Assorted content to end your week. – Noah Smith offers a reminder that market principles don’t work for everything. And Amelie Quesnel-Vallee and Miles Taylor note that in the health sector in particular, the use of private providers to supplement an underfunded public system is leading to inequitable disparities in
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Accidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Noah Smith makes the case for the U.S. Democrats to emphasize trust-busting as a means of restoring power to people rather than the business lobby: Big companies often argue that mergers will allow increased economies of scale, whose efficiencies will more than
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Assorted content to end your week. – Greg Jericho writes about Australia’s increasing income stratification and wealth inequality. Matt Bruenig examines what sets the Nordic countries apart from the rest of the world – including high unionization levels and substantial public ownership of industry along with their well-funded social programs.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – David Sirota interviews Thomas Frank about the U.S. Democrats’ obsession with educational achievement as a cure-all – and their consequent loss of touch with the large numbers of citizens suffering from economic policies which left them behind: Sirota: What do you think
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Noah Smith writes that far too many Americans (like people around the globe) face needless barriers to thinking, and suggests that the key public project of this century may be to remedy those problems: The biggest threat to clear-headedness comes from drugs.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Robert Reich comments on the absurdity of Donald Trump’s plan to shovel yet more money toward a military-industrial complex and corporate profiteers who already have more than they know what to do with. – Sara Fraser and Laura Chapin write that food insecurity
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Evening Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Paul Wells notes that the Trudeau Libs are having trouble keeping their story straight in pretending to appeal to Canada’s middle class. And Brent Patterson writes that the renegotiation of NAFTA is just one more area where the Libs aren’t interested in hearing
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Evening Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Paul Wells notes that the Trudeau Libs are having trouble keeping their story straight in pretending to appeal to Canada’s middle class. And Brent Patterson writes that the renegotiation of NAFTA is just one more area where the Libs aren’t interested in hearing
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Jesse Ferreras reports that Canada’s supposed job growth has included almost nothing but part-time and precarious work. And Louis-Philippe Rochon points out how the influence of the financial sector has led to economic choices which serve nobody else’s interests: What makes governments
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – Paul Krugman offers a warning about Donald Trump’s immediate moves to normalize corruption and cronyism as the foundation of his administration. And the New York Times’ editorial board points out that corporations are enabling Trump’s false claims with the expectation that they’ll be
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Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Miles Corak offers a must-read paper on the two stories most often told about inequality in Canada, reaching this conclusion on the recent accumulation of wealth at the top of the income spectrum and the readily observable inequality of opportunity based on the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Stephen Hawking discusses the urgent need to address inequality and environmental destruction as people are both more fearful for their futures, and more aware of what’s being taken away from them: (T)he lives of the richest people in the most prosperous parts of
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.- Paul Willcocks discusses British Columbia’s two-tiered education system and the role it plays in exacerbating inequality – which is well worth keeping in mind as Saskatchewan deals with the fallout f…
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Noah Smith writes that the renewable energy revolution is further along than was projected just a few years ago: Each of these trends — cheaper batteries and cheaper solar electricity — is good on its own, and on the margin will help to
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