Category: Economics

Saarimner on Facebook

On By saarimnerIn About - Personal Thoughts, D7000, Day-to-day, Economics, English, Formula 1, Inspiration, Inspirational, iPhone, iPhone Apps, iPhone-Photography - What I see through my iPhone lens, iPhonepics, Just for fun, Music, Nikon D5000, Olympus XZ-1, Other stuff, Photography, Quotes, Swedish, Thoughts, Tips & tricks, Youtube-clips2 Comments

As an experiment I’ve set up a page on Facebook. The page will be a way to be noticed when there are new things published on this blog. It may also be a better way to share thoughts and ideas in a better way?

The link to the new page is http://www.facebook.com/saarimner

Welcome to visit

Interview with Mark Zuckerberg at Startup School in 2011

On By saarimnerIn Economics, English, InspirationalLeave a comment

This is an interview with Mark Zuckerberg that I think almost everyone should watch. The interview is made at Startup School in 2011 and he’s talking about risk taking, entrepreneurship, culture, how to grow your business, how you can achieve things as a group and so on.

It’s quite long but I think you might as well just listen to it along side any other things.

Barcelona – Morning expedition – Woman at 6 AM

On By saarimnerIn D7000, Economics, English, Photography2 Comments

Almost every time I visit other towns I choose one day to get up really early in the morning to experience that particular town waking up.

Last week I was in Barcelona for work and I decided to try to portrait two areas that felt extra important in these hard economic times for Spain; people that we might not see otherwise during our hectic days, those that live their lives in the dark and have nowhere to go. The other topic was to show the town getting ready for a new day.

The first photo is from the first category. This is a woman I came about while walking over Plaça de Catalunya, and I really felt for her. A woman, without almost anything besides her stroller; but still she quietly stood there and shared her bread with the birds.

Woman at 6 AM – © Pedro Hansson

The moment really did have a mix of emotions. Sadness for her situation, compassion for her willing to give but also calmness since she, a few moments after this pic was taken carefully smiled at me and then continued to feed the birds. But most of all she made think of how she ended up there.

I couldn’t imagine how it must be, to have a life like that, and moments like this always brings perspective of the differences in the world. I’m really thankful of how Sweden have tackled this recession that has hit southern Europe so badly (even though there are things that also can and must be improved in Sweden as well).

We must not, in trying to think about how we can make a big difference, ignore the small daily differences we can make which, over time, add up to big differences that we often cannot foresee.
– Marian Wright Edelman

Förmögenhetsfördelning

On By saarimnerIn Economics, iPhone, Swedish1 Comment
För några år sedan började jag fundera över om vi inte, efter ett par årtionden – som gått i individualismens tecken, kommer att få en ny typ av fördelningspolitisk våg med tanke på hur förmögenheterna på jorden fördelas. (OBS! Jag lägger ingen egen politisk värdering i detta.) (1)
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När vi idag har ett samhälle där individen i första hand måste visa på att man vill lösa sin egen situation innan man begär hjälp, vilket jag personligen tycker är rätt, måste vi också ha skyddsnät som fungerar tillfredsställande. Idag behöver 40 miljoner amerikaner “food-stamps” för att kunna äta sig mätta samtidigt som extrema förmögenheter fördelas på väldigt få. Vi har också banker som ständigt måste räddas efter att ett fåtal personer tillförskaffat sig förmögenheter och fördelar, detta utan att sen behöva ta det ansvar som krävs av varje enskild individ.
Bike outside Handelshögskolan 2011-10-09
Bike outside Handelshögskolan 2011-10-09 - iPhone Camera
Den senaste tidens demonstrationer i USA (98%-vågen) känns som att ett tecken på
ovanstående. FN gjorde en undersökning där man kom fram till att fattigdomen i världen skulle kunna utrotas för 90 miljarder US-dollar. Det är ungefär samma siffra som nämndes för vad det kostar att utrota miljöförstöringen enligt samma undersökning. Samtidigt ser vi idag företag som värderas till 400 miljarder US dollar. Detta tror jag kommer att sticka alltfler i ögonen över tiden.
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Personligen tror jag ironiskt nog att den allra rikaste procenten har mest att vinna på att hitta vägar för att snabbt visa på mindre girighet och större vilja att bidra till samtliga människors välbefinnande.

Kommer uppdatera med källhänvisningar senare idag.

(1) Min personliga politiska uppfattning är liberal, dvs jag tror på individens rättigheter och skyldigheter samtidigt som jag tror på skyddsnät för de som verkligen försökt och ändå faller igenom. Alla har inte samma förutsättningar när vi föds.

Some thoughts about Apple’s total share value, World wealth and Poverty

On By saarimnerIn About - Personal Thoughts, Economics, English3 Comments

Yesterday I started reading about Apples share value that now is reaching for the $400.000.000.000-line. A totally staggering number! At the same time I ran into some articles from Credit Suisse and their World Wealth report where they came to the conclusion that the world’s total wealth is $194.500.000.000.000. Off course these figures aren’t comparable in a direct sense but it sure made me think… The ratio between the two figures are 1/510… (References at the bottom of the page 1, 2, 3)

At the same time I came across a statement from UNDP:
“The cost of eradicating poverty is 1% of global income. billion a year (equivalent to 0.5% of annual global income) would ensure universal access to basic social services (basic education, health, nutrition, access to water and sewerage disposal).”(4)

I’m a strong believer of freedom and liberalism (and I’m genuinely happy for anyone who makes that big economic dream come true because most of them deserve it), as well as a social responsibility from both the government as well as the citizens; but wouldn’t it be awesome if we all in the wealthiest part of the world would be part of a process where this generation took some serious steps towards ending poverty?

As John Lennon once wrote “Maybe I’m a dreamer.. “.

This post wasn’t supposed to be corny, but I guess we all are a little bit corny when we release our minds into things like this.

(Back to first page of this blog)

(c) Pedro Hansson
(c) Pedro Hansson - Visby, Gotland - Olympus XZ-1

Hope you have a great day/weekend!

References:

1) http://www.99.se/artiklar/2648-apple-varldens-hogst-varderade-bolag.html Article in Swedish.

2) http://www.stwr.org/poverty-inequality/new-tally-of-global-wealth-illuminates-staggering-disparities.html  “The world’s 4.4 billion adults, notes the new Credit Suisse research, now hold $194.5 trillion in wealth. That’s enough, if shared evenly across the globe, to guarantee every adult in the world a $43,800 net worth.”

(3) I must at this stage point out that I’m a big fan of Apple and their products. My home actually slowly turns into an Apple Store.

(4) http://www.teamstoendpoverty.org/wq_pages/en/visages/chiffres.php