Impact of Artificial Intelligence

 The Robot Surgeon Will See You Now
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/30/technology/robot-surgery-surgeon.html
Real scalpels, artificial intelligence — what could go wrong? 

The Race to Build Self-Driving Trucks Has Four Horses and Three Jockeys
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-01/waymo-tusimple-aurora-inside-the-race-to-build-self-driving-trucks 

Big Tech Dominance

‘A Perfect Positive Storm’: Bonkers Dollars for Big Tech
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/29/technology/big-tech-pandemic-economy.html 

Pandemic's Lasting Impact on Society

Affluent Americans Rush to Retire in New ‘Life-Is-Short’ Mindset
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-30/more-americans-are-considering-retirement-because-of-covid
 
With offers of cash, housing and a budding talent pool, smaller cities and states hope to get in on the ground floor of a new era for remote workers.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/30/realestate/want-to-move-to-our-town-heres-10000-and-a-free-bike.html

Welcome to the YOLO Economy
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/21/technology/welcome-to-the-yolo-economy.html
Burned out and flush with savings, some workers are quitting stable jobs in search of post-pandemic adventure. 

The Professional Women Who Walked Away
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/05/why-dont-more-american-moms-work-part-time/618741/ 

Double-Dip Recession in the Euro-Zone

Euro-Zone Vaccine Delays Mean Double-Dip Recession as U.S. Booms
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-30/euro-area-seeks-rebound-as-recession-shows-cost-of-vaccine-delay 

Europe’s Recession Contrasts Economic Fortunes of U.S. Expansion
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/30/business/europe-gdp.html 

A New Battle of Ideas

The new battle of ideas: How an intellectual revolution will reshape society
https://www.newstatesman.com/ideas/2021/04/new-battle-ideas-how-intellectual-revolution-will-reshape-society
Oxford economist Paul Collier notes:
“Just as the Tories are overweight in bankers, Labour is overweight in lawyers, and they seem to regard the main function of the law as protecting minorities from majorities. But the law’s main function is the opposite: to enforce adherence to those common purposes that have been widely agreed by a democratic process, protecting them from free-riding by small but recalcitrant minorities – whether it’s employers that won’t pay the minimum wage, “influencers” peddling hate speech or crooks peddling drugs. Sometimes the law needs to protect people from the state, but again primarily this is about protecting the majority from state capture by well- connected insiders trying to impose their own agenda on everyone else. The law should be restraining the power of lobbies”. 

Doughnut Economics

Paradigm Shift in Macroeconomic Policymaking

Biden-Powell Duo Seeks to Define an Era Like Reagan-Volcker Did
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-29/biden-powell-duo-seeks-to-define-an-era-like-reagan-volcker-did
 
Behind Biden’s Big Spending Plans, the Waning Sway of Economic Caution
https://www.wsj.com/articles/behind-bidens-big-spending-plans-the-waning-sway-of-economic-caution-11619710043 

Related:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/04/29/biden-education-childcare-global/ 

Exponential Decay and the End of the Pandemic

The Math That Explains the End of the Pandemic
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/29/opinion/covid-exponential-decay.html 

Draghi’s Attempt to Jumpstart the Italian Economy

If Italy Fails, Then Europe Fails Too
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-29/if-italy-fails-then-europe-fails-too 

US Economic Update

The Economy Is (Almost) Back. It Will Look Different Than It Used To.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/29/upshot/economy-gdp-report.html 

U.S. Recovery Gains Steam as Spending Fuels 6.4% GDP Growth

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-29/u-s-economic-recovery-gained-steam-in-first-quarter-on-spending

Diapers, Cereal and, Yes, Toilet Paper Are Going to Get More Expensive
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/29/business/consumer-goods-prices.html

Fed says vaccinations and strong policies are helping economy as inflation rises
https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2021/04/28/fed-powell-economy-covid/ 

Risk Premium and Interest Rates

Egypt Keeps the World’s Highest Real Interest Rate
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-28/egypt-keeps-the-world-s-highest-real-interest-rate 

The Past, Present, and Future of Money

Still Getting Your Head Around Digital Currency? So Are Central Bankers.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/26/business/economy/fed-digital-currency.html
 
Why Should We Care About Digital Currencies?
https://www.newsweek.com/why-should-we-care-about-digital-currencies-china-opinion-1586533
 
A Digital Yuan Should Be Welcomed by the U.S.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-21/china-s-digital-yuan-should-be-welcomed-by-the-u-s
 
History Lesson:
And now for something completely different – The Money Plot
https://www.milkenreview.org/articles/the-money-plot 

Dogecoin, Robinhood and Micro-Bubbles

It’s Hard to Take Dogecoin Seriously, But the Doge Doesn’t Care
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-28/dogecoin-worth-40-billion-as-cryptocurrency-joke-keeps-going-up
 
How Robinhood Made Trading Easy—and Maybe Even Too Hard to Resist
https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2021-robinhood-stock-trading-design/

Is the Dogecoin bubble as irrational as it looks?
https://www.newstatesman.com/business/finance/2021/04/dogecoin-bubble-irrational-it-looks
“Viewed as a normal investment, Dogecoin is crap even in comparison to other cryptocurrencies. Markus wrote this year that he “threw it together” in “about 3 hours” and little development has taken place since then. Bitcoin’s evangelists say their “deflationary” currency holds value because Bitcoin gets harder to produce as time goes on and there is a finite supply. The same is not true for Dogecoin; you can make as many as you like, and the fewer people there are “mining” new Dogecoins, the easier it is to make more. There are already more than 129 billion.
But Dogecoin’s success may not be as irrational as it looks. As a meme, it is able to exploit the group psychology of the internet in ways that other investments cannot”. 

US Labor Market is Already Tightening

As Economy Rebounds, Manufacturers Face New Hurdles
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/28/business/economy/factories-manufacturing-economy.html
 
Why are American workers becoming harder to find?
https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2021/04/27/why-are-american-workers-becoming-harder-to-find 

Labor Market Will Tighten Sharply: Not as Much Slack as Biden Assumes
https://www.forbes.com/sites/billconerly/2021/04/13/labor-market-will-tighten-sharply-not-as-much-slack-as-biden-assumes/ 

Central America and the Migration Problem

We could use economics to curb migration from Central America
https://thehill.com/opinion/international/550374-we-could-use-economics-to-curb-migration-from-central-america

Money alone can’t fix Central America – or stop migration to US
https://theconversation.com/money-alone-cant-fix-central-america-or-stop-migration-to-us-157953 

Tax Loopholes are the Real Problem

Corporate Tax Loopholes Matter More Than a Higher Rate
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-27/corporate-tax-loopholes-matter-more-than-a-higher-rate
 
The White House can raise taxes on the wealthy without touching the tax code at all
https://www.vox.com/22405898/joe-biden-irs-funding 

Raising Capital Gains Taxes Is the Fair Move
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-29/dogecoin-is-one-reason-not-to-worry-about-capital-gains-taxes 

Federal Reserve Policy Contributes to Wealth Inequality

The Fed helped fuel a stock market boom that benefited wealthy Americans — and left behind everyone else
https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2021/04/26/federal-reserve-interest-rates-inequality/
 
Related:
Have misguided policies led to recent asset bubbles and boom-bust cycles?
https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/538921-have-misguided-policies-led-to-recent-asset-bubbles-and-boom-bust-cycles 

Poor State Capacity Hurts India’s Battle Against Covid-19

How a Covid Spike Is Sucking the Oxygen Out of India
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-21/india-s-shortage-of-oxygen-comes-from-failure-to-prepare-for-second-wave 

Jumpstarting Economic Development in Africa

Africa’s latent assets
https://www.nber.org/papers/w28603
Abstract
Despite the past centuries’ economic setbacks and challenges, are there reasons for optimism about Africa's economic prospects? We provide a conceptual framework and empirical evidence that show how the nature of African society has led to three sets of unrecognized “latent assets.” First, success in African society is talent driven and Africa has experienced high levels of perceived and actual social mobility. A society where talented individuals rise to the top and optimism prevails is an excellent basis for entrepreneurship and innovation. Second, Africans, like westerners who built the world's most successful effective states, are highly skeptical of authority and attuned to the abuse of power. We argue that these attitudes can be a critical basis for building better institutions. Third, Africa is “cosmopolitan.” Africans are the most multilingual people in the world, have high levels of religious tolerance, and are welcoming to strangers. The experience of navigating cultural and linguistic diversity sets Africans up for success in a globalized world. 

US Housing Boom - Cause for Concern?

Is the US Housing Boom a Cause for Concern?
https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/550331-is-the-us-housing-boom-a-cause-for-concern

U.S. Home Sales Are Surging. When Does the Music Stop?

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/22/realestate/us-home-sales-surge.html 

Previously Owned U.S. Homes Are Now More Expensive Than New Ones
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-26/previously-owned-u-s-homes-are-now-more-expensive-than-new-ones 

The No. 1 emerging property market in America isn’t in Texas or Florida — you might never even have heard of it
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-no-1-emerging-property-market-in-america-is-not-texas-or-florida-you-may-never-even-have-heard-of-it-11619525977 

Slowdown in US Population Growth Rate

The latest Census figures show the U.S. is growing too slowly to remain internationally competitive.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-28/faster-population-growth-is-still-the-key-to-america-s-success

U.S. Population Over Last Decade Grew at Slowest Rate Since 1930s
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/26/us/us-census-numbers.html 

2020 Census shows U.S. population grew at slowest pace since the 1930s
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/interactive/2021/2020-census-us-population-results/ 

What Constitutes Infrastructure?

Why the Meaning of ‘Infrastructure’ Matters So Much
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/26/opinion/infrastructure-definition-history.html 

Cryptocurrencies Go Mainstream

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have gone from curiosity to punchline to viable investment, making them almost impossible to ignore — for better or worse.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/25/technology/cryptocurrency-mainstream.html 

Market Outlook - US Economy and the Dollar

Wall Street Splits on Dollar’s Fate Amid Economic Growth Debate
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-25/dollar-consensus-splinters-as-investors-clash-on-u-s-recovery

What Wall Street Is Telling Us About the U.S. Economic Outlook
https://www.wsj.com/articles/what-wall-street-is-telling-us-about-the-u-s-economic-outlook-11619429403 

Italy’s Woes Include Rising Rate of School Dropouts

Italy’s Problem with School Dropouts Goes from Bad to Worse in Pandemic
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/26/world/europe/italy-schools-covid-dropouts.html 

Beware the Covid-19 Resurgence

India ‘shaken’ by new coronavirus surge, says prime minister, urging everyone to get vaccinated
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/india-coronavirus-deaths-pandemic/2021/04/25/ec0f208a-a51c-11eb-b314-2e993bd83e31_story.html
 
U.S. Says It’ll Send India Vaccine Materials, Boost Aid Finance
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-25/u-s-to-consider-sending-india-unused-vaccine-doses-fauci-says

As Covid-19 Devastates India, Deaths Go Undercounted
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/24/world/asia/india-coronavirus-deaths.html
Related:
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/how-indias-second-wave-became-the-worst-covid-19-surge-in-the-world
 
Ravaged by Covid, Brazil Faces a Hunger Epidemic
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/23/world/americas/covid-brazil-hunger.html

As pandemic surges anew, global envy and anger over U.S. vaccine abundance
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/04/24/coronavirus-vaccine-us-anger-inequality/ 

India’s coronavirus surge could collapse its health system. The U.S. can help.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/04/24/indias-coronavirus-surge-could-collapse-its-health-system-us-can-help/ 

CEO Pay During the Pandemic

C.E.O. Pay Remains Stratospheric, Even at Companies Battered by Pandemic
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/24/business/ceos-pandemic-compensation.html

Covid-19 Brought the Economy to Its Knees, but CEO Pay Surged

https://www.wsj.com/articles/covid-19-brought-the-economy-to-its-knees-but-ceo-pay-surged-11618142400 

CEOs are hugely expensive – why not automate them?
https://www.newstatesman.com/business/companies/2021/04/ceos-are-hugely-expensive-why-not-automate-them 

How Israel Won the Battle Against Covid-19

In Israel, we happily gave up privacy to get our pre-covid lives back
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/in-israel-we-happily-gave-up-privacy-to-get-our-pre-covid-lives-back/2021/04/22/3d300ad4-a2bf-11eb-85fc-06664ff4489d_story.html 

Traveling Faster than the Speed of Light – Theoretically Possible?

Warp drives: Physicists give chances of faster-than-light space travel a boost
https://theconversation.com/warp-drives-physicists-give-chances-of-faster-than-light-space-travel-a-boost-157391

Capital Gains Taxation and Stock Market Performance

Stocks Will Get Over Their Big Biden Tax Wobble
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-23/stock-market-will-get-over-biden-s-capital-gains-tax-increase 

Joan Robinson’s Contribution to Economics

The Woman Who Shattered the Myth of the Free Market
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/24/opinion/joan-robinson-economy-monopoly-labor.html 

Reforming US Tax Code

End welfare as we know it — for the upper middle class
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/04/22/end-welfare-we-know-it-upper-middle-class/ 

The Case for Cautious Optimism

Now That Everyone Is Bullish, Be Cautious
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/23/business/stock-market-investors-optimism.html 

The Environmental Cost of Bitcoin Mining

Why Bitcoin Is Bad for the Environment

https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/why-bitcoin-is-bad-for-the-environment

Cathie Wood's Bitcoin Claims Are Overheated

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-23/cathie-wood-s-arkk-green-bitcoin-claims-are-overheated
“Judging by Wood’s enthusiastic tweets claiming the new research debunks the “myth” of Bitcoin’s environmental harm, one wonders if this report was designed to solve a problem or protect an investment. The message being sent out is that it’s not up to Bitcoin to fix its glaring issues — such as energy-inefficient mining algorithms that were always going to create problems at scale — but it’s the rest of the world that must adapt. Given the huge amount of money riding on Bitcoin staying just the way it is, namely digital gold to be hoarded speculatively rather than spent efficiently, its defenders will probably keep pushing complicated workarounds, not fundamental change”.

Electricity needed to mine bitcoin is more than used by 'entire countries'
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/feb/27/bitcoin-mining-electricity-use-environmental-impact
Bill Gates Sounds Alarm on Bitcoin's Energy Consumption–Here's Why Crypto is Bad for Climate Change
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonathanponciano/2021/03/09/bill-gates-bitcoin-crypto-climate-change/ 

Which Colleges Produce the Most Number of Billionaires?

These 10 Colleges Have Produced the Most Billionaire Alumni
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrickcai/2021/04/14/these-10-colleges-have-produced-the-most-billionaire-alumni/ 

Reforming US Social Security System

Saving Social Security from Itself
https://www.milkenreview.org/articles/saving-social-security-from-itself

Dogecoin Bubble - The Role of Group Psychology

Is the Dogecoin bubble as irrational as it looks?
https://www.newstatesman.com/business/finance/2021/04/dogecoin-bubble-irrational-it-looks
“Viewed as a normal investment, Dogecoin is crap even in comparison to other cryptocurrencies. Markus wrote this year that he “threw it together” in “about 3 hours” and little development has taken place since then. Bitcoin’s evangelists say their “deflationary” currency holds value because Bitcoin gets harder to produce as time goes on and there is a finite supply. The same is not true for Dogecoin; you can make as many as you like, and the fewer people there are “mining” new Dogecoins, the easier it is to make more. There are already more than 129 billion.
But Dogecoin’s success may not be as irrational as it looks. As a meme, it is able to exploit the group psychology of the internet in ways that other investments cannot”.

Dogecoin, Elon Musk—And the Latest Reddit Mania
https://www.forbes.com/sites/abrambrown/2021/04/21/dogecoin-elon-musk-reddit/

DogeCoin passed 40 cents: Why that excites the internet
https://www.cnet.com/news/dogecoin-passed-40-cents-why-that-excites-the-internet/

This dogecoin chart offers the clearest explanation for the buzz surrounding the ‘joke’ crypto
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/this-dogecoin-chart-offers-the-clearest-explanation-for-the-buzz-surrounding-the-joke-crypto-11618597012

Related:

How Robinhood Made Trading Easy—and Maybe Even Too Hard to Resist
https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2021-robinhood-stock-trading-design/

The 'metaverse' bet: crypto-rich investors snap up virtual real estate
https://www.reuters.com/business/metaverse-bet-crypto-rich-investors-snap-up-virtual-real-estate-2021-04-19/ 

GOP's Dangerous Lurch Towards Nativism

Anglo-Saxon’ Is What You Say When ‘Whites Only’ Is Too Inclusive
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/04/anglo-saxon-what-you-say-when-whites-only-too-inclusive/618646/
A new message proves too toxic for the Republican Party.
 
The Myth of America’s Anglo-Saxon Political Traditions
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-20/the-myth-of-america-s-anglo-saxon-political-traditions
Republicans’ latest racist dog whistle has a longer history than Marjorie Taylor Greene likely even knows.

Corporate Tax Loopholes

Biden wants to crack down on corporate tax loopholes, resuming a battle his predecessors lost
https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2021/04/20/corporate-tax-loopholes-biden/ 

Related:

Plans for a Global Minimum Tax Revolution, Explained

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-08/plans-for-a-bigger-pie-of-global-taxes-sliced-fairly-quicktake 

Money and American Politics

Dozen Megadonors Gave $3.4 Billion, One in Every 13 Dollars, Since 2009
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/20/us/politics/megadonors-political-spending.html
 
Related:
https://www.issueone.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Issue-One-Outsized-Influence-Report-final.pdf 

Political Polarization in a Divided America

Why Political Sectarianism Is a Growing Threat to American Democracy
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/19/us/democracy-gop-democrats-sectarianism.html 

What’s the Point of Bitcoin?

After eight years, the question remains: What’s the point of bitcoin?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/04/19/after-eight-years-question-remains-whats-point-bitcoin/

Yale Economist Gorton Questions the Stability of Stablecoins
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-16/yale-economist-gorton-questions-the-stability-of-stablecoins 

A Tragic Example of Sunk Costs

America’s War in Afghanistan Is the Mother of All Sunk Costs
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-19/america-s-war-in-afghanistan-is-the-mother-of-all-sunk-costs 

Economic Disaster in Argentina

‘We Were Left With Nothing.’ Argentina’s Misery Deepens in the Pandemic.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/19/business/argentina-economy.html 

Problem Solving – Addition versus Subtraction

Humans solve problems by adding complexity, even when it’s against our best interests
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/04/16/bias-problem-solving-nature/
“The researchers say this experiment, and a number of others they published in a recent paper in the journal Nature, reveal something fundamental about the human psyche: We tend to solve problems by adding things together rather than taking things away, even when doing so goes against our best interests.
It’s a tendency that may have especially wide-reaching implications for the realm of public policy.
“The tendency to overlook subtraction may be implicated in a variety of costly modern trends, including overburdened minds and schedules, increasing red tape in institutions and humanity’s encroachment on the safe operating conditions for life on Earth,” the authors write”.
 
Adding is favoured over subtracting in problem solving
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-00592-0

International Affairs - Weekend Reading

US-Europe ties will not snap back just because Biden is president
https://asia.nikkei.com/Opinion/US-Europe-ties-will-not-snap-back-just-because-Biden-is-president
 
The Real Migration Crisis Is in Central America
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/central-america-caribbean/2021-04-13/real-migration-crisis-central-america
 
How the Quad Can Match the Hype
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2021-04-15/how-quad-can-match-hype
 
The Contradiction That Doomed America’s Mission in Afghanistan
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/16/world/asia/interpreter-afghanistan-war.html 

Roaring Twenties: 1920s versus 2020s

Looking Back at the First Roaring Twenties
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/16/business/roaring-twenties-stocks.html

Open-Economy Macro and International Finance

Covid Will Leave Deep Scars in World Economy Even After Recovery

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-17/economic-recovery-after-covid-scars-will-remain-after-the-rebound

Charting Global Economy: U.S. Demand Spurs Export-led Nations
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-16/charting-global-economy-u-s-demand-spurs-export-led-nations

China Joins U.S. as Engine of Global Recovery with Record Growth

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-16/china-s-economy-soars-by-record-a-year-after-pandemic-slump
 
How Will Britain Defend Its Financial Fief After Brexit?
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/16/business/london-financial-hub-worries.html 

Healthcare Systems - US versus Canada

China's Robust Economic Recovery

China’s economy is roaring back, a year after coronavirus shutdown
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/china-gdp-growth-coronavirus-economy/2021/04/15/659185a6-9d93-11eb-b2f5-7d2f0182750d_story.html 

China’s Economy Is Booming. Shoppers Are Skittish Anyway.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/15/business/economy/china-economy.html 

How to Buy Happiness

How to Buy Happiness by ARTHUR C. BROOKS
https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2021/04/money-income-buy-happiness/618601/
The joys of money are nothing without other people.

Are We Trading Our Happiness for Modern Comforts?

https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2020/10/why-life-has-gotten-more-comfortable-less-happy/616807/
As society gets richer, people chase the wrong things. 

2021 World Happiness Report
https://worldhappiness.report/ed/2021/happiness-trust-and-deaths-under-covid-19/ 
 
The money, job, marriage myth: are you happy yet?
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/jan/06/happiness-index-wellbeing-survey-uk-population-paul-dolan-happy-ever-after
Paul Dolan, Professor of Behavioral Science at the London School of Economics, notes:
“The stories around wealth and success, in particular, are social narratives that we can’t seem to get enough of. Now, it should be obvious that the absence of either of these two things can cause anxiety and misery. I will not suggest otherwise. The narratives suggest, however, that no matter how much we have of each, we are expected to be reaching for more. The assumption is that ever more happiness is achieved with ever more money and more markers of success. The trap comes from the fact that the happiness hit from adherence to these narratives gets ever smaller the further up the ladder you go and, eventually, can become reversed. To be happier we need to move from a culture of “more please” to one of “just enough”.”

Why So Many Smart People Aren’t Happy
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/04/why-so-many-smart-people-arent-happy/479832/
  “There are three things, once one’s basic needs are satisfied, that academic literature points to as the ingredients for happiness: having meaningful social relationships, being good at whatever it is one spends one’s days doing, and having the freedom to make life decisions independently.
But research into happiness has also yielded something a little less obvious: Being better educated, richer, or more accomplished doesn’t do much to predict whether someone will be happy. In fact, it might mean someone is less likely to be satisfied with life.”

US Economic Rebound Gathers Steam

Rebound in U.S. Economy Gathers Steam with Surge in Retail Sales
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-15/u-s-retail-sales-climb-most-since-may-2020-in-broad-advance
 
With Earnings Soaring, Wall Street Banks See Economic Boom Ahead
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/14/business/wall-street-banks-earnings.html 

Waning jobless claims, soaring retail sales signal robust recovery
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/04/15/weekly-jobless-claims-unemployment-recovery/
 
Labor, Not Lumber, Will Drive Inflation
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-15/inflation-problems-will-show-up-most-in-worker-wages
 
$877 Billion in Checks Won’t Automatically Fuel Inflation
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-15/-877-billion-in-stimulus-checks-won-t-automatically-fuel-inflation
 
Biggest Banks Can’t Keep Up with U.S. Money Printing
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-15/big-banks-like-bofa-and-citigroup-can-t-keep-up-with-money-printing

What’s Behind the Big Bond Rally? It’s Counterintuitive.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-15/what-s-behind-the-big-bond-rally-it-s-counterintuitive 

The Frenzy Surrounding Crypto Assets

Coinbase Is Where Netscape Meets Laser-Eye Memes
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-15/coinbase-stock-is-where-tesla-and-ark-meet-the-faangs

Coinbase’s Public Listing Is a Cryptocurrency Coming-Out Party
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/14/business/coinbase-ipo-stock.html
 
NFT Fans Want to Crack the Da Vinci Code
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-14/nft-art-fans-want-to-crack-da-vinci-code-mona-lisa-has-some-lessons
 
Don’t Fear Cryptocurrencies. Manage Them.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/14/opinion/coinbase-ipo-cryptocurrencies.html 

Robert Mundell – Father of International Macroeconomics

The Mundell difference by Paul Krugman
https://voxeu.org/article/mundell-difference
Nobel Laureate Robert Mundell passed away on 4 April 2021. In this column, Paul Krugman describes the evolution of Mundell’s contribution to economic thought and policy, from his early pathbreaking models that remain the foundation of modern international macroeconomics to his later views that were more controversial and less influential in the profession. He also offers an explanation of how the man who brought Keynesian analysis to the open economy and highlighted the difficult tradeoffs in creating a currency area could come to be seen as the father of both supply-side economics and the euro.

Robert Mundell, Nobel Laureate Who Inspired the Euro, Dies at 88
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-05/robert-mundell-nobel-prize-winning-economist-dies-at-88

Robert A. Mundell, a Father of the Euro and Reaganomics, Dies at 88

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/05/business/economy/robert-mundell-dead.html

2006 Profile of Mundell:

https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2006/09/people.htm 

An Expected Inflation Spike

U.S. Consumer Prices Increased in March by Most Since 2012
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-13/u-s-consumer-prices-increased-by-more-than-forecast-in-march 

How Not to Get Fooled by the New Inflation Numbers
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/13/upshot/guide-new-inflation-numbers.html 

Related:

The Consumer Price Index Is Not Economic Reality
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-13/consumer-price-index-cpi-history-is-surprisingly-political

Uncomfortable Legacy of the ‘Washington Consensus’

The Uncomfortable Legacy of the ‘Washington Consensus’
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-12/john-williamson-s-washington-consensus-left-a-bitter-legacy-in-asia 

Related:

The Washington Consensus as Policy Prescription for Development
https://piie.com/publications/papers/williamson0204.pdf
 
The Washington Consensus: Assessing a Damaged Brand
http://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/848411468156560921/pdf/WPS5316.pdf

Structural Reforms in India

Modi's structural reforms enter climax as vested interests dig in
https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Asia-Insight/Modi-s-structural-reforms-enter-climax-as-vested-interests-dig-in 

Can the GOP Gets its Act Together?

Republicans Are Making 4 Key Mistakes
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/04/republicans-are-making-four-key-mistakes/618575/
 
America Needs the GOP, and It Needs Help
https://www.wsj.com/articles/america-needs-the-gop-and-it-needs-help-11617921536 

Tax Cuts versus Big Spending

Tax Cuts Versus Big Spending Is the Debate of the Decade
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-08/tax-cuts-versus-big-spending-is-the-debate-of-the-decade 

The One Argument Conservatives Have Made Against Every New Social Program
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/biden-child-tax-credit-republican-argument-spending-big-government.html
Jonathan Chait notes:
A mature governing party can make practical distinctions between market failures that require correction and government overreach. The conservative movement has never developed any interest in doing so. The Republican party won’t be able to govern until it lets go of its fear that any new social benefit would send us hurtling down the road to serfdom.
 
Republicans Love Infrastructure, Unless It’s Paid For, or Not Paid For
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/04/republicans-infrastructure-taxes-deficit-congress-biden.html 

Zoning Laws and US Housing Market

How Biden Can Free America From Its Zoning Straitjacket
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/12/opinion/biden-infrastructure-zoning.html
 
What Biden’s plan to tackle housing prices is missing
https://www.vox.com/22373757/biden-housing-prices-transportation-plan-multi-family-housing-exclusionary-zoning 

Earning Expectations and Sky High Equity Valuations

Stock Bulls Bet It All on Earnings Guesses with Troubled Record
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-10/stock-bulls-bet-it-all-on-earnings-guesses-with-troubled-record
“Based on existing analyst forecasts for earnings in all of 2021, the S&P 500 trades at almost 24 times estimates, among its highest valuations ever. To bring the multiple down to its long-term average of 16 times annual profits, companies in the gauge will have to make about 15% more than the equity researchers currently expect them to earn -- in 2023”.
 
‘Mother of All Recoveries’ Ignites Bullish Trades Across Europe
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-11/-mother-of-all-recoveries-ignites-bullish-trades-across-europe

How to Invest When Everything Is Expensive
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-economy-is-recovering-how-to-invest-when-everything-is-expensive-11618063500
 
Investors’ Hopes Are in Bloom as a Season of Growth Arrives

https://www.barrons.com/articles/investors-hopes-are-in-bloom-as-season-of-growth-arrives-51618014367  

US Economy - Output Gap and Inflation

Inflation Is the Only Signal That the Post-Covid Boom Will Heed
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-11/inflation-is-the-only-signal-that-the-post-covid-boom-will-heed 

Related:

Put Aside Inflation. Debt-Fueled Growth Is the Real Wild Card.
https://www.barrons.com/articles/put-aside-inflation-debt-fueled-growth-is-the-real-wild-card-51617999301

Did the Fed Shift Policy Lanes at the Wrong Time?
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-12/did-the-fed-shift-policy-lanes-at-the-wrong-time

Experiences of First- and Second-Generation Americans

Ambition, Alchemy and Searching for Way to Fit in 'Gold Diggers'
https://www.npr.org/2021/04/08/985138396/ambition-alchemy-and-searching-for-way-to-fit-in-gold-diggers
https://www.npr.org/2021/04/11/986203282/gold-diggers-is-a-magical-look-at-what-it-means-to-be-indian-american 

Other Recommendations:

A Critique of American Idiom

America isn’t speaking our language by Rory Sutherland
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/america-isnt-speaking-our-language
“So it is annoying when Americans unilaterally declare certain English words off-limits, only to replace them with designations such as BIPOC, which are useless outside the US. African-American doesn’t even translate to Canada. You occasionally see an American trying to describe someone of colour outside the US, and their brain hits a wall.
The problem with Americans is that they can’t delineate people by class because they haven’t got any, and they can’t describe people by geography because they don’t know any. So the emphasis they place on race is slightly weird”. 

Comparing Property Taxes

Real Estate Taxes in the US
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/08/realestate/real-estate-taxes-50-states.html 

Should the US Redirect More of its Foreign Aid to Central America?

‘We Are Doomed’: Devastation from Storms Fuels Migration in Honduras
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/06/world/americas/migration-honduras-central-america.html
 
Where U.S. Foreign Aid is Going
https://www.statista.com/chart/17610/countries-receiving-us-foreign-aid/
 
Why we 'send them money'
https://thehill.com/opinion/international/532044-why-we-send-them-money 

Social Trust, Logistics, and the Vaccination Race

A new key to covid success: Not states but societies
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/a-new-key-to-covid-success-not-states-but-societies/2021/04/08/31142d74-98a7-11eb-a6d0-13d207aadb78_story.html
 
What America’s Vaccination Campaign Proves to the World
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/04/mass-vaccination-show-american-might/618559/
Anne Applebaum notes:
“During 2020, Donald Trump’s chaotic, mendacious response to the pandemic; the wave of COVID-19 denialism that swept across America; and the high U.S. death rates were a shock to anyone, anywhere, who still expected competent American leadership. …
The U.S. became an outlier, even among democracies. A clear line emerged between countries that had high levels of social trust and decent public-health systems—Taiwan, Germany, New Zealand, Norway, South Korea—and those, including the U.S. and Brazil, that did not. …
But if the United States is very, very bad at social trust and public-health systems, it is very, very good at large-scale logistics. And skill at large-scale logistics, far more than social trust, has turned out to be a big advantage in this new stage of the pandemic”. 

The Corporate Tax Debate

Biden wants to crack down on corporate tax loopholes, resuming a battle his predecessors lost
https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2021/04/20/corporate-tax-loopholes-biden/ 

Paul Krugman on Corporate Taxes

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/09/opinion/trump-corporate-tax-reform.html
Bribing corporations with low taxes isn’t the way to create jobs
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/08/opinion/biden-corporate-taxes.html 

A Better Corporate Tax for America by Janet Yellen
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-better-corporate-tax-for-america-11617813355
 
Biden’s Tax Plan Aims to Raise $2.5 Trillion and End Profit-Shifting
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/07/business/biden-tax-plan.html

G-20 to Seek Agreement on Global Minimum Tax Rate by Mid-2021
https://www.wsj.com/articles/g-20-to-seek-agreement-on-global-minimum-tax-rate-by-mid-2021-11617807018

It's time the world commit to a global minimum tax
https://www.dw.com/en/opinion-its-time-the-world-commit-to-a-global-minimum-tax/a-57109191

Related:

https://vivekjayakumar.blogspot.com/2021/04/corporate-taxes-in-globalized-economy.html

Elections and the Future of American Democracy

The Assault on Trust in Our Elections by Brad Raffensperger
https://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/the-assault-on-trust-in-our-elections
The crisis in which our country found itself following the 2020 election was in many respects unprecedented. Yet it also built on a years-long pattern by which losing politicians have sown mistrust in our elections. We must now wonder if every candidate who loses a major election will refuse to concede and instead set out to raise money and build support on the back of unfounded claims of corruption. To avoid that prospect, we will need to come to terms with the scope of the problem, and that won't be comfortable for either party. 

America’s Never-Ending Wars

Why It’s So Hard for America to End Its Wars
https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/why-its-so-hard-for-america-to-end-its-wars 

Inflation Risk: Signs of Supply Constraints and Bottlenecks

Recent setbacks raise doubt about how quickly businesses can respond to customers who seem intent on spending freely.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/09/upshot/economy-supply-shortages.html 

U.S. Companies Dish Out Wages Like Never Before
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-07/u-s-companies-dish-out-wages-like-never-before

Inflation Has Gone K-Shaped in the Pandemic Like Everything Else
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-08/inflation-has-gone-k-shaped-in-the-pandemic-like-everything-else

The Battle over “Wokeness”

The U.S. and British right ramp up the war on ‘wokeness’
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/04/09/woke-wars-united-states-britain/
“Grievance over “wokeness” and “cancel culture” — two amorphous terms, with the former now often invoked as a pejorative for overzealous left-wing dogmatism, usually around issues of identity, and the latter as a condemnation of liberal censoriousness and intolerance — is now the coin of the realm on right-wing U.S. media. It’s also driving a slate of Republican legislative initiatives, including bills to ban the teaching of critical race theory in certain public institutions and control the way schools instruct American history”.

Emerging Markets - Fiscal and Monetary Policy Debates

Money in the bank provides hope for India's beleaguered economy
https://asia.nikkei.com/Opinion/Money-in-the-bank-provides-hope-for-India-s-beleaguered-economy
Reserve Bank of India should ease real interest rates

India’s Central Bank Says ‘Boo.’ Carry Traders Faint
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-09/qe-or-not-qe-that-is-the-question-after-india-s-central-bank-makes-a-move

Tax-the-Rich Initiatives Gain Support Across Latin America
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-08/tax-the-rich-initiatives-gain-support-across-latin-america
Initiatives to tax rich people are gaining support throughout Latin America, the world’s most unequal region, as it struggles to recover from its worst recession in two centuries. 

Quantum Computing

Quantum technology emerges from the lab to spark a mini start-up boom
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/04/07/duality-quantum-startup-accelerator/ 

Global Economy - Divergent Recoveries

 A K-Shaped Recovery, This Time on a Global Scale
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/06/business/economy/covid-world-economy.html
 
How Debt and Climate Change Pose ‘Systemic Risk’ to World Economy
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/07/climate/debt-climate-change.html

Global economy on firmer ground, but with divergent recoveries amid high uncertainty
https://www.imf.org/-/media/Files/Publications/WEO/2021/April/English/ExecSum.ashx 

Millions Are Tumbling Out of the Global Middle Class in Historic Setback
https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2021-emerging-markets-middle-class/
An estimated 150 million slipped down the economic ladder in 2020, the first pullback in almost three decades.

Related:

https://vivekjayakumar.blogspot.com/2021/04/start-of-us-economic-boom.html

A New Era of Economic Policymaking?

How Bidenomics Seeks to Remake the Economic Consensus
https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-bidenomics-seeks-to-remake-the-economic-consensus-11617796981
 
Job Training That’s Free Until You’re Hired Is a Blueprint for Biden
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/07/business/job-training-work.html
 
Let’s Cut Our Ridiculous Defense Budget
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/07/opinion/biden-defense-budget.html

[MUST READ] Jamie Dimon’s Annual Letter to Shareholders

JP Morgan Chase Chairman and CEO (Jamie Dimon) - Letter to Shareholders is a thought-provoking read:
https://reports.jpmorganchase.com/investor-relations/2020/ar-ceo-letters.htm
 
A few noteworthy statements:
“The problem with the American public’s impression of “shareholder value” is that too many people interpret it to mean short-term, rapacious profit taking – which, ironically, is the last thing that leads to building real, long-term shareholder value. …
 
The QE and deficit-spending response to the COVID-19 pandemic is of a completely different magnitude and without some of the offsetting drags that trailed the Great Recession. …
 
While equity valuations are quite high (by almost all measures, except against interest rates), historically, a multi-year booming economy could justify their current price. Equity markets look ahead, and they may very well be pricing in not only a booming economy but also the technical factor that lots of the excess liquidity will find its way into stocks. Clearly, there is some froth and speculation in parts of the market, which no one should find surprising. As Captain Louis Renault said in Casablanca, “I’m shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!”
Conversely, in this boom scenario it’s hard to justify the price of U.S. debt (most people consider the 10-year bond as the key reference point for U.S. debt). This is because of two factors: first, the huge supply of debt that needs to be absorbed; and second, the not-unreasonable possibility that an increase in inflation will not be just temporary….
 
China’s leaders believe that America is in decline. They believe this not only because their country’s sheer size will make them the largest economy on the planet by 2030 but also because they believe their long-term thinking and competent, consistent leadership have outshone America’s in so many ways. The Chinese see an America that is losing ground in technology, infrastructure and education – a nation torn and crippled by politics, as well as racial and income inequality – and a country unable to coordinate government policies (fiscal, monetary, industrial, regulatory) in any coherent way to accomplish national goals. Unfortunately, recently, there is a lot of truth to this.
Perhaps we were lulled into a false sense of security and complacency in the last two decades of the 20th century as we enjoyed relative peace in the world and a position of global dominance, validated by the fall of the Soviet Union. During those two decades, we experienced relatively uninterrupted and strong growth, resulting in broad improvement in income for almost all Americans. That stability was shattered by the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, which were followed by nearly 20 years of overseas combat for American soldiers. Economic growth over the last two decades (including the Great Recession of 2008) has been painfully slow, with increasing income inequality and virtually no growth in income at the lower rungs of the economic ladder. The COVID-19 pandemic, for which our nation was totally unprepared, capped by the horrific murder of George Floyd, shoved into the spotlight our country’s profound inequities and their devastating effects – inequities that had been there for a long time. Once more, our country suffered, and its least well-off individuals suffered the most. Unfortunately, the tragedies of this past year are only the tip of the iceberg – they merely expose enormous failures that have existed for decades and have been deeply damaging to America.
Today, the United States and other countries around the world are grappling with many other critical issues. To name just a few: capitalism versus other economic systems; access to healthcare; immigration policy; the role of business in our society; and how, or even whether, the United States intends to exercise global leadership. Many Americans have lost faith in their government’s ability to solve these and other problems – in fact, most people would describe government as ineffective, bureaucratic and often biased. Almost all institutions – governments, schools, media and businesses – have lost credibility in the eyes of the public. And perhaps for good reason: Many of our problems have been around for a long time and are not aging well. Politics is increasingly divisive, and government is increasingly dysfunctional, leading to a number of policies that simply don’t work.
Americans know that something has gone terribly wrong, and they blame this country’s leadership: the elite, the powerful, the decision makers – in government, in business and in civic society. This is completely appropriate, for who else should take the blame? And people are right to be angry and feel let down. Our failures fuel the populism on both the political left and right. But populism is not policy, and we cannot let it drive another round of poor planning and bad leadership that will simply make our country’s situation worse.
To explain how and why this all happened, we tend to look for convenient reasons – some blame greed and “short-termism,” some blame immigration and others blame the uncontrolled effects of new technologies, trade or China. Many of our citizens are unsettled, and the fault line for all this discord is a fraying American dream – the enormous wealth of our country is accruing to the very few. In other words, the fault line is inequality. And its cause is staring us in the face: our own failure to move beyond our differences and self-interest and act for the greater good. The good news is that this is fixable”.

2020 - A Good Year for Billionaires

Billionaires club grew by nearly a third, to 2,755 names, during pandemic
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/04/06/billionaire-wealth-forbes-pandemic/

Demographic Shift and US Labor Market

Pandemic Seen as Job Creator as Millions Speed Up Retirement
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-05/americans-are-bringing-forward-retirement-plans-because-of-covid 

Corporate Taxes in a Globalized Economy

What Happened to the Corporate Income Tax?
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-03-25/corporate-income-taxes-have-been-shrinking-for-decades

Dozens of America’s biggest businesses paid no federal income tax — again
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/04/05/corporations-federal-taxes/

No Federal Taxes for Dozens of Big, Profitable Companies
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/02/business/economy/zero-corporate-tax.html 

Related:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/tommybeer/2021/04/02/more-than-50-major-us-corporations-including-nike-and-fedex-paid-no-federal-taxes-last-year/ 

Yellen’s Global Tax Plan Is a China Trade War-Level Fight
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-04-06/yellen-s-global-tax-plan-is-on-the-level-of-trump-s-trade-war-with-china

JANET YELLEN, US TREASURY SECRETARY:

https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy0101
“Another consequence of an interconnected world has been a thirty-year race to the bottom on corporate tax rates. Competitiveness is about more than how U.S.-headquartered companies fare against other companies in global merger and acquisition bids. It is about making sure that governments have stable tax systems that raise sufficient revenue to invest in essential public goods and respond to crises, and that all citizens fairly share the burden of financing government. President Biden’s proposals announced last week call for bold domestic action, including to raise the U.S. minimum tax rate, and renewed international engagement, recognizing that it is important to work with other countries to end the pressures of tax competition and corporate tax base erosion. We are working with G20 nations to agree to a global minimum corporate tax rate that can stop the race to the bottom. Together we can use a global minimum tax to make sure the global economy thrives based on a more level playing field in the taxation of multinational corporations, and spurs innovation, growth, and prosperity”. 

OECD Pillar 2 Provides A Good Model for Biden US Worldwide Tax
https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxvox/oecd-pillar-2-provides-good-model-biden-us-worldwide-tax

Biden and Democrats Detail Plans to Raise Taxes on Multinational Firms
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/05/business/raising-taxes-corporations.html
 
A tech CEO’s guide to taxes
https://www.economist.com/business/2021/01/09/a-tech-ceos-guide-to-taxes  

Corporate Rate Increase Would Make Taxes Fairer, Help Fund Equitable Recovery
https://www.cbpp.org/research/federal-tax/corporate-rate-increase-would-make-taxes-fairer-help-fund-equitable-recovery
 
‘Taxing Corporations’ Might Be Good Politics, but It’s Still Bad Policy
https://www.cato.org/commentary/taxing-corporations-might-be-good-politics-its-still-bad-policy
 
A 28% Tax Rate Will Cost Companies, but Not Equally
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-28-tax-rate-will-cost-companies-but-not-equally-11617615180

‘Trickle-down’ tax cuts make the rich richer but are of no value to overall economy, study finds

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/12/23/tax-cuts-rich-trickle-down/
Related:
https://theconversation.com/footing-the-covid-19-bill-economic-case-for-tax-hike-on-wealthy-151945
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/107919/1/Hope_economic_consequences_of_major_tax_cuts_published.pdf