In Defense of Mall

So my two professors went to Manila this summer. One of them was amazed on how cool the malls over there, and the other offered an interesting interpretation: it's in many ways a form of private government.

Here is the reason.

Operating such huge (and usually integrated with business and residential complex) mall needs sophisticated technology and management. And it has to be efficient. With thousands of human resources involved as well as state of the art logistic, it needs high skills and knowledge to run the complex.

Now enter the common explanation for under-development in developing countries: lack of skills and "modern" culture.

These malls show that these line of reasoning doesn't add up. The businesspersons running the mall can deliver not only private goods (you know, from branded bags to broccoli to two bedrooms apartment) but also public goods, like open to public parks, between-the-shops-aisles for window shopping, or the water fountain dancing New York New York (to the dismay of barista Aco).

They are like government -- while the real government is busy doing something else. And the key is, I think, incentives that works, and it is profit motive.

I think it's a right observation. The mushrooming malls as well as those clustering real estates somehow also shows that government has failed, and, to some extent, private actors stepped in. And the blaming for lack of "modern culture" among the people seems to be unfounded.

And The Medal Goes To

Esther Duflo of MIT. She obviously very well deserves for the medal indeed. Congratulation.

Your barista Ape, her fellow randomista, will probably serve you a review on what Prof. Duflo has done and brought her to the prestigious John Bates Clark Medal.

On Good Coffee, Jazz, and Economic Data

Let us discuss those things this Cafe loves to talk about.

First, coffee. Finally New York City took their coffee seriously. This is actually a problem for almost all of American cities, that is, low per capita good coffee places. Come on, if you think Illy is the best coffee you can get, then you're in a serious need for better taste caffeine.

Unlike their counterparts in Europe, America needs much more good coffee -- and bread, I must add.

Second, jazz. Brad Mehldau is about to issue a new album, Highway Rider (HT: Sisil). It looks promising and you can listen to some of the sample here. Mr. Mehldau is one of Cafe Salemba's favorites for contemporary jazz --along with Joshua Redman and Branford Marsalis, to mention some. Of course we also listen to Vampire Weekend and Arctic Monkey, while on Lady Gaga, there's been a wide disagreement amongst us.

In this new album, apparently Mr. Mehldau is back to his old style as in Largo album. He seems indeed really good in expressing the melancholy of journey in life.

Third, economic data. Google launched visualization of the World Development Indicators subset (HT: Tyler Cowen). Any serious development economist must have been familiar with this data set at one point or another. The visualization is fun too. You can now see how good (or bad) Indonesia is, relative to other countries, using a real data --not an appeal to emotion.