Published elsewhere: Ontario is no California when it comes to debt
The Toronto Star just published an article I wrote in response to claims made by the Fraser Institute and the Toronto Sun that Ontario has a runaway debt problem worse…
debt
Corporate Cash Stash Surpasses National Debt
Today’s National Balance Sheet Accounts indicate that the amount of cash held by private non-financial corporations in Canada soared from $591 billion in the third quarter of 2013 to $626…
Do High Tuition Fees Make for Good Public Policy?
This afternoon I gave a presentation to Professor Ted Jackson’s graduate seminar course on higher education, taught in Carleton University’s School of Public Policy and Administration. The link to my…
Canada’s Luxury Index is through the roof
Numbers season is over but good inequality data is still missing. January sees us regularly bombarded with a whole range of economic statistics about the previous year. GDP growth: likely…
Does the Left have a corresponding great lie?
Yesterday, I gave a pretty harsh critique on the self contradicting core conservative talking point of cutting debt and taxes to create jobs. What I argued was that if your…
QE: Furthering the habit of privatizing gains and socializing losses
“Privatizing gains and socializing losses” could be the motto for the neoliberal era. Alongside this and “there is no alternative”, few slogans better capture the ideology that has been so…
The Great Conservative Lie
Virtually all incidences of modern Conservatism – Canada and the US, federally, state/provincially and municipally, from politician to politician – has a consistent central theme. Campaign planks comes and go,…
How the Occupy Movement is Enriching People’s Lives
Imagine an eco-community of micro-homes designed as a first step out of homelessness. Housing, easy to get into, if people care. Occupy Madison in Wisconsin has come up with an…
Austerity and the profitability puzzle: government gives profits a helping hand
This is the third and final post in what has become a three-part series on the puzzle of high profitability and low investment in the Canadian economy. In the first…
The rise of Bitcoin: and the challenge to the global domination of big money
The following article was written on October 25. I wanted to read it over once more before publishing it, then got busy with other things and forgot about it. In…
A Canadian housing bubble? Evidence from capital inflows
Warning: A wonky, but thankfully short, post follows. Yesterday, the Naked Capitalism blog reposted some recent research by OECD economist Eduardo Olaberria that looks at the effect of capital inflows…
Debt and Deficit as Shock Therapy » CounterPunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names
Debt and Deficit as Shock Therapy » CounterPunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names. When Naomi Klein published her ground-breaking book The Shock Doctrine (2007), which compellingly demonstrated how neoliberal…
Video: Max Haiven on The Debt of Creativity
Activist and art professor Max Haiven recently delivered a TED talk at TEDxNovaScotia titled “>The Debt of Creativity, in which he elaborates on the ideas he discussed in his essay…
Debt is debt, except when it’s hope
Sometimes Question Period is downright funny. Witness this exchange on the provincial debt between Opposition Leader Danielle Smith and Premier Redford.* Ms Smith: In Medicine Hat earlier this month the…
169 credit cards + $12.50 in change = Indebted States of America
Indebted States of America by Maine artist Eric Leppanen is created with 169 of his own credit cards, collected over the past 23 years, adorned with the 50 U.S. state…
Debt and Democracy
While this was written by Cicero in 44 BCE, after the assassination of Caesar and a year before Antony had Cicero murdered, the sentiment can be heard in today republicans–particularly…
Know your branches of economics
This comic does in one cartoon what the first chapter of Debt, the First 5000 Years does (pretty well) in one chapter. Alltop is a macro-humor generator.
Sell Your Crap. Pay Your Debts. Do What You Love.
This week’s TED Talk features Adam Baker, founder of ManVsDebt, a blog which focuses on a simple message: The first step to living a life of passion and purpose is…
Brazil Restructures Debt With African Countries
Brazil has announced that they will essentially “write off” about $90 million in debt from African nations. This is for helping the countries alleviate their huge levels of debt while…