Topic of the week: What does "longtermism" mean in the Caucasus and Central Asia?
Summertime may be useful for deeper reflections. Your analyst has thus been prompted into a kind of economic-philosophical diversion of thought by William MacAskill’s “What We Owe The Future”, a book that focuses on longtermism and effective altruism.
We explore what the idea that positively influencing the long-term future is a key moral priority of our time may mean for the Caucasus and Central Asia. The underlying critical focus on human survival suggests that, if we want to be taken seriously as economists, we must delve more responsibly than ever into the intricacies of demographics. Such analysis leads us to a longtermist ranking of CCA economies that goes in total contradiction to our earlier (and much more traditional) ordering of these countries.
If you feel that this particular way of looking at economics and life may be too esoteric for your investment taste, you are certainly not alone. While Keynes comes to mind with his expressed view about the ironclad relationship between death and the long term, we prefer another pithy comment by the Roman Emperor and famous Stoic Marcus Aurelius, who once claimed, “Remember that man lives only in the present, in this fleeting instant; all the rest of his life is either past and gone, or not yet revealed."
Still, musing in summertime over economics, philosophy and demographics may have its benefits even for the shorter-term investor.
Now read on...
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