Yule Heibel's Library tagged economy →  View Popular, Search in Google

More like this, please (I say this as an ethical atheist, btw). William Deresiewicz nails it:
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There are ethical corporations, yes, and ethical businesspeople, but ethics in capitalism is purely optional, purely extrinsic. To expect morality in the market is to commit a category error. Capitalist values are antithetical to Christian ones. (How the loudest Christians in our public life can also be the most bellicose proponents of an unbridled free market is a matter for their own consciences.) Capitalist values are also antithetical to democratic ones. Like Christian ethics, the principles of republican government require us to consider the interests of others. Capitalism, which entails the single-minded pursuit of profit, would have us believe that it’s every man for himself.
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nyt william_deresiewicz capitalism economy ethics morality

Call to arms (sort of) from Umair Haque:
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If we face an imperative, perhaps it's one as timeless and worn as bedrock: not merely to employ our selves to make the most, but to make the most of our tiny selves. Perhaps it's this imperative that is the bedrock of the human world, the only firmament solid enough to support the foundations of meaningful lives. And to this imperative, there are no easy answers — just hard questions. The questions we've been uncomfortably failing to ask for a long, long while.
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umair_haque harvard_business economy eudaimonia recovery

Words of wisdom from David Rothkopf. He is so right:
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I love it when Ron Paul says, “If we get rid of government, freedom will sweep right in.” That’s just not what happens. What happens is that a bunch of elephants stampede in because they’re in a position to take advantage of it. Meanwhile, if you get government out of the way, the people who need government, they don’t have it.

There’s this myth that government doesn’t belong in the marketplace. If that were true, there would be no canals, no railroads, no highways, no internet. The government was a critical partner in many of the biggest innovations in U.S. history.

But if you buy into that for 20 or 30 years, and you say, “smaller government, smaller government programs,” who gets squeezed by that? It’s the cities. And the problem is that, as that happens, it accelerates. Kids drop out of school. Neighborhoods decay. Businesses leave. The tax base goes down. Cops get fired. Teachers get fired. It’s a cycle of pain.
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cities grist david_rothkopf economy politics

Can bike lanes create new jobs?
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The answer seems to be yes — at least in the case of Long Beach, California. More than 20 new bicycle-related or bicycle-inspired businesses have opened at last count. I toured some of these business with Charlie Gandy and Melissa Balmer during a recent trip to Long Beach to meet these entrepreneurs, and prospect for locally-sourced goods and services for our conference. Twenty new businesses is a lot, especially in this economy, so you may be skeptical of these numbers (I was); but after meeting some impressive young people, I can assure you that it’s all real.
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There follows a review of the businesses.
I'd say that my observations in Portland confirm the article. Cycling is another way of bringing "life at 10km per hour" (or slightly more) into streets (vs cars at 50km per hour), which contributes to capturing interest *in* the street.

jobs economy bicycles cities

An undoubtedly frightening article (or rather: an article reporting a frightening reality).
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"The whole face of homelessness is changing, and a lot of that has to do with unemployment," says Craig Billman, who was Michele's case manager when she arrived at Maple Street and is now associate program director at the facility. "People from the professional ranks are becoming more prevalent. You're seeing more first-time homeless than ever before."

That this is happening here, in the crucible of high-tech affluence, is a testament to the fact that it is happening almost everywhere in the country, part of a wave of suburban poverty that began in the 1990s and has accelerated since the beginning of the Great Recession.
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silicon_valley homelessness unemployment economy depression usa recession

As an art history major (all the way to PhD), I approve of this message... Virginia Postrel nails it:
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The skills that still matter are the habits of mind I honed in the classroom: how to analyze texts carefully, how to craft and evaluate arguments, and how to apply microeconomic reasoning, along with basic literacy in accounting and statistics. My biggest regret isn’t that I didn’t learn Fortran, but that I didn’t study Dante.
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virginia_postrel arthistory economy college trends bloomberg

Useful.
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The MetroTrends team has graded the nation’s 100 biggest metros on how much economic security they offer families in these tough times. The rankings reflect erosion in house values, current unemployment, purchasing power of a low-wage job, and the rate of serious mortgage delinquencies. The best? Oklahoma City. The worst? Las Vegas. Mouse over your metro for more info.
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maps interactive_map economy cities

He's so right.
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Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich said he could explain the problems with the economy in less than 2 minutes, 15 seconds—and he did it (with illustrations to boot). It’s great! Check it out.
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moveon economy robert_reich video recession

Uh-oh Canada?
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As the Globe wrote this morning based on a leaked copy of the report (sigh), “Canada ranked worse or stagnated in 18 of 24 benchmarks tracked by the council since its 2008 report.”
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maclean's canada economy knowledge_economy

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We find ourselves at a point in the world where the main tool to measure economic success and progress — Gross Domestic Product, or GDP – is outdated. Do we need a new set of rules for our economy to effectively begin to measure real, productive growth? Umair Haque, author of “The New Capitalist Manifesto” and director of the Havas Media Lab, believes it’s critical to the future of our country and our global economy.
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Includes audio/ interview.

audiocasts interview umair_haque capitalism economy socialcritique dylan_ratigan

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If you accept my notion that it's time to update productivity to encompass not merely how much toxic mass produced junk we churn out, faster--but to reflect whether or not said junk actually makes a difference to how meaningfully well our lives are lived--then perhaps a next-generation BLS's job isn't merely computing labor productivity, but socio-productivity as well--and making the figures public every month, quarter, and year. If it were to do that, I'd bet our economy would spin on it's very axis: the numbers we use to track its health, gauge its performance, and that Wall St uses to (mis)allocate our hard-won capital would all be dramatically altered--the informational structure of incentives would shift, and the great gears of prosperity might find a newer, more, well, productive, rhythm--because we'd optimizing not just for the greatest amount of industrial age junk to line the bleak exurban shelves, but for groundbreaking, socially useful breakthroughs.
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prosperity productivity economy umair_haque capitalism

Geoffrey West on biology, networks, metabolisms, ...and cities and more. Fifty-two minute video.
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The great thing about cities, the thing that is amazing about cities is as they grow, so to speak, their dimensionality increases. That is, the space of opportunity, the space of functions, the space of jobs just continually increases. And the data shows that. If you look at job categories, it continually increases. I'll use the word "dimensionality." It opens up. And in fact, one of the great things about cities is that it supports crazy people. You walk down Fifth Avenue, you see crazy people. There are always crazy people. Well, that's good. Cities are tolerant of extraordinary diversity.
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geoffrey_west cities video edge economy complexity

Must-read article, America... (And Canada is actually even worse, because this economy manufactures very little, basing its wealth on the export of raw resources. Terrible.)
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To illustrate the importance of maintaining a U.S. innovation ecosystem even when an innovation's value isn't apparent immediately, Shih points out that rechargeable batteries didn't seem very important to U.S. companies when the University of Texas licensed lithium-ion technology to Sony two decades ago; hardly anyone in the United States was making consumer electronics. But after Sony introduced the technology in its Walkman in 1991, other Asian consumer-electronics companies also developed rechargeable-battery technology. Later, as rechargeable batteries became an important component of laptop computers, the battery makers honed their skills with manufacturers, which in turn transferred expertise with small consumer electronics into building laptops in Asia. Today, with hybrid and electric cars on the rise, manufacturers in Japan, Korea, and China have a big head start on the technology behind those vehicles.
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mit_techreview technology innovation economy david_pisano willy_shih

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America is watching a great tragedy unfold: The collapse of the middle class. That society needs megabanks is, to put it kindly, a finely tailored piece of marketing. In fact, as I’ve written about a few months back, banks need society a lot more than society needs banks. How do we know? Well, consider the Irish Bankers’ Strikes of the 1970s, when fed-up bankers petulantly decided to go on strike (with the assumption that the economy would collapse, and society would beg to have them back). Instead, the economy kept growing, and a kind of peer-to-peer banking system arose spontaneously. Far from instability, the result was relative stability.

The larger point is that the “instability” that is the heart of Wall Street’s scare tactics is in fact already upon us, savagely so. The global financial system is still being propped up with liquidity injections and implicit guarantees of every kind—and on the flipside, income, wealth, and job creation are stagnating while poverty is growing. That is economic instability—and the solution isn’t subsidizing Wall Street to the hilt, because that only sets the stage for a bigger, nastier, meltdown in the next five years or so. The solution is building fundamentally, radically better financial institutions.
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umair_haque banking banks america economy

Must read opinion piece in the Washington-Post about Conservatives' use of what could be called the "starve the beast" strategy: drive up bankruptcy fears to force cuts in programs - but never tax the rich. Shock doctrine...
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...the fiscal issues are just an excuse for ideologically driven policies to lower taxes on well-off people and business while reducing government programs. Yet only occasionally do journalists step back to ask: Are these guys telling the truth?

The admirable Web site PolitiFact.com examined Walker’s claim in detail and concluded flatly it was “false.”

“Experts agree the state faces financial challenges in the form of deficits,” PolitiFact wrote. “But they also agree the state isn’t broke. Employees and bills are being paid. Services are continuing to be performed. Revenue continues to roll in. A variety of tools — taxes, layoffs, spending cuts, debt shifting — is available to make ends meet. Walker has promised not to increase taxes. That takes one tool off the table.”

And that’s the whole point.
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washington_post economy shock_doctrine starve_the_beast republicans ej_dionne_jr

Interesting list... The ten in brief (click through for full description/ discussion): 1) Economic Turmoil; 2) Green Power; 3) The Senior Market; 4) Discount Retail; 5) Local Business; 6) Education; 7) Parental Outsourcing; 8) Health and Wellness; 9) Texas [huh? Texaplex cities: Houston, Dallas, Fort Worth, San Antonio, Austin: Youth Magnet cities]; 10) Affordable Alcohol; and 10 1/2) Pets.

trends trendwatch economy entrepreneur_magazine

Must-read article.
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The bigger issue is whether the country can afford the systemic damage being done by the ever-growing income inequality between the wealthiest Americans and everyone else, whether poor, middle class or even rich. That burden is inflicted not just on the debt but on the very idea of America — our Horatio Alger faith in social mobility over plutocracy, our belief that our brand of can-do capitalism brings about innovation and growth, and our fundamental sense of fairness. Incredibly, the top 1 percent of Americans now have tax rates a third lower than the same top percentile had in 1970.

“How can hedge-fund managers who are pulling down billions sometimes pay a lower tax rate than do their secretaries?” ask the political scientists Jacob S. Hacker (of Yale) and Paul Pierson (University of California, Berkeley) in their deservedly lauded new book, “Winner-Take-All Politics.” If you want to cry real tears about the American dream — as opposed to the self-canonizing tears of John Boehner — read this book and weep. The authors’ answer to that question and others amounts to a devastating indictment of both parties.
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nyt frank_rich wealth economy

Synopsis of Juliet Schor's new book, Plenitude. Excerpt from pt. II:
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Through a major shift to new sources of wealth, green technologies, and different ways of living, individuals and the country as a whole can be better off and more economically secure. Schor draws on recent developments in economic theory, social analysis, and ecological design to map out a path to a healthier environment and a higher quality of life.
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juliet_schor synopsis economy recession plenitude

Belt-tightening 101 includes public policy (like cracking down on super-frigid air-conditioning and free toss-away plastic bags at will)...

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Our consumption is out of control. Did you know there is a mass of bottles, plastic bags and other garbage the size of Texas--almost as large as LeBron James' ego--floating between California and Hawaii? My brother-in-law and I recently went to a Bed Bath and Beyond in the middle of the day. We were the only two customers in the entire massive store, and we were shivering from the frigid air being blasted from the air conditioners.

We could learn a lesson or two from China, where the Shanghai government caps the temperature at 79 degrees in malls and office buildings in summer to save energy. It's illegal there to get a free plastic bag at the grocery store (you have to pay a nickel or bring your own bag), helping reduce waste and petrochemical use. We should also increase the money paid for recycling aluminum cans from a nickel to a quarter, even if Pepsi and Coke object, as they most likely will. Maybe if we made simple changes to how we consume we could rein in waste, decrease pollution and reduce our dependence on oil, a commodity that has wrought so many problems.
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shaun_rein forbes recession economy new_frugality

More from Richard Florida, who's currently promoting his latest book, The Great Reset, in interviews and articles. In this interview, the emphasis is on shifting our perspective about "service" jobs:
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What is the future of service jobs in the next decade? How should these workers look for better opportunities?

We will still have about 10 percent of our population making things because we like to use things. But we can make some personal service jobs into professional ones, like the guys who run the designer cupcake shops or high-end cheese shop or the designer food cart. Another example is my dad, who only has a seventh-grade education. He was good with his hands. He could work up his way up in a manufacturing plant. Service companies have the same type of structure. My dad became a foreman, and then a plant supervisor. He made a decent living and used to wear a blue collar and a white collar. He still went to the factory every day, but he went to meetings. That same example could be applied in the rush to build green buildings. If you think about who knows the most about a building's energy, well, it's the janitor who would adjust the heating and cooling systems and know about the insulation. Why do we only think of the janitor as the person who sweeps the floors?

By getting people more involved in continuous improvement in companies, the country will value service more.
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richard_florida economy reset service_sector