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Tag Archives: Uncategorized

Michel Foucault: Power/Knowledge

from Asad Zaman We cannot understand the world around us without a sophisticated understanding of the complex but intimate relationship between knowledge and power. One of the most influential philosophers of the twentieth century, Michel Foucault, crafted a radically different understanding of this relationship. Instead of seeing power in brute force, he saw power as being the ability to shape knowledge. To understand Foucault, we must let go of our comfortable and conventional...

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Can the Venezuelan economy be fixed?

from Mark Weisbrot The international media has provided a constant fusillade of stories and editorials (not always easily distinguished from each other) about the collapse of the Venezuelan economy for some time now. Shortages of food and medicine, hours-long lines for basic goods, incomes eroded by triple-digit inflation, and even food riots have dominated press reports. The conventional wisdom has a set of predictable narratives to explain the current economic mess. “Socialism” has...

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Economists have no ears

Thomas Kuhn once famously described textbooks as the vehicle by which students learn how to do “normal science” in an academic discipline. Economic textbooks clearly fulfil this function, but the pity is that what passes for “normal” in economics barely deserves the appellation “science”. Most introductory economics textbooks present a sanitised, uncritical rendition of conventional economic theory, and the courses in which these textbooks are used do little to counter this mendacious...

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A Theory of Economic Policy Lock-in and Lock-out via Hysterisis: Rethinking Economists’ Approach to Economic Policy

This paper explores lock-in and lock-out via economic policy. It argues policy decisions may near-irrevocably change the economy’s structure, thereby changing its performance. That causes changed economic outcomes concerning distribution of wealth, income and power, which in turn induces locked-in changes in political outcomes. That is a different way of thinking about policy compared to [...]

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The old debt and entitlement charade

from Dean Baker The establishment is trying to pull a big one over on the public yet again. One of the designated topics for the last presidential debate goes under the heading, “debt and entitlements.” This should have people upset for several reasons. The first is simply the use of the term “entitlements.” While this has a clear meaning to policy wonks, it is likely that most viewers won’t immediately know that “entitlements” means the Social Security and Medicare their parents receive....

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Economic growth is not “natural”: re-thinking current economic challenges

from Maria Alejandra Madi Since the late 1980s,  the World Bank has been defending a policy agenda that reinforces the free market model of endogenous economic growth where human capital plays an outstanding role since the acquisition of abilities would increase the productivity levels, and as a result, the income levels. In the model of endogenous growth, the evolution of the level of product per worker depends on the increase of productivity. Regarding the human capital model, the long...

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Presidential poll, Euro area current account, Saudi output, Russian nukes

Clinton Vs. Trump: IBD/TIPP Presidential Election Tracking Poll (IBD/TIPP) The IBD/TIPP poll — a collaboration between Investor’s Business Daily (IBD) and TechnoMetrica Market Intelligence (TIPP) — has been the most accurate poll in recent presidential elections (About IBD/TIPP Poll). The latest results for the IBD/TIPP Presidential Election Tracking Poll will be released each morning by 6 a.m. ET. Trump Leads Clinton By 1 Point Going Into Debate (IBD/TIPP) Donald Trump has...

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Housing starts, Mortgate purchase apps, Sales managers index, Garbage carloads, Cass freight index

Starts very weak, but permits up. It’s about permits, so we’ll see if they level off or continue to rise: Highlights Starts are mixed but permits are up in what is a deceptively solid housing starts & permits report. Starts plunged what looks like a shocking 9.0 percent in September, to a 1.047 million annualized rate. But the drop is tied entirely to the volatile multi-family component where starts fell a massive 38 percent in the month to a 264,000 rate. The more...

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Links. EU (not?).

The latest UK (un)employment data (August) show at worst some stalling of the relatively high pace of the growth of employment. But there is no sign of any kind of Brexit cliff. The latest UK retail sales data show a 4,1% increase in volume (September). Obviously, people care more about earnings growth (2% higher wages and 1,6% more employment compared with one year ago) than about Brexit. This surprised me: average store prices were 1,1% lower than one year before. The latest UK data on...

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