The terms offered by Greece to the EU on June 22 have one important feature: they offer almost no reductions in state spending, but instead plan to make the modest savings needed for EU respectability by tax increases on corporations and the middle class. But why should we scoff: nearly all our governments today operate […]

Moody’s Analytics Survey of Business Confidence is currently hovering near record highs and “expectations have never been stronger in this history of the survey.” What’s more, while the survey is a worldwide one, optimism is greatest among U.S. businesses. Indeed the National Association of Homebuilders Housing Market Index at 59 is the highest since November […]

The G7 group of world leaders last weekend committed to eliminating fossil fuels’ usage by 2100, as well as to cutting their use by 40-70% by 2050. That commitment is absurd; neither the world leaders nor anyone else knows anything about what the world economy or its technical capabilities will look like by 2100, yet […]

The trader Tom Hayes spent last week at Southwark Crown Court, accused of manipulating the LIBOR market. He appears distinctly unlucky; his manipulation was only profitable because of the grotesque bloating of the interest rate swaps market, which rendered inadequate a LIBOR mechanism that was solid when devised in 1985. Traders do what they do, […]

The primary purpose of religion is not economic, but over the centuries religion has had a huge effect on society, and hence on economics. In the Dark Ages religion preserved learning (very economically positive!) then in early modern Europe the pendulum swung so that religious wars and Catholic obscurantism retarded the development of the Catholic […]

In Western countries, we have assumed since the late eighteenth century that technological advances will continue to increase our living standards, and that any living standards convergence with emerging markets will be overwhelmed by greater prosperity for all. About five years ago I questioned this view in the short term, believing that modern communications technology […]

David Cameron’s unexpected and admirable victory last week has produced a Conservative government with an overall majority in the House of Commons and an obligation to arrange a referendum on British exit from the EU by 2017. Cameron undoubtedly intends to get as good a renegotiation deal from the EU as possible, and then put […]

Capitalism has never existed in its perfect from. Even in the late eighteenth century when Adam Smith wrote, apart from a number of mediaeval holdovers, there was the East India Company, which Smith himself regarded as a monster of corruption and government meddling. Similarly Pierpont Morgan regarded pure unfettered capitalism as inherently wasteful, and preferred […]

The U.S. Congress is being asked to give President Barack Obama full “fast track” negotiating authority for the Trans Pacific Partnership, supposedly a free trade agreement with 11 other mostly wealthy Pacific nations. Yet when you examine the Wiki-leaked version of TPP which is all we have, it is far more notable for the draconian […]

“The Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all” wrote Rudyard Kipling in 1919. He also made the point that there are frequent periods when those gods appear to be asleep. There are a number of copybook headings that sensible policymakers consistently followed before 2008, which have systematically been ignored since. They are […]