Mike Norman Economics

Regaining control of the narrative through economic censorship. We’re grateful for the support we’ve received over the years … Loyal readers have made insightful comments for many years. Some loyal readers have donated $2/month, or $5/month or $10/month, (and a few have donated even more) which we appreciate. Passionate writers have burned the midnight oil to report on stories which no one else is covering. But we simply can’t afford to keep paying the thousands of dollars of hosting...

[H]eterodox economists need to be more active in challenging the dominance and anti-intellectual behavior of mainstream economics and economists. Not being respectable, standing up and just saying NO, pursuing heterodox research, and working with and through groups that are not part of the social-political-economic elite to promote better social-economics policies that benefit the non-elite are just some of the things heterodox economists can do. Of course, such behavior is frown upon,...

In the end, MMT looks like an extreme version of conventional economics in which there is no independent monetary policy and there are a lot of unused resources. But when resources get tight, the reflex is command and control central planning. This cuts to the quick of it. The question is how much market state (where free markets determine outcomes, in theory at least) and how much welfare state (where the economy is managed based on desired outcomes). This is an ongoing dialectic among...

It is Wednesday and I am travelling a lot today with limited opportunity to write. I am reading a lot though. Highly significant political debates with far reaching effects on the well-being of citizens once policies are implemented are conducted on a daily basis in our national Parliaments and in the media with little correspondence to reality. This is the norm for debates on macroeconomics, which dominate political news every day. There is this fictional world that has been created to...

Globalization not as represented by the free traders, who now have egg on their faces and have to eat crow. To boot, trade was supposedly Paul Krugman's specialty, even though he is best known for witing a popular macro textbook. So he was one of "the experts." Will the inapplicability of the ISLM "gadget " be next? So far, Paul Krugman is hanging onto it as it crashes and burns.Lars P. Syll’s BlogPaul Krugman — finally — admits he was wrong!Lars P. Syll | Professor, Malmo University...

Science trained people producing massive surpluses of real livestock... then incompetent unqualified Art Degree moron people have us "out of money!" leaving some unable to buy it...America is sitting on a mountain of uneaten bacon, the biggest since 1971 https://t.co/GU57PXoXlw— Bloomberg Economics (@economics) October 23, 2019

Double triggers all around...Nascent labor shortage resulting in compensation increases... Remember when Democrats called the extra money in Americans' wallets thanks to President @realDonaldTrump's economic policies "scraps" and "crumbs?"Update: "The median or average-income family has seen a gain of $5,003 since Trump came into office."https://t.co/iozPELkKBV — The White House (@WhiteHouse) October 22, 2019

Labor shortage resulting in increasing labor share.. general sales prices for now remaining mostly stable...$SPX is reporting a (Y/Y) decline in earnings of -4.7% for Q3 2019, which would mark the 3rd straight quarter of (Y/Y) earnings declines for the index. https://t.co/4CyajAfhmR pic.twitter.com/UIRc9jPQDW— FactSet (@FactSet) October 19, 2019

US labor shortage continues to get worse:How tight is the U.S. jobs market? Denver's light-rail system has had to cancel trips because there aren’t enough operators to run the trains https://t.co/L6bYjMsHU8— Bloomberg Economics (@economics) October 23, 2019

In “Monopoly”, the bank can “print” money indefinitely, the players get into debt, and the state adds 200 Marks each round. But what if everyone had to pay 200 Marks each round and would suffer negative returns when owning railway stations?  Even if “Monopoly” comes from the US, it has long since become a classic German game. And it goes like this: In the ideal case four players buy and sell roads, build houses and hotels and pay each other rent, which depends on the price of the road and...