Minimum-wage jobs are physically demanding, have unpredictable schedules, and pay so meagerly that workers can’t save up enough to move on.
Author: Barbara Ehrenreich | Source: The Atlantic (January 13, 2014) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Excerpts, Life & Society, Politics & Public Policy
The arguments being pushed by the Trump administration regarding tariffs and related restrictive trade policies are off the mark because they overlook two crucial issues, according to Wharton dean Geoffrey Garrett: “Rapid technological change coupled with economic stagnation have caused more of the pain felt in Middle America than free trade.” In this opinion piece, Garrett also notes that while free trade lowers the cost … [ Read more ]
Author: Geoffrey Garrett | Source: Knolwedge@Wharton (February 1, 2017) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Excerpts, International, Politics & Public Policy
What is a trade deficit?
A trade deficit happens when a country’s imports of goods and services exceed its exports of goods and services. In other words, when a country buys more from the rest of the world than it sells, the country incurs a trade deficit. […] The size of the trade deficit is primarily determined by four macroeconomic forces:
Authors: Euijin Jung, Gary Clyde Hufbauer | Source: PBS NewsHour (February 2, 2017) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Excerpts
We are creating an intelligence that is external to humans and housed in the virtual economy. This is bringing us into a new economic era—a distributive one—where different rules apply.
Author: W. Brian Arthur | Source: McKinsey Quarterly (October2017) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Excerpts, Politics & Public Policy
The influential economic theorist looks ahead to a world of virtually free energy and zero marginal cost production, and to a desperate race against climate change.
Authors: Art Kleiner, Jeremy Rifkin, Juliette Powell | Source: strategy+business (Winter2017) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Environment | Sustainability, Excerpts, History, Life & Society, Politics & Public Policy
Why is a donut shop pushing bananas? Perhaps profit margins are higher on the overpriced fruit. Or maybe the shop is attempting to proclaim its good corporate citizenship by providing an uncharacteristically nutritious snack. How you feel about this — whether you’re grateful to have been prompted to make a healthier choice or irritated that even a donut shop feels the need to try to … [ Read more ]
Authors: Cass Sunstein, Sally Helgesen | Source: strategy+business (Autumn2017) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Excerpts, Life & Society, Politics & Public Policy, Psychology | Behavior
Today’s economic and political upheavals reflect an ongoing misalignment between business and economies (on the one hand) and acceptable societal outcomes (on the other). There is still time to adjust, if we are willing to reexamine some long-held assumptions.
Authors: Blair Sheppard, Colm Kelly | Source: strategy+business (Autumn2017) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Excerpts, History, International, Life & Society, Politics & Public Policy
“There’s a magical thinking among business executives that something about the profit motive makes everything run better,” noted Raymond Fisman, a professor of economics at Boston University. […] A serious body of economics, not to mention reams of evidence from decades of privatizations around the world, suggests this belief is false.
[…]
Of course, the government can also do a horrible job of running things. And private … [ Read more ]
Author: Eduardo Porter | Source: The New York Times (January 10, 2017) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Excerpts, Politics & Public Policy
The U.S. recently passed the first major tax policy change in years. Over the past months I have been reading and noting articles on the issue and saving the ones I think have something useful to say on the topic, whether I agree or disagree. Here is a list of those articles, by source.
Subjects: Economics | Economy, Politics & Public Policy
Recently I posted to Facebook the following link:
Viewing U.S. History Through the Prism of Capitalism
It is an interview with Bhu Srinivasan where he discusses his new book, Americana: A 400-Year History of American Capitalism. It’s an interesting read and in my post I quoted the following:
“I think that previously the next big things in American history always created a lot of jobs. … [ Read more ]
Author: Jeff Blum | Subject: Economics | Economy
Corporate Democrats have never advanced their interests—and at least Republicans offer a persuasive story about why they are getting screwed.
Author: Kirk Noden | Source: The Nation (November 17, 2016) | Subjects: America, Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Excerpts, Politics & Public Policy
It’s unappreciated that for much of history, growth in economic frontiers — what we would call development markets — was actually quite low. The era of modern economic growth got started only in 1870, with the simultaneous advent of the iron-hulled screw-propelled oceangoing steamship, the submarine telegraph cable, and the industrial research lab. It was then that the pace of growth kicked up a notch … [ Read more ]
Author: J. Bradford DeLong | Source: strategy+business (Winter2016) | Subjects: Economics | Economy, Excerpts, History
Economic thinking is changing. If that thesis is correct – and there are many reasons to believe it is – then historical experience suggests policy and politics will change as well. How significant that change will be remains to be seen. It is still early days and the impact thus far has been limited. Few politicians or policymakers are even dimly aware of the changes … [ Read more ]
Author: Eric Beinhocker | Source: Evonomics | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Excerpts, Politics & Public Policy
The crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States. One of the most alarming, says a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government—a state of affairs that more typically describes emerging markets, and is at the center of many emerging-market crises. If the IMF’s staff could speak freely about the U.S., … [ Read more ]
Author: Simon Johnson | Source: The Atlantic (May2009) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Finance | Investing
An era of debt-fueled consumption has come to an end, and with it the economic culture that created it. If government is going to fill in for consumers, it will need to be smart about how it spends.
Author: Martin Walker | Source: The Wilson Quarterly (Summer2009) | Subjects: Articles & Links, Economics | Economy, Politics & Public Policy