What about legalizing hard drugs?

Prompted by my earlier post on legalizing marijuana, Jack Point thinks that a good way of tackling the problem of hard drugs, such as heroin is for government to give it away for free for addicts and encourage them to voluntary enroll themselves to treatment. I think that has some sense to it and better than our current policy.

I'm generally skeptical of government programs, once it's passed through the parliament and other bureaucratic processes, it wouldn't be nearly as optimal as one would want to design it. Given budgetary constraints, poor service delivery in places like Sri Lanka, there would inevitably be restrictions on accessible quantity nor would most taxpayers be too thrilled for the fact that they are financing someone else's doping habits. I think the market would do a better job in the goals Jack Point outlines, except in extreme cases where the addiction is uncontrollable.

None of this, including marijuana legalization, will happen anytime soon. At least in places like Sri Lanka where we (or at least the politicians and other intellectual types) like to pretend some sort of morally superior to the west. Even in the U.S. where marijuana usage is rampant -- Barack Obama of all people admitted he "inhaled frequently" both cocaine and marijuana. He even put it in his book. But once the changes comes in the west, not just in terms of attitude, but particularly in marijuana policy and eventually hard drugs, I think you will see changes starting happen here as well.

On the question of whether or not this will significantly reduce crime, I recall this interesting exchange between Tyler Cowen and Megan McArdle.

Legalizing Marijuana in Sri Lanka

I was recently reminded by a friend that Sri Lanka actually does have legal access medical Marijuana (Ganja). The practitioners of traditional Ayurvedic medicine are allowed to carry 1kg (figure unconfirmed) amount of Ganja to be used for medicinal purposes. Unfortunately, the government doesn't extend the same courtesy to medical doctors in the western tradition.

I am told the veda mahathays (ayurvedic doctors) have access to the best quality stuff, which they often sell for other um, recreational purposes. Don't ask me why, but I believe him.

A dilemma I often face is whether advocating for decriminalization or legalization of Marijuana in a place like Sri Lanka is actually worth it.

Obviously, there is very little case to ban the substance in the first place. Not only because Ganja has medicinal properties, but the risk of addiction is comparatively low, there's also no evidence that it's any more harmful than tobacco. Most arguments for prohibition is based on some notion that this is 'risky'. Well yes it is risky, so is tobacco, alcohol or for that matter, living in Colombo. Should most motorsports, or professions which has risk in it's job description -- policing, security guards, army personnel -- also be banned? I think not. What we have is a social stigma against using stuff like Marijuana. There is almost no objective case.

But now that it's illegal, does it make sense to advocate for legalization? From a purely consequentionalist standpoint, I think the answer leans on being 'No'.

I haven't been to a party in Colombo with late-teens or twentysomethings which didn't have someone lighting up Ganja. Even if you are caught using or carrying moderate amounts of ganja, you can pay the market-price for the bribe in most occasions (unless you really F up). Same goes for most other victimless crimes like prostitution. If you want the service, you can get it. When enforcement is weak like we have in Sri Lanka, does really it make sense to fire up the debate and actually make this an issue? from a user-perspective, I think the answer is No.

However, critical to the overall consequentionalist argument for the status quo is whether keeping marijuana illegal has other consequences, like providing revenue streams and upkeep for criminal gangs. Economics of prohibition is simple. If you ban something that's in high demand, it simply goes underground. Think prostitution, think kassipu (illicit liquor), think almost anything that has wide appeal, and is banned. These things don't disappear, they just fall into the black-market operated by goons and criminals.

People familiar with the Indian scene might remember the case of Scarlett Keeling, the 15-year-old British girl who was raped and murdered in Goa by a few drug dealers. Soon after the incident, I remember Jug Suraiya's article in TOI which hinted that perhaps Scarlett would have survived, had drugs in Goa was legal. In the article (I recommend a read) he presented the following statistics:

UN has estimated the international drug trade at $400 billion a year, a sum larger than the US defense budget and which constitutes 8 per cent of all global trade (textiles account for 7.5 per cent and automobiles for 5.3 per cent). [link]

Most of this trade is not Marijuana, it's probably other drugs. The critical question is how much exactly does Marijuana contributes to crime. This is difficult to answer, since marijuana dealers don't exactly report their accounts to the Inland Revenue Department. But for what it's worth, legalizing may be a good way of cutting down revenue potential for criminals (including perhaps the LTTE) and getting entrepreneurs in to the business of ganja.

If we require a debate at all on this issue, it's this one we should be having. But what are the chances of that happening?

French Mayor Bans Death

News is much more fun these days. C.J. wants to send pube robbers to hell, in Kandy they have a blow job test, and now in France..

The mayor of a village in south west France has banned residents from dying.

Village graveyard is full and Gerard Lalanne has threatened "severe" punishment for anyone who disobeys.[..]

In an ordinance posted in the council offices, Mayor Lalanne told the 260 residents that "all persons not having a plot in the cemetery and wishing to be buried in Sarpourenx are forbidden from dying in the parish".

It added: "Offenders will be severely punished." However, the nature of the punishment - apparently a fate worse than death - was not specified. [link]

Last year the Chinese banned reincarnation, the French are much smarter. Why even give that chance? duh!.

But no, seriously don't laugh, this is perfectly normal. They do this all the time. Whatever you don't like you just ban it. Don't like Gay people? ban them. Prostitution? banned. Smoking in public- banned. Alcohol for women, Porn, Abortion - All of it banned. Has that stopped any of this? No.. so what's so different here?

This is just the ultimate logical conclusion of government 'rationality', wonder why our fellows didn't think of this before. I mean it's so obvious..

[via ASI Blog]

P2P Lobbying

I was chatting to a friend of mine about all the talk about Lobbying in the U.S. elections and how Sri Lanka doesn’t seem to have a ‘formal lobbying’ process, there are no PACs (Political Action Committees), no people with the job title of ‘lobbyist’ or pressure groups waiting with campaign support in exchange for favorable policy.

Actually we do, but in Sri Lanka and much of the developing world, policy matters little. It’s people in control who matter. Lobbying in Sri Lanka is essentially peer-to-peer – you want something done you contact your man in Parliament. He probably can get it done for you. To keep this relationship going you keep your guy happy. Invite him for parties; send him monthly gifts, so on. I personally know businessmen as part of their mandate in city-based business associations send gifts to the local minister and fund ‘local initiatives’ undertaken in the name of the minister.

Lot of people think money to politicians comes from them stealing out of contracts, etc. This is probably the case, but a good part of the wealth of politicians is from, well, P2P Lobbying.

AirTel troubles

Apparently Airtel, scheduled to start operations in Sri Lanka this year, have run into some trouble. I like Airtel, it's my operator of choice whenever I'm in India, I've got good memories with it. It worked well for me, and i did do some traveling across states in remote moutanes areas. The Advert above with the two boys playing football is probably my favorite ad on TV.

I was looking forward to the increased competition, I think Air-tel could have given dialog run for their money. I think they have already woken up dialog from a monopoly lethargy and if Airtel do some of the things they do in India, they can lure in customers. Airtel as a brand will have instant recognition from anyone has table, so they have a good start. I don't think I will switch, changing numbers is a bitch unless Air-tel can give me a remarkably better deal.

As for the troubles, a few weeks back in a flight back from Delhi I met a guy from Chandigarh, who's flying to Colombo. He turned out to be a senior telecoms engineer at Airtel, flown down to SL to help with the operations here. I asked him what's taking Airtel so long to set up here, he told me they faced two main problems. one, was permissions issues - Setting up towers and that sort of thing needed all sorts of clearances from the ministry of defense, TRC, and the bureaucracy is taking time. The other, he told me is lack of telecoms engineers, He said latter is going to be a bigger problem in the long-term.

This is probably why dialog have invested in heavily University of Moratuwa, they desperately need the people. All of this is a problem of too much government. in 2006, Lirneasia, a Colombo-based policy research agency concluded the Telecom regulatory environment in Sri Lanka one of the worse in the region and heading in the wrong direction (PDF link). The impact of national security concerns since would only have worsen the situation.

It's heartening however, that the sector has grown tremendously despite having too much regulation. Often times, technology itself is a liberator, government bureaucracies cannot keep up with the dynamism of changing technologies and that's why telecoms 'work' for most people, when fixed-lines become a limiting factor, the industry comes up with CDMA, so on, before the bureaucrats can get their head around that, there'll be another technology.

It just beats me why when simple logic would tell you (and the data backs up the claim) that having barriers to entry, too much of regulation is just bad for business and bad for consumers, yet we are still stuck in this old paradigm of "license-permit" economic (mis)management. sigh.

Cochin and Liberty Pt2.

Continued from Part 1..

I finally get to the place I have to be, it turns out to be a Catholic place, where they have space for conferences and stuff. In fact Cochin has a lot of Christianness , the place has been colonized by the Portuguese and the Dutch before the English, the same transition of colonial power that occurred in Sri Lanka. The more I see of Cochin, the more it reminded me of Negombo – the lagoon, the weather, churches, boats and tamed-development.

I was here for a Seminar on Liberty and Society by Centre for Civil Society (CCS), a libertarian-leaning think-tank I’ve come to associate. The seminar was excellent. I highly recommend it to anyone with an interest in public policy. There were a lot of interesting speakers/sessions at the seminar, I’m tempted to blog about most of them, but that seems too laborious. Maybe I’ll write about some later.

Most of the fellows attending the seminar are from Kerala itself, but there were quite a few from other cities like Bangalore and Hyderabad. The people were naturally quite curious there was a chap “all the way from Sri Lanka”. I tried explaining to them that “really, it’s not that far” and that people who flew from Delhi actually came a greater distance. But all that didn’t stick, I had come from a different country and it’s a big deal. Someone asked me whether I took the boat, since Sri Lanka is so close by. I said no and made an Eelam joke.. didn't quite work out.

But coming back to the topic, there were few local Keralites who spoke about the fate of Liberalism in “God’s own country”. One of them was Babu Joseph, a former socialist turned-classical liberal after he joined Swatantra Party from Youth Congress feeling disillusioned by Nehru’s policies and Congress’ nepotism. Joseph was an articulate guy who knew how to use humor to good effect. He went on to talk among other things, about the lack of opportunity in Kerala which drives many enterprising people out of the state.

From the outset, Kerala is an odd place to talk about Liberty. For much of its existence it has been under Communist rule and by looking at the current political alliances competing for power, Keralites have a choice between two left-leaning coalitions. But thankfully there is some liberalization that is taking place, the Cochin Airport I mentioned in the earlier post, is actually run by a Private firm with the partnership of the state. Education (including higher ed.) is provided by private colleges with state university acting as an accreditation body. Some Marxism, this. These are the days I wonder whether Sri Lanka is the more commie country.

Cochin seems to have got everything that Colombo has, except I’d say it’s a lot less vibrant. I didn’t hear of any especially intriguing night life, although I did manage to check out a few nice restaurants. They have a few shopping malls, filled with the usual suspects, the Nike's, McDonald’s, Barista’s. We hung out at this place by the Marine Drive, which is a nice place. Later a few of us hired a boat go see around the Cochin.

Cochin has nice sight-seeing spots, there’s Fort Kochi with the fish market where they do ‘Chinese Fishing’. There’s a church where Vasco da Gama is supposedly buried, there’s a synagogue, an old Palace, Interesting stuff. Going to all this places in a boat makes it more fun, but boats aren’t just for tourists here it’s used as a means of public transport. It bugs me Sri Lanka being an Island and Colombo being a port city we don’t have a ferry service to anywhere. Where ever I’ve been to port cities, the folks there seem to make use of ferries. Just beats me why we can’t. It would personally cut down my daily traveling time by at least 45 minutes. I don’t think it would be that expensive.

The seminar timings didn’t allow me to go out a lot, so there’s probably a side of Cochin I missed. But booze here is too expensive. Apparently the state of Kerala has the highest per capita consumption of Alcohol in India, so the government plays the moral card to increase taxes. This is one of the many similarities Kerala has with Sri Lanka, which includes it’s highest suicide rate, literacy, how people look and even food (if you thought Kavum was something exclusively Sri Lankan, I’ve got news for you).

Cochin was good but my journey isn’t over, so I and a friend of mine took the train in the evening – next-stop Bangalore.

How much would the Nano cost us?

That's the car, not the iPod. For the uninitiated, the Indian motor company Tata recently unveiled the "Nano" the world's cheapest car priced at a low-low figure of Rs.100,000 (INR). (That works out to about $2,500 and Rs.275,000 LKR).

This is great news of course both for Tata and the hundreds of thousands of Indians who would now be able to afford an automobile. I don't find the car overly 'saxy' as some Indians do, but it looks all right and I'm sure there are many people who'd like to have one.

The enthusiasm for the Nano is not shared by the elitist greens however, for the adherents of the Church-of-Gore it's some sort of a carbon-crime machine. never mind the fact that that the Nano surpasses not only Indian regulatory standards but also the strict European emission standards.

Personally I don't know if I'd want the Nano for myself, but it could be an awesome little Taxi Car. small size, fuel efficiency with the possibility 4 or 5 passengers should be perfect for running a little taxi business. I can totally see that happening.

The question is how much would it cost to import one? It's a question I asked from a few vehicle importers, they don't really know yet. The Sri Lankan import duties on vehicles are insane ranging up to 300% of the initial value. The importers think it might go into about at least Rs.500,000 with the relative low taxes for allowed for Indian vehicles.

There goes cheap-taxis I can't believe the tolerance level of Sri Lankans when it comes to import duties, what's the logic anyway? the government is protecting the Micro guy? I'd think cheaper vehicles for the countries citizens might have been more important than the Micro-Car's bank balance, apparently not.

It's some how justifiable that Sri Lankans pay multiple times as taxes for the same vehicle as the Americans do. Insane is an understatement.

Privatized Government

This story from India made my day. A fully-functional fake government office has been found in Uttar Pradesh - collecting taxes, giving out birth certificates and even employing 20 "street sweepers" . More from the Times of India,

The racket was unearthed when some of the sweepers appointed by Valmiki went to senior JNN officials to complain that their salaries were being released by the branch office.

"We were shocked to hear this as we ourselves weren't aware that our department had a branch office in Jhansi," says Senior Swasthya Adhikari (SSA) Dr R Kulshreshtra. [..]

Police believe the racket was initially confined to fake appointment of sweepers. Valmiki's idea, according to the police, would have primarily been to pocket Rs 40 lakh in the name of ensuring their appointment and then disappear.

"But he later seems to have decided to carry on with the office as it didn't appear to be a loss-making proposition. And when he tried to change his decision, things went out of hand," said a police officer. [..]

The office had been set up 7 km from the city and a huge signboard of Jhansi Nagar Nigam was placed there. [Link]

Privatized government? too radical you think? come on now.. think about it.. we already pay extra for one-day Passport/ID-card delivery services, we bribe our policemen just so that we can skip the lengthy court ordeal, we have companies handling our Visas to some countries, so why cant just companies provide other so called, civic services? They'll be quicker, more reliable and much more likely to have pretty girls working for them. so again, why not?

[news story via Marginal Revolution]