Adam Smith Institute blog

Ten reasons why the Left should like the ASI, 9: Choice

sally — Sat, 18 May 2013 23:00:01 +0000

The Left ought to support our campaigns to put power over these services into the hands of the people who use them.

More on the ultimatum game

tim — Sat, 18 May 2013 06:00:30 +0000

A few days back I mused, almost as an afterthought, on whether the ultimatum game would be played the same way in all human societies. This is the game where player 1 gets to split $100, player 2 decidding whether or not to accept the split. If the division, 50/50, 60/40, 99/1, whatever, is accepted then both players get their money. If it's rejected, then neither gets any.

Ten reasons why the Left should like the ASI, 8: Immigration

sally — Fri, 17 May 2013 23:15:00 +0000

The Left, traditionally supportive of immigration, should admire the ASI's stance in consistently arguing that the UK benefits by welcoming immigrants to our shores.

An end to zombie politics 6: Broadcasting

sally — Fri, 17 May 2013 22:50:00 +0000

The government needs revenues and holds too many assets on its books. In future blogs, I will return to its holdings in finance and healthcare. For the time being, let’s look at its involvement in media, specifically broadcasting.

23 Things We're Telling You About Capitalism IX

tim — Fri, 17 May 2013 06:00:30 +0000

The ninth thing we're told is that even though manufacturing is becoming a smaller part of our economy, of all economies, it's still very important oh yes indeed it is! There's a certain sadness in watching the argument develop in this chapter in fact.

Chart of the week: US personal income and expenditure

sally — Thu, 16 May 2013 23:01:01 +0000

Summary: US household spending is holding up

What the chart shows: The chart shows the % change in US personal income and expenditure in nominal terms in the most recent three months (January-March 2013) compared with the previous three months (October-December 2012)

The debt and deficit cost of political policies

sally — Thu, 16 May 2013 23:01:01 +0000

UK Conservative Party Co-Chairman Grant Shapps MP has started "deficit alerts" on his Twitter account whenever a Labour politician appears on television to demand more spending on this or that. Here is a sample:

@grantshapps: "Deficit Alert! Ed Balls calls for £16.5bn more borrowing "this year" on #Murnaghan - same old Labour answer would mean soaring interest rates."

I am glad that politicians should be so focused on the debt and deficit implications of public policy. But we need to make it systematic.

Monetary rules vs. central bank discretion

sally — Thu, 16 May 2013 09:03:01 +0000

On Monday I attended a conference in Copenhagen on monetary policy regime change with Lars Christensen of Danske Bank, Sam Bowman, research director here, Anthony J Evans, economics professor at ESCP Europe Business School, and Martin Ågerup, president of Danish liberal think-tank CEPOS, among others. The discussions raised a huge number of interesting ideas, among which was the question of rules vs. discretion in monetary policy. We all agreed that a rule-based system would be a major improvement on the existing system.

23 Things We're Telling You About Capitalism VIII

tim — Thu, 16 May 2013 06:00:30 +0000

In our eighth chapter Chang tells us that as capital is, despite Marxist insistences, national in some manner therefore we should be nationalist about capital. Whether or not we allow Johnny Foreigner to come and invest in our pristine and national economy thus become a political question: the politicians should stroke their beards and ponder upon whether this specific capital is going to do the right thing in our specific economy.

Oil price fixing – who the European Commission should question

sally — Wed, 15 May 2013 09:56:19 +0000

The European Commission has launched an investigation into oil prices. They suspect that prices may have been artificially inflated in order to swindle motorists out of their cash.