Innovation Toronto » Economist

The Economics Of Nice Folks

innovation2 — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 16:32:08 +0000

photo credit: shoehorn99
A basic tenet of economics is that people always behave selfishly, or as the 18th century philosopher economist David Hume put it, “every man ought to be supposed to be a knave.”

But what if some people aren’t always knaves?

Sam Bowles argues in Science June 20 that economics will get it wrong then, sometimes badly so. He points to new experimental evidence that people do often act against their own personal self-interest in favor of the common good, and they do so in predictable, understandable ways. Poorly-designed economic institutions fail to take advantage of intrinsic moral behavior and often undermine it.

Read more . . .

Running Out of Planet to Exploit

innovation2 — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 13:34:37 +0000

photo credit: ekai

Nine years ago The Economist ran a big story on oil, which was then selling for $10 a barrel. The magazine warned that this might not last. Instead, it suggested, oil might well fall to $5 a barrel.

Last week, oil hit $117.

It’s not just oil that has defied the complacency of a few years back. Food prices have also soared, as have the prices of basic metals. And the global surge in commodity prices is reviving a question we haven’t heard much since the 1970s: Will limited supplies of natural resources pose an obstacle to future world economic growth?

The Economist - Social graph-iti

ron — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 17:41:30 +0000

There’s less to Facebook and other social networks than meets the eye

Something New Under the Sun - The Economist

ron — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 13:36:20 +0000

“A CRISIS is a terrible thing to waste,” Vinod Khosla laments to Larry Page. The two Silicon Valley luminaries are chatting one evening at the Googleplex, the quirky Californian headquarters of Google. The crisis which Mr Khosla is concerned about is caused by carmakers’ addiction to oil and the consequent warming of the planet. “The energy and car industries have not been innovative in many years because they have faced no real crisis, no impetus for change,” he insists.