How the ordering of the world to suit the 1% – also known as plutonomy – has generated long-overdue “populist” pushback.
Recent Items
Saturday, September 20, 2025
Let’s Crush the Woke Plutonomy! An Interview + Review of The Populist’s Guide to 2020: A New Right and New Left are Rising by Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti
Topics: Banana republic, Free markets and their discontents, Guest Post, Income disparity, Politics, Ridiculously obvious scams, Social policy, Social values, The destruction of the middle class
Posted by Yves Smith at 6:50 am | 53 Comments »
US Successfully Planned for the ‘Endless Frontier’ of Science Research in 1945 – Now It’s Time to Plan the Next 75 Years
Influence of Vannevar Bush and the Endless Frontier in Postwar science planning – US science for the next 75 years.
Topics: Doomsday scenarios, Guest Post, Politics, Regulations and regulators, Technology and innovation
Posted by Jerri-Lynn Scofield at 6:25 am | 10 Comments »
Why Our Food Systems Need a Radical Overhaul
Despite ravaging the Earth for industrial agriculture, we can’t provide nourishing food globally. That has to change.
Topics: Doomsday scenarios, Environment, Free markets and their discontents, Guest Post, Income disparity
Posted by Yves Smith at 4:21 am | 41 Comments »
How the National Disaster Medical System (NDMS) Could Help Pay for #COVID-19 Treatment (and Lead to #MedicareForAll)
Some refreshingly lateral thinking….
Topics: Guest Post, Health care, Pandemic, Politics
Posted by Lambert Strether at 4:55 pm | 25 Comments »
2:00PM Water Cooler 3/2/2020
Today’s Water Cooler: Super Tuesday polling, Bloomberg, Biden, Klobuchar out, Sanders, Warren, #COVID-19 and the primaries, Aaron Sorkin, manufacturing, construction, housing, Facebook, Calfornia wildfires, crops and salt, #COVID-19 and the working class, emotional support animals
Topics: Guest Post, Water Cooler
Posted by Lambert Strether at 2:00 pm | 319 Comments »
What Viktor Frankl’s Logotherapy Can Offer in the Anthropocene
Frank: “Man’s search for meaning is the primary motivation in his life and not a ‘secondary rationalisation’ of instinctual drives.”
Topics: Doomsday scenarios, Social values
Posted by Lambert Strether at 10:25 am | 36 Comments »
Links 3/2/2020
Topics: Links
Posted by Lambert Strether at 6:55 am | 307 Comments »
Coronavirus: Bracing for the Economic Shockwave
The coronavirus spread is setting up a nasty real economy-financial system contraction.
Topics: Banking industry, China, Credit cards, Credit markets, Derivatives, Doomsday scenarios, Economic fundamentals, Federal Reserve, Globalization, Macroeconomic policy, Pandemic, Private equity
Posted by Yves Smith at 6:15 am | 180 Comments »
Porkfest! Tallying How Much the Pentagon Really Costs
Yes, sports fans, Pentagon spending is even worse than you imagined.
Topics: Banana republic, Dubious statistics, Guest Post, Politics, Social values, The destruction of the middle class
Posted by Yves Smith at 6:10 am | 27 Comments »
2020’s Plague of Locusts: Updates on Africa and Pakistan (and China)
The plague of locusts in Africa (and Pakistan) is getting worse, and threatens millions with starvation. Solutions are pesticides, biopesticides (but, sadly, not ducks). China’s role is interesting.
Topics: Africa, China, Doomsday scenarios, Environment, Globalization, Guest Post
Posted by Lambert Strether at 2:25 pm | 16 Comments »
Links 3/1/2020
Topics: Guest Post, Links
Posted by Lambert Strether at 6:55 am | 481 Comments »
Why East Germans Are Not Taking Advantage of the Large Wage Gap Between East and West Germany
Reallocating workers to better jobs at their current location could be a more cost-effective avenue to increase aggregate wages, and even accelerate regional convergence
Topics: Europe, Free markets and their discontents, Guest Post, Income disparity, Market inefficiencies
Posted by Lambert Strether at 5:55 am | 35 Comments »
Links 2/29/2020
Topics: Links
Posted by Yves Smith at 6:55 am | 411 Comments »
Housing Insecurity, Homelessness, and Populism: Evidence from the UK
Cutting subsidies for private rental housing did not do much to reduce overall spending or lower rents but caused a lot of pain.
Topics: Dubious statistics, Free markets and their discontents, Guest Post, Income disparity, Politics, Real estate, Social policy, The destruction of the middle class, The dismal science, UK
Posted by Yves Smith at 5:19 am | 14 Comments »
More Than 9 Million People Use Freecycle Instead of Buying New
A bona fide sharing “economy”: Freecycle plans to add a lending and borrowing tool to encourage people to share with friends and neighbors.
Topics: Environment, Free markets and their discontents, Guest Post, Social values, The destruction of the middle class
Posted by Yves Smith at 4:43 am | 29 Comments »