Free economies will crumble if we fail to make the moral case for capitalism June 18, 2014 SITTING in the Guildhall yesterday, attending the Margaret Thatcher Conference on Liberty, I was struck by two thoughts. First, Thatcher was probably the only British Prime Minister who truly understood capitalism, not just as an engine of wealth creation and efficiency, but also as a moral force for good. But secondly, while the economic battle [...]
Elon Musk is right to share Tesla’s patents: Now he should ditch them altogether June 18, 2014 A WAR is being waged by the litigators of Silicon Valley. Their chosen weaponry: patent law. The battle is most obvious among the tech giants. In 2011, Apple and Google spent more on patent lawsuits and purchases than they put towards research and development. And it is consumers who get stung. A report released by [...]
Breaking point: Iraq is now in the grip of civil war June 18, 2014 ERBIL, Iraqi Kurdistan – No matter which way you look at the problem, Iraq is now in the grip of a civil war, and the forces of ISIS, backed by a number of tribes and ex-Saddam loyalists, are in all out conflict with the Iraqi state, backed by the Shia militias that have mobilised in [...]
The world never was peaceful – but combat deaths have plummeted June 18, 2014 Is the world becoming a more violent place? The world never was a peaceful place to begin with, but annual battle death has actually dropped tenfold since the 1950s. What is new is the conjunction of three parallel evolutions. First, improved media coverage, informing populations. Second, stronger transnational criminal groups with access to advanced military [...]
Why the world is becoming less peaceful June 18, 2014 Is the world becoming a more violent place? The world has certainly become a more peaceful place in the last 60 years, but short-term trends show a worrying increase in violence. On our measure, 111 countries’ peace levels decreased over the last seven years, while 51 improved. The eleven least-peaceful countries (including Syria, Afghanistan and [...]
Letters to the Editor – 18/06 – Intervention risks, The Bank’s babies, Best of Twitter June 17, 2014 Intervention risks [Re: Should the West cooperate with Iran to defeat ISIS in Iraq? yesterday] I agree with Michael Rubin – the West should refrain from assisting Iran with its intervention in Iraq. The Iranian leadership’s version of Shiism has proven to be just as ruthless and authoritarian when it comes to the minorities among [...]
Beware Blair: The West must not learn the wrong lessons from Iraq June 17, 2014 MUCH as I am intellectually fond of Boris Johnson, he is entirely wrong about both former Prime Minister Tony Blair and his motivation for speaking out on the present Iraq crisis. For those of us who were against the initial Iraq war (I lost my job in America for my pains), it was certainly emotionally [...]
Our prosperity depends on embracing disruption – but don’t forget the losers June 17, 2014 HERE is your starter for ten. What do the Uber app and David Ricardo have in common? “Ricardo?”, I hear you ask. Scarcely known outside academic economics, he ranks equal with Adam Smith and John Maynard Keynes as the greatest ever British economist. His classic Principles of Political Economy was published in 1816, and he [...]
We are jeopardising UK tech by failing to tackle UK skills shortages June 17, 2014 THE UK’s tech scene has changed beyond all recognition since I left London for the US in the late 1990s. Back then, there seemed little to be excited about beyond ARM and Autonomy. But fast forward to 2014 and Tech City can claim to have created more businesses than anywhere else in the UK, with [...]
Corporation tax should be abolished as soon as possible June 17, 2014 As Lord Saatchi proposes abolishing corporation tax for small firms, is the levy justifiable at all? Corporation tax is one of the worst on the books and it should be abolished as soon as possible. Corporations can hand over the cash, but they can’t bear the ultimate burden of tax, because they are legal constructs. [...]