Happiness and Weight

We now know the ideal weight from a happiness point of view:

"The study did not go without an "acute" for women topic of overweight. It was found that among women weighing up to 60 kilograms the lucky number is 74%, and among women weighing 90 kilograms or more - only 55%.

Men have the opposite reaction to the weight: the skinniest male respondents (60 kg) feel less happy against men with more weight. For comparison, for males weighing up to 60 kg, the lucky number is only 57%, while among men weighing 90 kg or more - 70%.

The most "happy" weight for women is less than 60 kg., whereas the male weight of "happiness" is within the range of 70-79 kg."

More on Hair

You can find a more comprehensive article on the hair-trade here

Hair

"A 16-inch braid carefully tended over the course of several years sells for around $50. "It's not hard to understand why people in Ukraine sell their hair a hundred times more often than people in Sweden," said one hair importer based in the Ukraine. "They are not doing it for fun. Usually, only people who have temporary financial difficulties in depressed regions sell their hair." The blonde hair trade is far from new, though as eastern European countries slowly make economic gains, it is becoming more difficult for hair scouts to find girls willing to part with their locks. In the United States, hair dealers say consumers aren't particularly fussed about the origin of the hair. "They are concerned about their looks more than anything else," said one California-based dealer."

Domestic Violence

"68% of Ukrainian women (about 18 million) are subject to bullying in the family. They suffer from domestic violence more often than from robberies, rapes and car accidents combined."


hard to believe that this is true - unfortunately this news item does not explain how this number was obtained.

The Wage of the Coach of the Ukrainian National Team

"Marcello Lippi is ready to sign a €5 million deal to coach Ukraine through their Euro 2012 campaign."

So that is roughly 2.5 million a year, not bad...

Entrepreneurship Survey

Information on an interesting survey on entrepreneurship can be found here

"Ukrainians think that the main stumbling block in starting their own businesses is the absence of start-up capital (61%). For Europeans, this figure is somewhat lower - 51%. But the fear of failure in starting an own business is peculiar to Europeans rather than Ukrainians - 34% against 16%."

Ukrainian Football

A good summary, in english, of the latest 'scandals' in Ukrainian football can be found here

About Interest Rates

Two interesting statements on interest rates today. First, according to this news item, deposit interest rates are almost 'optimal'

" A trend has been preserved toward reduction of a drop in interest rates for private deposits over recent weeks, which testifies to nearing of their level to the optimal, First Deputy Chairman of Brockbusinessbank Natalia Syniavska has said."

The question here is optimal in what sense and for whom?

Second, Ukrainian banks want to make it illegal to withdraw term deposits prematurely

"Now in Ukraine, many banks due to competition offer high deposit rates to clients. Therefore, the higher are interest rates on deposits, the higher are the rates on credits that we have to introduce for clients," Lavrenchuk explains.

Not surprising, banks do not like competition...

Ukraine's Scorecard

According to the Millenium Challenge Corporation - a mixed report if you ask me.

Intolerance

An interesting survey documenting the evolution of (in)tolerance of Ukrainians over time can be found here (in Ukrainian). An English summary can be found here. Overall, intolerance towards foreigners is quite high -' According to the poll, the lowest level of tolerance is shown toward representatives of the black race [only 22% agree that they live in Ukraine].'

How to Become an Oligarch

some lessons from Mikhail Fridman (Alpha Group), interesting to read.

Improvements

When good things are done, they deserve to be praised - on example of progress: direct trains to Moscow will no longer be stopped at the border . Given that border controls were in the middle of the night, this will considerably improve the travel experience. Moreover, corruption should decrease to as the bargaining power of the custom and border officials will decrease.

Ouch...

"Half of 25-year-old Ukrainians have lost at least one tooth; by the age of 65 half of Ukrainians are completely toothless, and all of them become completely toothless before their 85th anniversary. These figures, appalling as they are for the 20th century, were reported by the Ukrainian Association of Implantologists."


I especially like ' all of them become completely toothless before their 85th anniversary', like there is some governmental institution that makes sure no 85-year old keeps his/her teeth...

VAT Bonds

An interesting example of a company selling its VAT bonds - the discount is 12%

Shakhtar Annual Report

Shakthar has its annual report out - it reports the earnings, but as far as I can see, not its cost and hence it is hard to see the whole financial picture - I would expect a serious loss if you would take into account the cost of the stadium.

Maternity Grants

The government wants to increase the size of the maternity grants - being a recent father, I can only confirm the saying that ' a child costs a house' - hence, the maternity grants do not cover much of the real costs of having children - while there is some research that shows this kind of monetary transfers do help to increase fertility, I wonder whether this is a wise policy. First, one can argue that this premium will also be paid to families that would have had children anyway. Second, and many might find this argument politically incorrect, one can argue that those families who are 'at the margin' and thus decide to have a child because of this premium are really the families a government would want to target for having more children.

Econ 101 needed

The Minister of Agrarian Policy wants to prohibit the import of fruits that are also produced locally


""Our task is to stop the imports of vegetables and fruits that we produce, apart from exotic ones, using economic and administrative levers...

The minister said that the main problem of the consumption of imported products was a habit. "Our consumers are getting accustomed to imported products. This is the main problem, and it will be hard for us to get rid of it""

Significant Changes

The reporting on the latest WB Doing Business Report gives an excellent opportunity to illustrate the concept of 'statistical significance', and that sometime changes are no changes.

Interfax yesterday reported that doing business in Ukraine is getting easier as Ukraine moved up to the 145th position, while Ukrinform reported that Ukraine dropped 3 places.

And both are right - if you look at last year's doing business report, you will see that Ukraine was ranked 142nd. And in this year's report it is ranked 145th. Hence a drop of 3 places.

But in this year's report, Ukraine's rank of last year is reported as 147th. Hence, Ukraine improved 2 places.

As so often, one needs to read the small text - at the bottom of this year's table there is a footnote that reads 'Last year’s rankings, shown in italics, are adjusted: they are based on the same 9 topics and reflect data corrections.'


So Interfax and Ukrnews are both correct and one can claim both that doing business has become easier and more difficult in Ukraine!

Lies, Lies and Statistics, you might say. However, a more correct conclusion would be that one should use statistics correctly. Indeed, a statistician will typically hesitate to give an exact answer to a question - he would not say Ukraine's rank is 145th, but rather say something like. The best guess (in statistician's talk, the point estimate) for Ukraine is 145th, but Ukraine's true rank could be anywhere between, say, 140 and 150. That is they will give an interval, rather than one specific number, in statistician's talk, they will give an interval estimate. ( Note that I make up these interval numbers as the report does not have enough information to estimate this interval correctly). This interval makes explicit that typically we measure things with errors and that these errors cause us to observe an estimate of a true value rather than a true value itself. The data corrections the Doing Business report refers to illustrates very well that indeed, even the World Bank, measures things with errors.

If you think in terms of such intervals, it becomes clear that a change in the ranking of a country does not necessarily mean that the true rank of the country has changed. The estimate has changed yes, but not necessarily the true value which still can be between 140 and 150 (or something like that). We can see that correcting last year's errors moved Ukraine 5 places, from 142 to 147. So this year's change from 147 to 145 is smaller than last year's mistake! Hence, we shouldnt make much of a change of 2 places, if simple errors in the data alone can change your rank 5 places.

Conclusion - small changes should not be interpreted as reflecting change - given that the limits to our measurement skills are substantial, small changes are likely to be the results of changes in measurement error and hence should be ignored.

Of course, if journalists would apply this approach, there would be substantially less 'news'.

Doing Business in Ukraine

Ukraine now ranks 145th out of 183th in the World Bank's Doing Business ranking, which is similar to last year . Most worrisome is how bad Ukraine compares to other transition countries, its main competitors: only Uzbekistan does worse. Moreover, countries like Georgia and Belarus are among the fastest reformers in recent years, showing that transition countries are able to make substantial progress in a short time. Ukraine however has been a slow reformer since the fall of the Soviet Union and hasn't been able to make much progress despite declarations of good intentions of both the current and the previous governments. Some small progress has been made over the last five years (comparing the 2006 Doing Business Reports and the 2011 report but much remains to be done. The problem is not that one does not know what should be done, the problem is that governments are not able or willing to implement serious reforms.

Ukraine scores especially bad in terms of the difficulty of closing businesses, getting construction permits and paying taxes, hence those are the areas to tackle if Ukraine wants to increase on the World banks ranking. More generally,Ukraine's business climate would benefit from a general simplification and modernization of regulation and, related, a decrease in corruption - once good regulation is in place, consistent enforcement of such regulation would be a priority.

The current government is trying to reform the tax code, but its plans so far have been delayed by an inability to get a consensus on the draft of the new tax code. Tax laws are difficult to reform in any country, and Ukraine is unlikely to be a an exception on this rule, especially given its divided electorate and the short run focus of many Ukrainian politicians. The benefits of reforms typically will only be visible in the medium run, while the political costs are visible immediately, as many people benefit from the current outdated system of regulation.

Interesting Survey of Ukrainian MPs

The Parliamentary Development Project of Ukraine has an interesting survey of Ukrainian MPs which can be found here

Women and Politics

Some statistics about views of Ukrainians about women and politics

Charitable Giving and Oligarchs

An interesting story about a Ukrainian oligarch can be found here

"The problem was that Kolomoisky had not been elected but appointed unilaterally by the organization’s outgoing president, Jonathan Joseph, who had met Kolomoisky for the first time earlier that day. Joseph defended his sudden decision as justified by the size of Kolomoisky’s gift -- and by the need to respond to a man who might not be inclined to wait for an official vote from the board of directors."

Diagnose Yourself

Some interesting stats on how Ukrainians try to avoid to go to the doctor can be found here

"The study also showed that the Ukrainians are not in a hurry either to go to the doctor for usual advice. About a half (46.4%) of the respondents stated that, in principle, they visit the doctor only in emergencies. On the average, 16.2% of the respondents visit doctors once a year, 15% do it twice a year, and 12.2% on a quarterly basis. About 7% of the respondents said they did not consult with doctors at all."

Regional Elections in Ukraine

"
KYIV, October 31 /UKRINFORM/. The present election campaign in Ternopil was noted for a great number of creative and unique promises. One of candidates to the mayor post promised 10 ares of land under construction to every Ternopil resident. Another candidate wishes to construct Disneyland in Ternopil, the third one - believes that heating of the pavement in Ternopil region is a panacea from traumatism in the winter period. Another candidate for the city mayor post is convinced that it is necessary to construct a hydroelectric station in the regional center for the city needs.

Lists of candidates to city deputies are also noted for originality. The whole families are going to the city administration. For instance, among those wishing to get into the deputy chair of the provincial scale are son, daughter-in-law, mother-in-law and ... a driver of one well-known regional politician. "