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dishonest market advisors

Recomended reading for those seriously interested in recent conflict of interest in the markets.

“Too often, they were asked to tailor their investment advice to further investment banking interests, even if that was in conflict with their obligation to provide honest, objective advice.”
—
“For at least the last several years, analysts have labored in a corporate structure that placed undue or improper pressure on them. Too often, they were asked to tailor their investment advice to further investment banking interests, even if that was in conflict with their obligation to provide honest, objective advice.
—
“The best way to restore that trust quickly is to adopt the proposed reforms and to implement systems that allow for transparency. Taken together, they can serve as a bridge over the chasm of distrust separating the investing public from the brokerage industry.”

the web address for this article is
https://www.abelard.org/news/archive-economics1.htm#economics231202

23.12.2002

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Farmers buy cars with beans

“In Argentina, where economic chaos has given birth to 11 different currencies issued by cash-hungry local governments, farmers have found a bushel of soybeans is worth more than a bag of banknotes.”

Related material
private money
the mechanics of inflation

the web address for this article is
https://www.abelard.org/news/archive-economics1.htm#econ261102

26.11.2002

Related material

private money

the mechanics of inflation

european business environment

This page gives some inter-country comparisons, such as
• Entrepreneurial Environment in Europe and USA
• Europe's Top Internet Users
• Language Skills in Europe
• Index of Hourly Labour Costs for Production Workers in Manufacturing 1990-1999
     (UK=100)
(23 headings)

the web address for this article is
https://www.abelard.org/news/archive-economics1.htm#econ131102

‘invest’ in diamonds ...

Researchers in the United States are making small diamonds bigger. In 12 hours they can expand a 3.5-mm square slab of synthetic diamond to one 4.2 mm across. Large, perfect crystals like this should broaden diamond's technological applications.

I’ll have 2.2 pounds please.
[Nature, 30.09.02]

the web address for this article is
https://www.abelard.org/news/archive-economics1.htm#econ061002

Steve Forbes on the the US government’s reponse to market problems

one of the few honest and intelligent commentators.
A short article—recommended.

education economics, modern style...

“Tracy’s itinerary today has the precision of a train schedule: English 101 at Mary Washington from 8 a.m. till 8:50 a.m. Office hours from 9 till 10 a.m. Another English class from 10 until 10:50 a.m. Back in the car by 11 a.m. Up I-95 to George Mason University. Another class from 12:30 p.m. till 1:20 p.m. Talk to students for a few minutes. Back in the car by 1:45 p.m. and race to Georgetown University. Grade papers and prepare for class while eating lunch. Class on Shakespeare and film from 3:15 p.m. to 4:05 p.m. Back in the car before the meter expires and head home. Then she grades more papers until midnight. Six hours later it all begins again. .......

“She once imagined she’d land a full-time job as soon as she graduated. Along the way, she did everything she could to improve her chances. She focused on the more marketable Anglo-Saxon rather than Irish medieval literature. She made women saints her specialty, an added bonus in a field that currently prizes all things female. She applied to 20 colleges for teaching jobs as graduation neared. They all rejected her. The next year she applied to seven more places. Seven more rejections. After a while, all the letters started to sound the same. They wrote about having to make difficult decisions. They wrote about how it wasn’t a reflection on her qualifications. But, in the end, they all said no.” [Washington Post, 21.07.02]

UK government “25% less efficient than the private sector”....

Like blazes – 75% less efficient would be nearer.

But let’s believe them – the UK government spend about £500 billion of British taxpayers’ money each year.
25% is £125 billion a year wasted: say 1/9th of the national product down the drain each and every year.
The 25% is stolen from the productive companies; that is, £125 billion stolen from less than £700 billion of productivity, and burnt every year.
1/5 of the profit taken from business, and burnt instead of invested for the future. Or taken from wages to no effect, and that is just the bit the government now admitting.
(Figures are crude approximations, but quite good enuf for the purposes.)

Government is the problem, not the solution. [Observer, 14.07.02]

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the address for this document is https://www.abelard.org/news/archive-economics1.htm

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