Mike Norman Economics

First there was the Great Gatsby curve. Then there was the Proust index. Now, thanks to Neil Irwin, we have the Marx ratio. Each, in their different way, attempts to capture the ravages of contemporary capitalism. But the Marx ratio is a bit different. It was published in the New York Times. Its aim is to capture one of the underlying determinants of the obscene levels of inequality in the United States today—not class mobility or the number of years of national income growth lost to the...

This is the second in a series of blog posts on financing infrastructure assets. Multiplier EffectBanks, Capital Markets, and Institutional Investors as Providers of Long-Term Finance Felipe Rezende | Director, Economics and Finance Program, Bard College and Research Fellow, The Levy Economics Institute

Although this blog post considers some very technical material its message is simple. Mainstream macroeconomic models that are used to determine policy choices by governments are deeply flawed and the evidence strongly supports a central thrust of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) – that fiscal policy is powerful and that austerity will kill growth. In that sense, it helps us understand why various nations and blocs (such as the Eurozone) struggled after the onset of the GFC. It also explains...

Dollar’s long term trend is down. I’m gonna make the biggest score of my lifetime.

If only the original communists hadn't banned religion, then the West would not have been able to portray them as agents of the Devil. I guess they saw how the ruling elite had used religion to control the masses. Wahabbism is extreme right wing, religious fascism and I wonder how the Wahhabi clerics believe such hate and violence serves God? Perhaps they are making a ton of money out of it like the extreme right-wing, Christian evangelical  preachers do? Again we read about pure evil...

The first battle in the war between Brussels and Rome has thus been won by Brussels: I have little doubt that Mattarella was lobbied very strongly by EU figures to block Savona, because he is capable of developing the real weapon that Five Star/Northern League could bring to bear against the euro – the “mini-BOT.” Named in reference to Italy’s “buoni ordinario del tesoro,” which are short-term government bonds, these would be government-issued notes valued at between €1 and €500, which...

Thomas Fazi is Bill Mitchell's collaborator. The Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci coined the term “organic crisis” to describe a crisis that differs from ”ordinary” financial, economic, or political crises. An organic crisis is a “comprehensive crisis,” encompassing the totality of a system or order that, for whatever reason, is no longer able to generate societal consensus (in material or ideological terms). Such a crisis lays bare fundamental contradictions in the system that the ruling...

                        This beautiful park is up for sale to developers - once it's gone, it's gone!“Everybody uses this park,” says Jackie Lewis, who raised two children in a red brick house a block away. “This is probably our last piece of community space. It’s been one after the other. You just end up despondent.”So much for the Thatcher miracle, Britain is more broke than ever. But where did the money go, maybe the banks took it all in their bail out?  But aren't these the...

Steve keen on Twitter Yanis has just penned a superb review of reviews of Adults in the Room, and it's prompted me to make my review (which I only published on Amazon) more widely known. Here it is below, and here's the link to the review on Amazon. Buy Yanis's book. It's the only way you'll understand what's about to unfold in Italy  A cracking tale of the first act in the destruction of Europe by Europe's unelected elite  First an admission: Yanis and I have been friends since we met in...

I didn't know who Lindsey Graham was when I first saw him but I realised straight away he was a very dangerous person. KV Danial Larison - The Madness of Lindsey Graham For some mysterious reason, Lindsey Graham is taken seriously when he talks about foreign policy, and yet everything he has to say about these issues is either nonsense or maniacal. Here he is rambling about why the U.S. should be willing to attack North Korea despite the massive loss of life that would follow: Well, you...