Freakonomics writer on the “pleasure of visiting Dubai”

Freakonomics writer, University of Chicago’s economist Steven Levitt has been in Dubai a couple of days ago. In his New York Times blog (Yes, everyone is a blogger these days!), he is writing about his visit to Dubai. For him, an interesting issue has been the issue of democracy and rule of law in such countries:

“Some recent economic work suggests that rule of law is important for economic growth, but democracy is not. Dubai is following that path: strong rule of law and protection of foreign assets, but with foreigners (who make up roughly 85 percent of the population) unable to vote. … How upset are the foreigners over the fact they can’t vote? Among the ones I talked to, at least, not the slightest bit — just as an economist would expect. All they seemed to care about was the fact that they make good wages, have a nice lifestyle, and are free from crime.”