Exclusive Opinion, Commentary and Op-ed from today's Top Economists and Public Intellectuals

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Europe’s Economic Groupthink

Hans-Helmut Kotz Jun. 17, 2013

During a hearing on the constitutionality of the ECB’s measures to prevent the eurozone from falling apart, Andreas Vosskuhle, President of Germany’s Constitutional Court, raised an important question: Do non-German economists condemn the ECB’s measures as unequivocally as most German experts do?
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Only the Poor Die Young

Johan P. Mackenbach Jun. 17, 2013

The lives of people who are lower on the socioeconomic ladder are shorter and less healthy, on average, than those of people on higher rungs. What is needed are more targeted welfare policies that account for the effects of selective upward social mobility and different rates of diffusion of behavioral change.
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The Limits to Panic

Bjørn Lomborg Jun. 17, 2013

We often hear how the world as we know it will end, usually through ecological collapse. Indeed, more than 40 years after the Club of Rome released the mother of all apocalyptic forecasts, The Limits to Growth, its basic ideas – though thoroughly discredited – are still shaping mindsets and influencing public policy.
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Copycat Capitalists

Alexander Friedman Jun. 13, 2013

Given the West’s anemic growth performance in recent years, it is hardly surprising that envy of China’s economic dynamism has manifested itself in official policy. But Western countries are shifting to statism at the very moment that China is heading in the opposite direction.
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The Austerity Pandemic

Isabel Ortiz, Matthew Cummins Jun. 14, 2013

While some northern countries are beginning to question the austerity prescription, their southern counterparts are increasingly adopting cost-cutting measures. But the dangers posed by austerity are even more pronounced in developing countries, where citizens are especially vulnerable to its economic and social consequences.
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The Trouble Within Islam

Tony Blair Jun. 10, 2013

The murder of Lee Rigby on a London street last month does not signify a problem with Islam. But there is a problem within Islam: a strain that has at its heart a view of religion – and about the relationship between religion and politics – that is not compatible with pluralistic, liberal, open-minded societies.
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Taksim and the Left

Kemal Derviş Jun. 10, 2013

A striking feature of the Turkish protests has been the distance that the demonstrators have put between themselves and existing center-left political parties. In this sense, Turkey's protests resemble those elsewhere, from the “Occupy Wall Street” movement to the protests in Spain and Italy.
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Lessons of a Greek Tragedy

Barry Eichengreen Jun. 13, 2013

It was already clear in the first half of 2010, when Greece lost access to financial markets, that the country's public debt was unsustainable. If other countries draw the right lessons, Greece’s brave, beleaguered citizens can at least take comfort in knowing that many people elsewhere will be spared the same unnecessary sacrif…

Yannos Papantoniou Jun. 12

Bismarck versus Bismarck

ATHENS – The centrality of Germany to Europe and, more widely, to world affairs has been amply, and often bloodily, demonstra…
William White Jun. 12

The Ultra-Easy Money Experiment

BASEL – The world’s central banks are engaged in one of the great policy experiments in modern history: ultra-easy money. And…
Dani Rodrik Jun. 12

Europe’s Way Out

CAMBRIDGE – It seems that austerity is out of fashion in the eurozone – at least for the moment. The European Commission has …
Jeffrey Frankel Jun. 11

All Quiet on the Currency Front

CAMBRIDGE – The term “currency wars” is a catchy way of saying “competitive devaluation.” In the wake of the sharp fall in th…
Zhang Monan Jun. 10

China’s Cold Eye on Hot Money

BEIJING – With China feeling the pressure from large-scale inflows of short-term capital, the State Administration of Foreign…
Mahmoud Mohieldin Jun. 10

Financing the Next Development Agenda

WASHINGTON, DC – As the 2015 target date for the Millennium Development Goals approaches, the United Nations is intensifying …
Paola Subacchi Jun. 7

Central Banking’s New Face

LONDON – A changing of the guard is underway at many of the world’s leading central banks. Haruhiko Kuroda is now installed a…
Martin N. Baily and… Jun. 7

Myanmar’s Moment?

YANGON – Interest in Myanmar (Burma) has become intense. Last month, Thein Sein became the first president of Myanmar to visi…
Jeffrey D. Sachs Jun. 7

Sustainable Visions

NEW YORK – UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is mobilizing global action around the great challenge of our time: sustainable d…
Allan H. Meltzer Jun. 6

Quantitative Quicksand

PITTSBURGH – Almost all recoveries from recession have included rapid employment growth – until now. Though advanced-country …

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Shashi Tharoor Jun. 14

India’s LBW

NEW DELHI – A casual reader of India’s newspapers for the last several weeks would be forgiven …
Alpha Condé Jun. 12

Africa’s Transparency Agenda

CONAKRY – In December 2010, I became President of Guinea following the country’s first truly op…
Kandeh K. Yumkella Jun. 11

The Power of the Prize

VIENNA – The world faces two looming, interconnected energy challenges: how to provide reliable…
Bob Ward Jun. 11

Climate Change by the Numbers

LONDON – Governments around the world have just received one of the most important scientific r…
Sami Mahroum Jun. 11

Democracy in Arabia?

PARIS – In Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville argued that the public’s trust alleviate…
Peter Singer Jun. 10

A Moral Theory’s Immoral Outcome

PRINCETON – Is it always wrong to take an innocent human …
Jay Naidoo Jun. 8

Nutrition for Growth

GENEVA – This week, British Prime Minister David Cameron, whose country holds this year’s G-8 P…
Minghao Zhao Jun. 7

“Mao-Nixon” 2.0

BEIJING – The “Sunnylands summit,” which brings together Chinese President Xi Jinping and US Pr…
Nina L. Khrushcheva Jun. 7

Vladimir Putin’s Potemkin Love Life

MOSCOW – From Russia with love? Not in Vladimir Putin’s R…
Ian Buruma Jun. 6

Turkey’s Class Struggle

NEW YORK – One interpretation of the anti-government demonstrations now roiling Turkish cities …