The fallacies of GDP
The common error of confusing growth with progress goes largely unnoticed, though it permeates all macroeconomic analysis. There is no better example of this…
China’s five year plan and the end of an era.
China is in the late stages of constructing its thirteenth five-year plan, a process that commenced over a year ago and will result in…
Euro-sclerosis
There appears to be little or nothing in the monetarists’ handbook to enable them to assess the risk of a loss of confidence in…
Inaccurate statistics and the threat to bonds
Statistics have become very misleading: in particular we are being badly misled into believing that the US is teetering on the edge of price…
The trouble with cash
When interest rates are zero and it costs a bank to look after your money it becomes an unattractive asset. Banks in some jurisdictions…
Controlling copper and silver prices
There is an unwarranted assumption that market prices are always right, and represent “fair value”. In the case of commodities, particularly metals, this is…
Why deflation is unlikely
Financial markets are becoming aware that the US economy is stalling, so investors increasingly take the view that with demand likely to stagnate or…
Gold, the SDR and BRICS
Last Monday there was a meeting in Washington hosted by the Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum (OMFIF) to discuss the future relationship, if…
The over-valued dollar
There are two connected reasons usually cited for the current dollar strength: the US economy is performing better than all the others, leading towards…
Confusion over US unemployment
Unemployment is the one statistic that one would have thought is easy to define: just total up the number of people on unemployment benefit…