collapse

End of the Oilocene: the roar of the oil-fizzle dragon king

"Ireland’s policymakers exist in an insulated bubble; congratulating themselves on reducing the debt-GDP ratio and high employment due to the sleight of hand of low corporate tax rates, " writes Tim Clarke. He argues that Ireland is hugely vulnerable to a global financial crash triggered by net energy decline, coupled with rapidly rising extreme global debts and many other factors: "Talk of a 'Celtic Phoenix' excites dull short memories, and another property bubble is in the making."

And the Weak Suffer What They Must?: Europe, Austerity and the Threat to Global Stability by Yanis Varoufakis – review

This book is well worth reading if you're interested in how the Eurozone got into such a mess, although it ignores a very important source of financial instability - the relationship between money and energy - and it paints an overly rosy picture of the role that the US has played in the global economy over the past century. By Caroline Whyte.

Cursed to live in interesting times

Brian Davey connects the fall in the growth rate, with its roots in the rising costs of energy extraction and generation, to declining resilience in the economic system. He argues that these are in turn related to a more conflict ridden geo-politics. There is an increased vulnerability to shocks which will be catastrophic unless and until there is a new conventional wisdom in society about what is wrong and what has to be done about it.

Feasta submission to the Post-2020 Common Agricultural Policy consultation process

We argue that in order to achieve its new objectives, CAP policymakers need to collaborate with other high-level EU and global bodies so as to establish a core economic framework that would include Cap and Share, a basic income, land value tax, debt-free money issuance and reforms to the international trading organisations.