Quotes

(45) How to reform today’s rigged capitalism | Financial Times

Opinion Capitalism
How to reform today’s rigged capitalism
We must address weakened competition, feeble productivity growth, high inequality and degraded democracy
MARTIN WOLF Add to myFT

via (45) How to reform today’s rigged capitalism | Financial Times

Northern Comment – This is one of many articles from people who wish the ends but not the means. Those who analyse the problem superbly well, e.g. inequality, but hope/believe, that it can addressed by some kind of rational process. I wish! Sadly, I think those that “have” think it is nothing less than they are due. Rational argument is unlikely to win. Irrational violence is more likely to be the ultimate arbiter. Just hope this happens somewhere else.

 

Options for cutting direct personal taxes and supporting low earners – Institute For Fiscal Studies – IFS

“This is a substantial and expensive tax cut from which only those on high incomes would gain. It would offset some of the big tax increases that have affected the very highest earners since 2009.”

via Options for cutting direct personal taxes and supporting low earners – Institute For Fiscal Studies – IFS

Northern Comment – The above is an extract from the Institute for Fiscal Studies assessment of the proposals that have been articulated to date by the Prime Minister and his team. It gives a clear indication of the direction of travel of a Boris Johnson Government, if we ever get one!

Michael Gove pulls plans to reveal ‘watered down’ Yellowhammer | Financial Times

Michael Gove has pulled plans to publish a “watered down” version of the government’s Operation Yellowhammer no-deal Brexit contingency plans, after ministers decreed that the findings would still alarm the public.

Mr Gove, minister for no-deal planning, had been expected to publish extracts of the document on Tuesday as part of his efforts to prepare the UK for the possibility of Brexit taking place without an agreement on October 31.

Government officials worked throughout the weekend overhauling the Operation Yellowhammer document, and Mr Gove had hoped to use the work to prove that he had a grip on potential no-deal problems.

via Michael Gove pulls plans to reveal ‘watered down’ Yellowhammer | Financial Times

Lance Corporal Jones continues to reassure the public,… “Don”t panic, don’t panic!”

Mariana Mazzucato on the Value of Everything

The link below takes you to Econ Talk which is a weekly blog involving one to one interviews with an eclectic mix of economists. The website and blogs are published by the Library of Economics and Liberty which is supported by Liberty Fund Incorporated. So many uses of the word “liberty” might raise suspicions about the political outlook of the site and when you listen to the host of the weekly blog, Russ Roberts, your suspicions may be reinforced. He clearly comes from a libertarian perspective which places a great deal of faith in the market and thinks that education would be much more effective if wholly privatised. However, he is consistent in his views on the importance of effective competition and has excoriated the bail out of the banks after the 2008 credit crunch.

Whatever the ideological preferences of the site and the host of Econ Talk they get some great interviewees and one of the latest ones was Mariana Mazzucato.  Ms Mazzucatto wrote a very timely and important book on the role of the State in innovation entitled “The Entrepreneurial State”. In the blog connected to this link she talks about her latest book “The Value of Everything”. This looks at how the concept of value in economic theory has evolved over time and how it has been stripped of any social and moral context, effectively reduced to being market price. In a remarkable reversal, instead of value underpinning price it has become the case that value is determined by price.

It is a great conversation. Whatever his personal prejudices, Russ Roberts is an effective inquisitor and unfailingly courteous. Mariana is robustly compelling and gives a great summary of the main arguments of the book. If you are interested in current debates in economics I recommend the Econ Talk site generally but the Mariana conversation is a gem worth listening to if you never visit the site again.

Mariana Mazzucato on the Value of Everything – Econlib