Like a lot of people, I was disappointed that the latest vacancy for the President of the World Bank would likely be filled by another American nominated by the US President. It has been custom and practice for the head … Continued
Daniel Kahneman – Thinking, fast and slow Whenever I’m asked in future to recommend a book on behavioural finance, I shall enthusiastically suggest this one. Although it’s not limited to behavioural finance or even its wider relation behavioural economics, the … Continued
Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson: “Why Nations Fail“ There have been many fascinating books in the last couple of decades on the big question of why some countries are rich and others poor, and the persistence of inequality over decades, … Continued
It never occurred to me to study law at university. I mean it literally never entered my head, I was only even vaguely aware of the possibility. When I arrived at Sidney Sussex College, I discovered all these people working … Continued
The east of England, including Cambridge, is officially in a drought. This comes as incredible news to those many people who imagine the UK as trapped in a perpetual rainstorm. For the record, here are mean annual rainfall amounts (mm) … Continued
One consequence of getting older is that friends and former colleagues appear more frequently in the news. Last week it was the planning minister, Greg Clark, who I met when we were PhD students at LSE, launching a revamp of Britain’s … Continued
At a time when oil prices are around their all time highs it may seem odd to be thinking of how lower hydrocarbon prices will affect the world. But there is a growing sense in the US that longer term … Continued
The FT has an article by their Beijing correspondent, Simon Rabinovitch, saying that Chinese customers are getting angry about the big banks’ ever growing profits, which are in part at the expense of depositors who receive a negative real interest rate. … Continued
Following my post on teaching and research, I got a couple of comments and questions about the value of research for teaching. At a recent internal meeting, some colleagues who wanted to minimise the dilemma of whether to focus on … Continued
It is well known inside the major research-led universities but perhaps less well known outside, that the status of research is far higher than that of teaching. In a university like Cambridge, appointment, tenure, promotion and general reputation are dominated … Continued
Globally, applicants to MBA programmes take the Graduate Management Admissions Test (GMAT). Those applying to other sorts of graduate school often take the Graduate Record Examinations (GRE). If you want to enter a US college you usually need to take … Continued
2016, 2019, 2021, 2026. What do these dates have in common? They’re among the various predictions of investment banks and other pundits of when the Chinese economy will overtake that of the US to become the world’s largest. The most … Continued
The latest annual letter to shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway, the investment company run by Warren Buffet and Charlie Munger, has a short section on gold which has made waves round the investment world. It’s the best statement of the investment … Continued
Having just given two talks, in Singapore and Hong Kong, on the likelihood of Chinese banks, already the world’s most profitable, changing the world, it’s good to see my old boss Jamie Dimon agreeing with me. Dimon was quoted in … Continued
The Institute for New Economic Thinking was founded two years ago with funding from George Soros. It held its first ever conference here in Cambridge, where possibly the greatest combination of leading economists ever assembled for one meeting debated how … Continued