~ Today’s Water Cooler ~
Recent Items
Sunday, September 14, 2025
2:00PM Water Cooler 3/17/2021
Topics: Water Cooler
Posted by Lambert Strether at 2:00 pm | 123 Comments »
Legalise It: Prohibition’s Repeal and Its Unintended Impact on Public Health
How the US Prohibition remains widely misunderstood and why that matters.
Topics: Dubious statistics, Free markets and their discontents, Guest Post, Legal, Politics, Regulations and regulators, Social policy
Posted by Yves Smith at 9:55 am | 51 Comments »
Links 3/17/2021
Topics: Links
Posted by Yves Smith at 6:55 am | 126 Comments »
Michael Hudson and Paul Craig Roberts: It Is Time To Remove The Debt Barrier To Economic Growth
Why it’s time for a widespread debt writedown.
Topics: Banking industry, Credit markets, Doomsday scenarios, Economic fundamentals, Free markets and their discontents, Guest Post, Income disparity, Macroeconomic policy, Pandemic, Politics, Real estate, Social policy, The destruction of the middle class
Posted by Yves Smith at 6:15 am | 33 Comments »
Yanis Varoufakis: Draghi’s Outrageous Deployment of McKinsey, Europe’s Predicament, DiEM25’s Proposals
Yanis Varoufakis decries how McKinsey is undermining democracy in a putative first world country, a big step up from South Africa and Saudi Arabia.
Topics: Banana republic, Europe, Free markets and their discontents, Guest Post, Income disparity, The destruction of the middle class
Posted by Yves Smith at 6:14 am | 10 Comments »
The Long Term Damage of Economic Downturns
As the well off sail on, either unaffected by or profiting from Covid’s impact, for many, the economic damage is severe and lasting.
Topics: Banana republic, Doomsday scenarios, Economic fundamentals, Free markets and their discontents, Guest Post, Income disparity, Pandemic, Social values, The destruction of the middle class, The dismal science
Posted by Yves Smith at 5:03 am | 20 Comments »
2:00PM Water Cooler 3/16/2021
~ Today’s Water Cooler ~
Topics: Water Cooler
Posted by Lambert Strether at 2:00 pm | 80 Comments »
Why Would Anyone Buy Crypto Art – Let Alone Spend Millions on What’s Essentially a Link to a JPEG File?
Trying to make sense of crypto art.
Topics: Environment, Global warming, Guest Post, Ridiculously obvious scams, Social values, Technology and innovation
Posted by Yves Smith at 9:55 am | 85 Comments »
Links 3/16/2021
Topics: Links
Posted by Yves Smith at 6:55 am | 142 Comments »
Spain’s Labor Office Hit by Massive Ransomware Attack As Unemployment Hits Four-Year High
The victims of this latest ransomware attack are among the most vulnerable in society — those who have lost their jobs or whose jobs have been furloughed.
Topics: Guest Post
Posted by Nick Corbishley at 6:53 am | 8 Comments »
New York City Lost a Record 631,000 Jobs to the Pandemic in 2020. So What’s Next?
A look at the raw numbers behind the pain of New York City’s biggest economic downturn since the Great Depression.
Topics: Doomsday scenarios, Economic fundamentals, Guest Post, Income disparity, Macroeconomic policy, Pandemic
Posted by Yves Smith at 5:55 am | 12 Comments »
Biden Stimulus Plan Shores Up Weakest Multi-Employer Pension Plans Rather than Taking on Private Equity Abuses
A Biden rescue of the sickest private pension plans goes largely under the radar.
Topics: Economic fundamentals, Free markets and their discontents, Guest Post, Income disparity, Investment management, Pandemic, Politics, Private equity, Regulations and regulators, The destruction of the middle class
Posted by Yves Smith at 4:43 am | 12 Comments »
2:00PM Water Cooler 3/15/2021
~ Today’s Water Cooler ~
Topics: Guest Post, Water Cooler
Posted by Lambert Strether at 2:00 pm | 95 Comments »
Indian Vaccine Manufacturers: U.S. Use of Wartime Export Controls Threatens World Vaccine Production
Will the U.S. relax export controls that threaten global vaccine production? What’s the next step for U.S. vacccine diplomacy?
Topics: Africa, Health care, India, Pandemic, Politics
Posted by Jerri-Lynn Scofield at 12:55 pm | 14 Comments »
Links 3/15/2021
Topics: Guest Post, Links
Posted by Jerri-Lynn Scofield at 6:58 am | 136 Comments »