Mike Norman Economics

Sour grapes article by a Russian ex-pat who is a Putin-hater, but interesting between the lines. Putin is modernizing government by appointing young well-educated people that have already demonstrated success to prominent positions. This isn't new news but it is the first instance I have seen in the Western press, suitably dismissive, of course, based quite clearly on bias (Putin is a bad person so he can't do anything right) instead of evidence. We'll see. The skeptics believed that the...

I suppose there are a few themes to draw from this. First, catch-up in education levels by the rest of the world is broadly a good thing, because it's a good thing for a range of reasons from economic to self-determination when more humans have a higher level of education. Second, 1950 was a unique time, and it's implausible that the US would have maintained its status of dramatically higher education levels indefinitely. Third, with those previous points acknowledged, the US has not...

Cohen identifies six specific factors that make the new Cold War more perilous than the preceding one: The NationThe New Cold War Is Already More Dangerous Than Was Its Predecessor Stephen F. Cohen | Professor Emeritus of Russian Studies, History, and Politics at New York University and Princeton University

The American system relies to a surprising extent on foreign medical graduates, most of whom are citizens of other countries when they arrive. By any objective standard, the United States trains far too few physicians to care for all the patients who need them. We rank toward the bottom of developed nations with respect to medical graduates per population.… Although many feared that coverage expansions from the Affordable Care Act might lead to an overwhelmed physician work force, that...

Speech by Mr Andrew G Haldane, Executive Director and Chief Economist of the Bank of England, (co-authored with David Aikman, Sujit Kapadia and Marc Hinterschweiger), at the "Rethinking Macroeconomic Policy IV" Conference, Peterson Institute for International Economics, Washington DC, 12 October 2017.BISAndrew G Haldane: Rethinking financial stability

Harvard Business Review The “Smart Society” of the Future Doesn’t Look Like Science Fiction Bhaskar Chakravorti | Senior Associate Dean of International Business & Finance at The Fletcher School at Tufts University and founding Executive Director of Fletcher’s Institute for Business in the Global Context

Apparently, measuring the levels of two molecules—an individual’s C-reactive protein and fibrinogen (as in the charts above)—and matching them against their socioeconomic position starts to reveal the hidden mechanisms connecting social inequality and health. And the missing link turns out to be stress. Debt is a major cause of stress, and a rent-based economy is based on debt. Poverty is another major cause of stress, as is financial and economic precariousness. As more people join the...

According to the minutes of the last meeting of the monetary policy committee of the US Federal Reserve Bank, the most powerful monetary authority in the world, the committee members are split and unclear on what to do. “Some participants who counselled patience expressed “concern about the recent decline in inflation” and said the Fed “could afford to be patient under current circumstances.” They “argued against additional adjustments” until the central bank was sure that inflation was on...

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) released its biannual “World Economic Outlook” (WEO) today, presenting a 300-page overview of the world economy and where it might be going. The Fund is one of the most powerful and influential financial institutions in the world. Despite the fact that this flagship publication, and the Fund’s hundreds of PhD economists, missed the two biggest asset bubbles in US and world history (the stock market bubble in the late 1990s and the housing bubble that...

The IMF is one institutional which has been responsible for maintaining this world order. Since governments need exceptional financing, they are arm-twisted by the IMF. A recent United Nations General Assemby note, Promotion Of A Democratic And Equitable International Order, has recognized this and criticizes the IMF strongly.… The report is 18 pages long and critical of the IMF from the start to the end. Please read. You won’t find any discussion of the report in the mainstream media....