Mike Norman Economics

Admittedly a promotion video, but interesting none-the-less. If CO2 can become a valuable commodity, then we won't be letting it escape into the atmosphere anymore.Climate change and its consequences is one of the biggest challenge of the 21st century. According to leading scientists, global CO2 emissions must be cut in half by 2030 to prevent serious climate impacts, such as severe weather conditions, long droughts or the melting of glaciers and icebergs. To avoid these impacts new...

Spoiler: MMT-informed fiscal policy. The WeekThe 1 economic experiment Shinzo Abe won't try Jeff Spross

One of the pieces of pseudo-science that floats around in popular discussion of bonds is the belief that bond investors are deadly afraid of inflation. In particular, bonds "lose money" every time the Consumer Price Index rises -- which is most months, in most developed countries. As far as I can tell, this is the legacy of some Economics 101 textbook story that has been passed on from "expert" to "expert" over the decades. The correct answer is that nominal yields largely reflect the...

It will be interesting to see what Boris Johnson does, he seems to be more pragmatic and less dogmatic than other Conservatives.I've read he wants to keep his new voters, so he has shifted slightly to the left.The forced resignation of the United Kingdom’s Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sajid Javid, is the latest sign that macroeconomic policy is being upended, and not only in the UK. In addition to completing the ritual burial of the austerity policies pursued by UK governments since 2010,...

A growing number of Americans describe climate change as a crisis, and two-thirds say President Trump is doing too little to tackle the problem. The results, from a poll conducted by The Washington Post and the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), point to a growing disconnect between Americans worried about the warming planet and Trump administration officials, who have aggressively scaled back Obama-era environmental regulations and relinquished the nation’s role as a global leader in...

Looks like Xi is going to have to get the cattle prods out...Beijing is still pretty empty pic.twitter.com/yQNpglHADi— Cathy Zhang? (@CathyYZhang) February 19, 2020

Anti-EmpireUSA Is the World Spying Champion, That’s Why It’s Fighting the Simple Fix to China Spying FearsChristian Stöcker  Sputnik InternationalUnimaginable That BND & CIA Conducted Joint Spying Op For 23 Years – German Intelligence Expert Dances with BearsTHE CON IN THE CONSTITUTION – KREMLIN LOSES CONTROL OF THE AMENDMENT PROCESS, DELAYS DUMA VOTE, ORDERS ELECTION COMMISSION TO STOP ANSWERING TELEPHONEJohn HelmerOilprice Dutch Court Orders Russia To Pay $50B To Ex-Yukos...

This hunter gets a real pounding! [embedded content] It looks really dated now, but this Planet of the Apes human hunt scene frightened the living daylights out of me when I was 11. It reversed everything, where humans became worthless, and hunted and exploited for gain. The whole film was depressing, although brilliant! [embedded content]

Interesting critique of emergence in natural systems.Is the brain the producer of consciousness, or is the brain a receptor?MindMattersWhy the Mind Cannot Just Emerge From the BrainRobert J. Marks in conversation with neurosurgeon Michael Egnor WHY THE MIND CANNOT JUST EMERGE FROM THE BRA WHY THE MIND CANNOT JUST EMERGE FROM THE BRA WHY THE MIND CANNOT JUST EMERGE FROM THE BRA

The last 10 years have seen the collapse of neoliberalism. The question now is, what comes next? For 40 years, we have lived in a neoliberal era, an era defined in public policy by deregulation, liberalization, privatization, and austerity. Starting with the Thatcher and Reagan revolutions, neoliberal ideas spread to capture the center and even the left, ultimately becoming the reigning policy consensus by the mid-1990s.But over the last decade, that neoliberal consensus has collapsed. We...