Philanthropy is all too often misunderstood, mis-represented and subject to broad generalisations that obfuscate its potential, particularly in relation to the Global South. As Professor Beth Breeze outlines in her book, In Defence of Philanthropy, “Philanthropy is complex, messy and imperfect because it is an all-too-human response to enduring and intractable problems.” And yet, private capital […]
Read MoreI enjoy writing articles and books that integrate ideas, which resulted in my most recent book Encouraging Innovation: Cognition, Education, and Implementation. The first section of the book discusses the cognitive and social skills required for innovation – reasoning, problem solving, creativity, group decision making, and collaborative problem solving. The second section discusses education – […]
Read MoreIt’s hard to believe, but an increasing number of retirement plans are allowing employees to invest their 401(k) saving in non-conventional assets – including crypto currency funds and meme stocks. On the one hand, limited exposure to esoteric investments can provide some diversification benefits, on the other hand, the investors who are interested in these […]
Read MoreThe federal convictions of two founders of technology companies over the last year has illustrated the fine line between the over-optimism of entrepreneurs who believe they can change the world and the criminal intent to defraud investors. As it has become routine for stock valuations to reflect the future profits that may be generated by […]
Read MoreGlobal debt, public and private, is at record highs! But there is no agreement on whether we should worry about this much. My new Cambridge Element, Debt Sustainability—A Global Challenge” argues that we should care. Debt does not only affect poor countries, but also the largest and richest economies. In many of today’s advanced countries, […]
Read MoreOne of the many flaws of mainstream economics is its systemic allergy to competing paradigms. My book Macroeconomics: An Introduction (2021) treats this problem by providing readers not only with an alternative paradigm but also with a critique of mainstream economics. The alternative paradigm draws on the ideas of Adam Smith, David Ricardo, Karl Marx, […]
Read MoreAfter the extensive support to monetary and financial sectors in the aftermath of the global financial crisis and then during the Covid-19 pandemic, central bankers are now faced with the difficult task of engineering a controlled re-entry to the normal cycle of demand management. As we can all begin to see, the two-year interruption to […]
Read MoreIt is easy to explain why countries with rampant corruption tend to have poor economic performance: corrupt officials steal funds from the economy and steer resources to easy-to-corrupt, wasteful projects. However, it is not easy to explain why some countries achieve high economic growth despite corruption. We offer an explanation: a high level of trust […]
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