Michael Dedmon

I do not see how European democracies can survive being complicit in the war on Iran plus the escalation of the cost of living crisis this war causes. This is the perfect storm to bring the far right into power.

In an astonishing transformation in British politics, the Greens, not Labour, are now the most popular party not just with young, but also with the 20 percent who are struggling most in economic terms. More on this in the Chartbook Top Links today.

Have been researching inflation in times of overlapping emergencies the past years. This feels like 2022 on steroids. Am visiting the LSE this week to share some work in progress on anti-fascist economics, trying to make sense of this moment as it is unfolding.

When we started @equatormag, we talked of “a crisis that is as much spiritual and intellectual as it is political”. The war on Iran is a reminder that the root of this crisis is what Simone Weil called “the adoration of force”. Our leader on this calamity: equator.org/articles/epic-…

This guy is a US Senator. He's sitting in the same chamber that Daniel Webster and Robert Taft sat in.

Wendy Brown: "A worldwide revolution commenced in the final decades of the last millennium. Call it what you will—globalization, neoliberalism, the unleashing and exponential growth of the new leviathan on earth we call finance—we are still reckoning its proportions, impact, and precise logics.": read.dukeupress.edu/history-of-the…

Who stands to loose from a green transition? The biggest beneficiaries of fossil fuel profits, the richest of the rich. 50% of profits go to top 1% of wealth owners. My co-author @GregorSemieniuk will present our paper and more at the @LSEEI on March 3, 6.30 PM. Go if you can!

Any Democratic incumbent in Congress who refuses to clearly condemn any attack on or invasion of Iran should be driven from office and also from public life entirely,

For the Journal of the History of Ideas Blog, I wrote about fault lines within modern European intellectual history by examining work by @samuelmoyn and other members of “The Berkeley School” trained by Martin Jay, torn between liberalism and Marxism. jhiblog.org/2026/02/16/the…

A simple new paper in which we explain why corporate valuations relative to earnings have soared since the early 1980s, while valuations relative to corporate cash flow have remained relatively stable. The key is that companies have been able to grow earnings without increasing investment, thereby increasing the payout rate — the share of earnings paid out as free cash flow to firm owners.

The observed decline in labor’s share of corporate output, in conjunction with relatively weak corporate investment, generates a persistent rise in the ratio of corporate valuation relative to corporate earnings, from Andrew Atkeson, @Jonheathcote, and @fab_perri nber.org/papers/w34748

@MatthewSitman A few years ago I started reading this same excerpt at the end of the lecture on the politics of migration/refugees in my global politics course. Every time, maybe especially this semester, my voice cracks just a bit at the end.

Abraham Lincoln, Chicago, July 10, 1858: "We have, besides these men—descended by blood from our ancestors—among us, perhaps half our people who are not descendants at all of these men; they are men who have come from Europe—Germans, Irish, French, and Scandinavians—men that have come from Europe themselves, or whose ancestors have come hither and settled here, finding themselves our equals in all things. If they look back through this history to trace their connection with those days by blood, they find they have none; they cannot carry themselves back into that glorious epoch and make themselves feel that they are part of us; but when they look through that old Declaration of Independence, they find that those old men say that 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,' and then they feel that that moral sentiment taught in that day evidences their relation to those men, that it is the father of all moral principle in them, and that they have a right to claim it as though they were blood of the blood, and flesh of the flesh, of the men who wrote that Declaration, and so they are."

@gpackiam Regardless, and you’re the expert on this point, but wouldn’t the postscript run contrary to many Christian social movements eg Catholic social teaching, Christian Democracy? So are they just wrong on the merits to base these convictions in their faith? Genuine question!

@gpackiam I suppose I can see the distinction you’re making but the moral economy you’re suggesting is not really landing. Is the point that wealth accumulation in a modern economy is less problematic? You’re first point re financial wealth seems a mark against that view imo!

Listen, before you start quoting the Bible to dunk on trillionaires or billionaires or whatever…consider two massive differences between the “wealthy” in the Bible vs today: 1. Basis of Wealth: Fixed commodities vs Fluid currencies— wealth in the ancient world was about land, property, and material resources; today, it’s about currency and/or stock valuations that fluctuate. 2. Creation of Wealth: Conquest vs Creation— Wealth was taken in the ancient world; wealth is largely made through ideas and innovation today. The Bible challenges the wealthy not simply because they are rich but rather because of how it was gained and how it is used. In the ancient world, people became wealthy lost frequently through conquering and stealing/taking, not through creating goods and services or ideas and innovations that advance society. I think we should continue to challenge and warn people along those same lines: How are you acquiring riches, why, and how are you using it? PostScript: It’s OK if you prefer an economic system that bakes in some sort of distribution to those who have less; I just don’t think you should argue for that system based on the Hebrew prophets.

Our time is now!

This IMF paper finds that during and after the 2022 global inflation surge - largely driven by supply shocks -inflation outcomes in inflation-targeting countries were no better than in non-targeting countries, despite the former implementing more aggressive interest rate hikes.

BREAKING: Keir Starmer has just removed the whip from Zohran Mamdani

1/In the Eurozone, unconventional monetary policy leads to large cross-border fiscal transfers because it allows the periphery to borrow from the core at belo-market rates. We quantify these transfers.

The twilight of Macronisme: Jean Pisani-Ferry's cri de cœur. Chartbook 411 on a remarkable speech by @pisaniferry one of Europe's leading economic policy thinkers. tinyurl.com/3jfxte2p