02 June 2008

Wireless Access, Too

The small restaurant I had lunch at today has wireless internet access. Mind you, this was not in a Sheraton hotel, but in the crowded, narrow alley filled with tailors, shoemakers, and other little types of businesses--that is, a typical developing world alley.

I don't normally travel with my laptop, since I like to go light, so it's no benefit to me. But it clearly was to the two patrons checking their email and scanning the news.

Once upon a time I thought that capitalism was bad...but then I hadn't yet studied economics or travelled to Damascus. I am more and more amazed all the time at the power of markets and the entrpreneurial spirit, and at the ways the market works to the benefit of average people.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

James, great posts... I look forward to the full debrief on your return.

cheers,

Jim M.

Anonymous said...

Nothing gives you an appreciation for markets like the study of them.

After all Ronald Coase was a Fabian socialist as a student, until he studied economics at least.

James Hanley said...

I love Coase. I've read "The Problem of Social Costs" 3 times, and while I get lost in the middle of his argument each time, so that I can't quite follow his logic, I get the concept, which remains endlessly fascinating to me.

Jim, how did you happen to find my blog?

Anonymous said...

James,
I found it through a post you did on Dispatches a while back.

J

James Hanley said...

I'm bringing you a gift--some kind of Damascene insect that died in my hotel bathroom.