This interview on the 80,000 Hours podcast with Rachel Glennerster (chief economist at the UK’s Department for International Development and former executive director of J-PAL)… Read More »Recommendation: Rachel Glennerster on Poverty, Global Development, Randomised Controlled Trials and more
On The Inevitability of Inequality Since practical ability differs from person to person, the majority of such abilities, in nearly all societies, is gathered in… Read More »Will and Ariel Durant on Inequality, Redistribution, Revolution and the Nature of Society’s Wealth
No one can escape the transforming fire of machines. Kevin Kelly – New Rules for the New Economy Not all technologies are created equal. Most… Read More »Technology (4): General Purpose Technologies
The Centre for Development and Enterprise (South Africa) has released a great interview with Lant Pritchett focusing on how nations develop. I’ll post a few… Read More »Lant Pritchett: “Schooling ain’t learning; education ain’t investment.”
This photo of crowded living conditions in New York is from an interesting article by Theo Mackey Pollack in The American Conservative. See also: Little… Read More »Not long ago; or, Little by little (6): New York Tenement, 1889
To understand how persistent growth, even accelerating growth is possible, it helps to step back and ask where growth comes from. At the most basic… Read More »Recommendation: Paul Romer on progress, economic growth and combinatorial innovation
Good discussion of the dynamics of transient poverty vs persistent poverty, issues with The System and how hard it is to change, whether education helps,… Read More »Podcast recommendation: Mark Rank and Russ Roberts on poverty in the US (Econtalk)
I came across both of these posts in the last week, and they both highlight the problem of bad legislation. I recommend both – which… Read More »Market Economics: Slate Star Codex on Drugs Vs Chairs and The Grumpy Economist on Paying for Public Toilets
This is an interesting read I came across via Marginal Revolution. It’s a fairly straightforward, non-polemical description of the challenges of being “poor-ish” in the… Read More »Resident Contrarian On the Experience of Being Poor-ish
These were the kings who reigned in Edom before any Israelite king reigned:Bela son of Beor became king of Edom. His city was named Dinhabah.When… Read More »Generations: Tyler Cowen on faith in the future