The Age of Sanyas, the trivial hope of fixing an issue with EPS and how to live a worthwhile life after rejecting Sanyas

 I certainly have no plans for a sanyas or leaving for the Himalayas! 

Yet a couple of days before the d-day, I could sense a heaviness in the head which lasts even a day after. Since I am indifferent to religion, it has to be the social importance of turning 75.

I have no plans to change the course my life but a fogginess in the head persists.

I wanted to have a cozy house in a quiet area - started just before Covid, which delayed it. But we are now in it for the last two years. I am finally installing solar panels - not for economic reasons and not even to save the planet as we continue to consume and pollute more. 

It is more for the selfish reason of being off-grid in case of grid collapses. If California can now experience them, Goa is of course an easy and likely victim. Hence, it again doesn't give me happiness of doing something useful.

We also were able to dispose parental property on our terms of no cash, in spite of advice that we are losing money and paying more tax. Again it was for the selfish motive of peace of mind. I have no expectation that it will make any dent in the economics of sale of properties.

My investments are passive and not requiring much effort except occasional reorganisation of funds to minimize risk. A necessity in light of the absurd pension I get for Employee Pension Scheme.

I do need to continue to fight the EPFO - not for my pension but in the hope to help others less literate facing the same issue. In shifting my pension from Chandigarh to Goa, my date of birth has been incorrectly entered. The digital life certificate is rejected as the date of birth on the Aadhaar card does not match the record of the employee pension scheme. Their solution defies reasonableness - provide a certificate from the bank each year as they inform me verbally that they can't change the date in their records. I wonder how they will deal with my death certificate! I keep hoping that my occasional pestering will result in some internal escalation and fixing my birthdate. 

I can recommend to them that if they can't change the field, create another field the database 'Legal Birth Date' and use that instead. I doubt if they will listen. Even if I succeed, I can at best feel a tiny and momentary sense of achievement even after the age of sanyas.

The satisfaction from this achievement, if at all it happens, is hardly enough to clear the mental fog.

Grandchildren are also too old to be needing or wanting our advice or input. 

I am trying to convince myself that it is not being 75 years old, but I need to find something to work on which keeps me occupied and in principle could be useful even if it is never actually used.

So, time to meditate on what next!

 

Random walk and thoughts around cars parked on the sidewalks and roads where there are no usable sidewalk

 As I walk past and around cars parked on the sidewalk and the road in front of houses, I find it ironic that the very people who feel entitled to use the public space for their private comfort are horrified at the thought of homeless people using the same type of space for their shelter.

My thoughts of irony are disturbed by a car which wants me to move aside so that it can drive on the road.

Living Wage, Inflation and Guaranteed Minimum Income

Suppose we want less traffic on the roads:

We could reduce the need for private cars if the taxi drivers were paid a guaranteed basic income so people use taxis instead.

The concept can easily  be expanded to shared taxis, mini-buses and any other type of public transport.

It is easier to sell the idea if it is not treated as a subsidy but as a saving on needless infrastructure of roads - which also frees a lot space which could be better used for various public purposes.

We also want a comfortable society.

I am not comfortable when I see people struggling to survive. I cope with it by avoidance. There is nothing I can do as an individual that will help.  Donating or giving to charity makes me feel even worse.

I would love to see a living wage implemented even in India. 

We want to see a brighter future. We need peace and a low inflation.

If the wages of the workers in supermarkets, coffee shops, Udipi's,  child care centers, house hold workers, etc. are to be living wages, then the prices will increase.

Suppose instead each of these persons gets a minimum income. How much do they need to be paid? 

Depending on the nature of the work, we may actually be able to lower the prices. I can imagine a person having to clean toilets having to be paid even more than now while a child care worker may well even volunteer for just the pleasure of being surrounded by little children - esp grandparents whose children live far away :)

I wonder what has happened to minimum income programs for the common good -

"Barack Obama, in a reflective speech in South Africa, mused that basic income would figure prominently in the years ahead, and prominent corporate folk endorsed it again, including Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk."

This was in 2019. I hope the support of Elon Musk still holds. At least it did in 2021 as well.

 

 

 

An ideal example for a negative vote when facing a good, a bad and an ugly option

 As I was reflecting on the dilemma facing the uncommitted movement, the current US election seems to be a perfect example for the need for an option to vote against a candidate as well. 

If we are faced with the choice of a good, a bad and an ugly, we can vote for the good candidate, fully expecting him or her to lose. Our negative vote can be against the ugly in case, as we expect, the good candidate is the last one.

 If we do not  have the option for a good candidate, we can ignore our positive vote and still vote only against the ugly. We should not have to choose a lesser evil even if the result of the election would not be any different.

Would the victor of such a system celebrate and brag about his success, when the voting data would clearly  show that it is the ugly candidate who lost?

Goa is a small state. I wish the  election commission would experiment here.

A way to get rid of reservation in higher education

 "Show me where is the answer in the text book!" - stated in an aggressive tone by a faculty member from another college. This memory was triggered by "The Habit of Copying: Are We Creating a Culture of Plagiarism?" 

 

I could not even have imagined that anyone could have such an expectation for a management information course. My disappointment with teaching is documented here.

 

If there is a shortage of supply, there will be malpractices and there is a shortage of seats for a decent education. Gaming the system, blaming reservations, etc will be inevitable.

 

Instead of trying to stop loopholes, what if we accepted that there is a shortage and that there is no perfect way to select the best. We could, of course, auction the seats. However, I doubt if that would seem ideal to anyone, including those supporting auction of coal mines and mobile spectrum! First come, first serve will also not be an acceptable option.

 

An alternate system is a random selection from among a set of shortlisted candidates. The selection for shortlisting could be very much like the current system; except that there is no queue; rather, a set of acceptable candidates. 

 

We can eliminate reservation of seats for varying categories of candidates. The focus can be to ensure and help candidates from deprived communities clear the entrance test barrier.

 

The tuition industry would suffer but, at least, I have for one would not shed a tear to see it disappear. 

What are the possible exit conditions of the Coronavirus Lockdown loop?

Being locked in is not pleasant. There is also a little guilt of going out of the house, especially for walks, even if there is virtually no one around. Could we be increasing the duration of the lockdown by being careless? Uncertainty about the duration of the lockdown is stressful.

So, I thought that if I were writing a program for the lockdown, what are the conditions which would determine the exit condition for the lockdown loop for a particular region with no person entering or leaving the region:

1. There are no new cases emerging.
1. The virus stopped spreading for no known reason. This is the way The Plague by Albert Camus ends.
2. The virus has disappeared from the community thanks to the lockdown.
2. The community has developed a herd immunity.
1. If the lockdown is perfect, how can the community ever develop herd immunity?

If the region has not developed herd immunity and the borders of the region are opened, we will need to make sure that no infected or potentially infected person enters the community. Hence, testing and quarantine of each visitor will be mandatory.

If in spite of all efforts, an infected person enters the community, the lockdown will need to be imposed again.

Courteous Driving Resolution - will the effort last even till the new year?

Traffic rules in India seem to be against our social norms. My grandsons make me acutely aware of the cultural difference between the west and our environment. They do not let me even start the car till every person has tied his/her seat belt!

A couple of days ago, the 3 year old was complaining after I used the horn a couple of times - "Mommy never uses the horn". I explained to him that the people were driving in the wrong direction on a one way street and I was upset by them. Yesterday also I used the horn on the same road, which is narrow and very steep.

Today, he and his 5 year old brother were playing and I heard them blow horns and say, "What are you doing? You are on the wrong side!".

I decided that I must start practicing courteous driving, whenever it is "safe" :)

I let people merge or turn at least half a dozen times today. The only minor fear occurred when I let some pedestrians cross. Just as I started, a man ran in front of me. Fortunately, I could stop in time but it gave me a scare.

The courteous driving did not delay me at all as the brief delay hardly mattered given the flow of the traffic.

I, though, still have to retain my composure when a two lane road merging into a single lane for a bridge turns into a 3 lane road. I become a bit aggressive and try to prevent the 3rd lane from merging.

It seems obvious that the optimum solution is that alternate vehicles from the two lanes move into the single lane. Yet we don't do it. Each person from the, now three lanes, tries to squeeze in. Why - even I find myself doing it for fear that I will be stuck and people behind me will blow the horn :(

Need to practice meditation at least on such occasions :(

Am I Stingy?

A recent incident made me feel guilty and question my avoiding taking gifts when visiting people. My rationale has always been that the people have so many possessions already that our token gift is  not going to be of any value. Gifting cash seems vulgar, except for social obligations like weddings and birthdays.

A second point has been that I never remember the gifts except the ones we did not want and did not know what to do with them. However, I valued each visit of relations and friends for making the effort and time to meet us. I remember the cousins who visited us in Goa. I, especially, valued their visits to my parents in Chandigarh in their last days. (There is a lingering hurt of people who promised to visit but didn't. Showing up for the funeral was of 0 value to me.)

I suspect that possibly because  of the birthday party in my childhood when no invitee showed up, I have valued showing up so highly.

I have welcomed a cake or a bar of chocolate and am happy to share them when visiting. Anything else seems like a probable waste of money. Does that make me stingy?

There is one gift I will never forget - Information :)

Over 40 years ago, a friend suggested that I may enjoy The Outsider by Camus.  And later, he suggested Crime and Punishment. This has been a gift of unbelievable value. It has led to everlasting pleasure I have got from the European literature. Were it not for his suggestions, I may never have explored it.

Does a culture of mis-trust encourage and reinforce corrupt behaviour?

The current fraud at Punjab National Bank highlighted the fact that Public Sector bank employees are typically transferred after 3 years and that did not happen in this case. The message is clear that there must have been collusion even if no one will ever be able to prove it.

I have felt that the policy of transferring was counter-productive. It is nice to go to a branch and be recognised and there is a comfort in dealing with familiar faces.

It does not matter that much anymore as I hardly visit the branch and prefer an email response to any query I may have.

However, it seems to be a part of our (Indian) corporate culture as well that we mistrust employees. There is no issue in having checks. However, should the first impression be that it is assumed that an employee will misuse any privilege given and that must be prevented? Isn't the message we are giving to each young, new employee that misuse the privilege but in a way as not to be detected?

I used to feel that software folks will change our culture. The working environment in these companies was so much better and my hope had been that once the older folks were replaced by the younger ones, who had a lot more exposure to working with US/European clients, we will keep getting better.

From what I can gather, that has not happened. Processes have become more like in the rest of the companies, except with greater reliance on tech-tools.

It is unfortunate as a culture of trust would have helped create software companies that could have been the seeds of a new Indian work culture and a hope for a better future for our children.

I just can't get over the failure of our generation to create processes that we trust you unless proven otherwise. How hard should it have been?

I believe very hard in a society convinced of and obsessed by presumptive and notional losses. So, it is a delight to read the likely winding up of the board for

advising the government on enforcing “a code of conduct and ethics for managerial personnel” in these banks, will expire at the end of March. It is unlikely the government will look for a successor to Rai,

Voting Option: Not This One or Anyone But

I keep wondering if the outcome of elections in first-past-the-post would be any different if we had the option to vote against a candidate instead of just for someone.

There are times when one would find it hard to vote for a candidate though the idea of another candidate winning may be even more worrying.

Even in a binary election, the result may not change but the message to the winning party and the moral strength of victory can be very different.

I hope some psephologist would take that up and we can have a better understanding of people's voting intentions.

The goal, of course, would be that can it succeed in politicians avoiding polarising voters and creating a more just society for all.

Helplessness about events like the Bhopal Tragedy

The article by Indira Jaising was a grim reminder of the past. I think I became conscious of the scale and implications of the Bhopal tragedy only after I had seen the Yes Men Fix the World a few years ago.

I saw their prank on BBC  again. The sadness is about the drop in the stock price of Dow after the prank was broadcast. By a coincidence, I watched Chabrol's The Story Women yesterday and was struck by the statement of one of the characters - "Once you have a little money, you want more".

Increase in the value of my investments makes me happy though with little awareness about the reason for their growth. Investing via mutual funds makes the distance between my 'wealth' and corporate actions even more far removed :(

About time first premium of lapsed insurance policies is surrendered to the insurance regulator

The following statistic in Hiking FDI limit in insurance is remarkably illustrative of  morality of companies:

It is quite disquieting that some major companies have a very high rate of policy lapses like Birla Sun Life 51 per cent, Future Generali 49 per cent, ICICI Prudential 42, Reliance 38 and Bharathi Axa 36 per cent.

It explains that my effort to help a retired person scammed by insurance agents was hopeless.

I can't imagine profitability being any higher than on policies which lapse after a single premium.

Given the above statistics, it would be great if, at the very least, the premium of policies which lapse after the payment of just one premium is confiscated by the insurance regulator.

Furthermore, cancellation of policies should hurt the bottom line. Hence, the insurance companies should not be allowed to deduct any cancellation or service charges when refunding the policies which have been cancelled during the "free look" period.

Private insurance companies are cheating more than LIC

While I would like to be trusted, I would also like to be able to trust. Experience appears to be that while socialism makes people behave badly, capitalism seems to do that to companies!

Will the increase in foreign equity result in better behaviour by the insurance companies or greater pressure to get results regardless of the means?

Moral hazards  are an integral part of the insurance industry. I look forward to the day when software robots are the insurance agents and not commission based humans!

Compensation for Medical Negligence - Does it solve the problem?

My first reaction to the following news was discomfort - 

The Supreme Court on Thursday awarded a whopping Rs 5.96 crore as compensation to be paid by Kolkata-based AMRI Hospital and three doctors to a US-based Indian-origin doctor for medical negligence ...

It did not feel right. In  fact, it reminded me of Michael Sandel's concerns about becoming a market society where money dominates even moral and ethical issues. 

It feels terribly wrong that the difference is compensation can be so large based on a person's status in life. I wonder how courts will value a child. Will it based on the expected earnings as determined by his or her family background - an obvious reality but hardly the one we should be condoning and encouraging.

The US health care system is not exactly an inspiring example of a system which provides excellent care, without negligence, for all.

The chances are that even in India :

• the hospital will have an insurance cover
• insurance company will pay
• insurance company will raise insurance rates
• hospitals and doctors will raise their rates
• we will pay more
• the doctor will make no fewer errors as it is highly unlikely that the doctor wanted to make a sloppy diagnosis or provide wrong care
• high costs result in perverse incentive for delaying/avoiding treatment

The same logic is true for motor vehicle accidents. I have not heard of a single person who is a more careful driver because of the compensation he may have to pay in case of an accident.

What may be more effective?

• A person who makes the error should be accountable and punished.
• Revocation of a license quickly (not 15 years later) in case it is malpractice or an error which should(not could) have been avoided
• Limit compensation to a socially valuable amount. A poor victim's family needs financial help a lot more than a rich victim's.
• Impact of a victim's lost income should be covered by the individual's own insurance policy and not the insurance company covering the doctor (or the driver in case of motor vehicles).

I may even be inclined to favour an insurance cover by the doctors and hospitals where all care costs of the patient are returned in case treatment does not succeed regardless of whether a medical error was involved.