Magic Statistics

Robert Mugabe has been in power for 26 years and has another two years left in his current term of office; but it’s not enough.  He has just ordered Zimbabwe’s constitution re-written so he can stay in power until 2010.

Mr Mugabe's present term of office ends in 2008. But the 82-year-old leader, who won a violent and widely condemned presidential election four years ago, is about to rewrite the constitution and give himself the option of staying in power beyond this limit.

The next presidential poll will be delayed until 2010, on the pretext that parliamentary elections are also due in that year and the two contests should be harmonised.

Dictator President Mugabe is already Africa's oldest head of state.

The country’s ineffectual and divided opposition vainly protested Mugabe’s latest power play.

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For years, economists have debated whether growth in labour productivity is attributable to production shifts from one plant to another or to productivity improvements within plants.  If the latter theory is correct, then the competitive process arguably plays little part in productivity growth.

If the former theory is correct, on the other hand, the competitive process is of utmost importance.  According to that view, productivity increases as firms turn over and output is shifted from one firm to another.  The competitive process drives entry and exit of firms and shifts output shares toward firms that are more productive.

A new Statistics Canada study provides strong evidence in support of the view that competition accounts for the lion’s share of labour productivity growth.

The competitive process that shifts market share towards more productive firms accounted for about two thirds of aggregate labour productivity growth in Canadian manufacturing from 1989 to 1999, according to a new study that examines firm turnover and productivity growth.
. . .
The study finds that firms that gained market share tended to be more productive than firms that lost market share. The firms that entered the manufacturing sector by building new plants or acquiring new plants are more productive than those firms that exit by closing down plants or divesting existing plants. These results suggest that firm turnover should make a positive contribution to overall labour productivity growth of the manufacturing sector.

The study concludes that firm turnover associated with the competitive process accounted for about 70% of aggregate labour productivity growth in Canadian manufacturing. The remaining 30% was mostly attributable to productivity growth of the continuing firms that expanded their market share.

The study of Canadian manufacturing also found large-scale entry and exit of firms and sizeable shifts of market share among existing firms, contradicting the myths that large manufacturing firms stay large and that successful establishment of new businesses is rare.

The full study can be downloaded here (pdf); the executive summary is posted here.

Source:

Statistics Canada, 2006. " Study: Competition, firm turnover and productivity growth." The Daily, 25 September. Statistics Canada catalogue no. 11-001-XIE.http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/060925/d060925a.htm (accessed 25 September 2006).

John Hutton, Works and Pensions Secretary in Tony Blair’s Labour government, has mouthed off again.  Ten days ago, he astonished his party by saying that children raised by two parents face better life prospects than other children.  Today, he caused another commotion by questioning welfare rules that impose a greater burden on two-parent families.

In a controversial speech, Mr Hutton underlined his modernising credentials by stressing the role of individual families in getting people out of poverty and into work.
. . .
Mr Hutton was set to use his speech to the Labour conference to "ask the question" why the benefits system makes it very difficult for two-parent families to qualify for state aid. He privately believes that action has to be taken to correct the big gap between the way single parents are treated and those who are married or in long-term relationships.

At present, two-parent families on low incomes have to work an extra 16 hours a week before qualifying for state help, whereas lone parents have to work just three hours a week.

Mr Hutton is also pushing to require both parents to be named on birth certificates.  At present, a mother can elect to name only herself.

Brace yourselves for possibly the most argumentative statement this upstart has yet uttered:

"Bringing up a child is the single most important thing we'll ever do in our lives," he was set to say.

That’s something you don’t hear from politicians very often nowadays.

I have a question: Why does stating truths accepted virtually without question in past generations earn Mr Hutton the description “modernising”?

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