Jacob Christensen

FTF, the top-level union for Danish non-academic white-collar employees, walked out of the original round of negotiations about a quality reform for the public sector but following another fortnight of negotiations, the union today signed an agreement with the Finance Minister about quality improvements and supplementary training.

Press releases: Ministry of Finance, Quality Reform Initiative homepage, FTF.

According to news reports, Argentinian president Nestor Kirchner will be standing down at the next elections in October. The governing party will be nominating Cristina Fern�ndez as its candidate and, yep – she’s Mrs. Kirchner.

�Hmm – I try to write about politics and this is the result…?

Mingle² – Online Dating

Hat tip: Mattew Yglesias.

The viewers of the Danish TV2 guessed three out of four names correctly before the baptism of Crown Prince Frederik and Crown Princess Mary’s daughter: Henrietta Ingrid Margrethe. But nobody apparently hit her first name, Isabella. As it turns out, there has been a prominent Isabella in the Danish royal family before – Isabella of Habsburg, Christian II’s queen.

• Economic Investigations: Peculiar Libertarian Beliefs

  In this post, some weird�to say the least�beliefs the modal libertarian holds�

  (tags: economics humor satire libertarianism)

• Icky Thump

  Still, what do the White Stripes have to say? What do they stand for? Why do simple pop fans care about minimal Jack and his mythical sister, Meg?

  (tags: music whitestripes)

• Economist’s View: Social Spending and GDP per Capita

  The point here is that there’s no trade-off between high levels of national income and high levels of social spending.

  (tags: economics welfarestate policy)

• Dani Rodrik’s weblog: Does Europe owe its institutional development to Ottoman Turkey?

  Iyigun is able to document a strong negative correlation between the incidence of Ottoman military campaigns in Europe and the occurrence of religious conflict within Europe.

  (tags: politics religion europe turkey institutions history)

His Steveness descends on the Palo Alto Apple Store.

Hat Tip: TUAW.