Interesting Links for 24-07-2018

[andrewducker]

The Times comes out for dictatorship

(tags: newspapers uk politics OhForFucksSake )

What, exactly, are the WorldCon committee up to?

(tags: conventions wtf scifi )

This is the Tories advertising for people to stand in the street tomorrow, to welcome the President of Qatar. Because we are a joke of a nation

(tags: qatar acting wtf )

Brexit: What happens if UK leaves the EU with no deal?

(tags: UK Europe doom )

Terry Crews Speaks Out In Support Of Brendan Fraser

(tags: abuse assault hollywood )

There are cultures all across the world, throughout history, who saw more than two genders

(tags: gender )

The Onion's Review of ‘Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again’ is just perfect

(tags: review movies video music fun )

Offshore owners of British property to be forced to reveal names

(tags: corruption housing uk transparency )

A Complete Electron Microscopy Volume of the Brain of a fruit fly, at neuron level

(tags: brain insects scanning neuroscience )

2018’s “Board Game of the Year” award goes to… Azul!

I've played this with someone. Can't remember who!
(tags: games )

Britain only finished paying off slave owners in 2015

(tags: slavery uk debt viajoexnz )

Jeremy Corbyn to highlight economic 'benefit' of Brexit

(tags: Labour UK Europe OhForFucksSake )

First of ScotRail's new electric trains take to track

(tags: Scotland trains transport electricity )

The Genetics of Staying in School

One reason is to look at how genes and environments interact.“If you did a study like ours 100 years ago, the strongest genetic predictor of education would be how many X chromosomes you had, because society was set up in a way that it was much harder for women to get educated than men,” says Benjamin. Likewise, many of the genes that are associated with education today are likely important “because of how today’s educational system is set up. It requires people to sit at desks for hours, and listen to instructions from a teacher. People who get restless, or are less obedient to authority, will fare less well in that environment.”
(tags: genetics Education )

Comments

[danieldwilliam]

I'm not sure that "Britain only finished paying off slave owners in 2015" is an accurate description of what's going on there.

In fact, I'd argue that it falls in to a dangerous rhetorical trap that e.g. the Tories use to reduce the size of the state.

Firstly, and pedantically, Britain paid off the slave owners in 1833. The debt instrument used to make those payments was not paid off until 2015.

Secondly, government debt doesn't work like household debt. The state is a) a much larger part of the economy than a household, b) has am impact on fiscal policy, c) has an impact on monetary policy and d) has a policy impact on long-term growth rates.

Thirdly, government debt is not hypotheced. The debt instrument is different from the original and current requirement to hold the debt.

Fourthly, government debt represents spending today but interest payments tomorrow. The interest payments tomorrow represent taxation tomorrow. This taxation comes out of the growth of the economy. So if the government can borrow at 2% and the economy grows at 2.5% because of the spending the government made with the debt then there is basically free money. It's the magic money tree that Teressa May is so sceptical about.


The debt issued to make the cash payments isn't slave holder related debt - it's just general government debt. For example, the government could have paid off the "slave holder" debt in 1914 but decided to fight a war instead. Rather than pay off the" slave holder" debt paying (say) 2% interest and borrowing to fight the way at, say, 4% the Treasury decided to roll over the "slave holder" debt. Thus the total interest payable, and the tax required to service the interest is lower overall.

If you or I buy a house it makes sense to say that it took us 25 years to pay off the mortgage. We have one asset, one debt, one stream of income and discrete and finite amount of time to use that income to purchase goods and services. I'm not sure you can do the same with government debt.

If interest rates had dropped to 0.25% in 1835 and the government had called in all outstanding debt and re-issued it all at 0.25% would we say that it only taken the government 2 year to pay off the slave holders?

The danger in thinking and talking about government debt as if were household debt is that it buys in to the narrative of the Chancellor as a prudent housewife and that reducing government spending is always, all other things being equal a good idea. That's contrary to Keynesian economics and the need for counter-cyclical government spending. It's how we ended up with the Geddes Axe and Osborne's "long-term economic plan" which both reduced the size of the state, increased the political power of the rich and lengthened and deepened the real economic impact of the financial crisis that they followed.

[channelpenguin]

thank you for that! It is the clearest explanation of why governments can (and should) sensibly borrow that I have yet seen.

[drplokta]

Furthermore, the article says that the sum paid in compensation was so large that it took that amount of time to pay it off, which is ridiculous. All that happened was that long-term interest rates by 2015 had fallen enough that it was cheaper for the government to pay off and terminate three centuries worth of perpetual bonds than it was to keep paying the interest on them.

[danieldwilliam]

Which is happening a lot at the moment. UK Government borrowing rates have never been so low. The Treasury is busy cancelling as much outstanding debt as it can and replacing it with newly issued debt paying interest at 0.5%. Quite a lot of that date is very long dated. One of the curious side effects of the financial crash is that UK borrowing costs are likely to fall once we finally emerge from the economic slow down caused by the fniancial crash and Brexit.

[cmcmck]

As one who left school at fifteen unqualified having loathed the place but went on to have several sets of letters after my name, that last one makes a lot of sense- it just didn't suit my way of learning at all!

[calimac]

So is the Onion review of Mama Mia supposed to be blank? Is that what's "perfect" about it? I don't know if I'm looking at a joke too subtle for me to get or a display problem on my computer.

[snippy]

It's a video at the Onion's website; probably if you go to their website you can find it (the link worked for me).

[andrewducker]

There should be a video at the top.