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Jordan's Slow Economic Growth
By Micah Halpern

Sunday October 17, 2010

I've Been Thinking:

Jordan's King Abdullah spoke at a technology conference in Jordan yesterday.

Abdullah blames Jordan's slow tech growth on the tensions in the Middle East. His thesis is that if there was a treaty between Israel and the Palestinians, his economy would grow.

The Jordanians recently invested $2.2 billion in high tech - and they want to see an immediate return on the investment.

Yahoo recently bought a Jordanian company called Maktoob, the largest Arab on line information company.

There are 3 huge mistakes in Abdullah's analysis.
# 1: Jordan is only indirectly connected to the conflict and although they are affected, they are not a primary party.
#2: Most of the $2.2 billion was simply infrastructure, not creative investment. Tech booms do not result from having a computer and turning it on. To create a boom you create a service that people want to buy.
# 3: This is Abdullah's biggest mistake - the conflict has not slowed Israel's growth. The Israeli economy is outstripping even the US over the past few years. (Of course, one can argue that if there was peace the Israeli economy would be even better)

The reason Jordan's economy is in the tubes is that it has not been infused with any real creativity - instead, it is heavily control by the monarchy. Abdullah is as wily as he is smart, but here, he has created a recipe for failure.

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4 June 2017 12:13 PM in Thoughts


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