economics

As the yen strengthened in those early years, along with general global economic problems, Japan developed a rare trade deficit, which is unusual in its multi-decade history.

When the Bank of Japan began massive QE in late 2012, it began sharply weakening the yen vs other currencies throughout 2013. And then, in 2014, the US Federal Reserve ended

Or take Earth AI. What’s the Why Now for Earth AI?

When Roman started the company in 2017, machine learning had finally gotten good enough that it was possible to analyze huge amounts of data to identify mineral targets just as the amount of new discoveries using traditional methods plummeted. While the company’s drilling rigs don’t rely on

Internet has destroyed many long-established business models – in advertising (Yellow Pages), media (newspapers), retailing (bookshops), and entertainment (music industry and video rental). Investors who underestimated the disruptive impact of new technology have lost money.35 The capital cycle also ceases to function properly when policymakers

The Yuan is intentionally weakened to encourage growth. This will usually come with other growth measures that involve credit expansion, fixed asset investment and thus commodity consumption. The US Dollar, as a free-floating currency, doesn’t have the luxury of being managed against a broader national goal.

Interestingly, it’s the lack of an open

Baumol’s cost disease to include any sector of the economy where demand is inelastic (goods and services that most consider “essential), and supply/productivity is naturally and/or artificially restricted. With this expanded definition, four sectors of the economy stand out as afflicted by cost disease: healthcare, higher education, housing, and

have left out all the other things people think about when they decide what to own, e.g., taxes, risk, and any benefits an asset provides, like the value of living in your house or looking at a painting. People will take all of these things into account when making decisions. For this post, I want to concentrate two things: 1) there will be a

However, debt-to-GDP has limitations that are often overlooked. While much attention focuses on the ‘debt’ side of the equation, the ‘GDP’ component can also distort the picture. GDP growth can arise from genuine factors like productivity gains or an expanding labor force, but it can also be driven by large monetized deficits. These deficits can

Two Economies, Not One

As I have written in previous posts, the are two economies, not one. One is the Flow Economy that produces goods and services. The other is the Balance Sheet Economy that stores wealth