Friday, May 30, 2003

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Jargonwatch: Net-net Sample: "Net-net, we have to increase sales or reduce expenses". What does it even mean? Something along the lines of "bottom-line", "at the end of the day". As in "the net result". Apparently the concatenated repetition of "net" does have some legitimacy, as in a "triple net" lease. Here is an attempt at a more formal definition and etymology. It reminds me of what my mother said, some years ago, when she began to hear the term "win-win": "it sounds like baby talk". 11:33:46 PM    comment []

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SARS Political Impact on China The women's soccer world cup has been moved from China to the United States because of the SARS epidemic. I have to imagine the Chinese government, which seems to set great store on the opportunity to use international sports events to show off for the outside world, is horrified at this outcome. And the economic impact of SARS is large and possibly long-lasting (let's pray otherwise). So I will make a prediction: 30 years from now, the lessons of the mismanagement of the early stages of the SARS epidemic (lack of transparency, policy of denial, scapegoating individuals rather than digging for root causes), may well be seen as a pivotal event in the evolution of Chinese civil society. 10:49:26 PM    comment []

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Complexity in the Tax Code The Federal tax code is painfully complex, and getting ever-complexer: even Republicans, including President Bush, seem unable to maintain focus on the strategic goal of simplifying the code, giving in to the short-term temptation to tinker in ways that add to the complexity. I have thought of one obvious way to provide a across-the-board tax cut (of X%) that does not increase the complexity of the tax code: everybody calculates their tax using the previous year's formulae, then deducts X%. In other words, if it is an across-the-board 5% cut, and your tax bill, using last year's formulae, was $1000, this year you only owe $950. 10:36:54 PM    comment []