In Belgium the government just resigned because they cannot solve an issue that divides the Dutch speaking and the French speaking coalition parties. A quote from today’s Belgian newspaper illustrates well Ukraine’s image abroad. The Belgian Vice prime minister is quoted saying: ‘In any case, we have to try to avoid a Ukrainian scenario’. The newspaper adds: ‘ she refers to the incident in the Ukrainian parliament, where a vote on the Russian fleet in Crimea resulted in fighting and the throwing of eggs in the Parliament.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Friday, April 23, 2010
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Ukraine Just Can't Get Enough
"Ukraine hopes to secure a new $12 billion lending program from the International Monetary Fund for the next 30 months, "
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Small Risks
"Europe's airlines and airports have called for an immediate reassessment of flight restrictions imposed because of volcanic ash from Iceland.
Two bodies that represent most of Europe's airlines and airports say they question the extent of the flight restrictions currently imposed.
Airlines that have carried out test flights say planes showed no obvious damage after flying through the ash."
by the way:
"After 9/11, 1.4 million people changed their holiday travel plans to avoid flying. The vast majority chose to drive instead. But driving is far more dangerous than flying, and the decision to switch caused roughly 1,000 additional auto fatalities, according to two separate analyses comparing traffic patterns in late 2001 to those the year before. In other words, 1,000 people who chose to drive wouldn't have died had they flown instead."
Note that the whole article is a great read!
Saturday, April 17, 2010
Independent External Testing
Lots of discussions on the importance of the independent external testing these days - to me, this kind of centralized testing is the only way to 'compare' students across schools. Giving weights to the student's school results has the danger that it gives schools the incentive to give good grades. At the other side, school results are based on the performance over a period of time which means students cannot game the system by just study for a single test.
One thing the external testing has made clear is that there is quite a performance gap between rural and urban schools - in that sense, not using such centralized tests, might have an equalizing effect if university admission committees are foolish enough to take school results at their face value.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
It's the Economy, Stupid!
"The problem of forced Ukrainization and ousting the Russian language concern only 4.8% of respondents surveyed by GFK Ukraine in March 2010.
Only 3% of those polled are worried about tense international relations. At the same time, more than half of Ukrainians (55.8%) are concerned over inflation, and 40.5% are worried about rising unemployment. One third of respondents said they were concerned over the lack of money."
Saturday, April 10, 2010
What Women in Ukraine Want!
From the KIIS survey - the comment related to care and attention is most interesting!
Flowers, care, attention, kind words, jewelry, money and romantic trip are among the top five gifts that women would like to get
Ø 26% of women want to get flowers as a gift, while 32% of men plan to give them;
Ø Care and attention are on the second place in the female hierarchy of gifts - 13% of women expected this gift from men. However, only 6% of men plan such a gift for women. On the other hand, it should be emphasized that the interpretation of this response is rather ambiguous - would women really be happy if men offer them only care and kind words
Ø Absence of a person who could give the gift (to whom to give the gift) reported almost the same number of women (6%) and men (5%)
Ø In general wishes of women and intentions of men are quite close. Among most unmet women’s needs are: money (6.7% of women wanted to get the money, while 2% less men are going to give them), house or apartment (nearly 1% more women expect to get them comparing to the percentage of men who are going to give them) and household stuff (also about 1% difference). Flowers, perfumes and cosmetics are among gifts that men give more often than women would like.
Comparing the current survey results with the data from the previous years, we observe:
Ø Comparing to 2003, the number of men who plan to give flowers reduced (from 38% to 32%);
Ø Since 2003 the number of women who expect care and attention from men significantly increased (from 2% to 13%); alongside with that, the number of men who plan such a gift has increased slightly (from 1% in 2003 to 6% - in 2010)
Ø The number of women who would like to receive money as a gift has increased from 3% (in 2003) to 7% (in 2010).
Ø The number of men who can afford and plan to give to a women romantic trip has increased. In 2003 those were only 3%, while in 2010 - 7%.
http://www.kiis.com.ua/txt/doc/10032010/pr2.doc
ps - I expect this post to bring many visitors to my site!
Stress in Ukraine
"According to a recent KIIS survey 68% of respondents experienced some stressful situation during the year. In comparison to the year 2000 this number decreased by 9% (from 77% to 68%). Number of those who had no stressful situations during the year respectively increased from 22% in 2000 to 31% - in 2010.
Five types of stress were most common for Ukrainians in 2010:
Ø Severe disease experienced 16% of respondents (in 2000 - 22%);
Ø Severe disease and surgery experienced 14% (in 2000 - 19%);
Ø The death of loved ones experienced 13% of respondents (in 2000 - 16%);
Ø 12% of the Ukrainians lost their job – the same number as in 2000 (although in 2005 this situation occurred to twice smaller number of Ukrainians - only 6%);
Ø The loss of faith in people reported 11% of respondents (this number remains relatively stable during all 10 years)."
http://www.kiis.com.ua/txt/doc/10032010/pr3.doc
Friday, April 9, 2010
Professional Army
Even though in Ukraine, there is still a draft for the army, in practice there is a demand to enroll that exceeds the supply of army places
This is interesting as it would mean that abolishing the draft and making a 'professional' army wouldn't change anything
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Daughters and Voting Preferences
For those expecting a baby, this paper gives an interesting view on the effect of the gender of your newborn on your (voting) preferences
Saturday, April 3, 2010
The Easter Effect
In behavioral finance, a lot has been written on the ‘holiday’ effect, the finding that stock prices tend to increase just before holidays, including before Easter. In retail sales statistics, the Easter effect means that either March or April will have higher than normal sales, depending on whether Easter was in March or April. On Friday April 2, I noticed an Easter effect on the Ukrainian markets for fresh vegetables (at least on the Zhitniy Rinok). Peppers had increased from UAH 35 a Kg to UAH 50 a Kg compared to a week before, cucumbers from UAH 22 to UAH 30. From an economic point, this is not that surprising giving the increased demand for fresh vegetables before Easter should indeed be expected to an increase in prices. At the same time, the extent of the increase, and especially, the fact that all sellers on the market were charging the same price suggest that this market functions far from perfect.
Thursday, April 1, 2010
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