Brendan's interesting additional economic links :)

[brendan]

Economics of Love, Marriage and Altruism
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Price_Theory/PThy_Chapter_21/PThy_Chap_21.html

[brendan]

Labour Econmics
http://www.gmu.edu/departments/economics/bcaplan/e321/lab2.htm

[brendan]

"There were between 250 and 500 million fewer poor in 2000 than in 1970."
http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/qjec.2006.121.2.351

[brendan]

MEASURING AND EXPLAINING MANAGEMENT
PRACTICES ACROSS FIRMS AND COUNTRIES*
http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/qjec.2007.122.4.1351

We use an innovative survey tool to collect management practice data from
732 medium-sized firms in the United States, France, Germany, and the United
Kingdom. These measures of managerial practice are strongly associated with
firm-level productivity, profitability, Tobin’s Q, and survival rates. Management
practices also display significant cross-country differences, with U.S. firms on average
better managed than European firms, and significant within-country differences,
with a long tail of extremely badly managed firms. We find that poor
management practices are more prevalent when product market competition is
weak and/or when family-owned firms pass management control down to the eldest
sons (primogeniture).

[brendan]

Who is Ben Bernanke?
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/20/magazine/20Ben-Bernanke-t.html?ex=1358226000&en=de87a47b438cbc15&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=all

[brendan]

"New tools needed to make super choices" by Joshua Gans
http://business.theage.com.au/new-tools-needed-to-make-super-choices/20080123-1nr1.html

"Unintended Consequences" by STEPHEN J. DUBNER and STEVEN D. LEVITT
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/20/magazine/20wwln-freak-t.html?_r=3&oref=slogin&ref=magazine&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

[Collin Li]

"Unintended Consequences" by STEPHEN J. DUBNER and STEVEN D. LEVITT
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/20/magazine/20wwln-freak-t.html?_r=3&oref=slogin&ref=magazine&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

Unintended consequences are a part of what makes economics so insightful. Without an understanding of unintended consequences, some of your goals will be unsuccessful without you having any idea why.

A few examples:
* food and drugs regulations (they prevent useful drugs from coming in earlier, indirectly causing deaths - hurts individual responsibility)
* subsidies on housing markets (that are already facing excess demand)
* blowback (military intervention in Middle East provokes ordinary citizens to support terrorist groups that are hell-bent on attacking free countries)

[brendan]

Economics of dating/mating:


http://courses.washington.edu/ssci200/Econ_of_Dating_and_Mating.pdf

[Ren]

Economic Models explained with cows

SOCIALISM
You have 2 cows.
You give one to your neighbour.

COMMUNISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and gives you some milk.

FASCISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and sells you some milk.

NAZISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and shoots you.

BUREAUCRATISM
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both, shoots one, milks the other, and then throws the milk
away…

TRADITIONAL CAPITALISM
You have two cows.
You sell one and buy a bull.
Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows.
You sell them and retire on the income.

AN AMERICAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You sell one, and force the other to produce the milk of four cows.
Later, you hire a consultant to analyse why the cow has dropped dead.

A JAPANESE CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk.
You then create a clever cow cartoon image called ‘Cowkimon’ and market it worldwide.

A GERMAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You re-engineer them so they live for 100 years, eat once a month, and milk themselves.

AN ITALIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows, but you don’t know where they are.
You decide to have lunch.

A RUSSIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You count them and learn you have five cows.
You count them again and learn you have 42 cows.
You count them again and learn you have 2 cows.
You stop counting cows and open another bottle of vodka.

A SWISS CORPORATION
You have 5000 cows. None of them belong to you.
You charge the owners for storing them.

A CHINESE CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You have 300 people milking them.
You claim that you have full employment, and high bovine productivity.
You arrest the newsman who reported the real situation.

AN INDIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
You worship them.

AN IRAQI CORPORATION
Everyone thinks you have lots of cows.
You tell them that you have none.
No-one believes you, so they invade your country.
You still have no cows, but at least now you are part of a Democracy….

AN AUSTRALIAN CORPORATION
You have two cows.
Business seems pretty good.
You close the office and go for a few beers to celebrate



Source: http://rickmccharles.com/?p=2221

[Collin Li]

SOCIALISM
You have 2 cows.
You give one to your neighbour.

This should be:
The government takes 1 from you and gives it to your neighbour.
The total number of cows in the nation decrease.

[brendan]

Sin Taxes
http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2006/04/sin-taxes.html

How distortionary are taxes?
http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2006/11/how-distortionary-are-taxes.html

The invisible hand
http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2006/11/happy-thanksgiving.html

[brendan]

ABS Statistics on Taxation
http://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/[email protected]/0/ACE2B395A8657B91CA256A6800820742?Open

"In 2005-06 taxation per capita was $14,551, an increase of 5.5% from 2004-05."

Total taxation revenue as a proportion of GDP was 30.8% in 2005-06

"Taxes on income totalled $176,194 million in 2005-06 and comprised 59.1% of total taxation revenue for all levels of government. Taxes on the provision of goods and services, including goods and services tax (GST), totalled $75,994 million in 2005-06 and comprised 25.5% of total taxation revenue for all levels of government."

So when people talk about cost of living pressures, why doesn't anyone acknowledge the $14,511 elephant in the room?

[brendan]

Are Tax Cuts Inflationary?

Not necessarily.

If there is a reduction in taxes roughly equal in size to a reduction in government spending then according to simple-minded Keynesian economics, a $1 cut in government spending reduces aggregate expenditure by $1, while a $1 cut in tax payments adds only a fraction of a dollar to spending, the balance being saved which, as every good Keynesian knows, means hoarded under the mattress.
In terms of more sophisticated Keynesian analysis, or simply good economics, savings are not hoarded but are made available to borrowers - either the government or private borrowers, who in turn spend the amount borrowed. Hence, an equal cut in taxes and in spending is neutral in the short run - involving simply a shift from government spending to private spending. In the long run, it is a stimulus - but to output, not inflation. Since that part of private spending that is invested adds to productive capacity and hence to the future supply of goods, it will tend to reduce inflation.

[brendan]

The importance of information for efficient markets:
http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/qjec.122.3.879

[brendan]

Foreign aid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDzjfat3MRc