Mike Norman Economics

A good enough reason to never live in the US, in my opinion. In my last job I got five weeks and three days paid leave a year. The extra three days were added over a number of years for long term service. After my company got privatized my union could never negotiate the last few days to make it six weeks holiday.Five weeks three days, how can anyone say unions are bad, they served me well? Anyway, what I used to do was take two weeks leave twice a year but take those weeks where there was...

Private banks are failing to serve the public, say the professors, Mark Paul, Thomas Herndon, and so a public solution is needed to compete alongside the private banks. Banks today are increasingly consolidating branch locations, while also moving away from low-cost financial services to high-profit activities, leaving marginalized Americans underserved and left behind in today’s economy. Without access to basic banking services, such as checking and savings accounts or small loans,...

Peter Turchin has studied why civilisations collapse and he says it's when the gap between the rich and poor get's too big the rich can then use their power and influence to avoid paying taxes while at the same time use their monopoly position to force down the wages of the general population and so in the end the average citizen is unable pay enough tax to keep the system going either. Then societies begin to collapse and this can sometimes trigger a civil war, he says.What I found...

US farmers, lots of them in the State of Iowa, are not happy about losing the Chinese market, fearing it not come back once China substitutes.This article suggests their fear is justified. Earlier this week, Russia offered to bail out China from the trade war with Washington. Moscow offered 1 million hectares (2.5 million acres) of arable land available to Chinese farmers to meet its large-scale demand for soybeans — and of course, prevent a massive soybean shortage that would lead to...

About John Brennan.Sic Semper TyrannisDitto Colonel Lang Publius Tacitus See alsoUS Information classification and clearances Col. W. Patrick Lang, US Army (ret.) At the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lang was the Defense Intelligence Officer (DIO) for the Middle East, South Asia and counter-terrorism, and later, the first Director of the Defense Humint Service. At the DIA, he was a member of the Defense Senior Executive Service. He participated in the drafting of National Intelligence...

If you are in a position to step up....Sic Semper Tyrannis If I am going to continue with SST...Col. W. Patrick Lang, US Army (ret.) At the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lang was the Defense Intelligence Officer (DIO) for the Middle East, South Asia and counter-terrorism, and later, the first Director of the Defense Humint Service. At the DIA, he was a member of the Defense Senior Executive Service. He participated in the drafting of National Intelligence Estimates. From 1992 to 1994, all...

Some philosophy of statistics. Short read. Not wonkish.Statistical Modeling, Causal Inference, and Social ScienceThe fallacy of the excluded middle — statistical philosophy editionAndrew Gelman | Professor of Statistics and Political Science and Director of the Applied Statistics Center, Columbia University

MR Online Imperialism in the 21st Century — Global Value Chains and International Labour Arbitrage Dev Nathan Originally published: Economic & Political Weekly (Vol. 53, Issue No. 32, August 11, 2018)

Social media wars hotting up.. Zero HedgeTop Iran General 'Ready for Jihad'; Posts White House Explosion Pic On Instagram Tyler Durden See also What Twitter views as abusive, Caitlin sees as telling truth to power. Caitlin Johnstone — Rogue JournalistTwitter Has Shut Down My Account For “Abusing” John McCainCaitlin Johnstone

Yes, I know its August and all that, but this is too good to pass up. Scott Adams has been on this for a long while. Donald Trump could not ask for better adversaries from the point of view of persuasion. He doesn't even need to write the script. They are doing it for him. All he need do is tweet it.Moon of AlabamaJohn Brennan Is No Match For Trump bSee also We are coming down to the moment when anybody who’s a hero in Washington will be an automatic supervillain in the world. America...