Meta and educational resources
Welcome to the /econ/ board.If you have any educational resources, banners, flags, CSS suggestions, or other topics related to the board itself, post in this thread. I will not delete threads relating to the board itself that are not in the meta as long as there are not too many in the catalog.
If you want to learn more about economics:
https://www.khanacademy.org/economics-finance-domain/macroeconomics
https://www.khanacademy.org/economics-finance-domain/microeconomics
MIT Lectures on economics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vss3nofHpZI&list=PLD10630DEA5E7466A
Yale lectures on Game Theory
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL6EF60E1027E1A10B
Free Minds and Free Markets
Milton Friedman is one of the people who inspired me to learn more about economics. He makes it interesting, and the ideas he holds are as relevant today as they were when he was still alive.Who inspired you to learn about economics?
Political Compass
If you're in the green you're 16 and have no reason to be here
Paul Krugman Hate
What does /econ/ think of Paul Krugman? Anytime I usually see him mentioned on 8chan, it's people shitting on him.If you hate him, can you give a specific reason why?
should a politician study economics or leave that to someone else? i can't imagine world leaders studying economics instead of politics and history - so that is why i wonder if people like hitler, stalin, obama, bush, sadaam hussein, roosevelt and others sat down studying economics instead of having an adviser.
Hello, since the amount of active users on /econ/ has shot up a lot since I've started advertising it, I would like to get a general idea of the views of the users on this board.
1. Where do you stand economically and why? (Socialist, Anarchist, Monetarist, Keynesian, Austrian, etc.)
2. What kinds of /econ/ threads would like to see more of or enjoy the most? (debate threads, news threads, shitposting threads etc.)
3. What do you think sucks about the board right now, policy or post quality wise?
Also I was thinking of some policy changes and would like some feedback.
1. This board was intended for general economics discussion and was not made for more specific things like starting a business or how to get invested into stocks, resume advice, etc, like halfchan /biz/. I was wondering if it should be more inclusive to these things and act as 8chan's equivilant to /biz/ (since 8chan's /biz/ board has barely any users and is almost dead) or if I should just advertise 8chan's /biz/ board in the announcements.
2. Should I unsticky the Meta? I feel it clogs up space at the top and was thinking about just pasting the educational resources in a pastebin and linking them in the announcements section.
hello
this is my first time on this board and I just came to ask a noob question since asking google did not give me a succinct answer
Does tax-free activity add to the GDP?
Do you expect another crisis like in 2008, /econ/?
Post-Keynesian Economics
This is a thread about Steve Keen and other Post-Keynesian economics/economists.
Anyone else up on these guys and the baseness of their positions, models, predictions, and so forth?
Also, Post-Keynesian flag when?
Commie (mainly Soviet) PDFs
Hey, I figure some people here would be interested in at least glancing at these books. They're literally communist works having to do with economics.
First up, an analysis of the origins of American capitalism: https://archive.org/details/AmericanCapitalism16071800
Second, an overview of Soviet economic history by a commie academic up to 1948: https://archive.org/details/SovietEconomicDevelopmentSince1917
A reform-minded Soviet economist discusses capitalism in the 1960s: https://archive.org/details/PoliticoEconomicProblemsOfCapitalism
A North Korean book on the country's agrarian reforms of the 1940s and 50s: https://archive.org/details/TheHistoricalExperienceOfTheAgrarianReformInOurCountry
And of course no commie list would be complete with books about how imperialism works:
* https://archive.org/details/LogicOfImperialism
* https://archive.org/details/NeocolonialismMethodsAndManoeuvres
* https://archive.org/details/TheOverseasExpansionOfCapital
And finally, three Soviet compilations of Lenin's writings:
* https://archive.org/details/QuestionsOfTheSocialistOrganisationOfTheEconomy
* https://archive.org/details/OnWorkersControlAndTheNationalisationOfIndustry
* https://archive.org/details/OnStateCapitalismDuringTheTransitionToSocialism
BOOM! Russia, China to Create Entirely Different Gold Market!
Russia, China to Create Entirely Different Gold Market
While key Western banks are artificially restraining gold prices to breathe life into the diluted and devalued dollar system, Russia, China and other emerging economies are involved in "the genial move" to establish an entirely different gold market, F. William Engdahl underscores.
Key central banks, particularly the Federal Reserve and Bank of England, and Western market players have long been accused of clandestine gold price manipulating aimed at preserving the dollar's role "as world reserve currency primus," American-German economic researcher and historian F. William Engdahl writes.
"The COMEX gold futures market in New York and the Over-the-Counter (OTC) trades cleared through the London Bullion Market Association do set prices which are followed most widely in the world. They are also markets dominated by a handful of huge players, the six London Bullion Market Association gold clearing banks — the corrupt JP MorganChase bank; the scandal-ridden UBS bank of Zurich; The Bank of Nova Scotia — ScotiaMocatta, the world's oldest bullion bank which began as banker to the British East India Company, the group that ran the China Opium Wars; the scandal-ridden Deutsche Bank; the scandal-ridden Barclays Bank of London; HSBC of London, the house bank of the Mexican drug cartels; and the scandal and fraud-ridden Societe Generale of Paris," Engdahl narrated.
Furthermore, Western banks are issuing numerous paper "gold-futures" and other speculative contracts which are in fact disconnected from real physical gold.
In a word, operations with the precious metal in London and New York are in questionable hands, the economic researcher noted.
The West's ultimate goal is to preserve the dollar's monopoly in the market thus breathing life into the US-led global financial system. But no one likes monopolists.
Predictably, the current state of affairs cannot satisfy rising economies, such as China, Russia and other emerging powers.
However, "[r]ather than scream and cry 'fraud' at the owners of the COMEX/CME or the London Bullion Market Association Big Six clearing banks, these countries are involved in the genial move to create an entirely different gold market, one that not JP MorganChase or HSBC or Deutsche Bank control, but one that China, Russia and others of a like mind control," Engdahl stressed.
This new approach is connected closely with the China-led New Silk Road project and the Shanghai-based Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
In May 2015 Beijing announced it had established a state-run gold investment fund, aiming to bolster China's role in global gold trade. The new initiative is a part of China's ambitious One Belt and One Road plan. The "Silk Road Gold Fund" will invest in mining projects in the regions along the New Silk Road encouraging central banks of its members to increase their holdings in the precious metal.
"As China has expressed it, the aim is to enable the Eurasian countries along the Silk Road to increase the gold backing of their currencies. That sounds very much like some clear-thinking and far-sighted governments are thinking of creating a stable group of gold backed currencies that would facilitate orderly trade free from Washington currency wars," the economic researcher elaborated.
RONPAULRONPAULRONPAULRONPAULRONPAULRONPAUL
KIKES
MUH SHEKELS
>>>/texas/ here, wanting to wish all of you at /econ/ a happy Texas independence day. In celebration, here's an interesting article I saw an forbes:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/johntamny/2015/03/01/why-robots-will-be-the-biggest-job-creators-in-history/
As robots increasingly adopt human qualities, including those that allow them to replace actual human labor, economists are starting to worry. As the Wall Street Journal reported last week, some “wonder if automation technology is near a tipping point, when machines finally master traits that have kept human workers irreplaceable.”
The fears of economists, politicians and workers themselves are way overdone. They should embrace the rise of robots precisely because they love job creation. As my upcoming book Popular Economics points out with regularity, abundant job creation is always and everywhere the happy result of technological advances that tautologically lead to job destruction.
Robots will ultimately be the biggest job creators simply because aggressive automation will free us up to do new work by virtue of it erasing toil that was once essential. Lest we forget, there was a time in American history when just about everyone worked whether they wanted to or not — on farms — just to survive. Thank goodness technology destroyed lots of agricultural work that freed Americans up to pursue a wide range of vocations off the farm.
With their evolution as labor inputs, robots bring the promise of new forms of work that will have us marveling at labor we wasted in the past, and that will make past job destroyers like wind, water, the cotton gin, the car, the internet and the computer seem small by comparison. All the previously mentioned advances made lots of work redundant, but far from forcing us into breadlines, the destruction of certain forms of work occurred alongside the creation of totally new ways to earn a living. Robots promise a beautiful multiple of the same.
To understand why, we need to first remember that what is saved on labor redounds to increased capital availability for new ideas. Jobs aren’t finite; rather they’re the result of investment. For every Google, Amazon or Apple Inc. there are tens of thousands of failed entrepreneurial attempts to be like one of the aforementioned giants (all three are major employers), but in order for entrepreneurs to make big experimental leaps, they must first have the capital to do so. The profit-enhancing efficiencies that robots personify (even to their most ardent critics) foretell a massive surge of investment that will gift us with all sorts of new companies and technological advances that promise the invention of new kinds of work previously unimagined.
There are quite simply no companies and no jobs without investment first, and the investors whose capital creates companies and jobs are attracted to profits. If they live up to their labor-saving billing, robots will generate massive profits that will lure even more investment into the companies and ideas of the future.
The above is what is too often missed by economists, politicians and pundits. Far too many view economic growth through the prism of jobs created. This gets it 100% percent backwards. If growth and prosperity were about job formation the solution would be simple: abolish tractors, cars, ATMs, light bulbs, and the internet. If so, everyone would be working, but life would be marked by unrelenting drudgery.
In truth, economic growth is about production. It’s about producing more with less. Thank goodness for it. In the world’s poorest and most backward countries seemingly everyone works all day and every day. But in the U.S. and other economically advanced countries that have embraced the robot-equivalents of the past, kids are free to enjoy childhood, the elderly are able to enjoy retirement, plus mothers and fathers get to devote more of their time to watching their kids grow up. All of the latter is due to labor-saving advances throughout history that have showered us with staggering abundance for less and less in the way of labor inputs. Robots once again signal more of this wondrous same…
>tfw french
>libertarianism don't exist here
>why even vote
Walmart to raise wages to 9 dollar minimum
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/20/business/walmart-q4-earnings.html?_r=0Buffeted by a tightening job market, high employee turnover and scrutiny of its labor practices, Walmart, the largest private employer in the country, said on Thursday that it would increase wages for a half-million employees.
The retail giant, which for years has been the target of widespread criticism over its low pay structure and increasing reliance on part-time workers, said that all of its United States workers would earn at least $9 an hour by April.
While the company said about 40 percent of its work force, or 500,000 people including those at the wholesale Sam’s Club outlets, would be affected, many of those raises will amount to much less than a dollar an hour more. A mere 6,000 employees receive the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour. Its part-time force already earns an average wage of $9.48, and full-timers an average of $12.85.
Continue reading the main story
Related Coverage
In November 2013, Pedro Taverna took part in a protest for better wages outside a Walmart in Los Angeles.
Income Inequality: As Walmart Gives Raises, Other Employers May Have to Go Above Minimum WageFEB. 19, 2015
Protesters outside a Walmart in Washington were among the thousands who demonstrated against the retailer on Friday.
On Black Friday, Walmart Is Pressed for Wage IncreasesNOV. 28, 2014
Customers at a Walmart in Qingdao, China. Net sales at Walmart’s international business grew 1.7 percent in the last quarter.
After a Bump in Sales, Walmart Braces for a Competitive Holiday Season NOV. 13, 2014
“Walmart has been in labor disputes for years now, and people have been waiting to see when the shoe is going to drop,” said Calvin Silva, retail analyst at Nasdaq. “They realized that they were seeing some of the highest turnover for employees compared to the rest of the industry.”
Walmart lags major retailers like Gap and Ikea, which have taken steps recently to set hourly wages at or above the $9 level, in an effort to reduce turnover and attract more lower-wage workers. Even those higher pay scales fall short of compensation offered by the likes of Costco, known to offer wages closer to $20 an hour, or the Container Store.
But Walmart’s move could force other major retailers like Target and Home Depot to follow suit. “Wage increases could be imminent for other companies,” said Oliver Chen, retail analyst at Cowen & Company in New York.
Highest percent of people not participating in workforce since 1978
http://rt.com/usa/238697-americans-labor-jobs-report/pic not related
The number of Americans aged 16 and older not participating in the labor force hit 92,898,000 in February, tying December’s record, according to data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
Over the longer trend, the labor force participation rate was between 62.9 percent and 62.7 percent from April 2014 through February, and has been hovering around 62.9 percent or lower in 13 of the 17 months since October 2013, the BLS data revealed.
To put it another way, when President Obama took office in January 2009, there were 80,529,000 Americans who were not participating in the workforce, which means that 12,369,000 US citizens have left the workforce since then.
Silvio Gesell: free money
What do you think of this?http://sozialoekonomie.info/Info_Foreign_Languages/English_1/english_1.html
>In his main work, Die Natürliche Wirtschaftsordnung durch Freiland und Freigeld (The Natural Economic Order through Free and and Free Money), published in Berlin and Bern in 1916, Gesell explained in detail how the supply and demand of capital would be balanced in the case of uninterrupted currency circulation so that a reduction of the real rate of interest below the presently existing barrier of around 3-4% would become possible. Gesell used the term "basic interest" (Urzins) to denote this pure monetary interest rate of around 3-4% which is found to vary little historically. It represents the tribute of the working people to the power of money and gives rise to levels of unearned income far in excess of that suggested by its magnitude. Gesell predicted that his proposed currency reform would gradually cause the "basic interest" component to disappear from the monetary loan rate leaving only a risk premium and an administrative charge to allow lending institutions to cover their costs. Fluctuations of the market rate of interest around a new equilibrium point close to zero would allow a more effectively decentralised channeling of savings into appropriate investments. Free Money (Freigeld), a medium of exchange liberated from the historical tribute of "basic interest", would be neutral in its impact on distribution and could no longer influence the nature and extent of production to the disadvantage of producers and consumers. Gesell envisaged that access to the complete proceeds of labour brought about by the elimination of "basic interest" would enable large sections of the population to give up wage- and salary-oriented employment and to work in a more autonomous manner in private and cooperative business organisations.
An interesting study
http://www.peterleeson.com/An-arrgh-chy.pdfIt's about the laws and economics of pirates.
Some excerpts:
Several important features stand out from these examples of pirate
articles. First, they created a democratic form of governance and ex-
plicitly laid out the terms of pirate compensation. This was to clarify
the status of property rights aboard pirate ships and to prevent officers,
such as the captain or quartermaster, from preying on crew members.
In particular, making the terms of compensation explicit helped to cir-
cumscribe the quartermaster’s authority in dividing booty.
Third, pirate constitutions contained articles that provided incentives
for crew member productivity and prevented shirking. One manifes-
tation of this was their creation of social insurance for pirates injured
during battle. As in the examples from Exquemelin and Roberts above,
articles specified in detail what a lost arm was worth, a lost leg, and so
on. They even went as far as to assign different insurance values de-
pending on whether it was, for instance, the right or left appendage
that was mutilated or lost, according to the importance pirates assigned
to these body parts.
Another manifestation of these incentive provisions was the use of
bonuses for crew members who displayed particular courage in battle,
were the first to spot potential targets, and so forth. Because pirate crews
were large, quartermasters could not easily monitor individual pirates’
effort. As I discuss below, this is why pirates used profit sharing rather
than fixed wages for payment.
The problem with a share system is that it can create incentives for
free riding. Further, one team member’s laziness directly reduces the
income of the others. To deal with this, pirates, like privateers and
whalers, who also used a share system, created bonuses. According to
the rule aboard Exquemelin’s buccaneering vessel, for instance, “Those
who behaved courageously and performed any deed of extraordinary
valour, or captured a ship, should be rewarded out of the common
plunder” (1678, 156). Or, as Johnson records, “It must be observed,
they [pirates] keep a good Look-out; for, according to their Articles, he
who first espies a Sail, if she proves a Prize, is entitled the best Pair of
Pistols on board, over and above his Dividend” (1726–28, 191).
Finally, pirate articles stipulated punishments for failure to adhere to
their rules. As discussed above, for more minor infractions, crews typ-
ically delegated punishment power to the ship’s democratically elected
quartermaster. As Johnson described it, the quartermaster “acts as a Sort
of civil Magistrate on board a Pyrate Ship” (1726–28, 213).
BITCOIN
>inb4 "how do I bitcoin mining?"This is something else:
I sort of understand the basics of the Bitcoin system from the monetary view point, but I would really want to know more about it. Any econ lurker willing to take me deeper (no homo) into the Bitcoin scheme? pleasethankyou.
I have 3 specific questions:
1. How come the federal government doesn't crack down on it? Isn't it counterfeit money? Like the liberty dollar? Yay or nay, why?
2.How do people calculate Bitcoin parity? Being deregulated and marginally used, how are the ups and downs on its value calculated?
3. Is it only me or the whole thing seems extremely fishy?
Job fair at /econ/
Hey guys, looking for some advice on future stuff. I was looking into investment banking, because of the cash, but then i realized the hourly is piss poor because you're typically working 100 hour weeks and i'm not into that. I have no motivation for a job, main goal is money and i seem to pick up things quickly so i can probably migrate to something better. My college is paid for thanks to my psychiatrist grandfather so if you had a choice to be anything you wanted to be, what would it be? (Ithaca is most likely the college i'm going to, so if that helps with the job search i figured id include it) (also, sorry this is poorly written, house of cards is distracting me)
This board has so much potential and yet it's completely dead
Can we start advertising on /pol/ /news+/ etc? because I think this could be really great
/int/ GET
Congratz on the 100 posts anons. Keep the economy stronk .
What are the poorest American states?
According to the official poverty measure, the states with the highest percentage of people in poverty in the 2011-2013 period were:1. New Mexico: 21.5%
2. Mississippi: 20.7%
3. Louisiana: 20.6%
4. Arizona: 18.9%
5. Arkansas: 18.7%
6. Kentucky: 18.1%
7. Tennessee: 17.8%
8. Georgia: 17.6%
9. West Virginia: 17.4%
10. South Carolina: 17.3%
The regions with the highest percentage of people in poverty, regions being defined by the U.S census Bureau, are:
1. The South: 16.2%
2. The West: 14.8%
3. The Midwest: 13.0%
4. The Northeast: 12.8%
Unfortunately, the Official Poverty Measure used in the United States is flawed. The U.S. has developed a much more accurate way to track poverty, called the supplemental poverty measure.
The supplemental poverty measure was created due to criticisms of the official poverty measure's methodology and to see how well welfare helps the poor. The SPM is just an additional statistic to help understand poverty on a macroeconomic level and is not used to determine welfare benefits. The SPM takes these into account:
Cost of living, state by state.
Snap Benefits
Medical Expenses
Housing Subsidies
Recipients of the free school lunch program
There are more but I don't feel like listing them all here.
The states with the highest amount of people in poverty for 2011-2013 under the supplemental Poverty Measure are:
1. California: 23.4% +
2. Nevada: 20.0% +
3. Florida: 19.1% +
4. Arizona: 19.0% +
5. Hawaii: 18.4% +
6. Louisiana: 18.3% -
7. New York: 17.5% +
7. Georgia: 17.5% -
8. South Carolina: 16.4% -
9. Arkansas: 16.1% -
10. New Mexico: 16.0% -
A + indicates that a state's SPM is greater than the official statistic, while a - indicates taht it is lower.
Poorest percentage of people by region using SPM:
1. The West: 18.7% +
2. The South: 15.9% -
3. The Northeast: 14.3% +
4. The Midwest: 12.5% -
I hope this has been educational.
How well does /econ/ understand opportunity cost?
You won a free ticket to see a Beatles concert (which has no resale value). The Rolling Stones are performing on the same night and is your next-best alternative activity. Tickets to see the Rolling Stones cost $40. On any given day, you would be willing to pay up to $50 to see Rolling Stones. Assume there are no other costs of seeing either performer. Based on this information, what is the opportunity cost of seeing the Beatles?A) $0
B) $10
C) $40
D) $50
Keep in mind, even real economists get this question wrong. I changed the name of the bands playing so you can't easily look up the answer.
Re-enabling /pol/ style flags
I was gonna do these later in the week, but I decided to go ahead and experiment with /pol/ style flags. I will continue to keep the flags unless I feel they cause threads to become to circlejerky or lower thread quality in some other way. If you wanna suggest a new flag, do so in this thread or in the Meta thread.Also, thanks to the anon on >>>/boards/ who made pic-related so I wouldn't have to go hunting for flags on google images.
So I noticed there is no flag for gift economists
Do you faggots even economy?
MMT vs. Austrian School Debate
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cUTLCDBONok>Modern Monetary Theory vs. Austrian School Debate
Austridork gets his buttslaped
Worker Co-ops
What does /econ/ think of Worker Co-ops?
Bad Economics thread
Post stuff about random retards failing to understand the economy.Pic here is of a Portlander saying the city should put price controls on Uber and taxi services. He also believes that there is a libertarian elite trying to infect the city and his friend says that Portland needs real leftists in their government.
What economics blogs/podcasts/youtube channels do you guys like?
PEANUTTTS
>thousands of peanuts to make 1 peanut butter jar that costs like $3>a hundred peanuts in a bag
>costs the same
what
Unemployment
Why doesn't the news media report the u6 unemployment rating in America?http://portalseven.com/employment/unemployment_rate_u6.jsp
Do the reporters only trust the u3(official unemployment rating)? Do they not know? Is there actually a good reason for not reporting the u6? Is it because of the jews?
Minimum Wage
This is a recent study on the effects of minimum wage of the economy. Here is a short description of the study.>Over a hundred economic studies that say increases in minimum wage results in little to no job loss.
>Supporters of minimum wage increase use these studies as evidence for a need to increase the minimum wage.
>Supporters say that it helps poor families living on minimum wage.
>Study decides to make a simulation of what would happen if the minimum wage increase by Bill Clinton in the late 90s using information from a good chunk of these studies.
>Study finds that if no jobs are lost, minimum wage hikes results in increased prices for goods poor people usually buy.
>The total increase of the prices of the goods poor families usually buy is more than what they receive from welfare benefits .
>This means that minimum wage is hurting poor families, contrary to what advocates of the minimum wage say.
>Minimum wage acts like a regressive tax.
There is also other, more nuanced stuff in the paper you should check out. It's only 52 pages and a lot of that is references.
New EP, Selling for Bitcoin
Hey if you guys dig experimental music, and you do the whole bitcoin thing, I'm selling an EP check it out if you want. :)http://ruusticofficial.blogspot.com/
Critiques of Misesian Methodolgy, Praxeology
Has there been any responses to this?http://socialdemocracy21stcentury.blogspot.se/2010/10/mises-praxeology-critique.html