Mike Norman Economics

On Wednesday, February 21st, the UK’s Minister of Defence, Conservative Gavin Williamson, announced that the United Kingdom is changing its fundamental defence strategy from one that’s targeted against non-state terrorists (Al Qaeda, etc.), to one that’s targeted instead against three countries: Russia, China, and North Korea. He acknowledged that a massive increase in military spending will be needed for this, and that “savings” will have to be found in other areas of Government-spending,...

Not enough "FREEDOM!"...Trump tariff or not, Ron Paul warns a ‘calamity’ will hit stocks https://t.co/6t3hWMT2DW— daisy Vivaldi (@DaisyVivaldi) March 6, 2018

Talking about winning...From the text of S.2155: funds of a custodial bank that are deposited with a central bank shall not be taken into account when calculating the supplementary leverage ratio as applied to the custodial bank They are getting rid of this requirement to reserve capital against these risk-free assets.  Per the latest H.8 release, there are probably over $2T of such bank assets. "the Senate could do something we haven’t seen in the nation’s capital in a long time: show...

Winning! “We’re going to win. We’re going to win so much. We’re going to win at trade, we’re going to win at the border. We’re going to win so much, you’re going to be so sick and tired of winning, you’re going to come to me and go ‘Please, please, we can’t win anymore.’ You’ve heard this one. You’ll say ‘Please, Mr. President, we beg you sir, we don’t want to win anymore. It’s too much. It’s not fair to everybody else.’” Trump said. “And I’m going to say ‘I’m sorry, but we’re going to keep...

… For those that want to understand how Keynes is relevant for the 21st century I would recommend reading the original books – now in public domain – or modern books from Post-Keynesian/Modern Monetary Theory authors. econoblog 101A short comment on Temin and Vines on KeynesDirk Ehnts | Lecturer at Bard College Berlin

In recent weeks, the Trump administration has stepped up its efforts at “regime change” in Venezuela.... Gunboat diplomacy in new garb. Why does the US care about Venezuela? Oil, what else? CounterpunchStill Meddling in VenezuelaMark Weisbrot

Chris Rock may be right. Still, Americans are well aware that economic inequalityin their country is obscene, even though they often underestimate the growing gap between the poor and the rich. But it’s Frank Rich, who conducted the interview with the American comedian, who made the more perceptive observation: For all the current conversation about income inequality, class is still sort of the elephant in the room. Occasional Links & Commentary“If poor people knew how rich rich...

More than 300 satellites will be put into orbit as China, inspired by US billionaire Elon Musk’s plan to get the entire world online, aims to establish a global Wi-Fi network of its own. Musk’s Starlink initiative reportedly consists of more than 12,000 interlinked satellites. The state-owned China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation has been tasked with developing and launching such satellites, the Beijing-based Science and Technology Daily reports.... Asia TimesChina to follow...

My reading of the consensus view is that the change in personnel at the Federal Reserve has coincided with a more hawkish outlook, although the tax cut presumably helped push matters. I do not have a strong reason to disagree with such a view; the Fed is probably going to revert back to its historical policy of gradualism -- which was a 25 basis point hike per meeting.... Bond Economics Back To GradualismBrian Romanchuk

I was brought up on a council estate and it was bit rough. I remember being set upon a few times by gangs when all alone. You look around you and you see that you're encircled and that there is no escape. First they start with the verbal abuse, then one of them starts laying into you before all of them do. I was lucky, after a few punches I would be on the floor defeated and then they would give up after that. The next day I would be okay apart from some bruises and a cut or two.Being picked...