Its all about Money, Honey

“Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidise it” - Ronald Regan.

Coming from a seasoned politican, this quote is amazingly honest. Funny as it may seem, it is also the hard truth. For almost 60 years, Indian government has been actively working for social and economic equality and bridging the divide. Thousands of Crores of public money has been spent on public administration and social welfare schemes of which I too am a beneficiary and am also a contributor to the funds.

Even after such magnanamous effort by the Government, the results often leave a lot to be desired. Why do so many well-intentioned plans fail to impress? Are we funding the wrong cause?

The following are a series of blogs is an attempt to understand of our economy.

. Money, Government and Tax
. Group appeasement vs Individual (Rajas of Free India)
. Pro-Poor vs Poverty
. Hijack of Basic ameneties
. Transport
. Energy
. Cost and Subsidy
. Price Rise, Demand and Housing
. Movies..Freedom...Govt.Control
. Rich-Poor gap and Power struggle

Education - Did I get the worth? - Part II

Most of my current knowledge is something that came not from school, but by way of conversations with people or reading books and news articles or on the net.

School education provided me with such good foundation,that building more knowledge on it came naturally. In that way I couldn't have done so well without school. I bet the whole 10 years on it was worth everyday.

Graduation was a revelation of society। While school provided a safe and static environment, college was more of a vibrant and casual place to be. I learned more from outside my classes than inside them. Though attending classes didn't teach much, what it taught was to be independent. In this sense college education was very important, for individual development. I should have put in less number of years and more number of hours in effort.

But, this is a postmortem view of the situation. If I knew what I had to learn in advance, I could have spent less time and effort to gain that knowledge. The point that what interested me and what I had to know was not known to me, is what necessitated the 20-year span. This required me to learn a lot more than required and lot more than what I could actually retain. In this sense the 20 years spent on my education was a necessity and rather insufficient.

Education - Did I get the worth?

My previous blog on '... 3 books', has brought up an interesting topic. About education ... Was it worth the trouble?
No..I didn't mean that education was not worth. On the contrary I meant, did I actually get my time's worth? I will spill out my side of the story and hope to strike similar chords in yours.

I spent 12 years in school before I passed 10th standard and in a decently good private school. Then I spent another couple of years in Intermediate (Pre-University /XII / Plus 2), and spent a bunch of money of tuitions. I did my graduation in Physics for about 3 years in a private college (aided by Government) and another 3 years for my post-graduation in Computer Applications in a government college. Thats a good (12+2+3+3) 20 years of education which comes to about 7300 days of effort and couple of lakhs in investment by my dad and others [Government aid means some-body's hard earned money forcibly looted in the form of tax and paid to me].

Did I do good enuf? I guess not. In fact, I am quite sure I didn't do well.
I put in 7300 days of effort to learn English, Telugu, Hindi, Sanskrit, Maths, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Civics, Geography, Economics, History and Computers. What do I know at the end of it.

Subject	What I Know
English	know enough to write this blog and read the daily newspaper.
Telugu	stopped writing long ago. Can read the daily newspaper.
Hindi	stoped reading and writing long ago. Can read the movie names on posters.
Sansrkit	Never understood this language. Dont think ever will. [2 years wasted completely].
Maths	Know to count, multiply, add and divide, and some basic trigonometry, probability, algebra and geometry enough to solve GMAT aptitude tests.
Physics	Newtons 3 laws and some basic principles. Cannot recall the value of any constant apart from g=9.8 ms^2.
Chemistry	Periodic table. Acid+Base is Water+Salt. Amino acids are building blocks are proteins and cells. Vaguely remember Krebs Cycle and ATP. Thats it. Nothing more than that.
Biology	Plant cells are different from Animal Cells and that biologist have a very complicated name for everything. A little about evolution.
Civics	We have a constitution, a President and Prime-minister and some rules of the game.
Geography	Identify World and India Maps and name all the states and some important places.
History	Mughals invaded India, ruled for 200 years, British ruled for another 200, Free from 1947 onwards. A little about world history, i.e the names of various revolutions and world wars [cant remember a single date/year].
Economics	Book Keeping, reading a Balance Sheet and a little about GDP, inflation, and stock indices.
Computers	Some programming languages and s/w engineering concepts.

Phew! that sums up all my 7300 days of effort.

Couldn't I have done that faster, cheaper, smarter, easier? I bet I could have..

Or, is it everything appears easier after-the-fact?

[Will continue later..]