Good reads & charts - February 18, 2024

In this edition: Valentine's Day and friend-shoring. Plus, climate change fatalism (or lack thereof), driving in America, and our generous society!

Good reads & charts provides an assortment of interesting articles and data that I have come across recently that do not warrant a full article and might not be related to something I have previously discussed, but I feel are worth larger consumption.

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As you will have undoubtedly have heard, Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny died in prison this week. The chief critic of Putin had previously survived a number of attempts on his life and had returned to Russia knowing what his ultimate fate would likely be. He wasn’t perfect, but his actions shined a light on the rampant corruption endemic to Putin’s Russia. If you are interested in the story of his 2020 poisoning and subsequent recovery and the investigation into who was behind it, I can’t recommend highly enough the 2022 documentary Navalny. It is currently available for streaming on Max (formerly HBO Max).

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Whole lotta lovin’

Valentine’s Day…an expensive holiday!

Using data from the latest cost-of-living index by EIU, our sister company, we created our own “cost-of-loving index”. It ranks the world’s most expensive cities in which to go on a romantic night out: we start with drinks at a swanky hotel, followed by a lavish two-course meal and a trip to the cinema, a taxi home and a nice bottle of wine to cap things off. (Before you swear off dating, remember that EIU gathers prices with expatriates and business travellers in mind, not local love birds grabbing a cheap bite.)

Source: The Economist

Source: The Economist’s cost-of-loving index (The Economist)

And it’s not like all of those cities are concentrated in one geographical location. China, the US, the Middle East, Europe and South America are all represented in this index.

To put the icing on the cake, this year was probably not helped by the fact that the price of chocolate was at a record high too.

Source: ING

Source: Astonishingly high cocoa prices set to continue as deficit concerns grow (ING)

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Talk about burying the lede!