Mike Norman Economics

Cloud Cuckoo land! A US court has just handed down the verdict that the Islamic Republic of Iran owes the families of those who died on 11th September 2001 6 billion dollars in damages. It behooves us to point out that no one, anywhere, ever accused Iran of being behind the 9/11 attacks for over a decade afterwards. The attempt to shift the blame to Iran has been a slow developing situation. The idea was first floated by James Woolsey, former head of the CIA, in 2015. The official position...

[embedded content] Sainsbury's CEO, Mike Coupe, has been filmed singing and humming 'We're in the Money' while waiting for an ITV News interview about his supermarket's merger with competitor Asda. Coupe made a statement after ITV released the clip, saying: 'This was an unguarded moment trying to compose myself before a TV interview. It was an unfortunate choice of song, from the musical 42nd Street, which I saw last year, and I apologise if I have offended anyone.'

Says the former Goldwater girl.But she is finally beginning to approach the truth: A lot of Democratic voters realized that she is really a Republican at heart. Enough to deny her the election.Zero HedgeHillary Clinton Now Blaming Socialist Democrats For Historic Election Loss Tyler Durden

Peter Temin says 80 per cent of the population is burdened with debt and anxious about job security. Welcome to the banana republic.Independent (UK)US has regressed to developing nation status, MIT economist warnsChloe Farand

I kid to this previously, but it was in a list of links. It is important enough to give it its own post.Hudson at his best. It's a must-read. Longish, so save it for the weekend if time is an issue.Michael Hudson — On Finance, Real Estate And The Powers Of Neoliberalism“Creating Wealth” through Debt: The West’s Finance-Capitalist Road— To be delivered at the Peking University, School of Marxist Studies, May 5-6, 2018Michael Hudson | President of The Institute for the Study of Long-Term...

Jamie Galbraith recounts his transition from JG sceptic to JG advocate and the reasons for his change of mind.The BafflerWe WorkJames K. Galbraith | Lloyd M. Bentsen Jr. Chair in Government/Business Relations and Professor of Government at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, The University of Texas at Austin

Now that progressive leaders (Bernie Sanders, Kirsten Gillibrand and Corey Booker) have placed a proposed “Job Guarantee” program onto the mainstream political stage, it is essential they begin explaining the proposal’s underpinning macro-economic logic. Otherwise they lay themselves, and the proposal itself, wide open to scathing public ridicule—as exemplified by a recent Megan McArdle op-ed in the Washington Post (“A federal job for everyone?” April 25, 2018). But what should they be...

The dollar rally has been caused by ONE THING and now that thing is ending.

Since 2010 we have been investigating and reporting on activities of the billionaire Koch brothers’ political funding network to subvert democracy in the United States. Wall Street On ParadeWas that a Koch Brothers’ Agent Who Pounded on our Door after We Wrote a Critical Article? Pam Martens and Russ MartensSee also They’re spending $20 million to convince voters of the benefits of the GOP’s central achievement. BloombergKoch-Backed Groups Are Selling Trump’s Tax Cuts Door-to-Door Ahead of...

The Sino-American "trade war" — economic warfare by another name — seems to be escalating. China is showing no signs of backing down.Zero HedgeChina Warns Trump "We Will Outlast You" As US "Significantly Escalates" Trade War Tyler Durden