Archive for October, 2008
links for 2008-10-31
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(Økonomi- og Erhvervsministeriet og Forsikring & Pension)
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Das Geldwesen ist noch lange nicht gerettet. Eine Übersicht über die größten Gefahren, die Banken, Anlegern und der Weltwirtschaft jetzt drohen
And Yet More Iceland
Tyler Cowen notes that not only is the money gone, the cod has gone away as well, and – given the future payments on recent loans – does not really want to think about how the endgame will look like.
Well…
The original “How to marry a German” post is here and I would like to note that a) it was humourous in nature and b) I have no personal experiences of being married to or romantically linked with any German women.
links for 2008-10-30
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Until the EU develops a unified market for bonds denominated in euro and backed jointly by EU member states – or, better, by euro-area member states – its claim for the status of reserve currency for the euro will not be met. As a result, capital is not coming to Europe, where it is badly needed to shore up its shaken financial system; moreover, the US will continue to dictate the agenda in international monetary affairs, even now, after the colossal damage inflicted on the world by their misguided macro and regulatory policies. To add insult to injury the US government is now paying 2-3 percentage points less on its short term debt than even the most virtuous EU member states.
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The labour market suffers from asymmetric information, coordination, and collective action failures. This column explains how labour market intermediaries, such as online job boards and centralised job-matching institutions, work to improve labour market outcomes. These intermediaries will perform important coordinating functions even as information costs fall.
links for 2008-10-29
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Aftale om satspuljen på det sociale område 2009-2012
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In an attempt to explain these contradictions, the Cornell team reexamined nearly 650 previous studies from the past five decades. They found that inverse allergy-cancer associations are far more common with cancers of organ systems that come in direct contact with matter from the external environment—the mouth and throat, colon and rectum, skin, cervix, pancreas and glial brain cells. Likewise, only allergies associated with tissues that are directly exposed to environmental assaults—eczema, hives, hay fever and animal and food allergies—had inverse relationships to cancers.
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In the first half of 2008, Buiter and Sibert were invited to study Iceland’s financial problems. They identified the “vulnerable quartet” of (1) a small country with (2) a large banks, (3) its own currency and (4) limited fiscal capacity – a quartet that meant Iceland’s banking model was not viable. How right they were. This column summarises the report, which is now available as CEPR Policy Insight No. 26 with an October 2008 update.
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These results indicate that policies that are directed to increase per capita income will not have any effect in reducing the probability of civil war. Since the general consensus in the economic literature indicates that external development assistance does not improve the economic development of countries, even if poverty were the main determinant of conflict, it would be very difficult to act on this determinant.
Instead, polices need to address structural problems that make countries more prone to conflict. Colonisation strategies could explain some of these structural problems as, for example, poor institutional development or institutions that exacerbate ethnic differences.
Confederates for Obama!
I Hope They Received Their Payment in Advance…
The latest VoxEU column by Willem Buiter and Anne Sibert on the rotten state of Iceland:
Early in 2008 we were asked by the Icelandic bank Landsbanki (now in receivership) to write a paper on the causes of the financial problems faced by Iceland and its banks, and on the available policy options for the banks and the Icelandic authorities.
The OUCH! part comes at the end:
Iceland’s circumstances were extreme, but there are other countries suffering from milder versions of the same fundamental inconsistent – or at least vulnerable – quartet:
(1) A small country with (2) a large, internationally exposed banking sector, (3) its own currency and (4) limited fiscal spare capacity relative to the possible size of the banking sector solvency gap.
Countries that come to mind are:
* Switzerland,
* Denmark,
* Swedenand even to some extent the UK, although it is significantly larger than the others and has a minor-league legacy reserve currency.
Denmark Goes Iceland
Or something. Here is a snapshot of the queue outside of Merlin’s store on Vestergade in Odense yesterday. Needless to say, local media reported this as “chaos on the high street”. Today, Sterling Airways ceased operations.
Fans
Hm. The blog has five fans on Facebook.
Is this good, typical, bad or just pathetic?
links for 2008-10-28
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www.politi.dk – Redegørelse om politireformen
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If Barack Obama had taken his mother's surname and kept his childhood nickname, American voters might literally see "Barry Dunham" as a quite different presidential candidate, a new study suggests. A name significantly changes our perception of someone's face and race, according to research in the journal, Perception.
Iceland Update
It is always interesting to watch the effects of an international crisis close up. In my case, I had the opportunity to see the massive (well, 150 persons according to media) queue waiting outside of the Merlin branch on Vestergade here in Odense. Merlin – a consumer electronics chain owned by … you’ve guessed it … an Icelandic investment group – stopped its payments due to insolvency on Monday but was taken over by a Danish chain. So today saw a fire sale in the Merlin shops.
Meanwhile, Iceland is now being helped by the other Nordic countries in a working group led by Sweden.
PS: I have a picture of the queue but my internet connections are a bit erratic.