We need smart projects, not crazy ones
Güven Sak, PhD
06 March 2012
Revision brings good. Today’s world requires smart projects, not crazy ones. We have a great deal to lose now. The old project involving Sinop has risen from the grave once again. According to yesterday’s news, the Sinop Governorate is planning to turn Boztepe Cape into an island. You might wonder what the purpose is. As far as I understand, they want to connect the island to the mainland with a bridge. You might ask “Why would you separate it from the mainland if you are going to reconnect it?” Let me not ask that question. Instead I will argue, “The most difficult task for Turkey is to decide its priorities.” Above was Sinop’s unplanned “crazy” project. I think, the plan to increase the compulsory education to twelve years was also a crazy project. I do not believe that the project was a
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How will inflation rate change?
Fatih Özatay, PhD
06 March 2012
Growth rate is not the only macroeconomic indicator which is hard to estimate for 2012. Currently, it is even difficult to estimate the inflation outlook. Inflation figures for February were announced. Annual consumer price inflation decreased slightly to 10.4 percent. Core inflation, which is a stronger indicator for inflation dynamics, eased month on month from 8.4 to 8.1 percent. In January and February, therefore, inflation matched expectations as well as the projections of the Central Bank of Turkey (CBT).
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Some unpleasant facts about unemployment
Fatih Özatay, PhD
03 March 2012
Unemployment rate around 10 percent is about to become the fate of Turkey. This should be prevented. Last Thursday average unemployment rate for 2011 was announced. In 2009, when the impacts of the crisis on the labor market was felt the harshest, the rate stood at 14 percent. During the next two years, the rate decreased sharply to 9.8 percent. More importantly, non-agricultural unemployment rate also dropped by five points to 12.4 percent.
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This still is not an education reform bill.
Güven Sak, PhD
02 March 2012
Turkey needs to find structural solutions to structural problems and to give up empty talk. This week, it snowed more than ever in Ankara. On Tuesday, when the heavy snow started, I was at the Turkish National Assembly (TNA). The Subcommittee for Education and Culture was listening to the opinions of civil society organizations on the Bill on Amending the Primary Education Law and Certain Other Laws. Actually, there were two new bills. Some articles in the first one, which proposed a controversial distance education or homeschooling scheme after the first four years of basic education, were later omitted as they gave way to heated debates. So, girls were saved from seclusion. A mistake was corrected. In my opinion, the parliament were forced to change the bill as the telephone lines of all
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Intelligence wars: quo vadis?
Nihat Ali Özcan, PhD
01 March 2012
The rapidly changing agenda in Turkey doesn’t mean disputed issues have been resolved. Problems are either frozen or kept waiting until they will be argued again. Though they are less public than before, the intelligence wars are actually continuing behind closed doors; let’s take a close look at them. Open sources indicate that the struggle among intelligence organizations is continuing. Despite a political leader like Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, attacks on the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) are evolving to systematic “psychological operations.”There are two sides to these psychological operations; institutional and representative. One of the parties, police intelligence, is comprised of unlimited manpower, a high technical intelligence capability, a swollen budget, active
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New Euro injection
Fatih Özatay, PhD
01 March 2012
Huge injections by the ECB do not eliminate the fundamental problems of Europe. Yet, it is not the ECB’s duty to solve Europe’s problems. On December 21, European Central Bank (ECB) lent banks 489 billion Euros for three years at the average of benchmark interest rate, which currently is 1 percent. With a second auction held yesterday, the ECB awarded another 530 billion Euros to banks. This also is a three-year loan at the average of benchmark interest rate. It is said that in the first auction, 523 banks were financed and the number is estimated to rise to 800 with the last auction.
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Turkey is not as good as MIT!
Ozan Acar
29 February 2012
The Regional Entrepreneurship Acceleration Program carried out in February at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) hosted discussions on the role of local entrepreneurship and innovation ecosystem in the birth of companies that change the world [1].
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Financial regulations in the UK
Fatih Özatay, PhD
28 February 2012
UK has been changing the financial system radically. The current authority for financial services is to be abrogated. I am keeping my promise: I will go on examining under which governance structure macroprudential policies give healthier results. In my commentary dated February 16, I summarized the four options proposed in an important report by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). The first was to assign the role as a shared responsibility by more than one institution. There were two alternatives under this option: to establish a macroprudential policy council (or a financial stability policy council) or to introduce an arrangement under which macroprudential policy decisions will be taken by multiple agencies. Second was to establish a separate macroprudential agency. The third
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What does Israel have that Turkey does not?
Güven Sak, PhD
28 February 2012
In order to build the innovation debates in Turkey upon a concrete context, we must try to understand what Israel has that Turkey does not. We have been discussing innovations in Turkey for a long time. We stress that innovations are important and that innovativeness must be cultivated. But in fact, we talk nonsense. As the discussions on innovation turned out to be hollow, those on entrepreneurship also did. This is what I think, at least. Today, let me try to build the discussion on a solid framework, to help you envision the issue. Lately, I have been thinking that it is important to compare the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) with the Turkish Armed Forces (TAF) in terms of innovation performance. In order to build the innovation debates in Turkey upon a concrete foundation, we must try to
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The new education reform bill: 4+4+4
Fatih Özatay, PhD
25 February 2012
There exists a close link between the level of education and the level of welfare in a country. Income levels of countries are revised on the basis of the price of similar goods for comparison purposes. Otherwise, income gap between developed and developing countries would become huge, giving the impression that people in developing countries starve to death. For instance, food is relatively cheaper in developing countries than in developed countries. In a developing country, the price of the same goods basket is generally lower than that in a developed country.
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