Quote:A recent study by Fisman and Miguel used the parking fines accumulated by immune UN diplomats to estimate corruption by country.

A link to the full article is there, but here --- according to the study --- are the countries of the most and least corrupt UN diplomats:

Quote:Do these morons understand the difference between a misdemeanor and a felony?

EDIT: Was this study funded privately, or by a government grant? This erudition smacks of mental masturbation of the most refined sort. I read through it. I was bombarded with the usual ejcaulations from what an infamous dictator called "erudite apes." I arose from my desk and got more coffee. We had no hemlock, or I'd have drunk that in despair over the civilized world's habit of picking the fly feces from the pepper.

Occhi

Quote:From what I glean from it, this is not a clinical or objective study— and it never was intended to be. It's simply a smear campaign to shame the parking violators into changing their ways. The City of New York can do little else through due process, so this is a grass-roots approach.

Quote:I say the theory is fundamentally flawed. Corruption doesn't directly correlate with unpaid parking tickets (it helps to keep a low profile when skimming heavier stuff).
If anything, the study reveals a rather interesting trend across cultures' strictures and notions of "face". Coming from The Economist, though, I'm not surprised at the misconception and gross generalization.

Quote:The act of parking illegally fits well with a standard definition of corruption,
i.e., “the abuse of entrusted power for private gain,”2 suggesting that the comparison of parking violations
by diplomats from different societies serves as a plausible measure of the extent of corruption social
norms or a corruption “culture”.