Mike Norman Economics

The beautiful Earth  In my opinion, the most beautiful planet in the Solar System.  Although it is not perfectly round. And for some, it's not very round at all.

This is what struck me immediately on learning of Epstein's "passing," the near certainty of which I had mentioned to a friend several days before. He asked me, "Do you mean he will be 'suicided?" Of course, this remains just a hypothesis based on a suspicion that is based on "cui bono?" The truth of the matter will likely never be established to the satisfaction of all. Even if it is "established through evidence" in an investigation, the result won't be universally accepted, for good...

The U.S. has run a persistent trade deficit over the past few decades, similar to much of the 19th century. The shifts in the U.S. trade balance over time seem to correspond with U.S. industrialization in a global setting, according to a recent Economic Synopses essay.  “We hypothesize that industrialization leads to structural changes that cause a nation’s comparative advantages to change relative to those of other nations,” wrote Assistant Vice President and Economist Yi Wen and Research...

In their paper Maman and Rosenhek made an insightful contribution in shedding light on how the state agencies, institutional actors and mechanisms concoct the neoliberal morality and conduct the moralization of the economic field within particular macro-institutional context. This important research direction should be amplified more in our field. One thing is certain: in (neoliberal) capitalism moral sentiments play a key role in the extraction of economic value. Maman, Daniel and Zeev...

An executive’s guide to the global energy system An interesting podcast. Government regulation drove the renewables to start with, but now it is the cheapest form of enegy.  In my opinion, without the government regulations giving renewables a chance, they might still be more expensive today, and that would be a great loss. Global energy demand is headed toward a plateau over the next ten to 20 years, as the world focuses on electrification, energy efficiency, and more...

The GND proposed in the US already includes a JG. Now it looks like Scotland is in play, too. Asked if a Job Guarantee would be part of her vision for a Scottish Green New Deal, [First Minister] Nicola Sturgeon says: “‘Yes’ is the short answer.” A Job Guarantee would involve the state acting as an ‘employer of last resort’ to the unemployed, and was last year proposed in the United States by Senator Bernie Sanders Finance Secretary Derek Mackay warns that more powers over employment law...

First, of course I welcome this. Second, a job guarantee is a logical part of a Green New Deal, which offers work in every constituency by ensuring jobs are available everywhere to transform our green infrastructure, and most especially our housing. Third, it has to then be noted that this policy is linked to modern monetary theory, which is the only current school of economic thought that makes full employment for those who want work its core objective. And fourth, and inevitably, this...

A short one by Jimmy Dore, where he asks some pertinent questions. [embedded content]

Once upon a time the BBC did some balanced and fair reporting.A disturbing report on the Neocons. [embedded content]

The Chinese government 'exposed' an American diplomat meeting with the leaders of the Hong Kong demonstrators. Washington hit back saying it was just a routine meeting and called China a thuggish state for revealing the diplomat's identity. The Western media has run with the Washington side of the story downplaying Beijing's version. But the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has been backing the Hong Kong protestors for some time.Strangely, the Western media hardly ever reports on the...