In case you missed it, last year UCLA’s Ed Leamer did an excellent critique of Thomas Friedman’s The World is Flat. He plays cat and mouse with Friedman’s use of the term “flat”, offering up a review of economic theory and empirical evidence related to the theme, while making some pretty funny jokes at Friedman’s expense. The full pdf, which […]
Read moreI find myself shaking my head when I read that Exxon-Mobil just announced an all-time record profit of US$39.5 billion for 2006. And then, after the release of the IPCC report on Friday, the Exxon-Mobil-funded think tanks come out denying climate change (it should be noted that Exxon-Mobil’s contributions to these groups would appear to amount to less than a […]
Read moreAfter posting a 1959 video interview of Ayn Rand, Mark Thoma rants about the common problems of “free markets”: Markets Are Not Magic … To listen to some commentators is to believe that markets are the solution to all of our problems. Health care not working? Bring in the private sector. Need to rebuild a war-torn country? Send in the […]
Read moreAs we have been hearing about the legacies of the great minds of economics, a name that has not cropped up much lately is Marx. The first article below suggests that Marx’s ideas live with us in the global economy, and growing inequality has awoken the old guy’s spirit. With it we are seeing a resurgence of the word “capitalism” […]
Read moreDean Baker makes the case below. I think this is a good way of internalizing the external costs of driving, including CO2 emissions and other nasty stuff. And in the case of BC and a few other provinces, it would be easy to implement via public auto insurance monopolies. In and of itself, however, I don’t think it gets us […]
Read moreThe recent flurry of stories about Canada’s copyright laxity (see below) suggests that the “rights holder” community is softening up the Canadian public for a strong dose of copyright medicine. Want to see first-run movies at your local theatre just like everyone else in North America? Better support some tough new copyright (and criminal code) measures friend. There are indeed […]
Read moreOverall, the UK coverage of IPCC 4 has had an urgency beyond what we are seeing in the Canadian papers (who are, to be fair, much better than they used to be on this mother of all issues). From the front page of The Independent, a paper not known for its alarmism: UN delivers definitive warning on dangers of climate […]
Read more Posted below – An attack on expected linkage between trade and labour standards by the new US Congress by Bhagwati et al in the Financial Post, and a response by Global Unions. Fast-track renewal could lead to tougher demands on the poor By Jagdish Bhagwati, Alan Deardorff, Koichi Hamada, Parvin Krishna and Arvind Panagariya Published: February 2 2007 02:00 […]
Read moreThere’s a lot of dis-information in today’s Globe, especially from Jeffrey Simpson, re the supposed impossibility of Canada achieving our Kyoto commitments. In fact, the Kyoto protocol clearly allows us to make up for any shortfall in domestic emission reductions through the Clean Development Mechanism. As Matthew Bramley from the Pembina Institute told the Commons Committee on Bill C-288 (which […]
Read moreThe December, 2006 OECD Economic Outlook (full text unavailable on line) points to sudden tax revenue windfalls in most member countries due to large capital gains and the fact that “the process of income and wealth distributions becoming more skewed has picked up pace lately …. and may be interacting with progressive tax systems to produce more than usual increases […]
Read moreThe Guardian has an edgier take on the story posted earlier today. Check out the reference in last paragraph regarding a certain Canadian think tank. Scientists offered cash to dispute climate study Friday February 2, 2007 The Guardian Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world’s largest oil companies to […]
Read moreA colleague emailed me a submission to the Supreme Court of Canada seeking to have them interpret whether the investor-to-state dispute settlement regime of NAFTA (in Chapter 11) is in violation of the Charter of Rights. We will know in a few months time whether the highest court in the land will hear this appeal of a decision made by […]
Read moreLast Fall, in my capacity as a member of the Vancouver City Planning Commission, I helped organize a conference on affordable housing from a longer-term urban planning perspective. The final report is now available here. It features a summary of what happened at the conference, written by yours truly, but also contains lots of great visuals that were developed and […]
Read moreYesterday, the BC office of the CCPA released our annual alternative provincial budget, which we call the BC Solutions Budget. It is hard to keep these things fresh when the government does not listen year after year. Mostly, we harp on the fact that the budget estimates have become so conservative that they are off by billions come fiscal year […]
Read moreThanks to DeSmogBlog for posting a leaked copy of a new Fraser Institute report denying climate change.Their release follows; click the link to get to the desmog page which has links to more info and the actual leaked report. I think it is worth reiterating that the Fraser, like its US counterparts, has been very successful in sowing confusion over […]
Read moreSurely, the Tories knew this was coming. Just when Harper comes out swinging with those nasty attack ads, reminiscent of the anti-Kerry swift-boat ads in 2004, the Liberals (unlike the Democrats) counter-punch very effectively. I think the months to come are going to be pretty ugly in Ottawa. Harper letter decries Kyoto as ‘socialist scheme’ ALEXANDER PANETTA Canadian Press OTTAWA […]
Read moreThe UK’s Compass Institute, loosely tied to the Labour Party, has issued its second of three big picture think pieces. The first, The Good Society, was highlighted on RPE last Fall. The second is called A New Political Economy. It is a thick document full of good ideas, most of which are relevant beyond the UK. From the introduction, The […]
Read moreSteven Shrybman, a lawyer at Sack Goldblatt Mitchell, offers a short summary of TILMA, drawing from a longer legal opinion in development: February, 2007 [Updated version] Re: A Very Short Synposis of TILMA In April, 2006, Alberta and British Columbia entered into a Trade, Investment and Labour Mobility Agreement (“TILMAâ€). Certain provisions of the scheme went into effect at that […]
Read moreI was at the very first World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, back in 2001. My wife and I were travelling in Brazil and Argentina, fuelled by cheap passes from a relative at Air Canada, so we had to make a stop to check out the WSF. It was amazingly new and sexy (perhaps that was just the Brazilian […]
Read moreLondon Mayor Ken Livingston reflects on the World Economic Forum in Davos: Davos 07: lessons of the week I may not have found socialist soulmates in Davos, but I did not come away disappointed by the discussions. Ken Livingstone Davos is one of the world’s most important economic forums. In London 700,000 people are employed by foreign companies or in […]
Read moreA good article in the Toronto Star profiling the climate change denial industry. Funny how they want conclusive proof of harms caused by human-induced global warming, but seem to have no problem proffering dubious evidence themselves. It is also curious how these “free thinkers” come up with the exact same positions and arguments. Like an old African proverb: you cannot […]
Read moreThe minimum wage debate is heating up once again, with the NDP and labour strongly pushing for a minimum wage of at least $10 per hour in Ontario and at the federal level (as recently recommended by the Arthurs Report.) Anti poverty groups and the Toronto Star now strongly endorse a decent minimum wage as part of an anti poverty […]
Read moreMurray Dobbin, in his Tyee column, connects the dots between North American integration and the BC-Alberta deregulation deal known as TILMA. The danger is that Saskatchewan fails to contain the prairie fire, and it roars eastward. Dobbin paints some very plausible scenarios of what might transpire under TILMA’s investor-to-province dispute setlement scheme. To me, it is more about uncertainty – […]
Read moreThe February 15 edition of the New York Review of Books has an (extensive) intellectual obituary of Milton Friedman by Paul Krugman (Who Was Milton Friedman?). I’m impressed the Krugman does not really pull his punches much. He is very critical of Friedman the public intellectual after some kinder words about Friedman the economist’s economist.
Read moreThe Globe and Mail’s recent Unhealthy Schools series finds that our public schools are mouldy, serve unhealthy food, and are lacking in programs such as physical education. As a parent I can appreciate the anxiety people feel about the quality of our schools. This series just adds to that anxiety by citing anecdotes that reflect the thesis. But these paltry […]
Read moreI don’t entirely agree with Jim Stanford that RRSPs are a bad way to save for those not fortunate enough to be covered by a good pension plan, but I am struck by the absence of sober, independent analysis as we head into RRSP season. Today’s special Report on RRSPs in the Globe and Mail is, predictably, totally uncritical, and […]
Read moreVancouver is suffering from a plague of poverty, homelessness, drug addiction, mental health issues and crime. The good news is that all of these are inter-related, and that senior governments have the funds to make a difference. So with the Olympics coming is just three years, the political culture of neglect is showing signs of activism. Vancouver’s Mayor Sam Sullivan […]
Read moreTwo months ago, Andrew Jackson noted that Jim Webb, the new Democratic Senator from Virginia, seemed willing to discuss class and inequality with a candour seldom heard in Canadian politics, let alone American politics. Last night, Webb delivered the Democratic response to President Bush’s “State of the Union Address”. The excerpts below feature more frank talk about class and inequality […]
Read moreYesterday, the Conservatives announced three ballot options for an upcoming mail-in vote on the Canadian Wheat Board’s marketing of barley: (1) maintain single-desk marketing, (2) end the Board’s marketing of barley, or (3) have the Board market barley without its monopoly. In effect, Board elections have always been plebiscites on the organization’s role and supporters of single-desk marketing have always won. […]
Read moreIn terms of pure economics, Jim’s most interesting comparison may have been of investment to GDP, which has sparked a discussion about how to properly measure investment. For public policy, I think that Jim’s most interesting comparison was of investment to business finance/profits. If one accepts Stephen’s interpretation, then falling capital prices have allowed firms to make adequate or appropriate […]
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