A short background of Nobel Laureates Paul R. Milgrom and Robert B. Wilson.
Read More
Since 1969, pioneers in the field of economics and the social sciences have received the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, often regarded as the Nobel award of Economics. In the half-century that has followed, the honor has been designated 51 times to 84 Laureates — many of whom we hope to highlight in this series. This week, we’re featuring the recipients of the first prize, Ragnar Frisch and Jan Tinbergen, “for having developed and applied dynamic models for the analysis of economic processes.”
Read More
Given the convoluted nature of the politics of pandemics, it is important to understand the elements that enable successful government responses in the early, middle, and late stages of the crisis. By understanding the elements that help in times of pandemic, governments can learn from COVID-19 to better prepare for inevitable future public health crises.
Read More
With the advent of smart devices infiltrating the home and our increasing dependency of using technology within our day to day lives, the opportunity for data collection has grown exponentially over the past decade. The nascent exploration into privacy concerns have only started to become at the forefront of discussion where, in recent years, issues have become popularized by news outlets and media. In a 2013 speech by US Federal Trade Commissioner Julie Brill, she points to the potentially insidious intentions of firms “without our knowledge or consent [to] amass large amounts of private information about people to use for purposes we don’t expect or understand.” These concerns, however, have become a lot more alarming amidst the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Read More
What we are witnessing with COVID-19 is the loss of some of the emergent properties of human beings interacting and gathering - the breakdown of systems that keep us safe, warm, fed, and, just as importantly, well socialized.
Read More
The movie theatre industry is responsible for entertaining mass audiences; however due to its outdated method of delivery in a digital age dominated by accessibility and convenience, it has experienced a drastic drop in consumer demand. The film industry is now facing an unprecedented risk in producing and investing in theatrically distributed movies. These financial risks have reshaped the content produced for mass audiences away from original storylines and towards clichéd and overdone blockbusters, while streaming services have risen as the pinnacle for original, accessible, and influential entertainment. Therefore, the shift out of the stagnant movie theatre industry and into the at-home entertainment industry is signalling a new era of movie entertainment in the digital age along with the decline of a once dominant industry.
Read More
Remember the “I’m Just a Bill” song from Schoolhouse Rock? In it, a singing bill describes the path it must take to become a law in the United States, from surviving committee to getting a majority of support in both the House of Representatives and the Senate and, finally, requiring the signature of the president. The nation’s founding fathers famously sought to create a cautious process through which only the most worthy of ideas could become law because they wished to constrain overzealous legislators. But this cautious impulse is not just constrained to the United States. From houses of parliament to company boards the world over, a proposal must have the support of a majority of stakeholders to have a prayer of success. If a constituency’s issues cannot gain majority support, they are labelled “the opposition” and their issues remain unsolved. Is there an alternative to the majoritarian legislative process?
Read More
The threat of climate change is not as instinctively terrifying as a global war or stock market crash, but the stakes are just as dire. While its consequences may seem far off, the 2 degree Celsius increase in global temperatures that scientists warn against will ravage regions which are currently on the brink; Pakistan, India, and the Middle Eastern Gulf already suffer deadly heat waves that can exceed 49 degrees Celsius, but if global warming continues on its current trajectory, then by 2070 those regions will be on the verge of being uninhabitable. Coupled with growing problems like food insecurity, a worsened climate will culminate in famine, mass migration, and potentially war, all of which destabilize the world. Global warming isn’t simply an inconvenience or a risk to economic growth, it is a national security crisis which will affect everyone.
Read More