On a slightly related linguistic note, I find the following sentence annoying:
"Put yourself in the shoes of that Early Adopter. Does she want to see useless garbage phrases or does she want to hear about how you totally understand her pain?"
It's safe to bet that among the early adopters of a version control data mining tool there are overwhelmingly more males than females. Probably the poster feels that using she will somehow compensate this inbalance. I see the he/she problem as a bug of English, but using she in all technical text where a he would be more probable is just fake.
The article makes the implicit claim that IKEA does a favor to Russians by selling them stuff and not Russians do by buying the stuff. I'm not saying the opposite just that this is not as obvious as the article makes it sound. It says that they invested x billions of dollars. Obviously they are planning to make a profit, so on the net money will leave the country due to their presence. If I understand correctly they want to open retail stores not manufacturing plants. Did I miss some finer point ?
In theory, trade only happens when it benefits both parties. I might hate the local Exxon selling soda for 2$ a bottle, but I can still buy it at other stores. The only reason you complain is they are charging you for the amount of effort they save you and not their costs.
So, opening a store is a net gain, as is investing 4 billion in the economy. In theory.
Of course state protectionism might help local furniture manufacturers to catch up and grow their own business and that might actually benefit the Russian economy even more. Perhaps the legal, administrative burdens are there with a purpose, or maybe I'm reading too much into it...
Protectionism is bad. It doesn't benefit an economy. It can benefit the protected industries short term as well as the people they bribe to get the protection. But overall it is bad.
Trade happens when both parties think it benefits them. If one side gets fooled and screwed enough, it should stop. If that one side is the government, it may not, since it is paying with someone else's money.
So are you suggesting that IKEA is in the philanthropic business of propping up developing countries? At a loss, they will provide local workers with employment, will hire local construction companies to build unneeded crap just to help them out? Really?
I know a large part of IKEA's corporate structure is a non-profit organization, but trust me, that is only to evade taxes.
This is a giant corporate entity vs. a giant corrupt government. IKEA is complaining against the complicated bureaucratic nightmare that Russia set up so that it would be easier to extract bribes from companies like IKEA. _Technically_ IKEA is one breaking some local construction safety rules. Somehow I don't see Russians re-writing their crappy laws and regulations to suit IKEA. They might let IKEA ignore some of them... but that is exactly where the bribes come in ;-)
So far IKEA is going about it the right way -- shaming Russia on the international level.
IKEA does not have to be "in the philanthropic business" to benefit the countries in which they have operations. The fact that they make a profit does not preclude other people (the landlords, contractors and employees in the post you replied to, among others) from benefiting. Economics is not a zero-sum game. Wealth can be created. More at http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2007/04/wealth_creatio...
Sure, but on the whole they make a profit, so the money they take out of the country will be more than what they bring in the form of products, rents, wages, etc. or otherwise they would go bankrupt.
Another aspect often overlooked is how great help grandparents can be. Even though nowadays that is often seen as a big no-no, in some cultures, and if they are willing to help, they can make young parents' life much easier.
My parents live in the same town as we do. I can't imagine what it would be like not having them nearby.
Yeah, there are some drawbacks. They are far more permissive than we are, and my 7-year-old takes full advantage of that. But they give support and love and interaction that we sometimes don't have time for.
Watched until 1:40. That chart could be taught in school as "how to lie with data": reduction from 20 to 10 made to look more dramatic by changing the scale.
11th grade for me seemed quite intellectual. In those 1300 hours of busy work I learned about infinite series, analytical geometry, differential calculus, basic group theory, basic linear algebra, and this is just maths. While I had to relearn most of this in college in more rigorous format, most of my intuition in maths I have from this time.
I skipped maths class to attend rehearsals for the lead role in the school play, and learnt trig from trying to understand how Doom BSP worked.
I also got more from trying to automate Linux than I ever did in those non-practical Logo and Pascal exercises. My school had no concept of task-based learning.
In many countries it is already common practice that poor people buy glasses on the market without any prescription. They try on several different lenses and buy the one that seems most suitable. In essence that's what the doctor does as well.
It's safe to bet that among the early adopters of a version control data mining tool there are overwhelmingly more males than females. Probably the poster feels that using she will somehow compensate this inbalance. I see the he/she problem as a bug of English, but using she in all technical text where a he would be more probable is just fake.