On infectious greed as a development model...

One of the leading lights in the current government of Slovakia opined that Slovakia should attempt to become more like singapore or hong kong, a small extremely liberal enclave in the wider market of the EU and eurozone.

The allure of places like this should be tempered by the following facts.

  1. they are usually accidents of history and are usually not countries proper (this is true of both Hong Kong and Singapore)
  2. They have massive economies right next to themselves, and the rich of these countries usually uses these territories as a place to hide their money from taxes.
  3.   ermm.. this... http://video.ft.com/v/621971804001/Hong-Kong-s-property-extremes-cage-the-poor