Banking wasnt meant to be like this

Longish but very pertinent article from the ever sharp Michael Hudson.

"In sum, neither British nor American banking or stock markets planned for the future. Their time frame was short, and they preferred rent-extracting projects to industrial innovation. Most banks favored large real estate borrowers, railroads and public utilities whose income streams easily could be forecast. Only after manufacturing companies grew fairly large did they obtain significant bank and stock market credit.
What is remarkable is that this is the tradition of banking and high finance that has emerged victorious throughout the world. The explanation is primarily the military victory of the United States, Britain and their Allies in the Great War and a generation later, in World War II."


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Ian Chappell's take on the top three modern test batsmen

Brilliant. Simple brilliant. Precisely my points too.

Apart from being technically quite correct, a graceful approach to batting, playing when the team needs him the most, playing when the rest of the team was crumbling (which was often enough). Getting in and making it count and scoring big counts too.

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Al the worlds gold

Nice infographic

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United Bases of America

Good graphic on all the bases of the US around the world. I am reminded of one more pic that I saw a few years ago.

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Michael Hudson on Europe's woes

Never has the gap between pretended aim and actual effect been more hypocritical. Making interest payments (and even capital gains) tax-exempt deprives governments of revenue from the user fees they are relinquishing, increasing their budget deficits. And instead of promoting price stability (the ECB’s ostensible priority), privatization increases prices for infrastructure, housing and other costs of living and doing business by building in interest charges and other financial overhead – and much higher salaries for management. So it is merely a knee-jerk ideological claim that this policy is more efficient simply because privatizers do the borrowing rather than government.


Brilliant read on the Euro zone and its myriad problems.
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