Tag Archives: economic development

In Egypt, give ‘em entrepreneurship

By Elmira Bayrasli | Published: February 1, 2011
In the frenzy to understand, analyze and predict the historic events unfolding in Egypt, many rightly have focused on the Egyptian economy.  Here are some interesting data points: A year ago, Egypt’s government released figures on the country’s poverty.  It showed that it had reached 23.4 percent, “up from 20 percent the previous year.” In [...]
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Development choices: The poor or profits?

By Elmira Bayrasli | Published: January 15, 2011
(updated) Muhammad Yunus, the Nobel Prize winning founder of the Grameen Bank, writes in today’s New York Times that microcredit has “give(n) rise to its own breed of loan sharks.”  He’s troubled, in particular, with the “commercialization” of the industry, formed, as he says to “provide small loans that people, especially poor women, could use to [...]
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What is the middle class?

By Elmira Bayrasli | Published: August 13, 2010
Last Saturday, the NYT ran a piece on Indonesia’s economic miracle.  “After Years of Inefficiency, Indonesia Emerges as an Economic Model.”  That the South Asian island nation is rapidly growing wasn’t much of a surprise.  How the piece defines middle class was: “In Jakarta, worsening traffic and a proliferation of megamalls are seen as signs [...]
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