Real-World Economics Review

from Lars Syll And still, amidst all this tumult, many economists are disinclined to rethink the foundations of their field. It reminds me of the closing joke in Woody Allen’s film Annie Hall. A guy has a crazy brother who thinks he is a chicken.  The doctor asks, ‘Why don’t you turn him in?’ The guy replies, ‘I would, but I need the eggs.’ ” Why is the free-market discourse so perdurable despite so many social, ecological, and political realities that call its logic and categories of...

Intellectual property like pharmaceutical patents is part of the story of why so many people face a long wait for COVID-19 vaccines says Dean Baker discussing the high cost of policy choices that make the rich richer at public expense.

Covid 19 vaccinations are going well. Quite a number of vaccines have been approved. And these are being used. At the time of writing close to 100 million ‘jabs’ have already been provided, not just of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccine but also of the Sputnic, AstraZeneca and Sinovac vaccines. And the pace is quickening, for instance in countries like Brazil and Morocco (which uses AstraZeneca and Sinopharm vaccines in its 3.000 vaccination centres). Look here for the scientific...

from Lars Syll Speculators may do no harm as bubbles on a steady stream of enterprise. But the position is serious when enterprise becomes the bubble on a whirlpool of speculation. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done.The measure of success attained by Wall Street, regarded as an institution of which the proper social purpose is to direct new investment into the most profitable channels in terms of...

from Dean Baker The Wall Street crew is furious over the masses at Robinhood and Reddit ruining their games with their mass buying of GameStop, which wiped out the short position of a big hedge fund. The Robinhood/Reddit masses are touting this as a victory over Wall Street. The Wall Street insiders are decrying this effort to turn the market into a casino. It’s worth sorting this one out a bit and answering the question everyone is asking (or should be), would a financial transactions...

from Peter Radford The sudden attention being given to the gyrations of Game Stop stock prices has caused all sorts of hand wringing within the hallowed walls of high finance.  In typical fashion the people who like to carry on their trading and associated activities beyond the public gaze are all a twitter because a bunch of apparently crazy outsiders are not adhering to the sedate rules of the game.  This produces truly odd results.  Normally virulently anti-government voices are...

from Dean Baker President Biden’s proposal to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025 is prompting a backlash from the usual suspects. As we hear the cries about how this will be the end of the world for small businesses and lead to massive unemployment, especially for young workers, minorities, and the less-educated, there are a few points worth keeping in mind. While $15 an hour is a large increase from the current $7.25 an hour. This is because we’ve allowed so much time to pass...

Follow on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/actdottv Julianna welcomes back recurring guest Dean Baker, Macroeconomist and co-founder of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, to discuss how Joe Biden has inherited an economy that is failing working people. He campaigned on a pledge to put that to an end. So how can he make sure that America’s frontline workers and hurting families get the help they need right now? Dean Baker co-founded The Center for Economic and Policy Research in...

from Lars Syll Though an enthusiast of reason, I believe that rational choice theory has failed abysmally, and it saddens me that this failure has brought discredit upon the very enterprise of serious theorizing in the field of social study … Rational choice theory is far too ambitious. In fact, it claims to explain everything social in terms of just three assumptions that would hold for all individuals in all social groups and in every historical period. But a Theory of Everything does...

from Dean Baker It is more than a bit bizarre that the New York Times can run a major piece about the lack of access of developing countries to Covid vaccines and never once mention the vaccines developed by China, Russia, or India. The piece is very useful in highlighting the fact that the United States and Europe have secured the vast majority of the 2021 production of the vaccines developed by western drug companies, leaving relatively few doses for the developing world. As a result,...