A Fresh Take on History

A contrarian account of our prehistory argues that cities once flourished without rulers and rules—and still could.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/11/08/early-civilizations-had-it-all-figured-out-the-dawn-of-everything 

Stock Market Performance Under Different Presidents

S&P 500 Is Up 37% Since Biden’s Election One Year Ago, Setting Presidential Record
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-11-03/s-p-500-notches-best-one-year-run-after-a-presidential-election 

We Looked at How the Stock Market Performed Under Every U.S. President Since Truman — And the Results Will Surprise You

https://www.forbes.com/sites/sergeiklebnikov/2020/07/23/historical-stock-market-returns-under-every-us-president/#6f8e3953faaf

The Case for Moving to the Political Center

The Democratic Unraveling Began with Schools
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/virginia-election-youngkin-education/620596/ 

Watch Out, Democrats. Virginia Is Talking to You.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-11-03/virginia-governor-s-election-youngkin-win-is-a-warning-to-democrats-everywhere
How did a Republican win a governor’s race in a bright blue state? By parrying comparisons to Trump and offering a break from progressive activism.
 
What Glenn Youngkin’s Virginia win means for Democrats
https://www.vox.com/2021/11/3/22752593/virginia-governor-results-youngkin-wins 

Evolution of Macroeconomic Thought – A Few Good Reads

Paul Krugman’s famous 2009 critique: How Did Economists Get It So Wrong?
https://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/06/magazine/06Economic-t.html
 
Response to Krugman from John Cochrane (University of Chicago financial economist) can be found here: How did Paul Krugman get it so Wrong?
http://users.econ.umn.edu/~tkehoe/classes/CochraneKrugmanResponse.pdf
 
Paul Romer on Macro Disagreements
https://paulromer.net/solows-choice/
 
What Do We Actually Know About the Economy?
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/16/opinion/what-do-we-actually-know-about-the-economy-wonkish.html
 
Is economics an excuse for inaction?
https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/is-economics-an-excuse-for-inaction

Background Readings:

Keynesian Economics by Alan S. Blinder
https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/KeynesianEconomics.html
Monetarism by Bennett T. McCallum
https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Monetarism.html
Phillips Curve by Kevin D. Hoover
https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/PhillipsCurve.html
Rational Expectations by Thomas J. Sargent
https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/RationalExpectations.html
New Classical Macroeconomics by Kevin D. Hoover
https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/NewClassicalMacroeconomics.html

Supply Constraints and Labor Supply

How Car Shortages Are Putting the World’s Economy at Risk
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/02/business/car-shortage-global-economy.html
 
Shoppers Haven’t Minded Higher Prices. That Might Change Soon.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-11-02/shoppers-haven-t-minded-higher-prices-that-might-change-soon
 
Workplace strikes are surging. Here’s why they won’t stop anytime soon.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/10/31/faq-striketober/
 
Labor market shows signs of hiring uptick as coronavirus surge fades
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/11/01/labor-market-jobs-hiring/ 

Taper Tantrum 2.0

The Bond Market Is a Powder Keg. Can the Fed Defuse It?
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-11-01/fed-meeting-bonds-are-a-powder-keg-can-the-central-bank-defuse-it
“Taper Tantrum 2.0 has arrived just as the Federal Reserve plans to start scaling back its asset purchases. This time is different from the original edition in 2013 in a few important ways — raising the stakes for Chair Jerome Powell and the central bank, which will issue its latest decision at the conclusion of its meeting on Wednesday.
First, unlike eight years ago, traders in the $21.9 trillion U.S. Treasury market clearly understand the playbook: a combination of tapering and a potentially accelerated pace of interest-rate increases means a sharply flatter yield curve”. 

Global Corporate Minimum Tax

A triumph for Detroit over Davos
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/10/31/the-new-corporate-tax-deal-is-a-step-toward-solving-other-global-challenges/
Harvard economist Larry Summers notes:
“A stronger tax base is central to American prosperity. What determines U.S. competitiveness is not whether we can lower our tax rates faster than other nations, but rather the strength of our fundamentals: the talents and skills of our workforce, the modernity and durability of our infrastructure, and the stability and trustworthiness of our institutions. We need to make important public investments in broadband Internet access, roads and bridges, basic research, climate change mitigation and education, from prekindergarten through the university level.
Workers around the world will also be better off because this historic achievement enables tax burdens to be placed on those most able to pay. For too long, mobile multinational corporations have used accounting gimmicks and clever legal arrangements to avoid taxes, benefiting their shareholders while shifting tax burdens to others”.
 
As wealthy nations back Yellen’s call for global taxation, fears about national differences quietly persist
https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2021/10/31/global-minimum-tax-g20/