Power Pal

Read an interesting article in HBS Working Knowledge newsletter today about a new book that talks about reaching impasses in your life that require you to take a fresh look at your life to get "unstuck". I definitely feel like I've reached several of these in my life, so this article is pretty interesting. I suppose this is another way of saying "mid-life crisis", except that it can happen many times in your life. Here is an excerpt from the article where the author describes what he means by an "impasse": The meaning of an impasse, although it's usually first expressed as a failure or in an internalized notion of inadequacy, is a request for us to change our way of thinking about ourselves and our place in the world. At impasse our model—our cognitive map of life and of the way we're going to fit into it—is no longer working. We all carry a representation of the world, our work, how we do our work, and how we fit in and where we're going;...

We watched the movie The Pursuit of Happyness last night. It's a pretty incredible story and one that really leaves you feeling humbled. You lose perspective on how easy (relatively speaking) it is to be successful if you have the resources to support that pursuit. It takes resources to go to college or continue your education. If you're in the poorer end of the population, how do you invest in yourself? You need both the time and the money, either directly or via access to credit, to break out of that lower-class, paycheck to paycheck lifestyle. That's the economic perspective on the movie. The one that really touches you is what drives people to improve themselves. In this case, it was all about how Chris Gardener was trying to succeed simply to provide a home for his son. I suppose there is no better motivation. Great movie. I highly recommend it.

Read an interesting article in US News & World Report about how other countries are able to manage different aspects of society better than the United States. There are about 30 different examples in the article, but here are a few interesting ones: Removing all street signs, street lights, and speed limits . Apparently by removing all of these constraints, drivers feel less safe while driving and hence drive much more defensively. It also gives them a much greater feeling of interdependence with other drivers and with pedestrians. Upper class buses . In Colombia, they created a high-end commuter bus line. Many upper middle class commuters use it and it is far cheaper and quicker to setup than rail lines. I would absolutely use public transportation to commute to work every day if it were more convenient. Graduated fines . In Finland, fine amounts (e.g. for speeding tickets) are scaled based on means rather than a flat rate. They take half a days income as a base and then u...

Read two articles on the benefits and pains of globalization. One article in the Wall Street Journal about how Alan Blinder, a former vice chairman for the Federal Reserve Board, was commenting on some of the downsides of free trade. He was big proponent of free trade, but has recently changed his tune on the matter saying that there are real short term risks. One of those is the loss of certain types of jobs. At the top of the list are (of course) computer programmers. Good list of jobs to avoid I suppose. On the flip side of this article, I read another article in Forbes entitled "Why Globalization is Good". This one seems to focus more on why globalization is good for other countries though. Some examples In the 1990s, as Vietnam's economy grew 6% a year, the number of people living in poverty (42 million) fell 7% annually In Uganda, when GDP growth passed 3%, the number fell 6% per year, says the World Bank. Per-person income in China has climbed from $16 a y...

Read a few recent articles about private equity for non-profit organizations. Both of them dealt with how social enterprises or non-profits can not reach their full potential quickly enough because of lack of access to financing. One article in Forbes was about a social enterprise fund that was started recently called Good Capital . It's a venture capital fund targeted at social enterprises (both for profit and non-profit) that have sustainable business models. Apparently it's difficult for these enterprises to get debt financing as they don't have many assets to back up the investment. That's the gap this fund is intended to fill. The fund is supposed to provide a moderate return, but has very high fees. The article also mentions similar funds like Google's Google.org . The other article in the Wall Street Journal was about how hedge funds are getting involved in supporting fund-raising for non-profits. As hedge fund managers join the boards of non-profit...

Read an article in Forbes about a venture called WiLDNet that is providing low-cost, long-distance wireless internet access to the Third World. The initiative is being run by the Technology and Infrastructure for Emerging Regions ( TIER ) group at UC Berkeley headed by Eric Brewer (founder of Inktomi). It can transmit up to 60 miles using just 8 watts of electricity (a solar panel can run it) at cable modem speeds and costs only $400. One hospital is using it to deliver telemedicine in India. Very cool use of technology.

There are so many ways to make a living. Take this guy for instance.

I read an article in Forbes about this company called Planktos whose idea is to dump iron dust into the ocean to cause phytoplankton to bloom and suck carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. Also read an article about this company that is building a diesel rotary engine . Apparently it's much simpler than a piston engine and gets much better efficiency - 51 mpg.