by cactus I spent last week on a floating buffet. I had never been on a cruise before, and I was pleasantly surprised. The service was amazing, though I’m not sure having someone make the beds twice a day isn’t overkill. The food, in general, was quite good. Even the buffet had great fare, though […]

rdan Several other conferences are happening elsewhere in the world, but with less fanfare than in Pittsburgh, both in media coverage and police activity. We do forget the ‘smaller’ issues of distibution of goods, so here is a reminder. How to target the poor? How can governments and aid agencies target the poorest? Some use […]

rdan Chris Blattman has an interesting note reminding us of how US elections were done and offers a little consolation about elections in Afghanistan.

Once of the things that was clear at CGI this week is that the power companies that have looked into alternative energy sources have quickly realised they are not only good publicity but profitable (i.e., lower cost when used to scale). Florida Power & Light (discussed here) expanded an already major commitment, mostly in FL […]

by Bruce Webb Balt Sun: Obama picks Carolyn Colvin for SSA Deputy President Barack Obama has chosen Carolyn W. Colvin of Maryland to be deputy commissioner of Social Security, the White House announced Thursday. Currently special assistant to Maryland’s transportation secretary, Colvin was Montgomery County Health and Human Services director until her dismissal by newly […]

Once Again, D-Squared Explains It All: [T]he Big Mac Index can plausibly claim to be the major methodological forerunner of Freakonomics, as it combines the two methodological techniques of choosing “quirky” instruments more valuable for their amusement value than their validity, and not checking anything to see whether it’s economically meaningful. I’m not certain that […]

Probably I accept elimination of the rule that financial companies must offer plain vanilla products for a different reason, since he isn’t as ignorant as I am, but I would think that with a plain vanilly requirement, banks would offer plain vanilla products on terrible terrible terms. 30 year mortgage OK but the interest rate […]

by Rebecca Neal Soss and Henry Mo at Credit Suisse published a very interesting article, “Where is full employment in a more volatile macroeconomy?”, where they argue that the natural (long run) rate of unemployment may be shifting (they do this by showing that the Beveridge curve, which plots the the job vacancy rate against […]