining only weeks or months. And imprisonment and death penalty are so widely applied punishments throughout all cultures and ages because people are scared off by the prospect of losing lifetime. As lifetime is such a valuable good, it is surprising that it is largely ignored in the policy debate.
According to the World Populations Prospects report, published in 2010 by the United Nations, Georgians have a life expectancy at bir...
Nov
27
As I do every year since I arrived to Georgia back in 2009, I attended this November the Tbilisi International Fair for Agro, Food and Drink Products, Packaging and Processing. This fair, although very small for international standards (some 60 stands) is actually one of the most important trade exhibitions in the country, and the only significant one with a focus on agriculture and food sectors.
When I visited this fair the years before I always found it a bit 'fake': flashy stands, few visitors (excepting in the inauguration day) and very seldom real ...
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