For some time I’ve been trying to figure out how best to express my annoyance—is annoyance the right word? I think it is—at the ever-growing group of books that seek to use social science research to explain how people often don’t act in their own economic self-interest. It’s not that I think research by psychology [...]
My new column is online and in the issue of TIME with a wedding cake on the cover. It’s about Brazil, India and China—and how important it is that their economies aren’t imploding.
Okay, now I remember why I don’t do this every month. It took me a while:
So much for that two-to-three-month improvement trend in the employment data—the decline in payroll employment reaccelerated in June: 467,000 jobs lost according to the employment situation report released this morning by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, more than just about any forecaster expected—and markedly worse than the 322,000 jobs lost in May. The unemployment rate [...]
The line about the babies in high heels is a reference to this segment. Beyond that it’s pretty self-explanatory.
I’m the guest tonight. Seriously. I’m filling in for poor Henry Waxman, who had to go to the hospital (he’s feeling better now, though). Update: It’s all on tape now, and I think it went well. Stewart asks more intelligent questions than pretty much anybody on TV. And now for the information you’ve all been [...]
Peer-to-peer lending is the would-be Web 2.0 replacement for our naughty banking system. In recent months I’ve had visits from both Prosper CEO Chris Larsen and Kiva CEO Premal Shah. Larsen waxed eloquent about how Prosper’s peer-to-peer approach amounted to a better, more transparent alternative to loan securitization. Shah talked about how Kiva, a non-profit [...]
