Author Archives: wciecon
How I spent my gap year
Some economists think the 1871 revolution was a big mistake, and led economics down the wrong path. They take their inspiration from pre-1871 economics, especially Ricardo and Marx, and proceed from there. Many of them are very smart and knowledgeable people. They think that most academic economists ignore them and know little or nothing about […]
Bureaucratic Entropy?
The Association of Ontario Municipalities is having its annual conference August 19-22 in Ottawa, the mother city of all governments in Canada. Among the items on the agenda are the keynote address on: “new secrets to leadership with five powerful tools to improve negotiation effectiveness”, a speech by Ontario’s premier (followed by the opposition leaders […]
Flowcharts as models
Give an economist a problem such as "Why do people waste their time playing video games?" and she'll typically model it like this:
Should new editions of intermediate microeconomics textbooks be banned?
The basic content of intermediate micro – choice theory, theory of the firm, market equilibrium – has not changed for decades. The latest Intermediate micro textbooks cover substantially the same material – indifference curves, budget constraints, cost curves- as do 20 year old texts. Sure, there are some differences across editions. Take, for example Eaton, […]
The Loanable Funds and other theories
This is a long and boring post. (Though some will no doubt find it highly controversial, and a very few might even get over-excited). It might be useful for economics students who want to put the Loanable Funds theory into perspective. They are my main intended audience. And maybe for those who teach them too. […]
Signs of population aging
While wandering the world in recent weeks, I've spotted some sure signs of population aging…
As the Federation Turns: Quetarian Public Finances
Quebec and Ontario, the twin pillars of the Canadian federation, have much in common given that they share the economic space of the Windsor-Quebec axis – an economic region nestled around the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence waterway. Once upon a time, they were even one province but that fiery marriage had its ups and downs and […]
Taxpayers need warm glows too
Charles Sonnibank, D.D. by deed dated October 1635, bequeathed a reserve rent, out of land at Broome in the Parish of Hopesay, of 13 pounds, 6 shillings, 8 pence to be paid quarterly at the Rectory to Ten Poor Widows of Ludlow, the Rector to retain 6 shillings 8 pence for his care in receiving […]
Births Revisited: Births, Population and Per Capita Income
Well, after my last post I finally got around to calculating another measure of the birth rate – births per capita. Total births are a useful aggregate but the measure does not adjust for population size. There are other fertility measures out there such as births per woman aged 15 to 44 years but per […]
Why does repo exist?
Today's dumb question from the back of the Finance class. (But I would guess some other students might not know the answer either, and some maybe hadn't even thought of the question). [Update: just to be explicit, I am not asking why lenders want security for loans. I am asking why I don't sell my […]
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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