At ET Global Summit, New Delhi Taleb is to deliver a lecture on the topic Scripting Economic Change on Jan 17, 2015. Taleb recognises that the present day interconnected world has its pros and cons. A single disturbance at one place affects so many other places very rapidly — a cascading effect could be seen. An interconnected world is a better place to live in, but it has its vulnerability. Secondly the institutions that serve us well in favourable climate are not adapted to serve us under  new conditions. A tablet may crash, but a book does not. It is anti-fragile and whatever is anti-fragile can benefit from disorder.

Centralisation is considered far more efficient. Of course it is for certain things like the military decisions. However, in many other things, if we increase the number of decision making units, the decisions become more efficient, more responsive, more timely. Centralisation does not serve at the time of crisis. It is good if public administration is more decentralised. Decentralisation leads to smaller, more adaptable companies. It reduced the possibility of coups.

Instead of formal higher education, there should be focus on technical skills which are real and useable. Many IT stalwarts are college drop outs, and if they would have completed their education, they would have become lawyers or consultants. According to Taleb, higher education increases the  income of a family but it does not increase that of a country. Medical practitioners education is geared to skill developing apprenticeship mode.

There should be a cultural shift in favour of a serial failure. In IT, failure is a badge of honour. And IT performs the best . Silicon Valley respects the maxim ‘Fail fast’. In Japan and France, a stigma is attached to failure.

Consider 2008 crisis. There was economic volatility. The Federal Reserve prevented fluctuations by rescuing the family institutions. It provided them cheap money. The economic pressures would have cleaned up the dead wood. It would have opened up opportunities for new comers. It is good to prevent an economic crisis, but not so good to prevent the fluctuations by trying to stabilize the system. The stabilization does not work in favour of entrepreneurs, it benefits the inefficient large corporations.