The sentence in Ben Shapiro's book preceding the title quote is this: "Discussions of income inequality, after all, aren't about prosperity but about petty spite."
I'm sorry Mr. Shapiro, but this is entirely about prosperity. And not at all petty.
Macroeconomics
An important area of concern among many cryptocurrency proponents revolves around the idea that the current banking and government finance systems are inherently unstable or inflationary. Ultimately all finance is about debits and credits, assets and liabilities. How would total adoption of crypto by a country change these?
The currency of international trade has been on a lot of peoples' minds in the last few years. The hierarchy of currencies literature, the related questions of reforming the international monetary and financial system (IMFS), the effects of US monetary policy on the rest of the world (ROW). Add to that the war in Ukraine and Chinese trade-related discussion on the role of the ruble, dollar, yuan, oil and natural gas, wheat etc.
It is important to note that the proposals for a supranational currency have been made with various, disparate goals. Some are primarily interested in some aspect of commodities, others primarily or completely the supranational-currency aspect. These can overlap in several ways. The primary possibilities:
Before continuing with posts on this topic I want to note: I started these posts with a twitter comment by Nathan Tankus on replacing the dollar in international trade. That thread continues – that he foresees “a world of swap lines as alliance politics… Swap lines may seem like technocratic high politics now but it’s … Continue reading The Two Families of Global Reserve Proposals & Swap Lines
In modern states, demand for currency comes from the ongoing self-imposed liability for the currency. There is no need to pay savers in order for them to desire to hold the currency (interest on sovereign bonds issued for "deficit spending"). Any justification for doing so must rest on some other perceived benefit of paying savers.
John Lewis Cryptoassets and the crypto ecosystem as a whole has to face many of the same challenges as conventional assets and the regular financial system do. The same classic problems which are staple of economics textbooks (and history books), such as maturity mismatch, liquidity shortages, credibility, and collateral feedback loops. But whereas the conventional … Continue reading Old problems with new assets: some of crypto’s challenges look strangely familiar
Galina Potjagailo, Boromeus Wanengkirtyo and Jenny Lam CPI inflation in the UK has markedly increased over the last year, reaching 10.1% in September. The aggregate increase reflects potentially different dynamics across disaggregated prices, from which CPI inflation is constructed. How much of the increase has been broad-based across a wide range of prices? We assess … Continue reading How broad-based is the increase in UK inflation?
Rachel Adeney and Amy Fraser Operational risk is rapidly becoming one of the most important threats to the financial system but is also one of the least well understood. Cyber attacks are regularly cited as one of the top risks faced by firms in the financial sector and one of the most challenging to manage. … Continue reading When the lights go out: why does operational risk matter for financial stability?
Julian Reynolds Moves in oil prices have significant implications for the global economic outlook, affecting consumer prices, firm costs and country export revenues. But oil futures contracts tend to give an imperfect steer for the future path of oil prices because, at any given time, futures contracts may be affected by a wide range of … Continue reading What is the information content of oil futures curves?