Reihan Salam

By now you've heard of the modern marvel that is the Tata Nano, best known as the world's cheapest car. Perhaps you also know that Tata, long one of India's industrial giants and an increasingly powerful global player, is facing dire straits. Tata's acquisition of the Britain-based luxury automaker Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) came at a particularly inconvenient time, shall we say, and its domestic market is reeling as well. So why should Americans care? … More »

Tim O'Reilly, one of my personal heroes, has a short but very suggestive post on, appropriately enough, how publishers are starting to resemble software developers. As the premium on speed increases, we're likely to see more multi-author collaboration in the world of books, and software developers have learned a great deal about managing multi-author collaboration. … More »

Auren Hoffman, a serial tech entrepreneur, has an interesting and rather frank post on "why hiring is paradoxically harder in a downturn." … More »

On Friday, Jad Mouawad of the Times reported on rising anxieties concerning global oil supply. Prompted by a new report from Cambridge Energy Research Associates, it seems as though the recent price decline, generally seen as good news, is setting the global economy up for a fall.The report says about 7.6 million barrels a day of future supplies are "at risk" of being deferred or canceled, like heavy oil or deepwater projects, and which could bring total supplies…… More »

Was Facebook right or wrong to cave to the army of irate users who decried its Twitter-like redesign? Last week, Dare Obasanjo attracted a lot of attention by arguing that Facebook's redesign reflected a fundamental misunderstanding of its purpose.… More »

A number of America's storied companies have announced end-of-quarter layoffs, which isn't too surprising given the economic climate. But in the case of IBM, we see a sign of things to come: many of the jobs will be transferred to India, home, as the Wall Street Journal notes, to Wipro and Infosys, perhaps IBM's leanest, most nimble competitors in the information services business.… More »

The latest issue of The Economist has a data-rich dispatch (subscription-only, I believe) on the state of Texas's economy. Political progressives have long lamented the Sunbelt model of government, which marries low taxes with stingy public services. Without wading too deeply into the political thicket, it does seem, however, that the Sunbelt model might prove more resilient in an economic downturn. I should stress that resilience isn't the highest virtue. But…… More »

Via Alan Jacobs, I came across a short, interesting post from Doug Bowman, one of Google's lead designers, on why he's leaving the company. … More »

We've been told more than once that technological creativity flourishes in downturns, with Google's birth during the last web bust as the cardinal example. This time around, one gets the sense that the next technology boom will be driven by a phenomenon Vernor Vinge anticipated in a 2004 short story called "Synthetic Serendipity" -- the marriage of gaming and real life.… More »

A friend emailed to ask me for my thoughts on the "JournoList," a question prompted by Michael Calderone's short but suggestive report in yesterday's Politico. Calderone's piece is for the most part a lament about the secrecy maintained by the members of the list, which is particularly impressive given that many of its core members are prolific bloggers who are inclined to share many, if not all, details of their intellectual life. (I know the feeling.) In my…… More »

In a wide-ranging essay for Foreign Affairs, Atlantic national correspondent Robert D. Kaplan argues that the Indian Ocean rim will take "center stage for the 21st century" as a site of commercial and military rivalries. … More »

Massachusetts is facing a health care crisis. Despite landmark legislation that has brought the state close to its goal of universal coverage, spiraling costs have continued to spiral, and there is a growing consensus that tax increases aren't a long-term solution. According to Kevin Sack of the indispensable New York Times, the favored emerging solution is a pay-for-performance arrangement. They want a new payment method that rewards prevention and the effective…… More »

On Thursday, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., publisher of The New York Times, gave a thoughtful address on the subject of "news literacy," and it makes for an instructive contrast with the excellent Sullivan-approved Clay Shirky essay on the future of the news business. … More »

The American Conservative, founded by Patrick Buchanan to serve as a voice for anti-war, anti-immigration conservative nationalists, plays an interesting role in conservative politics. Though not as widely read as National Review, which aims to set the tone for the movement conservative mainstream, TAC has gained a devoted following as a sharp critic of the conservative mainstream, a stance reflected in its ardent embrace of Ron Paul's quixotic yet very impressive…… More »

Because this is a business and economics site, it's rare that we discuss matters relating to oatmeal. But over at Serious Eats, Erin Zimmer artfully explains why oatmeal is the food of this recession-ravaged moment. … More »

In 2007, Tyler Cowen raised an intriguing possibility. … More »

Florida Governor Charlie Crist, once known as "Chain Gang Charlie" for his tough-on-crime stance, surprised many when he embraced the cause of restoring voting rights for ex-convicts, not least because this was a move that in theory cut against the political interests of Crist's Republican allies. Yet this was of a piece with Crist's broader shift to the political center, which has proven politically advantageous given rising anti-GOP sentiment in Florida and…… More »

In describing the Employee Free Choice Act, Chris writes: The bill would eliminate employer-mandated secret-ballot elections in the union organizing process, allowing workers to potentially form unions via petition. And that's absolutely right. But as T.A. Frank has argued in The Washington Monthly, this is not necessarily the most essential part of the bill from the perspective of organized labor or, for that matter, those who hope to limit labor's influence.… More »

As the architect of America's overwhelming victory in the Gulf War, President George H.W. Bush spent most of 1991 as a prohibitive favorite for reelection. But after the economy entered a short, sharp recession, Bush looked increasingly vulnerable, not least due to restlessness among Republicans. He caught a big break in December of 1991 when his most formidable potential challenger bowed out of the presidential race. Just weeks before the New Hampshire primary,…… More »

Congressional Republicans are all but united in their opposition to President Obama's domestic program. But on foreign policy, where the Obama White House has taken a number of dramatic steps, Republicans have said virtually nothing, as Spencer Ackerman reports in The Washington Independent. … More »