Tag Archives: news

5th of March 2025 My Lords, like other noble Lords, I commend the efforts of the noble Baroness and her committee to shorten and simplify the code and guide. That they have not altogether freed themselves from the bureaucracy involved in all this is more a sign of the times than of any lack of effort on their part. I welcome the obligation to register non-financial interests and reduce registrable interests from 10 to seven, but I still struggle to understand the purpose of the...

from Peter Radford I am in a grim and introspective mood this morning.  I have been reflecting on how my father might react to where we are.  He was one of those who fought against fascism.    His life was shortened by being wounded during that fight.  As a result, I never knew him as a healthy person.  What, I wonder, would he make of America’s turn away from democracy and towards autocracy?  What would he make of the pillaging of Ukraine’s resources as payment for so-called “aid” given...

from Dean Baker (I saw that Jeff Bezos wants the Washington Post’s editorial page to run pieces touting the merits of free markets. Here’s my submission.) There are not many issues on which there is largely bipartisan agreement, so the story we tell about the origin of economic inequality stands out. Both sides agree that the increase in inequality of income and wealth is driven by an unfettered market. The difference is that conservatives say it is wise to accept the outcomes of the...

from Lars Syll  A science that fails to reflect on its own history and neglects critical methodological and theoretical questions about its practice is a science in crisis. As early as 1991, a commission led by Anne Krueger—featuring esteemed economists such as Kenneth Arrow, Edward Leamer, and Joseph Stiglitz—highlighted a fundamental weakness in graduate economics education. Drawing from their own experiences, they observed an alarming disconnect between theoretical and econometric...

from Dean Baker CEOs and other top management in the U.S. are far more highly paid than their counterparts in Europe and Asia. NYT columnist Jeff Sommer had an entertaining piece on how many of the business leaders who eagerly embraced DEI a few years back are now being very quick to abandon it. This is not terribly surprising to those of us who never took the commitment to DEI very seriously, but there is an important aspect to his discussion that he leaves out. Sommer spends much of the...

Donald Trump’ın Kasım 2024’teki ABD başkanlık seçimlerindeki zaferi, Ukrayna savaşını sona erdirmeye yönelik liberal senaryoyu yırtıp attı. Bu senaryo, Ukrayna’ya işgal altındaki Kırım ve Donbass topraklarını geri almak olarak belirtilen zafere ulaşana kadar koşulsuz maddi ve manevi destek sunmaktı. Trump’ın seçilmesinden önce bile senaryo, Ukrayna’ya Rusya ile barış görüşmelerinde mümkün olan en iyi pazarlık pozisyonunu vermek için “ne gerekiyorsa yapmak” şeklinde değişmişti. Bu...

A PLOG is a ´Persistent Large Output Gap´. Read: a long period of high unemployment. Literature about PLOGs tries to mitigate one of the ideas of economic orthodoxy, especially the unsubstantiated idea that lowering high post-economic crisis unemployment will fuel inflation. According to this literature, which is quite empirical, it doesn´t. However, this somewhat older literature does not yet consider the post-2009 Euro Area experience. Here, I will propose an updated definition of...

Who decides what statistical offices measure and how they measure it? And what are the implicit values embedded in these decisions? Recently, the ILO issued a new manual on measuring productivity. Below, I´ll discuss the questions posed. But for starters, it is essential to realize that economists measure monetary productivity, not physical productivity, which leads to problems with ever-changing prices. This will be part of the discussion. The ILO (International Labour Organization)...

from Peter Radford Take four. I continue to listen in on the conversation. The election reverberates loudly around leftish circles. Recriminations mount. Criticisms fly. Finger pointing and over-analysis have become all too common. And this is after just a week. Imagine what a month can produce. So far the central narrative seems to be that the Democrats have become isolated from the most consequential issues that regular folk feel are important. The explanation being that the party is...

Eurostat published new data on employment in Europe. Average employment growth is +0,9%. The average hides stark differences. A Germany-centered core consisting of Germany, Austria, Sweden, Estonia, Finland, and Hungary shows declines. Surprisingly, it excludes Denmark, Belgium and the Netherlands. The South does better. Countries like Portugal, France, Greece, and, especially, Spain post above-average increases. But unemployment in these countries is still high (over 5%), even when EU...