Author Archives: admin

Military expenditures data from SIPRI are derived from the NATO definition, which includes all current and capital expenditures on the armed forces, including peacekeeping forces; defense ministries and other government agencies engaged in defense projects; paramilitary forces, if these are … Continue reading →

The Big Mac Index is published by The Economist magazine as an informal way of measuring the purchasing power parity (PPP) between two currencies and provides a test of the extent to which market exchange rates result in goods costing … Continue reading →

Countries with Very High Social Hostilities Involving Religion (scoring 7.2 or higher out of 10 on the Social Hostilities Index) in order: Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, Somalia, israel, Iraq, Palestinian territories, Syria, Russia, Indonesia, Nigeria, Yemen, Kenya, Egypt, Sudan, Lebanon, Sri … Continue reading →

THE GLOBAL GENDER GAP REPORT 2013 The Global Gender Gap Report 2013 is published by the World Economic Forum. The Global Gender Gap Index 2013 is the result of collaboration with faculty at Harvard University and the University of California, … Continue reading →

CORRUPTION PERCEPTIONS INDEX Transparency International publishes thhe Corruption Perceptions Index annually. It ranks countries and territories based on how corrupt their public sector is perceived to be. A country or territory’s score indicates the perceived level of public sector corruption … Continue reading →

The Happy Planet Index (HPI) is an index of human well-being and environmental impact that was introduced by the New Economics Foundation (NEF) in July 2006. The index is weighted to give progressively higher scores to nations with lower ecological … Continue reading →

The world is now in the midst of a major policy debate about the objectives of public policy. What should be the world’s Sustainable Development Goals for the period 2015-2030? The United Nations invited member countries to measure the happiness … Continue reading →

Vietnam Jan 4-25 Vietnam immigration was interesting with my full passport. Despite having a visa, I still needed a stamp and they weren’t going to give me one. Accused of removing a visa because of the empty page in the … Continue reading →

History Vietnam has a rich and evocative history with a civilization as sophisticated as its northerly neighbor, China, from where it drew many of its influences under a 1000 year occupation. The USA was simply the last of a long … Continue reading →

It’s one of those old-fashioned sayings you’ve heard over and over, but probably never really stopped to consider the meaning of; perhaps your mother even said it to you as she tucked you into bed: “Sleep tight, don’t let the … Continue reading →