Category: Series

The modern state doesn’t get its power from the consent of the governed. Instead, it creates crises and then uses coercion to demand obedience.

Original article: https://mises.org/mises-wire/stop-fighting-your-neighbor-mechanics-state-power-and-how-opt-out

Trade wars. Financial panics. Inflation. How come it feels like it’s all bad news in the global economy these days? Economist Eswar Prasad’s answer: something he calls the ‘doom loop.’ That’s where massive geopolitical and economic forces feed off each other and send us careening into disorder. Sounds dire. But it’s not hopeless.

On today’s show, are we in a doom loop? And if we are … how do we get out of one?

Eswar Prasad’s new book is called “The Doom Loop: Why the World Economic Order Is Spiraling into Disorder”.

Related episodes: 
Is the financial media making us miserable about the economy?
Why are some nations richer?

For sponsor-free episodes of The Indicator from Planet Money, subscribe to Planet Money+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Fact-checking by Sierra Juarez. Music by Drop Electric. Find us: TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Newsletter.

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Chelsea striker Liam Delap has recently stunned fans on Instagram by apparently doing incredibly complicated calculations in his head, finding what’s known as the cube root of some very large numbers.

But is he really a human calculator? Or is there something else going on? Tim Harford speaks to Rob Eastaway, mathematician and author of ‘Maths on the Back of an Envelope’ to learn about the trick you can use to pull this off - and while he’s here we also ask him about the trend of more goals being scored in the Premier League.

Presenter: Tim Harford Producers: Nathan Gower Series Producer: Tom Colls Editor: Richard Vadon Programme Coordinator: Brenda Brown Sound Engineer: James Beard Credit: Video of Liam Delap from Chelsea’s Instagram account, chelseafc

Modern political economy is based upon a Machiavellian belief in might makes right. Yet, political power cannot accomplish what free markets and private property rights have done in lifting billions of people out of poverty.

Original article: https://mises.org/mises-wire/machiavelli-dead-why-politics-without-property-rights-rules-and-moral-limits-cannot-work

From time to time, the American people need to be reminded who is the boss. The boss is the US government. The citizenry are the serfs, the servants, the subordinates.

Original article: https://mises.org/power-market/ruthlessness-and-brutality-us-government

It’s a weird time for jobs numbers. Another month, another jobs report pushed back by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Averaging two private sources, ADP and Revelio Labs: an estimated 4,500 jobs were added in January. Sounds like … not many. 

And, yet, the unemployment rate hasn’t seemed to have risen. This might be, in part, due to the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. We’ll explain through the story of one Angeleno.

On today’s show, how bad are these job numbers? Or are they not bad at all? And what does immigration have to do with it? 

Related episodes: 
Can we still trust the monthly jobs report? (Update) 
What you need to know about the jobs report revisions 
What really goes on at the Bureau of Labor Statistics (Update) For sponsor-free episodes of The Indicator from Planet Money, subscribe to Planet Money+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org. Fact-checking by Sierra Juarez. Music by Drop Electric. Find us: TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Newsletter.  

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