Mike Norman Economics

Mixed bag. The glass is half–full or half–empty, which matters based on which half one is in. With domestic inequalities and “populism” taking center stage, the changes in global income inequality have understandably moved out of the focus. My access to the data—many of them still best obtained from the World Bank especially for poorer countries not covered by LIS—has also diminished since I left the World Bank. But one can still put together a quick update (thanks also to the contribution...

A new study reveals how the wealthy engage in ‘stealth politics’: quietly advancing unpopular, inequality-exacerbating, highly conservative policies... How can this be so? If it is true, why aren’t voters aware and angry about it?The answer is simple: billionaires who favor unpopular, ultraconservative economic policies, and work actively to advance them (that is, most politically active billionaires) stay almost entirely silent about those issues in public. This is a deliberate choice....

Didn't know that Marx was a feminist? Then you don't know about his wife, Jenny von Westphalen Marx. She was an aristocrat become social and political activist. Jacobin has the story of her life. ... we are in union with Marx, “to overthrow all relations in which man is a debased, enslaved, forsaken, despicable being”.... The German term Marx uses that is translated "man" here is Menschen. While it is correct to translate Menschen as "man" in the generic, non-gender specific sense, the...

(These remarks will be delivered today at the UBS European Conference in London.) Multiplier EffectA Better Way to Think about the “Twin Deficits”L. Randall Wray | November 13, 2018

When elections don't go the way the US wants. On Monday, the United States called the election of leaders and parliamentarians in the self-proclaimed people’s republics of Donetsk and Lugansk a “farce,” according to a spokeswoman for the US State Department, Heather Nauert. On Sunday the two self-proclaimed people’s republics held elections for leaders and parliamentarians. Turnout in Donetsk reached 80.1% of voters, while in Lugansk the number was 77%, according to the central...

Another optimistic video about climate change and how to reverse it. [embedded content] Below is a really good video of how a man transformed a near dessert in the U.S. into to fertile and lush green land. 50 Years Ago, This Was a Wasteland. He Changed Everything | Short Film Showcase [embedded content] Almost 50 years ago, fried chicken tycoon David Bamberger used his fortune to purchase 5,500 acres of overgrazed land in the Texas Hill Country. Planting grasses to soak in rains and...

Kalecki refutes Say's law, which says essentially that money is a "hot potato" and people spend or invest all of it immediately without intertemporal saving. That is to say against a strict interpretation of Say's law, choice is not anything like immediate in a modern monetary economy, and saving negatively affects consumption of consumer goods and productive investment in capital goods thereby reducing effective demand below full employment. Since private debt is a feature of a modern...

I have been reading the new book by Costas Lapavitsas – ‘The Left Case Against the EU’ – which has been recently published. It is solid and clearly explains why the EU is not an institution or structure than anyone on the progressive Left should support or think is capable of reform any time soon. It has become a neoliberal, corporatist state and hierarchical in operation, with Germany at the apex bullying the weaker states into submission. Divergence in outcomes across the geographic...

On one side the mathematician Roger Penrose. On the other side the philosopher Emanuele Severino. A double lesson by two masters of thought to understand future scenarios: philosophical, but also practical.Some A.I. scientists believe that one day machines will have consciousness, but Roger Penrose said that would never happen as a machine, no matter how bright it was, would never be aware.A computer can take in data and give out information or new data. It can record light, heat, colour,...

The NationWhy Liberal Hegemony? James Carden, contributing writer at The Nation and the executive editor for the American Committee for East-West Accord IrrussianalityTHE LIBERAL INTERNATIONAL ORDER Paul Robinson | Professor, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa Global Research | Opinion (11 Aug 2018, republished 10 Nov)A Decalogue: The Ten Theses of American Empire-Building: A Dialogue James Petras |  | Professor (Emeritus) of Sociology at...