Reading

Created
Mon, 19/01/2026 - 06:16
In recent times, there has been a growing interest in institutionalist trends and research within economics. Traditional explanations and analyses have seemed to have little or no value. Abstract and unrealistic theories have increasingly been replaced by historically grounded ones. Institutional and structural elements in the economy are highlighted, replacing overly short-term and model-based variables. […]
Created
Mon, 19/01/2026 - 05:53
Week-end Wrap – Political Economy – January 18, 2026 by Tony Wikrent Dingbat imperialism and its malcontents Dingbat Imperialism, the Lowest Stage of Capitalism John Ganz, Jan 13, 2026 [Unpopular Front] Germany planning ‘Arctic Sentry’ Nato mission to protect Greenland  [Telegraph, via Naked Capitalism 01-13-2025] Tech billionaires behind Greenland bid want to build ‘freedom cities’  [Responsible […]
Created
Sun, 18/01/2026 - 20:21
Sydney’s Phantom Book Shops by Isadore Brodsky was published in 1973, one of Brodsky’s many historical studies of the city. Brodsky was a doctor and a passionate historian, a prolific researcher of what was then called ‘Old Sydney’: its 19th and early 20th-century history. Sydney’s Phantom Book Shops followed the stories of the city’s bookshops […]
Created
Sat, 17/01/2026 - 20:38
När riksdagen 1998 beslutade om ändringar i regeringsformen och riksbankslagen gjorde man Riksbanken formellt och konstitutionellt oberoende från regering och riksdag i penningpolitiska beslut. Tanken var att man beslutsmässigt skulle ha mer eller mindre vattentäta skott mellan finans-och penningpolitik. Detta har också inneburit att Riksbanken har en nästintill oinskränkt makt över en politik som i […]
Created
Sat, 17/01/2026 - 19:28
In November 2022, any residual feeling that Silicon Valley represented a clear-cut boon for humanity vanished like a fart in the wind. In an act of breathtaking arrogance, OpenAI released GPT-3.5, a free preview of its chatbot ChatGPT. Confronted with a technology that could synthesise humanlike text in response to prompts from actual humans, journalists and commentators rushed into print to weigh its likely implications, often using the chatbot itself to generate the first few paragraphs of their articles (which is a bit like a caveman ostentatiously sporting a bronze medallion towards the end of the Stone Age) ...
Created
Sat, 17/01/2026 - 19:23
The British journalist and activist Ash Sarkar is one of the most engaging members of the group of leftwing radicals who make up Novara Media. Established in 2011, in the long wake of the GFC, and at the dawn of Prime Minister David Cameron’s savage reign of austerity, Novara now has over a million subscribers, not least because of Sarkar’s ambassadorship in the otherwise solidly centrist world of mainstream UK political commentary ...