Utopia, you are standing in it!

Language

One of the most obvious effects of the conquest was the introduction of Anglo-Norman, a northern dialect of Old French with limited Nordic influences, as the language of the ruling classes in England, displacing Old English. Norman French words entered the English language, and a further sign of the shift was the usage of names common in France instead of Anglo-Saxon names. Male names such as William, Robert, and Richard soon became common; female names changed more slowly.

The Norman invasion had little impact on placenames, which had changed significantly after earlier Scandinavian invasions. It is not known precisely how much English the Norman invaders learned, nor how much the knowledge of Norman French spread among the lower classes, but the demands of trade and basic communication probably meant that at least some of the Normans and native English were bilingual. Nevertheless, William the Conqueror never developed a working…

Seeing babies in incubators nowadays is a fairly common sight.

Infant incubators are used to provide a warm environment for babies born prematurely or for other infants who are unable to maintain a normal body temperature. The infant incubator is a relatively small, glass-walled box that may have portholes fitted with long rubber gloves through which nurses can handle and care for the infant. Most infant incubators are fitted with special devices that can control the concentration of oxygen inside the incubator; this is necessary because some infants need either greater or lesser amounts of oxygen owing to particular diseases they may have. Infant incubators also regulate the humidity inside the enclosure.

The concept of the incubator was developed in France as early as 1857. The first device in the USA was built by William Champion Deming at the State Emigrant Hospital on Ward’s Island, New York.

The device was…

The Imperial title

Another aspect of examining the origins of the Holy Roman Empire is to examine the history of the Imperial title itself. In other words, the history of the title gives us some understanding of the history of the empire itself.

The Holy Roman Emperor’s standard designation was simply, originally and officially “August Emperor of the Romans.” In Latin this was translated as “Romanorum Imperator Augustus.” In native German the title was translated as Kaiser der Römer.

Let me expand on this a little further. In German-language historiography, the term Römisch-Deutscher Kaiser (“Roman-German Emperor”) is used to distinguish the title from that of Roman Emperor on one hand, and that of German Emperor (Deutscher Kaiser) on the other, the title held by the Hohenzollern Emperors from 1871 until 1918.

The English term “Holy Roman Emperor” is modern shorthand for “Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire” and not corresponding…

In my fantasy country of Libertaria, there is no Department of Labor, no regulation of employment contracts between consenting adults, and no favoritism for either labor or management.

In the real world, the relevant question is the degree of regulation and intervention. Especially compared to other nations, which is why the the Employment Flexibility Index is a useful measuring stick.

The Employment Flexibility Index is a quantitative comparison of regulatory policies on employment regulation in EU and OECD countries. …Higher values of the Employment Flexibility Index reflect more flexible labor regulations.

The good news, for American workers and American companies, is that the United States has the second-best system among developed nations, trailing only Denmark (another reason why pro-market people should appreciate that Scandinavian nation).

It’s hardly a surprise that France is in last place, notwithstanding President Macron’s attempt to push policy in the right direction.

It’s worth…

Next week MPs debate the government’s bill to repeal the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011. One argument frequently deployed for scrapping the Act is that it generated gridlock over Brexit. But, Meg Russell argues, no clear counterfactual to support this claim has ever been presented. In fact, when considering the possible scenarios, it seems likely that the situation would have been made worse, not better, had the Prime Minister retained an untrammelled prerogative power to dissolve parliament in 2017–19.

Next week MPs debate the remaining stages of the Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill, which seeks to repeal the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 (FTPA). It proposes to reinstate the pre-FTPA position, whereby the Prime Minister would effectively control general election timing using prerogative power. A key argument deployed by those seeking repeal of the FTPA is that it helped to cause the Brexit deadlock of 2019: that the FTPA, as…

John Cochrane has written a long essay in National Review called ‘Climate Policy Should Pay More Attention to Climate Economics’ with a subtitle of ‘Without numbers, we will follow fashion.’

The article is beautifully written, hardly a single one of the 3,500 words is wasted. In arguing for economics in climate policy, Cochrane covers many of the major ideas for thinking about how to reduce emissions. The article is comprehensive enough to be a framework.

In this post, I attempt to distil the main ideas in Cochrane’s article.

To avoid doubt, Cochrane (and I) believe climate change is real and is a problem which justifies a policy response. He disputes none of the climate science. He takes the findings from science as given and thinks about the consequences for climate policies. He highlights the harmful mismatch between scientific findings and popular rhetoric on climate.

Most of the following…

Taxi Driver (1976) Director: Martin Scorsese

“You talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me? Well, then who the hell else are you talking – You talking to me? Well, I’m the only one here.“

★★★★☆

In a depraved, morally ambiguous, post-Vietnam War New York City we are introduced to Travis Bickle (Robert De Niro), a veteran suffering from PTSD. He is isolated, lonely, empty, likely racist, and an insomniac -he visits porn shops and takes a job driving a taxi. We see him perhaps akin to a Holden Caulfield-esque character. Everywhere he goes in a busy world of urban decay he is surrounded by people but fundamentally he is alone. An odd mix of passengers ride in his taxi, including Director Martin Scorsese himself, who plays a vengeful husband planning to kill his wife. Travis also meets a charismatic politician named Senator Palantine, and…

How the Irish Saved Civilization was a bestselling book in the mid-1990s.

Today, we’re going to consider an updated version, focusing on whether Ireland can save the world economy from Joe Biden’s plan for a global tax cartel.

This should be a slam-dunk issue. Ireland transformed itself from “The Sick Man of Europe” to the “Celtic Tiger” in part by adopting a 12.5 percent corporate tax rate.

How much of a tiger? Look at this data comparing per-capita gross domestic product in Ireland and France.

For what it’s worth, the Maddison data on gross domestic product makes Ireland look richer than it actually is (a result driven by largely by all the corporate activity).

So I also used World Bank data on gross national income to create a chart that tells a similar story, but with numbers that presumably are a closer match to actual economic conditions.

The bottom…

The news that the number of people working on zero-hours contracts has risen to a new record high has prompted fresh calls for a ban. If you’re employed on one of these contracts and like it, tough. How on earth did we come to this?

To recap, a ‘zero-hours contract’ is simply a form of employment that does not guarantee a certain amount of work every week. Casual labour is of course nothing new, and at least part of the longer-term growth in the number of people saying they are on ‘zero-hours contracts’ probably reflects increased familiarity with the new term.

This flexibility is good for employers because it allows them to match supply to fluctuating demand, especially in sectors such as health and social work, education, hospitality, or delivery driving, where demand can be erratic.

However, this flexibility is also welcomed by many employees. People do not have…

By the time of Emperor Diocletian (r. 284–305), the idea that the Roman Empire had grown so large that it would be better managed by two co-ruling emperors, rather than one, had become established. After various divisions were made throughout the 4th century, the empire was firmly and permanently divided into a western and eastern sphere of imperial administration from the death of emperor Theodosius I (r. 379–395) in 395 onwards.

Though modern historians typically use the terms Western Roman Empire and Eastern Roman Empire to describe the new political situation, the Romans themselves never considered the empire to have been formally divided, still viewing it as a single unit, although most often having two rulers rather than one. Over the course of the 5th century, the western empire experienced a period of catastrophic decline. Not only were many of the rulers in the west generally lacking in competence, but…