BERKELEY — One hears many strange things nowadays, not least because “they” (a complicated term) are flooding the zone with misinformation. Without a shared set of facts upon which to base ethical and policy debates, democracy inevitably breaks down.

BERKELEY — Once again, the United States is standing out as a world leader, but not for any reason anyone would want to emulate. In most of the Global North, the daily COVID-19 infection rate is down to around one per 5,000 people.

BERKELEY — US national income and output in the first quarter of 2020 was 1.25 per cent below what it had been in the fourth quarter of 2019, but still 9.5 per cent above would it would be by the second quarter of this year.

BERKELEY – On April 23, 2020, the United States crossed the threshold of 50,000 confirmed COVID-19 deaths, making it the world’s worst-hit region. The US has half the population of continental Europe, but three-quarters as many daily deaths.I am not an epidemiologist.

BERKELEY – Even to US President Donald Trump’s most ardent critics, his administration’s disastrous response to the COVID-19 pandemic has come as a surprise.

BERKELEY — Back in September 1994, the Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman actually wrote about one of US President Donald Trump’s current nominees to serve on the Federal Reserve’s seven-member Board of Governors.

BERKELEY — I was not surprised when leading Democratic primary contenders began endorsing a “wealth tax” along the lines of what has been proposed by my University of California, Berkeley, colleagues Gabriel Zucman and Emmanuel Saez.

BERKELEY — Since 1900, human technology and organisation have been evolving at a blistering pace. The degree of change that occurs in just one year would have taken 50 years or more before 1500.

BERKELEY — I recently received an email from my friend Mark Thoma of the University of Oregon, asking if I had noticed an increase in commentaries suggesting that a recession would be a good and healthy purge for the economy, or something along those lines.