There's no such thing as a free lunch...Or is there?

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It's official. The next president of Indonesia is former army general Prabowo Subianto. Quite how the next five years will pan out is anyone's guess but hopefully the foreign pundits who always bring up his dodgy human rights record will be proven wrong. Nonetheless, on policy making, Prabowo's popularist move to literally offer the poor 'a free lunch' every day of the week does not augur well for the future. Such a policy - if it ever came to fruition - would cost a phenomenal amount of money and likely lead to huge inefficiencies (food waste) and poor incentives (make people lazy). Another concern is Prabowo's strong nationalist bent. Thus, in the possible event that he finds himself with his back against the proverbial wall in the face of stern economic challenges, there is a big chance that he will simply scapegoat foreigners. But he will have to be careful. Construction of the new capital city, Nusantara, for example, is highly dependent on foreign in
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Indonesia’s Big Mac index

According to the Economist’s Big Mac index, an Indonesian worker must work for 3 hours 3 minutes to earn enough to buy one Big Mac (in Australia, a worker only needs to work for 16 minutes). Doesn’t really make much sense to me though – I mean the energy needed to work for over three hours is probably more than you get from the Big Mac in the first place. Wouldn’t it be better just to sleep or do nothing? 

But putting the Big Mac in the shade is the hamburger being sold by the Four Seasons Jakarta – it sells for a phenomenal US$110 (Rp1 million). For an Indonesian worker to buy one of these beauties he’d have to work for more than a month and save every penny. And then he’d probably complain of the taste anyway– it contains foie gras, Portobello mushrooms and Korean pears. But despite its high price, the burgers are apparently selling well... 

Nasi goreng anyone?

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