Its been a whirlwind two months in India and this is a post which has been in the pipeline for a while (hence the length). For those unaware of my current research project, I’m working on a study of Microfinance Self-Help Groups in villages near Sanchi, Madhya Pradesh. It is the first time that I have conducted a real survey. Needless to say, it has given me a deep appreciation of the process of data collection and work of the surveyor.
First, designing a questionnaire is not simply about putting …

Over the next few years the United States and its individual states will be facing the greatest budgetary and entitlement deficits along with the greatest infrastructure crisis they have ever seen. Privatization presents itself as one of the tools in answering this question and challenging the problems of economic revival that have plagued state and local governments over the past generation.

One of the major elements of the new healthcare bill worrying conservatives and ‘limited government’ voters alike is the bill’s mandate requiring U.S citizens to purchase health insurance. Whether this mandate is constitutional or not is a matter being debated by a handful of state attorney generals nationwide. Some, including Virginia’s attorney general, Kenneth Cuccinelli, are planning to sue the federal government, arguing that Congress lacks the proper authority to require U.S. citizens to purchase health insurance under the new bill. This “primer” is not intended to discuss this debate. Instead, it is intended to introduce one of the primary economic principles underlying the compulsory health plan mandate itself. This principle is called “adverse selection”. Once the concept of adverse selection has been explained, it should become clear that the Congressional mandate is probably necessary to bring about an efficient, cost-effective healthcare system – one that does not see insurance premiums skyrocket, which closes off coverage to all but those who are wealthy enough to afford these plans.

The New York Times’ Economix blog has an interesting post on the health implications of agricultural policy. Their take-home message? “Thanks to lobbying, Congress chooses to subsidize foods that we’re supposed to eat less of.”
Economix cites a study by Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. Their writeup (actually from 2007) concludes:
The Farm Bill, a massive piece of federal legislation making its way through Congress, governs what children are fed in schools and what food assistance programs can distribute to recipients. The bill provides billions of dollars in …

As my hometown of New Orleans basks in the glow of the Saints’ divinely ordained Super Bowl victory, the rest of the nation is using the opportunity to take stock of the city’s recovery. The pre-Mardi Gras and Super Bowl hoopla coincided with the city’s mayoral election, where Lt. Governor Mitch Landrieu won with 64 percent of the vote.  While there might be general discomfort regarding the implications of a Landrieu political dynasty (his father was the last white Mayor the city has seen since the 70’s, his sister U.S. …

Catherine Rampell, writing for The New York Time’s Economix blog on January 28, ably describes how the “Great Recession” will affect the employment situation for millions of Americans. Basically, many of the jobs lost will be lost for good:
Lots of the bloodletting we’ve seen in the labor market has probably been permanent, not just cyclical. Many employers have taken Rahm Emanuel’s famed advice — never waste a crisis — to heart, and have used this recession as an excuse to make layoffs that they would have eventually done anyway. Some economists …

Instructional, humorous, and applicable: this YouTube video screamed out to me, demanding that itself be posted on the CPR blog. I humbly complied (and highly recommend you watch).

Last month, the McKinsey Global Institute published a discussion paper which argued that conventional wisdom , which says that US enjoys an “exorbitant privilege” because of the dollar’s status as the global reserve currency, is wrong.  It estimates that the financial benefit to having the dollar as a global reserve currency, was in fact, a piddling $40 – $70 billion in a “normal” year and between -$5 to $25 billion in a “crisis” year.
The McKinsey results are interesting in that they appear to challenge a key defense of American proponents …

Business and economic policy are tied to energy policy in more ways than we often care to admit. One of the more important of these in the upcoming years is the relationship between the value of the dollar compared to other currencies and the price of oil. Energy Outlook has done some interesting analysis on this. In a 2007 post, Energy Outlook summarizes the relationship between valuation of the dollar and crude oil prices:
So imagine a closed loop, and follow it around a cycle:

The value of the dollar drops.
Non-US demand …