Writing Worth Reading
Writing Worth Reading
"Being wealthy and feeling rich are often inversely correlated. In a room full of rich men, only one doesn’t feel poor by comparison. This lesson is often overlooked in the ongoing debate over income inequality"
"The sensible question is not whether China will replace the US, but whether it will start to acquire some of the attributes of a world power, particularly a sense of responsibility for global order." And this has no clear answer
Measuring the size of the global middle class is no easy matter. But here's an idea – count the number of cars in circulation and extrapolate from there. Doing so suggests much greater past and future growth than we've appreciated
Evidence supporting Keynesian pro-stimulus approach is astonishingly thin, says Barro. Now France and Greece are likely to diverge from path of austerity, imperilling the euro. At least we'll get better data on what works
Worries abound about global status of the dollar, what it would mean for the US politically and economically if it weakened. But, as Eichengreen shows, there are both benefits and drawbacks to the dollar as reserve currency
Interview with economist James Galbraith. "There are common global patterns in economic inequality across different countries that appear to be very strongly related to major events affecting the world economy as a whole"
Reflections on global economy, Occupy movement. "Much of what has gone on can only be described by the words moral deprivation. Something wrong had happened to the moral compass of so many people working in the financial sector"
The Economist started it, by using Big Macs as a benchmark for comparing exchange rates worldwide. A new academic paper goes further, by using Big Macs to measure purchasing power, and how workers in poor countries get richer
Excellent, authoritative and measured overview of today's economic ills. Much papering-over of cracks in past few decades. Status quo ante not a good place to return to. So here are some suggestions for ways forward (PDF)
"No one kind of money can possibly work for the sheer diversity of life. We have to escape the old idea that money is one, indivisible, totemic, semi-divine, golden truth issued from on high and handed down to a grateful populace"
A warning from Europe crosses the Atlantic. "A large debt with faster growth is preferable to a smaller debt sitting atop no growth at all. And it’s infinitely better than a smaller debt on top of a contracting economy"
"Politicians are pitching the idea of 'tax reform' – suggesting that they can simplify the system, close loopholes, and use the proceeds to reduce tax rates. But this vision of tax reform is an illusion with no basis in reality"
