The upheaval in Maine's Senate race has focused attention on candidates and party leaders. Less noticed is what the campaign finance data reveal about the state's Democratic Party and its structural dependence on national organizations and large out-of-state donors.
A response to Paul Krugman's recent essay on U.S. and European productivity opens onto a broader question. If the standard metrics point in conflicting directions, perhaps the problem lies less with the economies than with the measures themselves.
What can one Senate race reveal about the hidden machinery of American politics? In Maine, donor patterns expose how campaign finance can shape party competition, political narratives, and the choices voters are asked to make long before ballots are counted.
We’ve inherited a stubborn reflex for resisting fatcats, oligarchs, profiteers, and anyone who tries to run roughshod over us.
“If you’re a billionaire, why are you a billionaire?”
~American singer-songwriter Billie Eilish
“This land was made for you and me.”
~American folk singer-songwriter Woody Guthrie
As America marks 250 years of independence, Adam Smith is again being pressed into service as a founding myth. A deeper reading of The Wealth of Nations reveals a far richer thinker than today’s easy invocations of markets and liberty suggest.
As America marks 250 years of independence, Adam Smith is again being pressed into service as a founding myth. A deeper reading of The Wealth of Nations reveals a far richer thinker than today’s easy invocations of markets and liberty suggest.
Europe’s new fiscal rules still bind policy to fragile estimates of potential output. For Italy, targeting lower unemployment could sustain stronger growth, improve deficit outcomes, and expose the self-defeating logic of austerity when debt is measured against a stagnating economy.
1. Introduction
Central bank money is still accounted for as debt, a legacy of an earlier monetary order. Treating sovereign money as equity would clarify central bank balance sheets, strengthen institutional transparency, and better prepare monetary systems for future digital-era design choices.
Global health financing is collapsing just as demands on health systems are rising. As funding retreats and reform debates intensify, a deeper question emerges about who bears the costs, and whether today’s fixes risk creating lasting damage that will be difficult to reverse.
Equality runs deeper than preference or policy fashion, rooted in human social instincts and reflected in outcomes across societies. It is time for economics and policy alike to reckon with how profoundly distribution shapes well-being and social stability.
