ISET Economist Blog

01 May 2015

Aleksandra Markovic

When More Is Less: Values and Europe's Declining Fertility Rates

Judging by Georgia’s average birth rate, it clearly belongs into the European family of nations. At 1.82 children per woman, according to the latest data, the Georgian nation is below (but still relatively close to) 2.1, the birth rate at which the population size remains steady. On average, the birthrate in Europe is around 1.5, which is significantly lower than it was only fifty years ago.

27 April 2015

Eric Livny

The US and Georgia: Finding the Common Denominator

At ISET we teach graduate economics, which uses the mathematical language to analyze economic behavior (“microeconomics”) and macroeconomic systems. Being based in Tbilisi, we heavily depend on “upstream” Georgian educational institutions, such as schools and undergraduate departments at TSU and elsewhere.

24 April 2015

Florian Biermann, Nino Mosiashvili, Nikoloz Pkhakadze

Let Tourists Arrive and Georgia Thrive!

After the collapse of the Soviet Union it was believed that tourism might become one of Georgia’s “locomotive” sectors. While the Shevardnadze government failed to develop this potential, after the Rose Revolution, tourism became a top priority. Each year since 2005, the direct effect of tourism (i.e. the money spent by tourists) alone has contributed 6-7% of Georgia’s total GDP.

20 April 2015

Florian Biermann, Eric Livny, Maka Chitanava

Save the Mingrelian Language!

There are clear expectations in many cultures to marry somebody from their own group, and not living up to these expectations will at least cause a loss in reputation. This is nicely displayed in the movie Late Marriage by Dover Kosashvili, humorously depicting a young Georgian Jew in Israel whose parents want him to marry the “right” woman (the movie features extensive dialogues in Judeao-Georgian, another endangered language).

17 April 2015

Eric Livny

Lessons Learned From a Decade of Georgian Reforms. View From The Sky

Georgian reforms have become an internationally traded commodity. Underappreciated and no longer wanted at home, some of Georgia’s former reformers are doing well-paid consulting gigs in Mongolia, Central Asia, Ukraine, Moldova, and further away emerging markets. Sensing a business opportunity, a group of former government officials groomed by Kakha Bendukidze, the mastermind of Georgian reforms, has recently established a consulting agency, “Reformatics”.

13 April 2015

Florian Biermann, Levan Pavlenishvili

The Complexities Facing the Competition Authority

Economists disagree whether it was a good decision to reestablish the Georgian competition authority. When some years ago it was removed, the underlying logic was that a non-existing authority cannot be corrupt, and, more importantly, cannot harm the economy through misguided decisions. Assuming that corruption will not be a problem for the competition authority, neither now nor in the future, regulating markets is still a highly delicate issue which yields many possibilities to go wrong.

ISET Economist Blog

A blog about economics in the South Caucasus financed within the institutional grant by the Government of Sweden.