Edward Conard

Top Ten New York Times Bestselling Author

  • “…a must-read for serious students of economic policy.” - Glenn Hubbard, Dean, Columbia Business School, and former Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers
  • “…reminds us that inequality sends a signal of what society lacks most, in America’s case, entrepreneurship and risk taking.” - Lawrence Lindsey, CEO, The Lindsey Group, former Director of the National Economic Council
  • “Unintended Consequences provides a provocative interpretation of the causes of the global financial crisis and the policies needed to return to rapid growth. Whether you agree or not, this analysis is well worth reading.” - Nouriel Roubini, New York University; Chairman, Roubini Global Economics
  • “…serious thinking for serious thinkers. …a thought-provoking blueprint for growing middle- and working-class incomes.” - Mitt Romney, former Governor of Massachusetts
  • “Unintended Consequences represents the most cogent and persuasive analysis of the Financial Crisis to date.” - Andrei Shleifer, 1999 John Bates Clark Medal Winner
  • “…a fresh argument for the productive value of inequality.” - David Autor, Professor of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • “…challenges misconceptions that distort our economic debates.” - Arthur Brooks, President of the American Enterprise Institute
  • “Unintended Consequences is far smarter and more thought-provoking than most economics written for the general public” - Greg Mankiw, Harvard University, Former Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors
  • “Unintended Consequences is full of substance, it is one of the must-read books of the year, and once I finish it I will be giving it a second read through right away.” - Tyler Cowen, Professor, George Mason University
  • “There are an amazing number of good ideas and interesting points made in Unintended Consequences. The thinking underlying it, and the obvious depth of understanding of the author, are very impressive.” - Steven Levitt, coauthor of Freakonomics; 2004 John Bates Clark Medal
  • “Unintended Consequences offers deep and well-argued analyses on almost every issue.” - The New York Times
  • “…a fresh argument for the productive value of inequality.” - David Autor, Professor of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Upside of Inequality Oxford Unintended Consequences

Macro Roundup


Monday, September 9, 2024

AI Summary. Labor market earnings are strongly associated with measures of personality traits and preferences, and over the last two decades returns to cognitive skills have been flat or declined in the US, Sweden, and Finland while returns to "soft" skills such as conscientiousness, extraversion, emotional stability, and social skills have grown rapidly.

David Deming and Mikko Silliman National Bureau of Economic Research
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.@ProfDavidDeming and @m_silliman find “the economic return to social skills in the US more than doubled” between the 1980s and the 2000s, and argue for a multi-dimensional concept of human capital.

Are labor market returns shifting from cognitive skills to soft skills?

Core argument: Economic returns to cognitive skills have been flat or declined in the U.S., Sweden, and Finland, while returns to non-cognitive skills such as conscientiousness, extraversion, emotional stability, and social skills have grown rapidly.

We present evidence for the growing importance and economic value of "non-cognitive" skills - a strong association between labor market earnings and various measures of personality traits and preferences. Over the last two decades, the economic returns to cognitive skills have been flat or declined in the U.S., Sweden, and Finland, while the returns to "non-cognitive" or "soft" skills like conscientiousness, extraversion, emotional stability, and social skills have grown rapidly. We argue that the right term for these capacities is "higher order" skills, in part because they are farther up the hierarchy of cognitive processes than the skills measured by traditional tests of academic achievement. Teamwork and decision-making require workers to apply knowledge to solving new problems and to connect one’s own skills and ideas to others. We argue that modeling higher order skills requires us to consider workers as agents who make choices about which jobs or tasks to do, and whether to do them alone or in a team.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Economic returns to cognitive skills have been flat or declined in the U.S., Sweden, and Finland, while returns to non-cognitive skills such as conscientiousness, extraversion, emotional stability, and social skills have grown rapidly.
  2. Evidence of a strong association between labor market earnings and measures of personality traits and preferences supports terming these capacities "higher order" skills, farther up the hierarchy of cognitive processes than skills captured by traditional academic achievement tests.
  3. Because teamwork and decision-making require applying knowledge to new problems and connecting one's own skills and ideas to others, modeling higher order skills requires treating workers as agents who choose which jobs or tasks to do and whether to do them alone or in a team.

Related Articles:

  • The Economics of Inequality in High-Wage Economies — Information technology created investment opportunities exceeding the supply of properly trained talent, while trade with low-wage economies, low-skilled immigration, trade deficits, and aging demographics eased constraints on low-skilled labor and risk-averse savings. The author argues this framework, rather than rising cronyism, explains high returns to success, slowing productivity growth, and low interest rates.
  • Why Do Wages Grow Faster for Educated Workers? — College graduates sort into professional, non-routine occupations where wages rise much more with job tenure, and the author estimates this occupational sorting explains at least half of the life-cycle growth in the college wage premium. That premium is estimated at 22% at age 26, 49% at age 40, and 56% at age 60.
  • Multidimensional Human Capital and the Wage Structure — The wage return to cognitive skills has declined, from about 10% higher hourly wages per standard deviation of test score in the 1980s and early 1990s to 4.5% in the 2000s and early 2010s, while returns to a bachelor's degree rose. Social skill-intensive occupations grew as a share of US jobs, with faster real wage growth.

AI Summary. If consumption growth accounted for 70% of China's future GDP growth with nominal GDP growing 6% a year, the author estimates it would take 16 years for consumption to rise from 53.4% of GDP to 63–64%. Even with consumption driving 90% of growth, the shift would take 6 years.

Michael Pettis Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
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.@michaelxpettis argues that rebalancing China’s economy to raise the consumption share of GDP from 53% in 2023 to a target of 63–64% may take decades. The alternative is “surging debt” or a “disruptive contraction in GDP.”

How long would raising China's consumption share of GDP take?

Core argument: With consumption growth accounting for 70% of China's future GDP growth and nominal GDP growing 6% a year on average, China's consumption share of GDP would take 16 years to rise from 53.4% in 2023 to 63–64%.

If growth in consumption accounted for 70% of China’s future GDP growth, and if China’s nominal GDP grew by 6% on average, it would take 16 years for the consumption share of China’s GDP to rise [from 53.4% in 2023] to 63–64% of GDP. Even if we allowed for exceptional circumstances, with an annual average GDP growth rate of 6% and the growth in consumption accounting for nearly all of the country’s future GDP growth (90%), it would still take 6 years for the consumption share of China’s GDP to rise to 63–64% of GDP. From such a low base, it is not enough that the consumption share of GDP growth is above average (say 60 to 70% ) for a few years for China to really catch up to a more sustainable consumption share of GDP.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. With consumption growth accounting for 70% of China's future GDP growth and nominal GDP growing 6% a year on average, China's consumption share of GDP would take 16 years to rise from 53.4% in 2023 to 63–64%.
  2. Even under exceptional circumstances in which consumption growth accounts for 90% of China's GDP growth at a 6% average annual rate, China would still need 6 years to lift consumption to 63–64% of GDP.
  3. From a base of 53.4% of GDP in 2023, a consumption share of GDP growth of 60–70% sustained for only a few years would not be enough for China to reach a more sustainable consumption share of GDP.

Related Articles:

  • Communist Party Priorities Complicate Plans to Revive China’s Economy — China's leadership objects to Western-style consumption-driven growth, viewing it as wasteful and at odds with the goal of making China a world-leading industrial and technological power, according to people familiar with decision-making in Beijing. Chinese officials also emphasized avoiding a current-account deficit, which would signal greater dependence on the outside world.
  • Why Is It So Hard for China to Boost Domestic Demand? — Chinese manufacturing competitiveness was built on transfers that acted as implicit supply-side support, so reversing them to raise household consumption would likely erode that competitiveness and cause a short-term contraction. Manufacturing accounts for 27–28% of China's economy versus 15–16% of global output, making any such hit especially painful.
  • What Will It Take for China’s GDP to Grow at 4–5 Percent Over the Next Decade? — China accounts for 18% of global GDP, 13% of global consumption, and 31% of global manufacturing. The author estimates that if China grew 4–5% annually for a decade while keeping manufacturing's role in its economy, its share of global manufacturing would reach 36–39%, requiring the rest of the world to let manufacturing's share of its output fall by 0.5–1.0pp.

AI Summary. A New York Times/Siena College national poll of likely voters found Trump leading Harris 48% to 47%, within the poll's three-percentage-point margin of error, alongside battleground-state polling averages showing a tied race or slim Harris leads. In the same poll, 47% of likely voters viewed Harris as too liberal, versus 32% who saw Trump as too conservative.

Jonathan Weisman and Ruth Igielnik New York Times
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The latest Times/Siena poll shows the race for the White House is a dead heat with Trump leading 1pp nationally at 48% (margin of error 3pp). Harris is leading by 2pp in WI and MI and by 1pp in PA. The candidates are tied at 48% in GA, NC, AZ and NV.

Is the presidential race essentially tied nationally and in battleground states?

Core argument: A New York Times/Siena College national poll of likely voters found Trump leading Harris 48% to 47%, a gap within the poll's three-percentage-point margin of error.

A national poll of likely voters by The New York Times and Siena College found Mr. Trump leading Ms. Harris, 48% to 47%, within the poll’s three-percentage-point margin of error. The national results are in line with polls in the seven battleground states that will decide the presidential election, where Ms. Harris is tied with Mr. Trump or holds slim leads, according to New York Times polling averages. Taken together, they show a tight race that remains either candidate’s to win or lose. 47% of likely voters viewed Ms. Harris as too liberal, compared with 32% who saw Mr. Trump as too conservative.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. A New York Times/Siena College national poll of likely voters found Trump leading Harris 48% to 47%, a gap within the poll's three-percentage-point margin of error.
  2. New York Times polling averages show Harris tied with Trump or holding slim leads across the seven battleground states that will decide the presidential election.
  3. In the Times/Siena poll, 47% of likely voters viewed Harris as too liberal, compared with 32% who saw Trump as too conservative.

Related Articles:

  • Silver Bulletin 2024 Presidential Election Forecast — Polling shows Kamala Harris underperforming in swing states relative to her national numbers, a pattern especially evident in Pennsylvania. Donald Trump has also been gaining ground in most state polling averages, which are not affected by the forecast's convention bounce adjustment.
  • Many Gen Z Men Feel Left Behind. Some See Trump As An Answer — National polling shows a gender gap of roughly 39 to 51 percentage points among voters under 30, with young men favoring the Republican candidate and young women favoring the Democrat. The Republican message resonates particularly with young men without college degrees and young men of color.
  • An Unsettled Electorate: How Uncertainty and Apathy Are Shaping the 2024 Election — A survey of young registered voters finds 54% backing Biden and 46% backing Trump, with 60% of young women supporting Biden while 52% of young men support Trump. Young men are more likely than young women to say the country has gone too far in giving women equal rights, 19% versus 9%.

AI Summary. A meta-analysis found that polygenic scores, person-specific aggregates of inherited DNA differences, are associated with educational attainment at a correlation of .27 and with educational achievement such as school grades at .24; after accounting for sample ancestry, age at assessment, and education measure, these estimates rose to .29 and .50. Only 15% of estimates came from samples of non-European ancestry.

Kirsty Wilding, Megan Wright, and Sophie von Stumm Educational Psychology Review
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A meta-analysis of international studies finds a 24% correlation between education achievement, as measured by grades, and “polygenic scores that are person-specific aggregates of inherited DNA differences.”

How well do inherited DNA differences predict educational attainment and achievement?

Core argument: A multilevel meta-analysis of 20 estimates covering 314,757 individuals found polygenic scores associated with educational attainment at ρ = .27 (95% CI .22–.32), and with educational achievement at ρ = .24 (95% CI .18–.30) across 19 estimates and 83,788 individuals.

Recent advances in genomics make it possible to predict individual differences in education from polygenic scores that are person-specific aggregates of inherited DNA differences. Here, we systematically reviewed and meta-analyzed the strength of these DNA-based predictions for educational attainment (e.g., years spent in full-time education) and educational achievement (e.g., school grades). For educational attainment (k = 20, n = 16, Ntotal = 314,757), a multilevel meta-analysis showed an association with polygenic scores of ρ = .27 (95% CI from .22 to .32). For educational achievement (k = 19, n = 10, Ntotal = 83,788), the association was ρ = .24 (95% CI from .18 to .30). Eurocentric biases were evident with only 15% of estimates being reported in samples of non-European ancestry. After accounting for sample ancestry, age at assessment, and education measure, the meta-analytic estimates increased to ρ = .29 (95% CI from .24 to .33) for educational attainment and ρ = .50 (95% CI from .39 to .61) for educational achievement, indicative of large effect sizes.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. A multilevel meta-analysis of 20 estimates covering 314,757 individuals found polygenic scores associated with educational attainment at ρ = .27 (95% CI .22–.32), and with educational achievement at ρ = .24 (95% CI .18–.30) across 19 estimates and 83,788 individuals.
  2. After accounting for sample ancestry, age at assessment, and education measure, the meta-analytic estimates rose to ρ = .29 (95% CI .24–.33) for educational attainment and ρ = .50 (95% CI .39–.61) for educational achievement, described as large effect sizes.
  3. Eurocentric biases were evident in the reviewed literature, with only 15% of estimates reported in samples of non-European ancestry.

Related Articles:

  • Standardized Test Scores and Academic Performance at Ivy-Plus Colleges — Using admissions records and first-year grades at multiple Ivy-Plus colleges, the authors find SAT and ACT scores substantially predict college academic success even among students with the same high school grades, while high school grade point average does little to predict it. Conditional on test scores, students from lower- and higher-resourced high schools have virtually identical college grades.
  • Steeper At The Top: Cognitive Ability and Earnings in Finland and Norway — Administrative data on over 350,000 men each in Finland and Norway show a convex relationship between earnings rank and cognitive ability measured by military conscription tests: top-percentile earners score about 1 standard deviation above median earners, who score about 0.5 above bottom-percentile earners. The lowest scores are almost absent among top earners.
  • US PISA Results By Subpopulation — On the international PISA student assessments, American Asian and White students ranked at the top, American Hispanic students outscored Hispanic students elsewhere, and American Black students performed well. In reading, American Asian students placed first and American White students third.

AI Summary. AlphaProteo, an AI system trained on protein structure data, generates novel protein binders for target molecules, including the first successful AI-designed binder for VEGF-A, a protein associated with cancer and diabetes complications. Across seven tested targets it achieved higher experimental success rates and 3x to 300x better binding affinities than the best existing methods.

Vinicius Zambaldi, David La, Alexander Chu, et al. Google
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.@GoogleDeepMind has developed AlphaProteo, an AI system that designs proteins that bind to target molecules at success rates 3 to 300 times better than the best prior methods, potentially accelerating advanced drug design.

Can AI design novel protein binders better than existing methods?

Core argument: AlphaProteo achieves 3–300 times better binding affinities and higher experimental success rates than the best existing methods across seven target proteins tested.

AlphaProteo can generate new protein binders for diverse target proteins, including VEGF-A, which is associated with cancer and complications from diabetes. This is the first time an AI tool has been able to design a successful protein binder for VEGF-A.AlphaProteo also achieves higher experimental success rates and 3 to 300 times better binding affinities than the best existing methods on seven target proteins we tested. Trained on large amounts of protein data from the Protein Data Bank (PDB) and more than 100 million predicted structures from AlphaFold, AlphaProteo has learned the myriad ways molecules bind to each other. Given the structure of a target molecule and a set of preferred binding locations on that molecule, AlphaProteo generates a candidate protein that binds to the target at those locations. AlphaProteo’s performance indicates that it could drastically reduce the time needed for initial experiments involving protein binders for a broad range of applications.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. AlphaProteo achieves 3–300 times better binding affinities and higher experimental success rates than the best existing methods across seven target proteins tested.
  2. AlphaProteo designed a successful protein binder for VEGF-A, a protein associated with cancer and diabetes complications, the first time an AI tool has done so.
  3. AlphaProteo was trained on protein data from the Protein Data Bank and more than 100 million predicted structures from AlphaFold, and generates a candidate binder given a target structure and preferred binding locations.

Related Articles:

  • Accurate Structure Prediction of Biomolecular Interactions With AlphaFold 3 — AlphaFold 3, a single deep learning model with a diffusion-based architecture, jointly predicts the structures of complexes containing proteins, nucleic acids, small molecules, ions, and modified residues. The authors report accuracy exceeding specialised tools for protein-ligand docking, protein-nucleic acid interactions, and antibody-antigen prediction.
  • Evaluation and Learning in R&D Investment — Pharmaceutical firms favor incremental drugs because they are easier to evaluate, even though novel drugs generate more learning that improves future screening decisions. The authors argue policymakers could strengthen incentives for novel research by making it easier for firms to capture indirect revenues from successor projects, which accrue even when the original project fails.

Tuesday, September 10, 2024

AI Summary. Using a high-frequency narrative approach around news about US 2021 deficits, the authors estimate an "inflation multiplier" of 0.18% price-level growth over two years for a deficit shock of 1% of GDP. They estimate this implies the 2021 deficits caused about 30% of the 2021–22 inflation.

Jonathon Hazell and Stephan Hobler Working Paper
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.@JADHazell and @sj_hobler review inflation swap market reactions to the results of ‘21 Georgia Senate run-offs which allowed Democrats to pass legislation on a party-line vote. They infer that the resultant stimulus caused ~30% of 2021-22 inflation.

How much of recent inflation did deficits cause?

Core argument: The authors estimate an "inflation multiplier" of 0.18% price-level growth over two years for a 1% deficit-to-GDP shock, implying the 2021 U.S. deficits caused around 30% of 2021–22 inflation.

This paper measures the causal effect of deficits on inflation using a “high frequency narrative approach”. We identify an event that released news about the 2021 deficits in the United States—the Georgia Senate election runoff. Figure 4 graphs the results for the single event study. The figure shows a jump in inflation expectations around the election, representing the causal effect of the Georgia shock. The outcome variable is the expected increase in the price level over two years, which is calculated from the two year inflation swap, deducting the first value on January 5th. From January 5th to January 7th—as news about the Georgia election is released—the inflation swap jumps upwards. The green line is the estimate of what would have happened to inflation expectations absent the Georgia election. The difference between the blue and green lines is the causal effect of the election on inflation expectations. Excluding data after 2PM on January 6th leads to a qualitatively similar but smaller estimate of 18 basis points. We estimate an “inflation multiplier” of 0.18% price level growth over two years, for a 1% deficit-to-GDP shock. Our estimate implies that the 2021 deficits caused around 30% of the 2021-22 inflation—meaning deficits were important but not the only cause.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. The authors estimate an "inflation multiplier" of 0.18% price-level growth over two years for a 1% deficit-to-GDP shock, implying the 2021 U.S. deficits caused around 30% of 2021–22 inflation.
  2. Using the Georgia Senate election runoff as a high-frequency narrative shock releasing news about 2021 U.S. deficits, the authors find two-year inflation expectations derived from inflation swaps jumped between January 5 and January 7.
  3. Excluding data after 2PM on January 6 yields a qualitatively similar but smaller estimate of 18 basis points, and the authors conclude deficits were important but not the only cause of the inflation.

Related Articles:

  • Fiscal Influences on Inflation in OECD Countries, 2020-2022 — Across 21 economies, the authors find that headline and core inflation responded positively to a measure of government spending increases scaled by pre-pandemic debt-to-GDP and average debt duration. Estimated coefficients of 0.4–0.5 suggest 40–50% of the extra spending was financed through inflation, with the rest through conventional public finance.
  • Fiscal Narratives for US Inflation — Fiscal theory attributes the deflation of the deep recession to a fall in real interest rates that lowered real interest costs on government debt, an effect that outweighed large deficits. The predicted deflation spiral and the hyperinflation forecast from quantitative easing both failed to materialize.
  • Fiscal Arithmetic and the Global Inflation Outlook — Across advanced economies, core inflation is significantly positively associated with growth in government debt since the start of the pandemic, and the authors expect this decade's fiscal expansions to shift price levels permanently higher. They argue this differs from permanently higher inflation, projecting inflation to diminish as temporary deficits normalize, with medium-term inflation expectations still anchored near central bank targets.

AI Summary. Adjusting for time spent, tuition costs, and completion probability drastically reduces the estimated return on a master's degree, leaving master's programs with the lowest adjusted return among degree types. Averages mask wide variation: business master's degrees show a negative return on average, while top programs' graduates can earn millions more.

Mark Schneider American Enterprise Institute
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Mark Schneider @AEIecon reviews the ROI of master’s degree programs and finds “vast differences among fields of study and among programs in the same field of study.” He argues that policymakers need to provide accurate ROI metrics to applicants.

Do master's degrees pay off for students after accounting for costs?

Core argument: Adjusting lifetime earnings gains for time spent in school, the cost of the degree, and the probability of completion drastically reduces the return to master's students and places master's degrees last on adjusted ROI.

The absolute increase in lifetime earnings is the average gain in income between students completing the degree and the counterfactual earnings of similarly situated students without the degree. Incorporating the time spent getting a master’s degree, the cost of obtaining the degree, and the probability of completing a program generates an “adjusted ROI.” Taking these costs into account drastically reduces the return to the student—and puts the return for master’s degrees dead last. [But] Averages Hide Lots of Information. Business is the single largest field of study for master’s students; but, on average, business master’s degrees have a negative ROI. But graduates from the top performing programs—including Dartmouth, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the University of Pennsylvania— can earn millions more than graduates from other business programs. Students who choose badly could experience a negative ROI of over $1 million. Even in computer science, the field with the highest overall ROI, graduates from some programs experienced negative ROIs.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Adjusting lifetime earnings gains for time spent in school, the cost of the degree, and the probability of completion drastically reduces the return to master's students and places master's degrees last on adjusted ROI.
  2. Business, the single largest field of study for master's students, has a negative ROI on average, while graduates of top-performing programs at Dartmouth, MIT, and the University of Pennsylvania can earn millions more than graduates of other business programs.
  3. Students who choose badly could experience a negative ROI of over $1 million, and even in computer science, the field with the highest overall ROI, graduates of some programs experienced negative ROIs.

Related Articles:

  • Why Do Wages Grow Faster for Educated Workers? — College graduates sort into professional, non-routine occupations where wages rise much more with job tenure, and the author estimates this occupational sorting explains at least half of the life-cycle growth in the college wage premium. That premium is estimated at 22% at age 26, 49% at age 40, and 56% at age 60.
  • Diversifying Society’s Leaders? The Determinants and Causal Effects of Admission to Highly Selective Private Colleges — Children from top-1% families are more than 2x as likely as middle-class students with comparable SAT/ACT scores to attend an Ivy-Plus college, with two-thirds of the gap attributable to higher admissions rates. The authors attribute this advantage to legacy preferences, weight on non-academic credentials, and athlete recruitment.
  • Multidimensional Human Capital and the Wage Structure — The wage return to cognitive skills has declined, from about 10% higher hourly wages per standard deviation of test score in the 1980s and early 1990s to 4.5% in the 2000s and early 2010s, while returns to a bachelor's degree rose. Social skill-intensive occupations grew as a share of US jobs, with faster real wage growth.

AI Summary. Billionaires own more than $5tn in stock, 7% of the entire stock market and 66% of their wealth, so an annual wealth tax would require hundreds of billions in stock sales every year, a long-term drag on all investors' returns. An exemption for wealth held in illiquid private assets would encourage delisting and discourage public listings.

Hal Scott and John Gulliver Wall Street Journal
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.@HalScott_HLS notes that billionaires own more than $5T in stock, 7% of the market, and argues that ongoing wealth tax-driven sales would send equity markets into a “tailspin” and potentially reduce the number of public firms.

Would a wealth tax on billionaires lower all investors' returns?

Core argument: Billionaires own more than $5 trillion in stock, or 7% of the entire stock market, and with public stock making up 66% of their wealth they would need to sell hundreds of billions of dollars of stock each year to pay the proposed wealth tax.

Billionaires own more than $5 trillion in stock, or 7% of the entire stock market. Public stock represents 66% of their wealth, so they would need to sell hundreds of billions of dollars worth of stock to fund wealth-tax payments. This wouldn’t be a one-time problem. Stock sales would need to continue each year to pay the annual wealth tax. This would be a long-term drag on the returns of all investors, while also reducing the skin in the game of the innovative founders who built these companies. The Biden-Harris tax includes an exemption from the proposed wealth tax for ultrarich investors who have 80% of their wealth in nontradable illiquid assets, such as investments in private companies. This would create a major incentive for the wealthiest Americans either to delist the public companies that they control or to keep their private companies from going public in the first place. Public markets are already small and getting smaller. In 1996 there were more than 8,000 public companies in the U.S. Today there are fewer than 5,000.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Billionaires own more than $5 trillion in stock, or 7% of the entire stock market, and with public stock making up 66% of their wealth they would need to sell hundreds of billions of dollars of stock each year to pay the proposed wealth tax.
  2. The author argues that recurring annual stock sales to fund wealth-tax payments would be a long-term drag on the returns of all investors while reducing the skin in the game of the innovative founders who built these companies.
  3. The Biden-Harris proposal exempts investors holding 80% of their wealth in nontradable illiquid assets, which the author argues would incentivize the wealthiest Americans to delist companies they control or keep private companies from going public; U.S. public companies fell from more than 8,000 in 1996 to fewer than 5,000.

Related Articles:

  • Taxing Top Wealth: Migration Responses and Their Aggregate Economic Implications — Swedish data show that when a wealth-taxed entrepreneur emigrates, employment at their businesses falls 33%, value-added 34%, tax payments 50%, and investment 21%, but 60% of closed firms are absorbed by other domestic companies. The authors estimate aggregate effects on employment and investment are small.
  • Birth, Death, and Wealth Creation — The median age at which US companies went public rose from 7.9 years in 1976–2000 to 9.5 years in 2001–2022, implying that more wealth creation now occurs in private markets. Research on more than 28,000 US-listed companies since 1926 finds that just under 60% destroyed $9.1tn of wealth while about 2% created $50tn.
  • Most of the US Economy Is in Private Markets — Companies in the S&P 500 employ 29m people globally, compared with 158m total US employment, meaning more than 80% of US employment lies outside the index. 87% of US firms with revenue above $100m are private.

AI Summary. Germany is extending temporary border controls to all of its land borders, expanding existing checks on its frontiers with Austria, the Czech Republic, Poland, and Switzerland. The interior ministry says the controls are intended to restrict irregular immigration and guard against Islamist terrorism and serious crime, and that 30,000 people have been turned away under the existing checks.

Guy Chazan Financial Times
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Germany is introducing border checks along all of its land borders to limit illegal immigration; after introducing such controls along its south and eastern borders last year 30,000 migrants were turned away.

Is a country extending temporary controls to all its land borders?

Core argument: Germany has turned away 30,000 people since last October under temporary controls on its borders with Austria, the Czech Republic, Poland, and Switzerland, which interior minister Nancy Faeser called highly effective.

Germany is to introduce temporary controls along all its land borders, as the government steps up its response to public calls for a tougher approach on irregular immigration. Interior minister Nancy Faeser said on Monday that the move — an extension of existing controls on borders with four countries — is designed to “further restrict irregular immigration and protect us from the acute dangers posed by Islamist terror and serious crime.” Faeser said the introduction of temporary controls on its external borders had been highly effective, with 30,000 people turned away since last October along Germany’s borders with Austria, the Czech Republic, Poland, and Switzerland.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Germany has turned away 30,000 people since last October under temporary controls on its borders with Austria, the Czech Republic, Poland, and Switzerland, which interior minister Nancy Faeser called highly effective.
  2. Germany will extend temporary controls to all of its land borders, expanding measures currently applied to four neighbouring countries, as the government responds to public calls for a tougher approach on irregular immigration.
  3. Interior minister Nancy Faeser said the expanded border controls are designed to "further restrict irregular immigration and protect us from the acute dangers posed by Islamist terror and serious crime.".

Related Articles:

  • The Rich World Revolts Against Sky-High Immigration — 15m people moved to rich countries over three years, the biggest surge in modern history, with net migration exceeding 3m to America, 1.3m to Canada and about 700,000 to Britain. As immigration surged, output per person fell in Britain and Germany, partly because recent arrivals are on average less skilled than residents.
  • Europe Hopes Barbed Wire Will Keep Migrants Out. It Won’t — The total length of border fences in the European Union grew from 315km to 2,163km over roughly a decade, yet unauthorised crossings made up just 0.13% of all external crossings into the EU. Most migrants arrive via the Mediterranean rather than the Balkans or the eastern land border.
  • Changing Sub-Saharan Africa’s Growth Trajectory — Sub-Saharan Africa's working-age population is growing nearly 3% a year, versus close to zero in much of the world, and is projected to exceed China's within about a decade and reach a quarter of the global total. With modest productivity growth near 2%, the region is likely among the world's fastest-growing.

AI Summary. Russia's state statistics service reported 599,600 births in the first half of the year, 16,000 fewer than the same period a year earlier and the lowest count since 1999. Natural population decline accelerated, with 325,100 deaths recorded over those six months, 49,000 more than a year earlier.

Reuters Staff Reuters
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In the first half of 2024, the Russian birth rate fell 2.7% from the same period in 2023 to the lowest level since 1999, according to official data published on Monday.

Is Russia's population declining as births fall to a quarter-century low?

Core argument: Russia recorded 599,600 births in the first half of 2024, 16,000 fewer than the same period in 2023 and the lowest level since 1999, according to Rosstat data.

According to data published by the statistics service Rosstat, 599,600 children were born in Russia in the first half of 2024, which is 16,000 fewer than in the same period in 2023 and the lowest since 1999. In June, the number of newborns fell 6%, to 98,600, which is the first time the number fell below 100,000, Russian media reported. Russia's natural decline of population accelerated this year, with 325,100 deaths recorded between January and June, or 49,000 more than in the corresponding period of last year. "This is catastrophic for the future of the nation," Kremlin's spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said in July, according to Russian state news agencies.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

  1. Russia recorded 599,600 births in the first half of 2024, 16,000 fewer than the same period in 2023 and the lowest level since 1999, according to Rosstat data.
  2. Russian births in June fell 6% to 98,600, the first time the monthly figure dropped below 100,000, Russian media reported.
  3. Russia registered 325,100 deaths between January and June, 49,000 more than in the corresponding period of 2023, and Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov called the situation "catastrophic for the future of the nation.".

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