"Heading for an inevitable loss"

I once sat in the row above a man who had hair plugs at a Shakespeare play. I can’t remember which play it was because I spent so much time staring at the perfect rows of crop below me.

An article in last week’s FT discussed ‘male pattern baldness’; why it happens and what can be done about it. Treatments include Rogaine, hair transplants and hormone treatments, but sadly, there remains no cure or reversal for baldness.

All this talk of no hair got me thinking about our obsession with hair. We don’t really need it. A hat is a fine replacement for keeping heads warm in the winter, but everybody wants hair, even if they already have it.

Hair extensions are the latest rich girl’s must have. They are strands of synthetic or human hair, glued to your natural hair to add length and volume. They look great and cost a small fortune, but they are costing girls in India even more.

India is the biggest exporter of human hair. Human hair trade is a ruthless business where women and children are often forced to shave their heads as a sacrifice to their gods, or so they are told. Once the hair is collected, the “temple hair” is then coloured and treated, and shipped off to the US and UK for idiots like Paris Hilton.

I understand that balding can be traumatic. I have great sympathy for people who lose their hair due to illness or cancer. But leaving a child bald so that Mrs Beckham and her friends can have more hair is simply unacceptable.

Is private equity so bad?

Am I a dirty capitalist if I think that private equity is not ‘that bad’, or just naïve? My ex-boyfriend works in private equity, which alone should be enough to turn me off of it. I wouldn’t go as far as to say that I am a full supporter of it, but I am not its worst critic either.

Before I met my ex-boyfriend, let’s call him Joe, all I knew about private equity was that it sounded ‘kind of cool’ and that every junior investment banker I knew, wanted in. Joe often explained his work and I would pretend to listen. Surprisingly, I managed to learn a few things.

An article in last week’s New Statesman, describes private equity as “capitalism’s dirty business”. Private equity is, basically, a group of investors who buy underperforming companies. After a few years, they sell them, hopefully, for a profit. According to the New Statesman, private equity “sacks staff, cuts wages, sells off assets, outsources, screws suppliers and, more often than not, reduces services to customers” in order to make their profit.

Supporters of private equity will of course argue that their expertise is in managing and developing the weaknesses of a company. I half believe this, because it is not in the best interest of private equity firms to screw a company over. They make better returns by ‘refurbishing’ the company and selling it for more.
Believe it or not, the public can benefit from private equity.

Pension companies are big investors in private equity and some of the profits actually go back to its pensioners. Private equity can also create jobs once better, more efficient business models are up and running.

If the job can be done by one, why would you hire five? If it can be done in half the time for half the price, why wouldn’t you? Oh dear. I’m afraid I am a dirty capitalist. It is thoughts like these that upset labour unions and keep sweatshops in production.