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Have you ever wondered why it is so difficult to follow through on new year’s resolutions, such as to exercise more or to start saving more money towards retirement? The agent that most traditional economic models are based on would not struggle to keep up these resolutions. These agents are referred to as homo economicus.
2018
Level: beginner
Homo Economicus: Why are new year’s resolutions so difficult to maintain and economic models so bad at predicting our behaviour?
Wheat and oil prices were already rising before the Russian invasion so what might be the effect for people in low income countries of a war far away that may have a secondary impact much closer to home In this short video Rabah Arezki Chief Economist Vice President African Development …
2022
Level: beginner
War in Ukraine, impact in Africa. The effect of soaring energy and food prices
Ecological economics explores new ways of thinking about how we manage our lives and our planet to achieve a sustainable, equitable, and prosperous future. Ecological economics extends and integrates the study and management of both "nature's household" and "humankind's household"—An Introduction to Ecological Economics, Second Edition, the first update and expansion of this classic text in 15 years, describes new approaches to achieving a sustainable and desirable human presence on Earth.
2014
Level: advanced
An Introduction to Ecological Economics, Second Edition
In this article, Rob Hoveman breaks down concepts like historical materialism and materialist analysis that are pivotal to understand Marx. He argues that abstractions are necessary for a concrete analysis of society that in turn should inform political practice.
2018
Level: advanced
Marx and historical materialism
The authors analyse the role and effects of the US dollar as factual global reserve currency. They demonstrate that a flight into the dollar creates adverse effects for the global economy as it represents a tightening of financial conditions.
2021
Level: advanced
Dollar dominance and the international adjustment to global risk
In this video Manuela Mosca talks briefly about the role of women in economics from the perspective of history of economic thought She then introduces the book A History of Feminist and Gender Economics written by Giandomenica Becchio Manuela Mosca The European Society for History of Economic Thought
2020
Level: beginner
Manuela Mosca on Giandomenica Becchio, A History of Feminist and Gender Economics
This article demonstrates Schumpeter s propagated approach to monetary analysis in macroeconomics so as to provide for a better understanding of the relation between finance and growth Peter Bofinger Lisa Geißendörfer Thomas Haas Fabian Mayer voxEU
2022
Level: advanced
Discovering the 'true' Schumpeter: New insights on the finance and growth nexus
Could the Brazilian measures of income support carried out during 2020 be considered one way towards UBI? This questions is broadly addressed in the video.
2020
Level: beginner
Brazil and Basic Income & Covid
Are there any limits to government spending? In times of war, particularly? And what about the aftermath of such special times when treasuries seemingly feel unshackled from any rules? And are those times really any special? That is what this paper is about.
2019
Level: advanced
Modern Money and the War Treasury
The article summarizes the effects that the war in Ukraine, the resulting economic sanctions as well as associated financial turbulences have for cryptocurrencies and their role in the global financial system.
2022
Level: beginner
Cryptocurrencies and the war in Ukraine
Max Krahé explains the role of economic planning for a green transition.
2022
Level: advanced
The Whole Field - Markets, planning, and coordinating the green transformation
Source image GC Videography Fellows Youtube channel David Harvey davidharvey org City University of New York
Level: advanced
Marx and Capital: The Concept, The Book, The History
The interview states the importance of joining hands in the international trade to get trade justice at multilateral forum such as the WTO. It is mainly in English, the introduction is in Spanish.
2024
Level: advanced
International trade and barriers
Is our knowledge of the world essentially rational What does it mean to be burdened with the gift of rationality Philosopher Corine Besson considers the nature of humanity s defining trait Corine Besson iai University of Sussex
Level: beginner
Knowledge and Rationality
The chi-square distribution is used to test a hypothesis. Therefore, expected values are related to observed values using a chi-square distribution. Then using p-value tables the hypothesis is tested at a 5% significance level.
2010
Level: beginner
Pearson's chi square test (goodness of fit) | Probability and Statistics | Khan Academy
Based on Modern Money Theory (MMT), Stephanie Kelton compares the cryptocurrency to the fiat money system (or simply what we have today).
2017
Level: beginner
Cryptocurrency and Fiat Money
MERCOSUR (Mercado Común del Sur or Common Southern Market) was the first formalized attempt to integrate South American countries economically and politically.
2018
Level: beginner
How can MERCOSUR move forward?
Health Economics traditionally involves two distinct strands. One focuses on the application of core  neoclassical economic theories of the firm, the consumer and the market to health-seeking behaviour  and other health issues. It suggests a role for government intervention only in the case of specific  market failures (for example externalities, asymmetric information, moral hazard, and public goods)  that distort market outcomes. The second strand is evaluation techniques, used to assess the cost effectiveness of competing health interventions.
2022
Level: beginner
Health Economics
One method of economic modelling that has become increasingly popular in academia, government and the private sector is Agent Based Models, or ABM. These simulate the actions and interactions of thousands or even millions of people to try to understand the economy – for this reason ABM was once described to me as being “like Sim City without the graphics”. One advantage of ABM is that it is flexible, since you can choose how many agents there are (an agent just means some kind of 'economic decision maker' like a firm, consumer, worker or government); how they behave (do they use complicated or simple rules to make decisions?); as well as the environment they act in, then just run the simulation and see what happens as they interact over time.
2020
Level: beginner
Agents, agents everywhere
This course introduces students to the relevance of gender relations in economics as a discipline and in economic processes and outcomes. The course covers three main components of gender in economics and the economy: (1) the gendered nature of the construction and reproduction of economic theory and thought; (2) the relevance and role of gender in economic decision-making; and (3) differences in economic outcomes based on gender. We will touch on the relevance of gender and gender relations in at least each of the following topics: economic theory; the history of economic thought; human capital accumulation; labor market discrimination; macroeconomic policy, including gender budgeting; household economics; basic econometrics; economic history; and economic crises.
2019
Level: beginner
Feminist Economics
Understanding international trade is central to economics and is currently a hot political issue. It’s an area where popular perceptions of mainstream economics are low, since they have historically missed some important downsides of trade agreements, especially the hollowing out of former manufacturing hubs in the Western world. et economists have for long time had a theory of trade with an impressive amount of scientific clout behind it: the gravity trade model.
2020
Level: beginner
A Theory of Enormous Gravity
This lecture by Economy Studies lays out the foundations and current state of the ecological crisis, its main drivers and who is responsible for this. It is crucial for students to develop a deeper understanding of the problem they are likely to encounter in their future careers, before getting into various economic policies or solutions to this pressing issue.
2022
Level: beginner
Economic Introduction to the Ecological Crisis - Economy Studies
For a long time, price controls were considered taboo, as neoliberal economic theory assumes that prices are supposedly formed freely by supply and demand. But especially in times of crisis, the state must intervene and cap prices to protect wage earners from excessive burdens. However, the how matters.
2025
Level: beginner
Price Controls Against Inflation
The notion that the demand and supply side are independent is a key feature of textbook undergraduate economics and of modern macroeconomic models. Economic output is thought to be constrained by the productive capabilities of the economy - the ‘supply-side' - through technology, demographics and capital investment. In the short run a boost in demand may increase GDP and employment due to frictions such as sticky wages, but over the long-term successive rises in demand without corresponding improvements on the supply side can only create inflation as the economy reaches capacity. In this post I will explore the alternative idea of demand-led growth, where an increase in demand can translate into long-run supply side gains. This theory is most commonly associated with post-Keynesian economics, though it has been increasingly recognised in the mainstream literature.
2020
Level: beginner
It’s Demand All the Way Down
Firms are the primary places where economic activity takes place in modern capitalist economies: they are where most stuff is produced; where many of us spend 40 hours a week; and where big decisions are made about how to allocate resources. Establishing how they work is hugely important because it helps us to understand patterns of production and consumption, including how firms will react to changes in economic conditions and policy. And a well-established literature – led by post-Keynesians and institutionalists – holds that the best way to determine how firms work is to…wait for it...ask firms how they work. This a clearly sensible proposition that is contested in economics for some reason, but we’ll ignore the controversy here and just explore the theory that springs from this approach.
2020
Level: beginner
The ‘How Firms Work’ Approach to How Firms Work
This course will fundamentally ask whether we can, or even should use the word ‘decolonising’ in our pursuit of a better economics?
2022
Level: beginner
Decolonising Economics?
Is degrowth bad economics To properly answer this question it is essential to understand what economic growth really is The term growth is often associated with an increase in wealth a term loosely defined but according to the degrowth movement economic growth is a narrower concept only describing an increase …
2022
Level: beginner
Is prosperous degrowth feasible?
Economic sociology is an entire subfield and one could write an series on it, so I’m going to stick to probably the most prominent economic sociologist and the founder of ‘new economic sociology’, Mark Granovetter.
2020
Level: beginner
Economic Sociology: the Contributions of Mark Granovetter
Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) is a school of monetary and macroeconomic thought that focuses on the analysis of the monetary and credit system, and in particular on the question of credit creation by the state.
2020
Level: beginner
Modern Monetary Theory
How countries achieve long-term GDP growth is up there with the most important topics in economics. As Nobel Laureate Robert Lucas put it “the consequences for human welfare involved in questions like these are simply staggering: once one starts to think about them, it is hard to think about anything else.” Ricardo Hausmann et al take a refreshing approach to this question in their Atlas of Economic Complexity. They argue a country’s growth depends on the complexity of its economy: it must have a diverse economy which produces a wide variety of products, including ones that cannot be produced much elsewhere. The Atlas goes into detail on exactly what complexity means, how it fits the data, and what this implies for development. Below I will offer a summary of their arguments, including some cool data visualisations.
2020
Level: beginner
GDP Growth: It’s Complicated
One hundred years ago the idea of 'the economy' didn't exist. Now, improving the economy has come to be seen as perhaps the most important task facing modern societies. Politics and policymaking are conducted in the language of economics and economic logic shapes how political issues are thought about and addressed.
2017
Level: advanced
The Econocracy
Michael Kalecki famously remarked “I have found out what economics is; it is the science of confusing stocks with flows”. Stock-Flow Consistent (SFC) models were developed precisely to address this kind of confusion. The basic intuition of SFC models is that the economy is built up as a set of intersecting balance sheets, where transactions between entities are called flows and the value of the assets/liabilities they hold are called stocks. Wages are a flow; bank deposits are a stock, and confusing the two directly is a category error. In this edition of the pluralist showcase I will first describe the logic of SFC models – which is worth exploring in depth – before discussing empirical calibration and applications of the models. Warning that there is a little more maths in this post than usual (i.e. some), but you should be able to skip those parts and still easily get the picture.
2020
Level: beginner
Stock Flow Consistent Macroeconomics

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