Reading

Sleepwalking Into a Global Trade War — Anne O. Krueger

http://mikenormaneconomics.blogspot.com/2022/12/sleepwalking-into-global-trade-…
Created
Fri, 23/12/2022 - 04:45
For 70 years after World War II, global growth was underpinned by ongoing efforts to boost international trade by eliminating self-defeating trade barriers. Sadly, the United States started dismantling this source of shared prosperity under Donald Trump, and it has now accelerated the process under Joe Biden.
Like I've been saying. As a result of the policy of sanctions, asset freezes, and price caps, era of the free market, free trade and free flow of capital as the basis of global trade is over.

Reason? Lack of systems awareness leading to failure to accurately assess consequences of action. Likely caused by faulty reasoning resulting from cognitive-affective bias and informal fallacies. ("Believing your own bullshit.")

Harbour of hope

https://larspsyll.wordpress.com/2022/12/22/harbour-of-hope/
Created
Fri, 23/12/2022 - 04:24
. In April 1945 thousands of concentration camp survivors arrived at the harbour of the town where yours truly lives, Malmö, Sweden. When taking my daily walk with the dog, I often go by the Jewish cemetery in the northern part of Sankt Pauli kyrkogård. And it breaks my heart every time to see tombstone […]

Yield Curve Control Blues — Brian Romanchuk

http://mikenormaneconomics.blogspot.com/2022/12/yield-curve-control-blues-brian…
Created
Fri, 23/12/2022 - 04:13
The Bank of Japan surprised people with a change to its yield curve control (YCC) policy. This has caused a mild sell-off in Japanese bonds, with the 10-year Japanese Government Bond (JGB) yield up 15 basis points on the month when I last checked.

Although I think some of the usual suspects have tried to get excited about this — a harbinger of doom to Japan and/or the global fixed income complex! — this is still in nothingburger territory. (Note: people who discuss bond yield changes as a percentage of previous yields — e.g., “bond yields rose by 100%!” when the yields go to 0.2% from 0.1% — are innumerate clowns and are safe to ignore.) Nevertheless, if the yield cap was raised by a lot more, there would be a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth.

No laptops, no phones.

https://crookedtimber.org/2022/12/22/no-laptops-no-phones/
Created
Fri, 23/12/2022 - 03:52
In one of the end-of-term reflections I just read a first-year (freshman) student says “It struck me that there was a no technology rule, something my classmates and I were unfamiliar with… when you disconnect from your online presence, you can fully dive into the discussion”. I have a no-laptop, no phone policy in all […]

Print Edition 46

https://nautil.us/print-edition-46-253992/
Created
Fri, 23/12/2022 - 03:21

Issue 46 of the Nautilus print edition combines some of the best content from our September and October 2022 issues. It includes contributions from award-winning author Philip Ball,  psychology professor Laith Al-Shawaf,  anthropologist Dimitris Xygalatas, and more. This issue also features a new illustration by Myriam Wares.

The post Print Edition 46 appeared first on Nautilus.

The Lions’ Den is Not a Fleeting Phenomenon: On Palestine’s Looming Armed Revolt

https://www.mintpressnews.com/lions-den-not-fleeting-phenomenon-palestine-loomi…
Created
Fri, 23/12/2022 - 03:20

As Lions’ Den insignias are now appearing in every Palestinian neighborhood throughout the Occupied Territories, the group has succeeded in branching out from a specific Nablus neighborhood - Al Qasaba - to become a collective Palestinian experience. 

The post The Lions’ Den is Not a Fleeting Phenomenon: On Palestine’s Looming Armed Revolt appeared first on MintPress News.

Bill Mitchell — Bank of Japan has not shifted direction on monetary policy

http://mikenormaneconomics.blogspot.com/2022/12/bill-mitchell-bank-of-japan-has…
Created
Fri, 23/12/2022 - 01:44
The hysteria surrounding the decision by the Bank of Japan (released December 19, 2022) to make a minor adjustment to its yield curve control ceiling on Japanese government 10-year bonds has been predictable but uninformed and full of vested interest agendas. You know the type of agenda that investment bankers engage in where they consistently pump out their media statements, which are soaked up by the financial media as if they are knowledge that needs repeating, that claim interest rates have to rise to deal with some inflation emergency or something. The media doesn’t tell the public who absorb this stuff that the actual agenda is that bankers want higher interest rates because they make more profit and that the reason the media statements give is largely fiction. So we are seeing more of that in the last few days. My understanding of the decision is that it does not signal a fundamental change in monetary policy in Japan. It is a minor shift to tweak the interface between the government bond market and the corporate bond market in order to maintain financial stability – the most important role of a central bank.

Part III Of My Interview: Twitter and Reasons For Hope

https://api.follow.it/track-rss-story-click/v3/niyBMplQItDvAkOEaX1WekTXPGaG87AR
Created
Fri, 23/12/2022 - 01:09
Part III Of My Interview: Twitter and Reasons For Hope

Last of three parts.

(I am fundraising to determine how much I’ll write this year. If you value my writing and want more of it, please consider donating.)

Lessons Learned in the Internet’s Darkest Corners

https://tomdispatch.com/lessons-learned-in-the-internets-darkest-corners/
Created
Fri, 23/12/2022 - 01:05

We all do it. Make little snap judgments about everyday strangers as we go about our lives. Without giving it a second’s thought, we sketch minibiographies of the people we pass on the sidewalk, the guy seated across from us on the train, or the woman in line in front of us at the grocery store. We wonder: Who are they? Where are they from? How do they make a living? Lately, though, such passing encounters tend to leave me with a sense of suspicion, a wariness tinged with grim curiosity. I think to myself: Is he or she one of them? By them, I mean one of the tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of “people” I... Read more

Source: Lessons Learned in the Internet’s Darkest Corners appeared first on TomDispatch.com.