Mike Norman Economics

Like in Bolivia, the strength of public opinion in Chile was so immense that the government, led by Chile’s richest man Sebastian Piñera, immediately conceded.“Yesterday Bolivia, today Chile, tomorrow Ecuador”Mint Press NewsIn Stunning Display of Popular Will, Protests in Bolivia to Chile Force Public Reckoning of “Chicago Boy” EconomicsBut it isn't over yet.Times Editorial Lets Slip Joe Biden’s Latin America Policy: More Obama-Style CoupsAlan MacleodSee alsoHow many years did it...

Consumers plan to spend $805 on gifts this year, down sharply from 2019More than twice as many say they are spending less, versus more, than last yearConsumer spending intentions often change over holiday seasonGallupAmericans Plan to Scale Back on Holiday Spending This YearLydia Saad

One important property of time series is models is whether they are causal or non-causal. A non-causal model has the property that future values of inputs affects the current values of outputs. For time series, the calculation implies the use of a time machine, which is generally not available. One needs to be careful of the issues posed by non-causality in financial model building, since time series libraries treat time series as single units, and contain many non-causal operations.... Bond...

The reason that the NY Fed as well as many Keynesian and other critics of the Chinese ‘miracle’ are so sceptical is that they are seeped in a different economic model for growth. They are convinced that China can only be ‘successful’ (like the economies of the G7!) if its economy depends on profitable investment by privately-owned companies in a ‘free market’ where consumption rules over investment. And yet the evidence of the last 40 and even 70 years is that a state-led, planning...

A few weeks ago, I did a podcast for the group that has organised ‘Politics in the Pub, Newcastle’, which is a monthly event where a speaker(s) address a topic of public interest in a local Newcastle hotel and answer questions from the audience.It is meant to be an educative engagement with the interested public....Bill Mitchell – billy blogPolitics in a Podcast – fiscal statements and the pandemic futureBill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and...

 Okay, it's China state media, but Mihrigul Tursun's family say she was lying and that her son is still alive.In a recent CNN interview, a woman named Mihrigul Tursun claimed one of her three children was killed by the Chinese government. She said she was separated from her triplets at the Urumqi airport in northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region and held in custody in 2015. Mihrigul said she was told after her release that her son died following an operation. But according to a...

 But vaccines will still work. Phew!Antibodies against the novel coronavirus declined rapidly in the British population during the summer, a study found on Tuesday, suggesting protection after infection may not be long lasting and raising the prospect of waning immunity in the community.Reuters UK study finds evidence of waning antibody immunity to COVID-19 over time

Partisan biases in processing political information contribute to rising divisions in society. How do such biases arise in the brain? We measured the neural activity of participants watching videos related to immigration policy. Despite watching the same videos, conservative and liberal participants exhibited divergent neural responses. This “neural polarization” between groups occurred in a brain area associated with the interpretation of narrative content and intensified in response to...

A fellow heretic. Not just "liberals." There are also a good many "progressives" in that boat to nowhere. Not that many conservatives know the whole story either. Libertarians do better.Zero HedgeHow I Became A Heretic To My Liberal FriendsTyler Durden

Trump happy:We are seeing a continued strengthening of the Chinese RMB vs. the U.S. dollar. The USD/CNY rate is now retesting a double bottom of 6.7 USD/CNY that was reached for the first time 18 months ago. Read more: https://t.co/H17Nrhh1pa #fx #forex pic.twitter.com/VC4OTFQnjd— FactSet (@FactSet) October 27, 2020