Thursday, June 05, 2008
Productivity fatwa
An Egyptian cleric is worried that quantity of prayer may be less important than quality, at least insofar as the production of wealth is concerned:
For Egyptian-born Muslim cleric and television host, Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, there is a simple answer to Egypt's productivity problem -- pray less, work more.
"Praying is a good thing ... 10 minutes should be enough," Al-Jazeera television personality Qaradawi says in a religious edict, or fatwa, published on his website.
I'm not sure, however, that excessive prayer is responsible for this draw-dropper (emphasis added):
According to an official study, Egypt's six million government employees are estimated to spend an average of only 27 minutes per day actually working, reflecting a real problem with productivity.
This is apparently a long-standing problem. Not sure why the Egyptians needed a study.
10 Comments:
By 
Georg Felis, at
Thu Jun 05, 05:45:00 PM:
27 minutes per day? Wow! Can we get a few of our managers to go over there and see if we can raise the US Government Workers to that level of productivity?
/sarc
By Dawnfire82, at
Thu Jun 05, 07:12:00 PM:
They also apparently think nothing of showing up for work hours late (or not at all), taking extravagant breaks, and quitting early. I once knew an Egyptian who was full of bitter vile at government workers there, and I got to hear a lot about them...
By Ray, at
Thu Jun 05, 07:48:00 PM:
Watch it. I was a federal employee once, and logged at least 4 hours a day of real work. Usually 2 hours a day of meaningless meetings and Powerpoint presentations, and another 2 hours on socializing, background research, filling out my damned timesheets (multiple systems), and writing up meaningless reports that nobody ever read for a promotion process I wasn't planning to stick around for.
Now that I'm a grad student, my productivity has declined precipitously.
By 
, at
Thu Jun 05, 10:18:00 PM:
The hidden truth here is that these government employees are doing all Egyptians a favor by "working" only 27 minutes per day. I am with Mark Levin in the theory that the more government involves itself in the lives of citizens, the less freedom we will have.
By , at
Thu Jun 05, 10:52:00 PM:
And for being slack, Egypt is about two clicks short of shithole. The entire city of Cairo is one unfinished construction project, largely because you don't pay property taxes until you reach a particular point, but damn what a dump. Every last person was a beggar. For Christ's sake, step it up to 30 minutes a day and smoke the competition guys.
By OregonJon, at
Fri Jun 06, 12:05:00 AM:
Not so long ago I was the American looking out for our interests in a 50/50 Egyptian joint venture. Our "partner" was an Egyptian government owned company. The joint venture managed to be almost efficient but our partner was told by the government how many university grads they must hire every year and what their pay would be. Most of their home office was filled with graduates whose only job was to read the newspaper before they went home. Hectares of office space throughout Egypt was required for such unproductive enterprise. The folks at the top of the government company could have been world class, but burdened by a system designed for failure.
By D.E. Cloutier, at
Fri Jun 06, 12:55:00 AM:
I've made a lot of money in Egypt. But it's not unusual for a large deal with the government to take two years to negotiate.
My Egypt consists elegant homes, quality hotels, and chauffeur-driven Mercedes-Benz automobiles. Most of my Egyptian dinner companions speak at least three languages fluently. Their wives usually shop on Rodeo Drive when they visit the U.S. You need to polish your act so you can hang out with a better class of people in the Land of the Pharaohs, Anonymous at 10:52 p.m.
The Pyramids at Giza are okay. But sitting at a villa on the Suez Canal, watching cargo ship after cargo ship go by like cars on a California freeway, is more fun for a trader like me.
By randian, at
Fri Jun 06, 01:30:00 AM:
The hidden truth here is that these government employees are doing all Egyptians a favor by "working" only 27 minutes per day. I am with Mark Levin in the theory that the more government involves itself in the lives of citizens, the less freedom we will have.
The Egyptian government is to a large extent a welfare program for Muslims. It's also a subsidiary of the Muslim Brotherhood, enforces daily prayers and "proper" Muslim attire (though not to the extent the Saudis do), and is notoriously unable to police or prosecute crimes against non-Muslims. It's not a good example of hands off government.
By , at
Fri Jun 06, 08:54:00 AM:
A lot of people forget that Sh. Yusuf al-Qaradawi is barred from entering the US because they see him as a terrorist!
Other than some probably unwise views he's aired about the Palestinian conflict, (some of which I believe he's changed or recanted, but I'm not so sure). On the other hand, he happens to be an extremely well-respected and very progressive qadi, who gives online advice and has great online debates on his website's forums at islamonline.net.
This is just another example of a Muslim shaykh of some influence who thinks outside the box. And it's all the more evidence that al-Qaradawi is a moderate the US should constructively engage rather than to stubbornly dismiss.
By Dawnfire82, at
Fri Jun 06, 10:49:00 AM:
Once more demonstrating that 'moderate' is an over-used term whose meaning has devolved from "not extreme" to "less extreme."
"Qaradawi strongly supports Palestinian attacks on Israeli targets, including against civilians, believing they are legitimate form of resistance. Qaradawi claims that hundreds of other Islamic scholars are of the same opinion.
Defending terrorist bombing against off duty soldiers Qaradawi told BBC Newsnight that:
* "An Israeli woman is not like women in our societies, because she is a soldier."
* "I consider this type of martyrdom operation as an evidence of God's justice."
* "Allah Almighty is just; through his infinite wisdom he has given the weak a weapon the strong do not have and that is their ability to turn their bodies into bombs as Palestinians do". [28]
At the press conference held by the organizations sponsoring Qaradawi's visit to London, Qaradawi reiterated his view that Suicide attacks are a justified from of resistance to Israeli occupation. In the past, Qaradawi has justified such terrorist actions on the basis that all Israel civilians are potential soldiers since Israel is a "militarized society.""
His view is that killing Jews is fine, but killing Muslims while you're at it is not.
This is what passes for moderate?
