Rumi Nations

I read the cover story on Newsweek which talks about whether a college degree is all that it is cracked up to be. I don't even want to talk here about stingy and weird American parents who pretend to be martyrs or heroes just because they 'paid' for their kids' college education. I mean ... Anyway, here's a look at the economic brute facts of life for Americans and people of other advanced/developed nations. Some things appear obvious to me as an Indian: Americans whose mother tongue is English should not have to go to university to learn English. Not in the 21st  century. Less lawyers are better. Progress is unidirectional and not cyclical. The assembly line of Ford is not going to be re-invented. Ever. Hopefully we'll also never again be making airplanes and tanks by the thousands in assembly lines. Thousands of women are not going to be sitting at telephone exchanges. Managers typically work without secretaries now. We live in a world of robotic...

Americans are having to scrimp … saving quarters for diapers … Americans luckily have access to a few social safety nets provided by the government such as Medicaid, unemployment benefits, food stamps, etc. Then, non-governmental organizations and religious charities pitch in to provide whatever help they can. The effects of this prolonged recession are definitely going to be far-reaching on the psyche of those who will have gone through long periods of unemployment. This is happening after some seven decades. So, very few are alive today who had experienced it the last time it happened. The last recession was followed by an economic boom aided by both government policies as well as the ‘martial’ nations of Europe who still wanted to fight one last great, climactic mother of all wars after the Great War. The lessons for India? I think the message is a very sobering one. If a nation as advanced and prosperous can suffer such havoc from economic cycles of boom and bust, what chance does...