Deflationary Purges

18th Annual Hayek Lecture

Capitalism 3.0

GAVI's business model
Owen Barder takes issue with the following:GAVI’s business model is based on the expectation that rising demand for immunisation in developing countries induces more companies to produce vaccines, thus creating competition and driving prices down.Whilst I applaud Owen's analysis, I can't help thinking he's missing something. I doubt GAVI have in mind what I'm about to say (and therefore Owen's point is 100% valid), but I think there is a way to reconcile the above statement. The problem is that Owen uses comparative statics to make his case. Whilst the basic laws of supply and de

Derby build up
I'm a fairly pessimistic Evertonian, so my reaction to The Shite's humbling in Hungary is grounded by the expectation that they'll now knock us out of Europe via a dodgy pen. I also approach most derby games with fear, trepidation, and a general feeling of "can't we just get it over with". But then I remember Cahill's piley uppy, AJ's three fingered salute, and

I'm less and less of a foreign aid skeptic
Owen Barder discusses a new paper, and concludes:It is good to have confirmation that the folk regressions are wrong and that aid does, as best we can tell, lead to economic growthAlthough it's an accounting illusion, we'd expect fiscal stimuli to increase measured GDP in the short run. Therefore it's self-defeating for market-oriented economists to deny this empirical association when it comes to foreign aid. The relationship between aid and economic growth must be similar - it'd take some pretty ridiculous multipliers not to see aid money increase growth. I'm sure

Investors.com - Joseph Schumpeter Spoke Out For Capitalism
Peter Boettke, a professor of political economy at George Mason University in Virginia, likens capitalism's success to a horse race. One horse, named Schumpeter, represents innovation. The second horse, called Smith, stands for free trade. The third is government "and its stupid decisions," Boettke said. "As long as the first two horses stay ahead of the stupid horse, the economy's cycles are manageable," he told IBD. "The trouble happens when the stupid horse's nose gets in front by (creating) policies that restrict trade or are anti-technology." via

Beyond the Culture of Discipline « Fourcultures
Caulkins’ approach is to equate the ‘great company’, with its long-termism and its culture of responsibility, with the Egalitarian bias of Cultural Theory. If this is so, Collins could be said to achieve this without at any point scaring American business leaders off by sounding like some kind of cheerleader for socialism. To recognise this strand in American business thinking is to call into question the easy assumption that the typical American approach is Individualist. via fourcultures.com