TweetThis post by Oxford economist J. Zachary Mazlish is very good; I encourage you to read it. (HT David Levey) Nevertheless, there are two points that I think to be worth making in response to Mazlish’s post. I will here make one of these points. I’ll make the other of these points in a follow-up…
China Shock 2.0 vs. China Shock 1.0
China Shock 2.0 vs. China Shock 1.0
04 May 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, development economics, econometerics, economic history, growth miracles, history of economic thought, industrial organisation, international economics, survivor principle Tags: China, free trade
How Reform Happens
30 Apr 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, comparative institutional analysis, constitutional political economy, development economics, econometerics, economic history, economics of bureaucracy, growth disasters, growth miracles, history of economic thought, Public Choice
What determines whether and how regulations are reformed? We use a newly constructed data set of 3,590 successful and failed regulatory reforms in 189 countries, between 2005 and 2022, to address this question. We document that regulations have become more business friendly in some regulatory domains but not others. We also show that regulations are…
How Reform Happens
The Paper That Breaks Climate Economics
22 Apr 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, applied welfare economics, development economics, econometerics, economic history, economics of climate change, economics of natural disasters, energy economics, environmental economics, environmentalism, global warming, growth miracles
Part 1 of 2 on a damning new paper that takes on the top-down climate-economics literature — “The empirically inscrutable climate-economy relationship”
The Paper That Breaks Climate Economics
The Chinese Current Account Imbalances
21 Apr 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, development economics, econometerics, economic history, economics of love and marriage, financial economics, growth miracles, labour economics, labour supply, population economics Tags: China
The subtitle of the paper is Puzzles, Patterns, and Possible Causes. Here is the abstract: China’s large current account surplus has been an irritant to its trading partners. While industrial and trade policies often lead to sector-level imbalances, they play a relatively limited role in the economy-wide surplus. Structural factors such as an unbalanced sex…
The Chinese Current Account Imbalances
Wealth Is Not a Fixed Pie
27 Mar 2026 1 Comment
in applied price theory, behavioural economics, comparative institutional analysis, constitutional political economy, development economics, growth disasters, growth miracles
One of the most destructive myths in economics is the zero-sum fallacy. Back in 2018, I shared a cartoon that sought to debunk the notion that one person getting richer meant another person had to be poorer. But I wasn’t satisfied with the cartoon, so I offered a modified version. But I still didn’t think […]
Wealth Is Not a Fixed Pie
The rise of China as a global innovator in pharma (incentives matter)
26 Mar 2026 Leave a comment
in development economics, entrepreneurship, growth miracles, health economics Tags: drug lags
This paper examines China’s transition from pharmaceutical “free rider” to global innovator over the last decade. In 2010, China accounted for less than 8% of global clinical trials; by 2020, it had surpassed the US in annual registered clinical trial volume. To study this transformation, we compile a comprehensive, synchronized database spanning the pharmaceutical drug…
The rise of China as a global innovator in pharma (incentives matter)
‘Ever-wrong Ehrlich’s’ Greatest Hits (er, misses)
18 Mar 2026 Leave a comment
in development economics, economic history, environmentalism, growth disasters, growth miracles, labour economics, labour supply, population economics Tags: pessimism bias, population bomb, population bust
His famous 1968 book, “The Population Bomb,” changed the world. He famously predicted that human “overpopulation” would soon outstrip food supplies, leading to catastrophic famines, and societal collapse. He predicted that hundreds of millions of people would starve to death in the 1970s and 1980s, that India would be unable to feed its population by 1980, and…
‘Ever-wrong Ehrlich’s’ Greatest Hits (er, misses)
The Great Enrichment
18 Mar 2026 Leave a comment
in economic history, growth disasters, growth miracles
Quotation of the Day…
17 Mar 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, development economics, economic history, entrepreneurship, growth disasters, growth miracles, industrial organisation, labour economics, labour supply Tags: creative destruction, The Great Enrichment
Tweet… is from page 103 of Historical Impromptus, a 2020 collection of some of Deirdre McCloskey’s work on economic history; this quotation, specifically, is from McCloskey’s 2000 review, in the Minnesota Journal of Global Trade, of Thomas Friedman’s The Lexus and the Olive Tree and John Gray’s False Dawn [original emphasis]: Globalization encourages the capitalist…
Quotation of the Day…
Two Great Escapes
14 Mar 2026 Leave a comment
in development economics, economic history, growth disasters, growth miracles Tags: China, Indonesia
Colonialism, Slavery, and Foreign Aid (with William Easterly) 12/8/25
01 Feb 2026 1 Comment
in applied price theory, comparative institutional analysis, constitutional political economy, development economics, economic history, growth disasters, growth miracles, history of economic thought, labour economics, labour supply, law and economics, property rights Tags: age of empires, economics of colonialism, economics of slavery
Violent Saviors: The West’s Conquest of the Rest
29 Jan 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, comparative institutional analysis, constitutional political economy, development economics, economic history, economics of bureaucracy, growth disasters, growth miracles, history of economic thought, income redistribution, law and economics, liberalism, libertarianism, Marxist economics, property rights, Public Choice, rentseeking Tags: age of empires, economics of colonialism
Part II: Oxfam Is a Leftist Joke, not a Real Charity
20 Jan 2026 1 Comment
in applied price theory, development economics, economic growth, economic history, growth miracles, income redistribution, labour economics, liberalism, macroeconomics, Marxist economics, poverty and inequality, Public Choice, technological progress Tags: regressive left, The Great Enrichment
As I wrote nine years ago, Oxfam is a pathetic organization. Originally created to help the poor, it has been captured by activists who peddle class warfare. But they play that role in an incredibly sloppy fashion. In all the debates I’ve been part of over the years, no left-leaning academic has been willing to […]
Part II: Oxfam Is a Leftist Joke, not a Real Charity
Why Some US Indian Reservations Prosper While Others Struggle
06 Jan 2026 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, development economics, economics of bureaucracy, economics of regulation, entrepreneurship, growth disasters, growth miracles, industrial organisation, labour economics, law and economics, politics - USA, property rights, Public Choice
Our colleague Thomas Stratmann writes about the political economy of Indian reservations in his excellent Substack Rules and Results. Across 123 tribal nations in the lower 48 states, median household income for Native American residents ranges from roughly $20,000 to over $130,000—a sixfold difference. Some reservations have household incomes comparable to middle-class America. Others face persistent…
Why Some US Indian Reservations Prosper While Others Struggle
Three that Made a Revolution
25 Dec 2025 Leave a comment
in development economics, growth disasters, growth miracles Tags: India
Another excellent post from Samir Varma, this time on the 1991 reforms in India that launched India’s second freedom movement: Three men you’ve probably never heard of—P.V. Narasimha Rao, Manmohan Singh, Montek Singh Ahluwalia—may be the three most important people of the late 20th century. Bold claim. Audacious, even. Let me defend it. Here are…
Three that Made a Revolution
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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