Welcome to the Proposals Library of AltKuznets Advisors Pvt Ltd., Your Sustainability Nirvana !

GP Two-Part Vote ? What's that? A curse? No, in fact, and to the contrary, perhaps deliverance, though not the divine kind! Don't get it? Read on! Just today, as has happened innumerable times before, the people of Jharkhand gave a fractured mandate with seats split three-, even four-ways. In doing so, they have brought upon themselves the likelihood of a coalition - a result none of them voted for, and a result that, I suspect, many parties were eagerly awaiting for (so much for 'independent platforms and manifestos'), and not for the opportunities to congratulate one another! And that is the crux of this blog. Our voting system, as I have pointed out earlier, does not permit the voter to distinguish between his choice of candidate for his constituency and the choice of the party to form the government. Is that a problem? Clearly. Every constituency has its popular faces. While many candidates turned popular because they were supported by political parties, there are a

Hail Mary Pass!!!! Ganga Prasad Rao http://myprofile.cos.com/gangar For once, I am glad I didn't graduate in finance! Why, I'd be burned with flame-mail for the sacrilege I am about to commit! Much attention has been devoted to the study of volatility in equity markets. Many have reached the conclusion it is the search for short-term 'rents' - overnight profits from 'get-rich quick' derivatives - that is to blame. But greed being what it is, it is inconceivable to mandate the elimination of short-term trading opportunities (though, and at a tangent, I can see why speculators are no longer necessary in 'mature' commodity markets). Many also subscribe to the viewpoint markets should reward those 'enterprising' investors who pay to acquire superior information and do their 'homework' over less agile or less alert investors. So, how do we go about designing a solution that rewards 'good' investment behavior over 'bad'? Read on

'Byte Credits (and Byte Penalties)' – Online Gateway to Social Equity? Ganga Prasad G. Rao http://myprofile.cos.com/gangar With so many email solicitations, pop-up windows for shopping and online survey invitations, it is questionable whether one ever gets to the important stuff on the internet beyond glamor girls, cine awards and afternoon gossip-metamorphosed to late-evening internet chats. You know, stuff like emerging technology, social policy initiatives and documents, financial meltdown, global warming, reports from riot commissions, hygiene and nutrition, advances in medicine, groundbreaking scientific discoveries, theses, court opinions, ... the list is endless. The sad answer, for most of us internet addicts, is No! Despite immediate access, we are limited in what we surf and learn on the world-wide web. In a manner, we are deluged by the inane on the net, and left with little time for the sublime. Years back, I realized those seeking our participation in surveys on th

Neo-Socialist Per-Capita Economics Ganga Prasad G. Rao http://myprofile.cos.com/ The prophets of doom have spoken. And for once, the financial meltdown did turn those prophecies true. The stock markets, banks and financial institutions fell like nine pins (and with them, the thick volumes of budget and five-year plan documents) when the big daddies pulled the plug on the bourses. They knew better than to expect 50% returns year after year. ( Now is not the time to speak of the small investor who lost his house and family to the crisis by following the 'invest and hold long' strategy. Sucker!!!!!) With the threat of an economic collapse following the financial crisis still in the air, and with the upcoming global warming negotiations already casting their long shadow on the industry, the governments of the world are groping for ideas to grow their economy. Like? Keynesian Economics? Neo-classical laissez faire? Neo-Keynesian Economy? Been there done that! So what's new? Macr

Buy in to the 'Green Star'! Ganga Prasad G. Rao http://myprofile.cos.com/gangar What does it take to turn the world green - I mean, without poisoning our air, water, and land with toxic residues that perpetuate across time, accumulate in the food chain, reduce sperm count and infiltrate in to mother's milk and foetuses? Food, vegetables, fruit, even opaquely-packaged drinks with preservatives/pesticides and colours that negate any nutritive value they might contain (despite the detailed risk-analysis prepared by the consultant who was compensated with a free 'day-old, returned' Mercedes by the industry!). Toilet cleaners that, going by the composition, smell and color, are likely to turn the Pacific Ocean barren of life. Or, cadmium-doped, brightly colored plastic bags that poison the land they litter (and turn it eligible to receive EPA's Superfund monies! Phew!). To answer the question, not much. A strong political will, a few economists who will not sell them

NUKE THE ......WAIT!!!! THERE IS HOPE YET! Ganga Prasad G. Rao http://myprofile.cos.com/gangar As described by one writer, the Indo-US nuclear deal has seen a path more tortuous than the meandering of deltaic rivers. Yet, as the Bush presidency comes to a close and the UPA government totters at the precipice of inflation and mis-governance, the Indo-US nuclear deal stands out as the one hope in the monsoon of despair. Not that it has been supported within or outside the government. For once, the Left has kept its word, at least on paper. Predictably, it has backed away from the deal when it matters the most. Thankfully, that was no surprise! Manmohan Singh's government now faces the prospect of pushing the deal down the unwilling throats of the BJP and the Left by garnering support from the third-tier parties and marginalized/regional political parties and dissenting members of various political parties. So much for a national consensus on a issue that arguably ranks as one of more