Greed and Capitalism

What kind of society isn't structured on greed? The problem of social organization is how to set up an arrangement under which greed will do the least harm; capitalism is that kind of a system.
- Milton Friedman

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Recent Nobel Economics Winners

2010: Peter Diamond and Dale Mortensen, U.S., and Christopher Pissarides, a British and Cypriot citizen, for their analysis of markets with search frictions.
2009: Elinor Ostrom and Oliver E. Williamson, for their analysis of economic governance.
2008: Paul Krugman, U.S., for his analysis of trade patterns and location of economic activity.
2007: Leonid Hurwicz, Eric S. Maskin and Roger B. Myerson, U.S., for laying the foundations of mechanism design theory.
2006: Edmund S. Phelps, U.S., for furthering the understanding of the trade-offs between inflation and its effects on unemployment.
2005: Robert J. Aumann, of Israel and the U.S., and American Thomas C. Schelling, for their work in game-theory analysis.
2004: Finn E. Kydland, Norway, and Edward C. Prescott, U.S., for their contribution to dynamic macroeconomics.
2003: Robert F. Engle, United States, and Clive W.J. Granger, Britain, for their use of statistical methods for economic time series.
2002: Daniel Kahneman, United States and Israel, and Vernon L. Smith, U.S., for pioneering the use of psychological and experimental economics in decision-making.
2001: George A. Akerlof, A. Michael Spence and Joseph E. Stiglitz, U.S., for research into how the control of information affects markets.
2000: James J. Heckman and Daniel L. McFadden, U.S., for their work in developing theories to help analyze labor data and how people make work and travel decisions.
1999: Robert A. Mundell, Canada, for innovative analysis of exchange rates that helped lay the intellectual groundwork for Europe's common currency.
1998: Amartya Sen, India, for contributions to welfare economics, which help explain the economic mechanisms underlying famines and poverty.
1997: Robert C. Merton and Myron S. Scholes, U.S., for developing a formula for the valuation of stock options.


Source:

Nobel in economics goes to Sargent, Sims of U.S. - World - CBC News

Nobel in economics goes to Sargent, Sims of U.S. - World - CBC News:

Americans Thomas Sargent and Christopher Sims won the Nobel economics prize on Monday for research that sheds light on the cause-and-effect relationship between the economy and policy instruments such as interest rates and government spending.

Sargent and Sims, both 68, carried out their research independently in the 1970s and '80s, but it is highly relevant today as world governments and central banks seek ways to steer their economies away from another recession.



'via Blog this'

Monday, October 10, 2011

Keep a cautious eye on the Tax Man.



"A government that is big enough to give you all you want is big enough to take it all away."
- Thomas Jefferson



Saturday, October 8, 2011

Gee, where are all the Bankers?




Jailed Protesters but no jailed Perpetrators...

Why Can't We All Just Get Along?

Funny how this sentiment arises over and over but falls on deaf ears.


We can solve many problems in an appropriate way, without any difficulty, if we cultivate harmony, friendship and respect for one another.

Dalai Lama


Friday, October 7, 2011

Its a Mean Old World



WHERE DO WE START TO MAKE THE WORLD A BETTER PLACE?


The place to improve the world is first in one's own heart and head and hands, and then work outward from there."


— Robert M. Pirsig (Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance)





Wall Street Protests Are Growing



"Men., it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one."

- Charles Mackay
Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

If children are considered the future, why the smoking?

For Chinese Students, Smoking Isn’t All Bad - Businessweek:

"In dozens of rural villages in China’s western provinces, one of the first things primary school kids learn is what helps make their education possible: tobacco. The schools are sponsored by local units of China’s state-owned cigarette monopoly, China National Tobacco. “On the gates of these schools you’ll see slogans that say ‘Genius comes from hard work—tobacco helps you become talented,’” says Xu Guihua, secretary general of the Chinese Association on Tobacco Control, a privately funded lobbying group. “They are pinning their hopes on young people taking up smoking.”

Anti-tobacco groups say efforts in China to reduce sales... "

Chinese kids smoking on the outskirts of Shaoyang in Hunan province
'via Blog this'