About power, profit, progress and sustainability. In a year of underwhelming new films, Arrival was almost impressive. The director, Denis Villeneuve, makes intelligent thrillers about big universal issues. I first came across him with his film Incendies, about the pointlessness of religious hatred, set in a place that could be Lebanon.

The problem of social organization is how to set up an arrangement under which greed will do the least harm, capitalism is that kind of a system. If you want to understand geology, study earthquakes. If you want to understand economics, study the Great Depression. Capitalism is the astounding belief that the most wickedest of men will do the most wickedest of things for the greatest good of everyone. Inflation is the one form of taxation that can be imposed without legislation.

Will a Global Happiness Index Ever Beat Out GDP? May 24, 2011. And yet, politicians and the media are constantly using growth rates as. Way to assess whether a country is really getting ahead. By Kevin Yao and Langi Chia.

Hopefully, this blog will offer you some insight to both in a way that is not boring, and possibly even entertaining. Sunday, November 6, 2011. Have you ever noticed that sometimes we have too many choices for some things, and not enough of others? Links to this post. Wednesday, January 5, 2011. Happy New Year blog fans! And by the way, if you must know, I have accomplished one go.

Bursting of the US housing bubble. The financial effects of a bird flu triggered pandemic. US tariffs on China to revalue counterproductive. The potential real effects from the repricing of risk. Credit crunch worsens US outlook.