Economics and International Affairs Blog

Monday, January 6, 2020

Politics and Education

Meritocracy in Education

https://www.economist.com/united-states/2020/01/05/a-battle-over-gifted-education-is-brewing-in-america

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/12/opinion/meritocracy-tests-education.html

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/an-american-dilemma-stuyvesant-high-school/

GMU economist Tyler Cowen notes:

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-09-23/harvard-s-legacies-are-nothing-to-be-proud-of

“Non-meritocratic admissions not only corrode the ideals of those who want to become part of supposedly great American institutions. They also give the rest of us less faith in the institutions that supposedly make America great.”

https://vivekjayakumar.blogspot.com/2019/06/meritocracy-in-academics.html

Friday, January 3, 2020

The US Tax Debate

The Ultra-Wealthy Who Argue That They Should Be Paying Higher Taxes

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/01/06/the-ultra-wealthy-who-argue-that-they-should-be-paying-higher-taxes

How Big Companies Won New Tax Breaks from the Trump Administration

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/30/business/trump-tax-cuts-beat-gilti.html

Tax Debate - A More Constitutional Way to Tax the Rich?
https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2019/12/03/784173610/a-more-constitutional-way-to-tax-the-rich

How to Increase Taxes on the Rich (If You Must) by N. Gregory Mankiw

https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/mankiw/files/how_to_increase_taxes_on_the_rich.pdf

To Reduce Inequality, Tax Inheritances by Henry J. Aaron

https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/publications/reduce-inequality-tax-inheritances/full

Stop Treating American Expats Like Tax Cheats

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-11-26/tax-nightmare-for-american-expats-as-irs-treats-them-like-cheats

https://vivekjayakumar.blogspot.com/2019/11/consumption-tax-and-wealth-tax.html

Politics, Economics and the US Labor Market

As Push for Higher Minimum Wages Grows, New York Offers a Test Case

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/13/business/economy/minimum-wage-new-york-pennsylvania.html

Tech Is Splitting the U.S. Work Force in Two: A small group of well-educated professionals enjoys rising wages, while most workers toil in low-wage jobs with few chances to advance.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/04/business/economy/productivity-inequality-wages.html

Big Boost for Bottom Earners Comes in Part from Minimum Wage Increases

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/03/upshot/minimum-wage-boost-bottom-earners.html

Minimum wage increases fueling faster wage growth for those at the bottom

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/01/02/minimum-wage-increases-fueling-faster-wage-growth-those-bottom/

Tax Reform Has Delivered for Workers

https://www.wsj.com/articles/tax-reform-has-delivered-for-workers-11577045463

Latest Research Findings on Minimum Wage Laws:
The Effect of Minimum Wages on Low-Wage Jobs
https://academic.oup.com/qje/article-pdf/134/3/1405/29173920/qjz014.pdf

Thursday, January 2, 2020

Economics, Technology and Time Management

Three Theories for Why You Have No Time: Better technology means higher expectations, and higher expectations create more work.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/12/why-you-never-have-time/603937/

Derek Thompson notes:

“As technology has reduced the time it takes to cook a meal or wash a shirt, it's opened up more hours in the day to care for other parts of the house. Such as the little humans living in it.

In the past few decades, child care has been the fastest-growing component of housework. Since the 1980s, American parents—and particularly college-educated mothers and fathers—have nearly doubled the amount of time they spend raising, teaching, driving, and helping their kids. The economist Valerie Ramey chalks it up to a “rug rat race” led by middle- and upper-class parents devoting more hours to prepare their kids for competitive college admissions and a cutthroat labor force.”