Mike Norman Economics

Thomas Fazi is an Italian journalist and collaborator with Bill Mitchell on several books.The US is not the only neo-imperialist. It is joined by France and Great Britain.spikedFrench Colonialism Is Alive and Kicking in Africa, Has the Continent in an Iron Grip Thomas Fazi See also Disproportionate focus on corruption of national leaders distracts from the systemic theft of Ghana's wealth Slate98.3 percent of Ghana’s gold remains in the hands of multinational corporations Celina Della...

If you move all your expertise and factories to another country, train the staff there how to use the technology, and school them in our universities, then you have to be pretty dumb not to expect those people to use that knowledge not to build their own technology in the future.  We gave it away.Our response it's not to design and build our own better technology, but to pump money into the military industrial complex instead to force other nations to heal. Which is a big earner for the...

Ben Shapiro believes there is a market solution for everything. One of the best and worst things about the internet is, when someone says something stupid, it follows them forever. Right-wing commentator Ben Shapiro – who you might remember was recently schooled by the BBC’s Andrew Neil live on air – has found this out the hard way. A ludicrous clip has re-emerged of Shapiro arguing that climate change won’t be such a big deal “if the sea level rises five or ten metres” because people...

Veteran Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad has made a speech calling for all of east Asia to begin trading on the basis of a new currency based on a classical gold standard. While Mahathir did not suggest that this currency should be used to settle daily transactions between individuals, he proposed that a gold backed pan-Asian currency should replace the US dollar as the standard currency used in bilateral trade among Asian countries.... Mahathir’s statement comes at a time when...

It's hard to believe an American Ambassador would say this but in the Trump era, it's completely normal... Just being honest. It's called imperial prerogative. Historically, this is the tradeoff when there is an empire. The American Empire is just being true to form.HullaballooYou wanna trade with the US? Well, we own you if you do.digby

David P. Goldman puts some numbers on it.Asia TimesWashington is wrong about China’s economy David P. Goldman puts some numbers on it.See alsoGold, Goats 'n GunsWhat’s the Plan Mr. Tariff Man? Tom Luongo See also Tom DispatchTomgram: Michael Klare, Fighting the Next War, Not the LastSee alsoNEONew US Ambassador to Uzbekistan – You Just don’t Wanna Know Martin BergerSee alsoThe Vineyard of the SakerSpecial China SITREP & Analysis Larchmonter445See alsoFortuneChina Is Creating A...

Table of current RRRs for many countries at Central Bank News here. (Try to just ignore the common reification error  of "lend out the reserves!" these people typically make here for now...) TURKEY Central Bank of Republic of Turkey 16-Feb-19 7.00% 8.00% UNITED STATES 1) Federal Reserve 27-Oct-16 3.00% URUGUAY Central Bank of Uruguay 1-Apr-13 25.00% 20.00% UZBEKISTAN Central Bank of the Rep. Of Uzbekistan 1-Sep-09 15.00% VENEZUELA Central Bank of Venezuela 25-Oct-13 19.00% 17.00%...

Tucker Carlson is spot on again. [embedded content]

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden said Thursday that people in systems of power have exploited the human desire to connect in order to create systems of mass surveillance. Snowden appeared at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia via livestream from Moscow to give a keynote address for the Canadian university's Open Dialogue Series.Right now, he said, humanity is in a sort of "atomic moment" in the field of computer science. "We're in the midst of the greatest redistribution of...

No surprise, actually. Same policy as toward China requiring "reform" allowing the US to compete equally in their domestic markets. India and China have no intention of allowing foreign entities control the commanding heights of their economies through "investment." It's a national security issue, just as the US approaches this domestically itself. This is basic to neoliberal globalization that effectively colonized the rest of the world. Nothing new here, either. It is typical of empires....