Author Archives: Yves Smith

Rapid COVID-19 Tests Can Be Useful – But There Are Far Too Few To Put a Dent in the Pandemic

Why Covid antigen tests, which are easy to administer and produce results in less than a half hour, are not a magic bullet.

How Do You Combat Information Overreach?

A shaggy dog story, and a request for reader ideas on how to escape unreasonable requests for personal information.

Are “Net-Zero” Emissions a Smoke Screen?

A wide-ranging, and therefore sobering, discussion of climate change policy, including emissions and temperature targets.

Potential Consequences of Post-Brexit Trade Barriers for Earnings Inequality in the UK

More bad news on the inequality front.

MMT and the EU: A Case for Capturing the Prevailing Narrative

A political economy take on the EU.

Another Blow to Private Equity: “You Can Pick Winners” Again Shown To Be a Fool’s Game

More bad news about private equity returns.

Much of the U.S. Could Be Uninhabitable by 2050

A new report confirms earlier studies that found that climate change will render a lot of the US uninhabitable in a few decades.

Can’t Do America: Kick the Can Approach to Public Pension Fund Crisis, Even Though Canada Cleaned Up Its Mess

Why the US is certain to ignore the Canadian roadmap out of its public pension fund mess….and it’s not just because exceptionalism.

Links 11/28/2020

Covid Profits of Pharmaceutical Monopolies vs Peoples’ Lives

The WTO is set to consider a proposal supported by 99 countries to waive intellectual property protection for Covid treatments.

Spreading Like Wildfire: Luther’s Network and the Early Reformation

How did Martin Luther’s message spread so quickly?

Brexit: HURRY UP PLEASE ITS TIME

Little Brexit motion and less progress as the clock runs.

The Forgotten Thanksgiving

Americans tend to downplay the grim year that preceded the first Thanksgiving.