Subjects Archives: Political Economy

Over all, Washington has provided the regime with $310 billion in military and economic aid, which has been regularly adjusted for inflation, according to the Council on Foreign Relations, an American think tank.

BRICS keeps expanding, adding 9 partner countries in January 2025, after admitting 4 new members in 2024. It now makes up roughly half of the global population and more than 41% of world GDP (PPP). It’s an economic powerhouse, with top producers of key commodities like oil, gas, grains, meat, and minerals.

The Wilmington, North Carolina, massacre of 1898, also called a coup, was not a spontaneous eruption of white supremacist violence, but instead came from the top leadership of the Democratic Party and was backed by the rich.

Several obituaries of Amiya Kumar Bagchi have appeared since his death on November 28, covering his remarkable achievements.

Money on the Left speaks with Dr. Jens Martignoni, lecturer at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences and chief editor of the International Journal of Community Currency Research (IJCCR). Community or complementary currencies are phenomena of great interest to monetary scholars and activists. We’ve spoken often about them on this show–whether about the Benjamins classroom currency at SUNY Cortland, the DVDs currency at Denison, or our recurring work on the Uni Currency Project. During our conversation with Martignoni, the appeal of such projects becomes clear.

A study came out in December that made me cry.

Credit card defaults in the U.S. reached their highest level since the 2008 financial crash during the first nine months of 2024, according to figures compiled by BankRegData and cited in a recent Financial Times article.

All this however is still in the realm of mere possibilities; what is more certain is the 10 per cent tax on global imports and the 60 per cent tax on imports from China.

Billy Saas and guest-host Ben Wilson speak with Martha McCluskey about the ins and outs of the Law & Political Economy movement. McCluskey is Professor Emerita at the University at Buffalo School of Law and a progressive institution-builder. She has made foundational contributions to feminist research and activism in and beyond the academy, focusing on interrelations between economic and legal institutions. McCluskey’s expertise with construction and maintenance of durable institutions for the development and circulation of socially- and politically-attuned critical legal scholarship gives good reasons for hope in this time of great political unease. 

The sentiment that the West is an unreliable trade partner in now common in Russia. In an interview with GUANCHA.CN, Russian consumer market expert Dmitry Reva noted that Western corps left the Russian market after the war broke out, leaving a vacuum. Following this, China-Russian trade has enhanced, with prospects for deeper cooperation in agriculture, Far East development, and other fields.

Mark Rutte said the alliance needs to adopt a ‘wartime mindset’ and suggested cutting spending on pensions and healthcare.

The evolution of the Pentalasia has been and continues to be central in defining the Middle East and the entire geopolitical Rimland. To whom the control of Pentalasia will go, will probably go the control of the entire Rimland.

Under the presidency of Emmanuel Macron, the expected lifespan of a prime minister has gone from three years to three months. Michel Barnier, the latest PM to fall victim to the rolling political, social and constitutional crisis that is the Macron presidency, was appointed in September and kicked out in time to spend Christmas with his family. His predecessor, Gabriel Attal, lasted a comparatively Methuselean six months.

Liberal opinion holds that the international monetary and financial system is a device for promoting the interests of all participating countries by providing a convenient payments arrangement within which trade can be carried on. The reality however is altogether different: the international system is founded upon the hegemony of western imperialism, and in turn sustains this hegemony.

Oil companies have long lied about the impacts of burning their fuels. They also lie about the plastic they produce. The treaty talks were no exception.

The Global North and its corporate executives have wielded the concept of ‘corruption’ to underdevelop the Global South, whose social wealth it instead injects into the Continent of Sleaze.

The solution is obvious and simple, which is why the nation’s richest people hate it so much: Scrap the cap and make the wealthy pay a much fairer share in Social Security taxes.

‘UNION’ follows Amazon warehouse organizers through an uphill battle, a stunning victory, and an uncertain future.

Recently, there has been a spate of articles and commentary about ‘U.S. exceptionalism’, namely that the U.S. economy is bounding forward in terms of economic growth, hi-tech investment and productivity, leaving the rest of the world behind.

The United States is continuing its economic battle against China in South America. However, its influence in the region is in decline as nations seek alternatives in order to forestall U.S. hegemony.