Happy birthday, Baby Seven Billion – more human beings are good news for the planet October 27, 2011 A CHILD is born. Hurrah – a time for celebration. Babies usually bring out the optimist in people. “What a joy” we coo over a bundle of potential in swaddling – this could be the new Einstein, a modern Joan of Arc, a future Steve Jobs. However, there seems widespread reluctance to pop the champagne [...]
The latest euro deal isn’t pretty in cold daylight October 27, 2011 ANOTHER summit gone and another Greek bailout plan to assess in the cold light of day. On the surface this one sounds promising: a 50 per cent write down for Greek bondholders and €130bn in new bailout funds – should sort things for a while, right? Well, unlike in previous rounds, Wednesday’s meeting between Eurozone [...]
The Vatican’s imperial economic plan is naive October 27, 2011 THE Vatican waded into the debate over the financial crisis this week, when the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace released a paper titled Toward Reforming the International Financial and Monetary Systems in the Context of a Global Public Authority. Despite some interesting analysis, as Robert Sirico of the Acton Institute has pointed out, on [...]
RAPID RESPONSES October 27, 2011 Big after the Bang Reading yesterday’s comment by Terry Smith, I can’t help but reflect that there were very few, if any, “Terry Smiths” working at the top of firms in the City before the deregulation implemented in the Big Bang. For better or for worse, the gentleman’s club of the Square Mile has been [...]
25 years after the Big Bang we ask: Was it a good idea? October 26, 2011 YES Eamonn Butler SOMETHING had to happen. London had once been the world’s major financial centre, but by the 1980s it had been overtaken by New York and that lead was growing. The City remained an old-fashioned world: to outsiders like me, more like a private gentlemen’s club than a place of business. Its leading [...]
Scandinavia is a showcase of free market reforms October 26, 2011 GEORGE Monbiot once claimed “Sweden proves the neoliberals wrong about how to slash poverty.” Our new research reveals a different story: Scandinavian success is a triumph of prudent fiscal policy, government downsizing and smart market regulation. It is a showcase for neoliberalism, and not its nemesis. The whole region’s success is striking: in the past [...]
A twenty-first century trade policy for Britain October 26, 2011 THE world may seem in deep economic turmoil, but it is only our part of it. Across the planet, the lumbering Asian superpowers of China and India are ticking along nicely. For many UK companies, exports to these growing economies will be critical to pulling through the next few years. In the longer term, boosting [...]
RAPID RESPONSES October 26, 2011 University blues While Jamie Whyte celebrates a 12 per cent decline in university applications [Hooray for a decline in university applications, yesterday], the CBI says that 56 per cent more jobs in the UK will require degree-level skills by 2017. Whyte may belong to the group of people who think we have too many graduates, [...]
At last, a sign of good news in the economic data – the UK’s trade deficit is falling October 25, 2011 AMID the gloom that permeates most economic and financial commentary at the moment, a rather more positive development has become apparent over the past few weeks, but has received scant attention. When revised data were released for the second quarter of 2011, on 5 October, most analysis concentrated on the recent deceleration in the economy. [...]
It is a myth that there is no way to quit the euro October 25, 2011 IN 2010, the economist Barry Eichengreen wrote: “The decision to join the euro area is effectively irreversible.” That’s certainly the view of Europe’s politicians, busy again today with their latest plan to save the euro intact. They seem to think that any exit from the euro would bring chaos, not only to the exiting country [...]