Year: 2012

Mudville – Tin Village at the Sunrise Festival

by

Sometimes you have to go off-line, off-grid, out of your comfort zones, to get a sense of what is possible. I know now when push comes to shove people can work together in hard conditions and flourish. And when they do something beautiful can happen that you would not expect if you judged everything from the way things appear, from the outside. The people who will make the future work are not the people you think: the control people, the shiny people, the spiritual people. They are the activist people, smart, funny, edgy, generous, friendly, warrior-hearted. The people who are not afraid of the mud. Who are not afraid of the earth or each other, and who can still make a fire, come what may.

How cascading failures in the global finance system could mean TEOTWAWKI

by

I’ve met David Korowicz and he is a thoughtful, deeply knowledgeable, highly analytical, caring man who worries that the global system we now labor under is headed for what might be called the ultimate crash. To Korowicz, a physicist turned risk consultant, that system resembles nothing so much as a house of cards waiting to be blown down by the next financial hurricane that comes its way.

Sustainable healthcare

by

Sustainable healthcare is achievable now, at (relatively) little cost and with existing knowledge. It is being demonstrated all over the world currently and has been demonstrated historically. Is it easy? No, it is challenging, but why would that be a reason not to do it? What we have is unsustainable, and more importantly, does not generate health.

ODAC Newsletter – Aug 3

by

US oil and gas reserves grew faster than at any time in the past 35 years according to figures released this week by the EIA. The numbers are for 2010 with the increase credited to fracking technology and high oil prices leading to more exploration and development. While the report will be used to provide further confirmation of a new era of energy abundance, there is growing evidence that the realities when it comes to actual production are not as rosy…

Petroleum Demand in Developing Countries

by

Conventional wisdom might suggest that as oil prices rise, developing countries would be less able to afford oil, leaving wealthier countries to bid against each other for increasingly higher-priced supplies. But that is not at all what happened over the past decade, and the trend may give developed countries a reason for concern.

Shell Game in the Arctic

by

When you go to the mountains, you go to the mountains. When it’s the desert, it’s the desert. When it’s the ocean, though, we generally say that we’re going “to the beach.” Land is our element, not the waters of our world, and that is an unmistakable advantage for any oil company that wants to drill in pristine waters.

Pulitzer-Winning Reporting Duo Don Barlett and James Steele on “The Betrayal of the American Dream” (Parts 1 and 2)

by

The famed award-winning investigative reporting team of Donald Barlett and James Steele have just published a new book, “The Betrayal of the American Dream,” a followup to their landmark bestseller, “America: What Went Wrong?” As Republicans and Democrats continue disputing who should bear the brunt of the tax burden, Barlett and Steele argue that America’s middle class has been decimated over the years due to policies governing not only taxes but also bank regulations, trade deficits and pension funds. Their book chronicles how the American middle class has been systematically impoverished and its prospects thwarted in favor of a new ruling elite.

‘Central banks should admit their mistakes’: an interview with the Bank of England’s Andy Haldane

by

Andy Haldane, Executive Director of Financial Stability at the Bank of England, has been hailed as a new type of policy expert and intellectual. In this interview, for our Uneconomics series, he sets out his vision for the future of economics and economic policy-making. It is a future where central banks are humble, “listen as often as they speak”, and own up to their mistakes.