'If We Leave the Euro, Everything Will Be Worse'

Greece is on the verge of economic collapse and yet the country's left wants to jettison austerity measures. Would this leave any alternative other than exiting the euro? SPIEGEL ONLINE invited the leader of Greece's pro-business Drasi party and an anti-austerity Syriza parliamentarian to debate the issues

Spiegel Online International | 05/16/2012

A Greek euro coin. Are the country's days as a member of the euro zone numbered? (dapd)

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End of business as we know it

When it comes to creating a sustainable, green economy, failure cannot be an option — not least for future generations. That provocative statement was made in the opening remarks at a recent conference here in Tokyo organized by the European Business Council

by Brendan Barrett | OurWorld 2.0 | May 4, 2012

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Capital, Debt, and Alchemy

“Capital,” said Nobel chemist and pioneer ecological economist Frederick Soddy,”merely means unearned income divided by the rate of interest and multiplied by 100.” (Cartesian Economics, p. 27)

by Herman Daly | CASSE | Apr 9 2012

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Popping the carbon bubble

How much ‘unburnable’ carbon is there on the world’s stock exchanges? Last year, the Carbon Tracker Initiative (CTI) published an analysis asking this question. CTI compared the global ‘carbon budget’ needed to stay below a rise of two degrees Celsius in average temperatures (above pre-industrial levels) with the emissions potential of the proven coal, oil and gas reserves owned by listed companies

James Leaton | Climate Spectator | 23 Mar 2012

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Deceptionomics

This March, at the Environmental Film Festival in Washington, DC, I saw a documentary on the destruction of the Aral Sea in Kazakhstan, once the world’s fourth-largest inland lake. Soviet planners and decision makers fifty years ago decided to divert the two main tributary rivers of the Aral to grow cotton. Starved of fresh water inflows, the Aral Sea has shrunk to half its original surface area and lost 75% of its volume

by Brent Blackwelder | The Daly News | March 26, 2012

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Alternative finance radicals: Infusing rebellion with entrepreneurial creativity

Several weeks ago I sat in a pub with someone from, what I’d call, ‘the confrontational Left’. He was caught up in passionate indignation at the injustice of the financial sector, highly eloquent at providing a persuasive diagnosis of the flaws of the system that he perceived. His language was phrased in terms of rebellion

by Brett Scott | Mar 16 2012 by OpenDemocracy in Energy Bulletin | Mar 16 2012

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Dire Poverty Falls Despite Global Slump, Report Finds

A World Bank report shows a broad reduction in extreme poverty — and indicates that the global recession, contrary to economists’ expectations, did not increase poverty in the developing world

By ANNIE LOWREY | The New York Times | March 6, 2012

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Has the global economy become less vulnerable to oil price shocks?

This paper examines the impact of oil price changes on global economic growth. Unlike some recent studies, this paper finds that oil price rises have had significant negative impacts on world economic growth

by Dr. Mingqi Li | Mar 14 2012 by The Oil Drum in Energy Bulletin | Mar 14 2012

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Pricing climate change

The concern over the negative consequences of global warming has led to a vast array of policy measures aimed at reducing the use of fossil fuels. Yet a comprehensive plan for a shift towards more climate-friendly energy is still lacking. This column argues that a major reason for this is that macroeconomists have not been sufficiently active in the policy discussion. It then lays out four lessons from macroeconomics that should be helpful

John Hassler | VOX - Research-based policy analysis and commentary from leading economists | 11 March 2012

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Getting planning right

We need a planning policy that reflects the competing interests of the economy, the environment and communities

By Telegraph View | The Telegraph | 06 Mar 2012

Green and, for now, pleasant: to regard the planning system as an arm of economic policy is deeply flawed Photo: ALAMY

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Chilled out - Measures of well-being

A poll contradicts what we thought we knew about income and happiness

The Economist | Feb 25th 2012

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