There are several visual ways of helping people understand how fiscal policy (and especially marginal tax rates) can change behavior. The philoso-raptor meme. The questioning worker. Supply-and-demand curves. The Wizard-of-Id parody. To augment these examples, I’ve started a series that is based on real-world examples. Part I of the series highlighted how the capital gains […]
This week, my ECONS102 class covered inequality, and social security. Which is timely, because I have been meaning to blog about this Treasury Analytical Note from 2024, by Tod Wright and Hien Nguyen, for some time. Wright and Nguyen look at the distributional impact of taxes, transfers, and government spending (on healthcare and education).Importantly, they distinguish…
The Public Office (Accountability) Bill was introduced into the House of Commons on 16 September 2025. It gives effect to the Labour Party’s 2024 Manifesto commitment to introduce a ‘Hillsborough Law’ which will ‘place a legal duty of candour on public servants and authorities and provide legal aid for victims of disasters or state-related deaths’. As the Government’s ‘Duty of […]
Bill Maher is on a winning streak with his 7-8-minute politics and comedy bits on his “Real Time” show. Here’s the one from yesterday, called “New Rule: Long Division”: This one’s about gender (he means “sex”), with Maher saying “Until the Democrats come to grips with that, they’ve not going to have much success winning […]
Dr. Hooven (“Carole” to me) has a new piece in Tablet (click headline below to read for free) explaining why all sensible biologists see sex as a binary defined by two (and only two) types of gametes. Perhaps you’ll already be familiar with some of her arguments in the article below (click to read), as […]
I have to say this about Richard: he is fearless. Of course he’s in a position to say what he wants and not lose much, though he is sensitive to erosion of his reputation, but that won’t stop him from speaking out. And one thing he will not apologize for is the claim shown in […]
On 26 August 2025 Nigel Farage (Leader of Reform UK) and Zia Yusuf (now Head of Policy at Reform UK) unveiled their plan titled, ‘Operation Restoring Justice’. Key points from the plan were also reiterated at the Next Step Conference on 05 September 2025. Reform UK address the topic of immigration in their plan, adding […]
Evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins is standing up for science against trans ideology: The slogan “trans women are women” is scientifically false and harms the rights of women, Richard Dawkins has said. In a new book, the evolutionary biologist warns that scientific truth must prevail over “personal feelings” and argues that academic institutions must defend facts above emotion. […]
Karin Horen is standing for the Takapuna Local Board. As you can see she was on the “A fresh approach” ticket. But they have dropped her suddenly. Why? Because Karin is Jewish. She was born in Israel and like all Israeli citizens served in her youth in the IDF, over 30 years ago. She has […]
From a big-picture economic perspective, I worry most about the damage of high tax burdens on innovation, entrepreneurship, and investment. Those are things that generate enormous benefits for society, yet also things that are very sensitive to bad tax policy (specifically high marginal tax rates and the tax code’s bias against saving and investment). Sadly, […]
The super-rich are super-mobile. So, if a country decides to increase taxes on the super-rich (for example, with a wealth tax), some (but not all) of the super-rich will simply move elsewhere. This should not be a surprise to anyone. And yet, simplistic proposals to tax the super-rich are a favourite policy for some political…
From 1990 to 2010, rising numbers of H-1B holders caused 30–50 percent of all productivity growth in the US economy. This means that the jobs and wages of most Americans depend in some measure on these workers. The specialized workers who enter on this visa fuel high-tech, high-growth sectors of the 21st century economy with skills like computer […]
In the halcyon days of 2015-19, openings on the economics job market hovered at around 1900 per year. In 2020, Covid was a major shock, but the market bounced back quickly in 2021 and 2022. Since then, though, the market has clearly been in a funk. 2023, my job market year, saw a sudden dip […]
Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
“We do not believe any group of men adequate enough or wise enough to operate without scrutiny or without criticism. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it, that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire. We know that in secrecy error undetected will flourish and subvert”. - J Robert Oppenheimer.
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