First of all, Flassbeck is the only(!) prominent economist in Germany arguing strictly against the madness of austerity. But he's living in the border region between France and Switzerland, so he's a European more than a German.

Among all the economic think tanks in Germany, only the union-sponsored IMK makes a credible case against this madness. Everyone else is more or less in line with the neoclassic perspective. Not a Keynesian in sight, much less a post-Keynesian group.

But now to the meat of the issue. There will be no major political shift in Germany in the near future. As Flassbeck stated, only a single party opposes the financial inquisition commonly known as the Troika. Unfortunatly, it's the socialists, and despite overwhelmingly popular policies, they are still an absolute no-go for large swaths of the demos thanks to the authoritarian regime in East Germany. Sucks, but it is what it is.

So it's up to the French people once again to save the continent from itself. Noone else has the balls or the influence to put an end to this misguided union. How likely is it for the French government to openly challenge German hegemony soon? I wouldn't bet on it. Which means the Greeks are fuuuucked².

In any case, what would it take for Greece to stabilise? And by stabilise I'm talking about a return to a manageable level of unemployment, a working healthcare system and social safety net. A conservative guesstimate would be a public deficit of ~10% of GDP for at least 5 straight years. Alternatively, the EIB would have to prop up Greece with €50b a year for the same number of years. To get a working bureaucracy, to undo four decades of nepotism, Greece would basically need a generation to reestablish itself as a state – and it would require appropriate financing.

Now remember which of Syriza's demands is painted as most controversial right now: debt restructuring. Debt restructuring, while neccessary at some point, is entirely pointless as long as the fiscal policy remains contractionary. Greece needs austerity to stop, right the fuck now. Greece needs to provide income-generating jobs for its people. All the talk about debt is utterly pointless, because at 25% unemployment, we're looking at permanent damage in every way imaginable. The social toll alone should be completely unacceptable within Europe if we truly gave two shits about human dignity.

So, even if Syriza get their way tomorrow, Greece would still be flushed down the shitter. Syriza's proposal is contractionary. Any primary surplus in this situation is contractionary.

Greece is done within the Euro. The use of a foreign currency makes it impossible to use appropriate fiscal policy on their own. Unfortunatly, but also intentionally, the currency issuer, the ECB, is placed outside the democratic control of the European Parliament, or any national parliament for that matter. Fiscal policy within the EZ was taken out of the control of our elected representatives to ensure that the neoclassic/neoliberal approach was irrevocably built into the system. We can thank Germany for that, by the way.

There is a shortage of spending in Greece. There is a shortage of spending in Spain. There is a shortage of spending in Portugal, Ireland, Italy, France. There is a shortage of spending in Germany, for fuck's sake. Put the ECB under control of the EP, add full employment (2-3% unemployment) to its mandate, and have them finance the appropriate programs at the national level. The output gap in Europe is so massive, the un(der)employment so vast, they could spend a trillion Euros and inflation would still not reach the agreed upon target value of 2%.

All it would take to change the rules is consent from every national parliament in the union. Might as well go skinny-dipping instead.

Ah, good to see that TRN had Flassbeck on again. I'll definatly check it out tonight.

Overall, Flassbeck might be just about the only prominent German economist to argue in this manner. Everyone else is in line with the neoclassic orthodoxy.

http://www.zalmos.com/ for unblock.

Think I posted this before but The Economist had some good articles on this last year:

http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21589868-shocking-number-non-violent-americans-will-die-prison-throwing-away-key

http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21589903-if-you-are-poor-dont-get-caught-speeding-new-debtors-prisons

What @RedSky said.

Also, I'm an armchair economist, and a green one at that. The union has some fundamental flaws on just about every level, but since I consider us all to be fellow travelers on this planet, I'm highly in favour of a European Union.

Maybe Syriza and Podemos are successful, then France will break rank and everything's open for discussion again. That'd be nice.

Varoufakis used to work for Valve.

That means he instantly has more cred than anyone else in European government.

About 15 months ago, at a conference in Austin aptly titled "Can the Eurozone be saved?", my favorite Greek mathematician/economist Yanis Varoufakis made center stage with his "Modest Proposal".

Now that he's in charge of Greece's finances, the media is firing broadside after broadside at him, trying their best to discredit the man. Doesn't even wear a tie, shaves his head, wears biker jackets, has a temper... the usual ad hominem bullshit. Yet it only took him three days to give the debate a new direction. Calling the austerity program "fiscal waterboarding" was a stroke of genius.

Him and Tsipras created the first crack in this bubble of lunacy that we call Eurozone. Someone might even realize that the Emperor is, in fact, naked.

Oh, and my personal word of the week: Stahlhelmökonom

(lit.: steel helmet economist, as in "a level of denial and ignorance made famous by the German military on the Eastern front" applied to economics)

You almost never hear of an NHL player being upset (in a litigation sort of way) about injuries they got that resulted from fighting (drop the gloves and throw punches).

In general, the one major incident I am aware of that resulted in legal action being taken against a player was when Todd Bertuzzi checked Steve Moore down the the ice from behind and then drove his head/neck into the ice with his stick in some heavy followup hits. This is mentioned in the wikipedia article @eric3579 posted, and hinted at in the article @RedSky posted from the Economist.

In that incident, Steve Moore (a lower-level player on the Colorado Avalanche) had hit Marcus Naslund (a star level player of the Vancouver Canucks) in a previous game. That hit was a fairly normal hockey hit -- Naslund had the puck, Moore intentionally hit him to try to separate him from the puck, but arguably led with his elbow to Naslund's head. It was a dangerous play, that should have be penalized (it wasn't) -- although I don't think Moore intended to cause injury. It is a fast game, sometimes you can't react quick enough to avoid a dangerous collision like that. Still, I think that kind of play should be penalized to make it clear to players that they need to avoid dangerous plays if possible. Steve Moore didn't have a history of dirty or dangerous play, but still.

Anyway, all of that dovetails in pretty nicely with my previous post, specifically about what leads to a "spontaneous fight". Moore, a 3-4th line guy (lower ranks of skill/ability on the team) hit star player Naslund. In almost ANY hockey game where that kind of thing happens, you can expect that somebody from the star's team is going to go over to the offending player and push them around, probably with the intent to fight them. Usually it happens right at the time of the incident, but here it was delayed to a following game between the two teams.

In the next game between Colorado and Vancouver, Moore got challenged by a Vancouver player early in the first period and fought him. But I guess that the lag time and injury to Naslund (he ended up missing 3 games) had brewed up more bad blood than that so many Vancouver players hadn't gotten it fully out of their systems. Later in the game, Todd Bertuzzi skated up behind Moore when he didn't have the puck, grabbed him and tailed him for several seconds trying to get him into a second fight, and when he didn't respond just hauled back and punched him in the back of the head.

Moore fell to the ice, where Bertuzzi piled on him and drove his head into the ice. A big scrum/dogpile ensued, with Moore on the bottom. As a result of that, Moore fractured 3 vertebrae in his neck, stretched or tore some neck ligaments, got his face pretty cut up, etc. Pretty severe injuries.

So, in comparison:
Moore (lesser skill) hit Naslund (high skill) resulting in a minor(ish) injury, that could have ended up being much worse. But, it was a legitimate hockey play that just happened to occur at a time when Naslund was vulnerable -- arguably no intent to harm/injure.
Bertuzzi hit Moore in a following game, after he had already "answered" for his hit on Naslund by fighting a Vancouver player. Bertuzzi punched him from behind and followed up with further violence, driving his head into the ice and piling on him, initiating a dogpile. Not even close to a legitimate hockey play, well away from the puck, and with pretty clear intent to harm (maybe not to injure, but to harm).


Moore sued Bertuzzi, his team (the Canucks), and the NHL. Bertuzzi claimed that his coach had put a "bounty" on Moore, and that he hadn't intended to injure him -- just to get back at him for his hit on Naslund. Bertuzzi was suspended for a fairly long span of time, and his team was fined $250,000. The lawsuit was kind of on pause for a long time to gauge the long-term effects on Moore, but was eventually settled out of court (confidential terms).

All of this stuff is or course related to violence in hockey, but only loosely tied to fighting in hockey. Some would argue (with some merit in my opinion) that if the refs had called a penalty on Moore's hit on Naslund, and allowed a Vancouver player to challenge him to a fight at that time instead of the following game, it probably wouldn't have escalated to the level it did.

So, at least in my opinion, the league (NHL) needs to be careful, consistent, and fairly harsh in handing out penalties/suspensions to players who commit dangerous plays that can or do result in injuries -- especially repeat offenders. BUT, I think that allowing fighting can actually help mitigate that kind of stuff also -- as long as the league keeps it from getting out of hand and the enforcer type players continue to follow their "code".

@MilkmanDan

Interesting. The Economist had a bit this week arguing that some violence (fistfights) seem to be treated much more lightly than violence with sticks, which usually leads to suspensions even though arguably you could have a no tolerance policy for both (or at least be consistently harsh).

http://www.economist.com/news/international/21639527-courts-are-increasingly-being-asked-rule-injuries-inflicted-during-games-fair-game

Here's an interesting take on it

http://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21625662-history-life-universe-may-have-been-governed-frequency

In my opinion - and i think Brand's too, though i don't want to put words in his mouth - the motivation to act based upon nothing but profit is the largest and most significant drain on happiness and especially the advancement of us as a people. We need a revolution of principle, a revolution of the mind, we cannot keep on doing what we are doing when it is so clearly not working.

We have been pouring the results of our productivity into bank balances for so long now. If our productivity was represented by food instead of money, we would have been putting corn into a hole in the ground for 30 years and wondering why people are hungry. In a system based on corn, prosperity of a nation is based upon the free and active flow of corn.

I ask this question of you, because i don't know the answer. Do you think that we can continue pouring our productivity into big holes that other people sit on for "whenever they might need it?" Is it reasonable to build a system based on flow, but let huge clumps of it gather and expect everything to keep running quickly and without turbulence?

It just doesn't work anymore. The very rich don't realise it yet because they can afford to pay to avoid it, the quite rich notice it when they sit in traffic for example, but eventually things will become so clogged up that they will have no choice but to notice that there are no quality schools, hospitals, roads, airports, shops nor people to do their shopping, cleaning, cooking and driving. We all benefit, including the rich, if money is put into improving our infrastructure and facilities. We all benefit when productivity is flowing freely and quickly through the system. The opposite of that is called a depression, and it's when people don't have confidence in spending their money... we know that, we accept it, people were repeating it during the recession. How come we can't recognise the polar opposite? We're in a semi-permanent state of inverse depression, where those at the top don't have the means to spend their money, so it doesn't move.

This is an idea that needs to come from grassroots, everyone needs to come together somehow and unify over this idea. Because you can't blame any one individual for taking advantage of their fortunate position on the uneven playing field, or for fighting for a better position on the field. We all need to agree that the playing field has to be even, otherwise eventually the playing field will not be worth using.

I cannot stand this poisonous idea that you cannot ask a company for tax and here's my argument against that:
A lot of people live in the UK and a lot of people want to buy coffee and other assorted goods (starbucks, amazon). Even including tax, there is a lot of money to be made selling to these people. Let's say there is 2 billion pounds in profit available to be made by someone. That's still profit to be made by someone, and whoever offers that service to them under the correct rules makes that money.

The problem is that there's 4 billion to be made without tax, and it's cheaper to buy the politician for a billion to ensure you get the tax breaks. That is the poisoned system that psycho-capitalism has eventually produced... And it's so naive to think otherwise... so naive to think that those with billions of pounds wouldn't buy economists and lawyers, tout the favourable theories, generally spend top money on creating the right environment to make more money. Whether you think more or less tax is a good idea, surely have to agree that whatever the rules are, we adhere to them, or the system that we so carefully designed it around will fail.

Why are people so reticent to believe that we're being duped? No, surely not, it's the government, they can't possibly be lying to us. They stood in front of us, bare-faced, and told us they weren't torturing people, they had intelligence about WMDs, they weren't spying on us all. They prove themselves to be deceitful but like toddlers we trust the adult.

"The high-income tax increase sapped 0.25 percentage points from GDP in 2013, estimates Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics Inc. in West Chester, Pennsylvania."

"Politicians who support tax increases operate under a misconception that there is little real effect, Maloney said.

“A higher tax rate reduces our ability to recapitalize and reduces our ability to expand,” he said. “You keep your forklifts a little longer, you do whatever you can to stretch the dollars you’re left with.”"

"According to Zandi’s estimates, the payroll tax cut subtracted 0.6 percentage points from U.S. economic growth, more than twice the effect of the high-income tax cuts."

“Clearly, taxes affect behavior; they affect some behaviors more than others. What has not been established is that the level of taxes has a clear and important impact on economic growth. And one reason is that this is not a well-posed question. How government activity affects prosperity depends not only on the level of taxes, but also on what the money is used for.”

"Thus, the proper answer to a question as broad as whether tax increases are “positive” or “negative” for growth is: “It depends.”"

It's just bad legislature towards the role of a police force creating poor incentives to earn revenue rather than 'serve and protect'. I'm sure state budget cuts of late given the low growth rate have been an additional squeeze. The Economist had an article about this practice at federal/state level, particularly with the Justice Department essentially now being seen as profit centre.

Bit off topic, but the article itself is an interesting take on how back door settlements (particularly with banks recently) have not been in the public interest when they have circumvented the legal system (without establishing precedent and on dubious grounds having never actually been presented publicly as evidence) and have usually led to nobody personally prosecuted and no admission of guilt through a plea deal.

http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21614101-corporate-america-finding-it-ever-harder-stay-right-side-law-mammoth-guilt

But like Magicpants says, when you compare across equivalent jobs, the number is closer to 90-95%.

That can be attributed to employers factoring in potential maternity leave and the general lower likelihood of women working overtime. These are not necessarily fair as some women will work long overtime and not have kids (or have the father take leave) but there's a rational reason for employers to assume this on average.

Realistically, I would argue that the best way to approach this is purely through awareness. Mandates on pay scales or opening up companies to lawsuits for unequal pay would, if anything, make the issue worse. Which is why this being brought up in politics seems like a play for votes for an issue that can't be effectively tackled with policy and instead requires cultural changes.

Take for example, South Korea, which has much more serious discrimination. Women earn 63% of what men do, and are expected to not return to work after having children. This has created an opportunity where domestic cultural biases allow foreign firms to come in a scoop up female talent cheaper. Over time, this will give them a competitive edge, raise wages for women, and help overturn the cultural stigma.

http://www.economist.com/node/17311877

Yay, The Economist.

It's a good segment. Socialists (many videosifters included, such as @ChaosEngine & @enoch) seem to be convinced that either they themselves know all the facts (i.e., narcissism?) or that the "rulers" know all the facts, or that the "majority of the people" know all the facts.

While it may be true that the masses, as a collective of course, are even more intelligent than any individual on his or her own, it is true only when individuals among the masses are acting and thinking independently of one another (i.e., pursuing their own interests as best that they themselves know how to do) and not when they are under the sway of one form of demagoguery or central planning or another.

Political democracy shows the masses in all their foolishness, while market democracy (i.e., anarchy) shows them in all their wisdom. I think it is this distinction that illuminates the discrepancy between the theory of democracy and the practice of democracy.

(Moreover, it seems that, when listening to Hayek -- or Milton Friedman or Rory Sutherland -- one gets the impression that one is listening to a highly intelligent individual. This is quite different from listening to someone like, say, Paul Krugman and other so-called "economists," who are in truth would-be pundits and polemicists and not at all cognizant of the underlying postulates that support their arguments.)