Letters Remain

Tag: politics

  • Food Advertising Causes Unconscious Snacking

    Food advertising does much more than influence our brand preferences; it also ‘primes’ automatic eating behaviours, contributing to overall and longer-term weight gain. This is the conclusion of a recent study into whether food advertising (of both the healthy and non-healthy kind) can trigger unconscious snacking by leading our thoughts toward hunger and food. Children…

  • Healthy Food Boosts School Results

    In 2004 UK TV chef Jamie Oliver ran an experiment at a school in Greenwich, London for an upcoming show of his, Jamie’s School Dinners. By various means Oliver attempted to improve the eating habits of the school’s students and, by-and-large, succeeded. Tracking his progress–and that of the children–were two Oxford economists, Michele Belot and Jonathan James.…

  • Poor Cyclists Key to Safe Roads

    Are poor cyclists and a laissez-faire attitude to enforcing road laws on them the key to safer roads? Are those that cycle on the wrong side of the road, pedal on the pavement and rush along one-way streets the wrong way one of the main reasons why the Netherlands has some of the safest roads in…

  • The Health Care Debate To Date

    For the health care debate that has been raging in America of late, I have subscribed to the same philosophy as Ben Casnocha: I’ve decided I’m just going to read it about once it’s resolved. You can’t keep up with everything. Rather than lightly follow along and skim articles and pretend to be informed, I’m…

  • Common Misconceptions About Iran(ians)

    Ten common misconceptions people of the West have about Iran and its inhabitants, as compiled by Juan Cole, president of the Global American Institute, Professor of History at the University of Michigan, and author of Engaging the Muslim World: Iran is aggressive and has threatened to attack Israel, its neighbors or the US. Iran is…

  • Absolute and Relative Poverty

    I’ve already mentioned the World Bank’s startling definition of extreme poverty: $1.25, adjusted for PPP. This is what is known as absolute poverty and it is seldom used by politicians—who prefer to look at poverty in relative terms. Relative poverty is slightly more involved, and the BBC weighs in with the internationally accepted definition of relative…

  • The Point of Economists

    Following Queen Elizabeth’s question to the economists—Why did no one see the crisis coming?—the Financial Times goes one further asking, What is the point of economists? If the economics profession could not warn the public about the credit crunch and the recession, what is the profession’s raison d’etre? Did this reflect, as some claim, that…

  • Exporting Poor Work Environments

    After a long time of successfully managing to avoid the blog, I eventually clicked this past week when I was sent Fake Steve Jobs’ reaction to the news that an employee of Foxconn, one of Apple’s Chinese ‘manufacturing partners’, committed suicide shortly after reporting a missing iPhone v4 prototype. We can’t make these products in…

  • Prosperity, Freedom, Fertility

    When it comes to reproduction, are individuals who strive only for personal gain—as Adam Smith stated in The Wealth of Nations—”led by an invisible hand […] to promote the public interest”? In The Tragedy of the Commons, ecologist Garrett Hardin suggested not and called for further government intervention to help control rising populations. Recent studies,…

  • Iran Political System Infographic

    Nicolas Rapp—an Art Director for the Associated Press—has produced a timely and simple infographic depicting Iran’s “complex and unusual political system”. Iran’s political system combines elements of democracy and religion. Institutions controlled by the Supreme Leader [elected by the Assembly of Experts] are balanced by an elected president and parliament. Wikipedia’s Politics of Iran article (and…