‘Editor’s Picks’ Podcast (July 24, 2023) – Three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue of The Economist. This week: a report on the technology behind babymaking, why optimism about the world economy might be premature (10:30), and what the hype over Barbenheimer says about the movie industry (16:17).
Category Archives: Analysis
Opinion: Trump 2024, NATO Promises To Ukraine, New Anthropocene Thinking
‘Editor’s Picks’ Podcast (July 17, 2023) – Three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue of The Economist. This week: how populist Republicans plan to make Donald Trump’s second term count, NATO’s promises to Ukraine mark real progress, but there is still much more to do (10:12) and what matters about the human-dominated Anthropocene geological phase is not when it began, but how it might end (14:41).
Retirement Plans: How To Retire Better Financially
Video timeline: 0:00 Difficulty mapping a retirement plan 1:01 What retirees wish they did differently 2:38 Relationships and retirement 4:43 Message for future retirees
Opinion: Future Of War In Ukraine, A New Asia Family, U.S. Lab-Monkey Shortage
‘Editor’s Picks’ Podcast (July 10, 2023) – Three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue of The Economist. This week: how the war in Ukraine will affect the future of combat, the new Asian family (10:36) and why a lab-monkey shortage in America is encouraging smuggling (19:07).
Opinion: A Humbled Putin, Environmentalism Harms The Poor, The Better Flags
‘Editor’s Picks’ Podcast (July 3, 2023) – A selection of three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue of The Economist: The humbling of Vladimir Putin, how misfiring environmentalism risks harming the world’s poor (10:20) and some tips to design better flags (18:55).
The humbling of Vladimir Putin
The Wagner mutiny exposes the Russian tyrant’s growing weakness. But don’t count him out yet
The last pretence of Vladimir Putin to be, as he imagines, one of his nation’s historic rulers was stripped away on June 24th. A band of armed mercenaries swept through his country almost unopposed, covering some 750km (470 miles) in a single day, seizing control of two big cities and getting to within 200km of Moscow before withdrawing unharmed.
How misfiring environmentalism risks harming the world’s poor
The trade-off between development and climate change is impossible to avoid
Thank goodness for the enthusiasts and the obsessives. If everyone always took a balanced view of everything, nothing would ever get done. But when campaigners’ worldview seeps into the staid apparatus of policymaking and global forums, bad decisions tend to follow. That, unfortunately, is especially true in the world of climate change.
How to design better flags
Some tips to avoid having an embarrassing emblem
Have you ever met a vexed vexillologist? This is someone who frets when flags are badly designed. Sadly, too many flags flutter to deceive: they are cluttered with imagery, a mess of colours and all too easily forgettable. Yet flags matter. Witness Ukraine’s blue-and-yellow banner, which now serves as a potent symbol around the world (not to mention on this newspaper’s covers).
Technology Review: AI Vs White-Collar Workers
Video timeline: 0:00 AI software 0:42 Why white-collar jobs? 2:01 AI and job cuts 3:52 What’s next?
Initial images, video and product designs could be taken over by machine learning tech. In fact, one report says nearly 4,000 workers lost their jobs in May to AI. Dropbox cut 16% of its workforce in part to invest more in the tech, while IBM sees a future where 30% of clerical work could be taken over by AI.
WSJ explains why AI may take some white-collar jobs – but also add new ones.
REVIEWS: ‘Warfare After Ukraine – Battlefield Lessons’ (The Economist)
Like the first world war, but with high technology
The war shows how technology is changing the battlefield. But mass still counts, argues Shashank Joshi
The latest in the battle of jamming with electronic beams
Jamming is knocking drones and missiles out of the sky
Opinion: Sticky Inflation Issues, Building Ukraine 2.0, A New King Of Beers
‘Editor’s Picks’ Podcast (June 12, 2023) – A selection of three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue of The Economist including the trouble with sticky inflation, the challenge of building Ukraine 2.0 and why Modelo Especial is the new king of beers.
Investors must prepare for sustained higher inflation
The costs of taming price rises could prove too unpalatable for central banks
The trouble is that the inflation monster has not truly been tamed. Britain’s problem is the most acute. There, wages and “core” prices, which exclude energy and food, are rising by around 7%, year on year.
Building Ukraine 2.0
For Russia’s war to fail, Ukraine must emerge prosperous, democratic and secure
Ukraine’s nation-builders face formidable obstacles. The greatest is that, while Mr Putin is in power, this war is unlikely to end with a solid peace treaty. The two sides may talk—if only to avoid being seen as war-crazy.
The new king of beers is a Mexican-American success story
Move over, Bud Light. Heed the power of the Hispanic market
The king is dead. ¡Viva el rey! That is the cheer ringing through drinking dens this summer as Bud Light, America’s self-styled “king of beers” for 22 years, is dethroned by Modelo Especial, a Mexican brew.
Preview: Foreign Affairs Magazine- July/Aug 2023
The Treacherous Path to a Better Russia
Ukraine’s Future and Putin’s Fate
There is good reason to be pessimistic about the prospects of Russia’s changing course under Putin. He has taken his country in a darker, more authoritarian direction, a turn intensified by the invasion of Ukraine.
China Is Ready for a World of Disorder
America Is Not
In March, at the end of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin stood at the door of the Kremlin to bid his friend farewell. Xi told his Russian counterpart, “Right now, there are changes—the likes of which we haven’t seen for 100 years—and we are the ones driving these changes together.” Putin, smiling, responded, “I agree.”
An Unwinnable War
Washington Needs an Endgame in Ukraine
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 was a moment of clarity for the United States and its allies. An urgent mission was before them: to assist Ukraine as it countered Russian aggression and to punish Moscow for its transgressions. While the Western response was clear from the start, the objective—the endgame of this war—has been nebulous.
The Korea Model
Why an Armistice Offers the Best Hope for Peace in Ukraine
In the middle of August 1952, Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai traveled nearly 4,000 miles to Moscow to meet with the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin… The two Communist powers were allies at the time, but it was not a partnership of equals: the Soviet Union was a superpower, and China depended on it for economic assistance and military equipment.
Opinion: U.S. & India Draw Closer, UK As An AI Power, Lula Can’t The Amazon
‘Editor’s Picks’ Podcast (June 12, 2023) – Three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue of The Economist. This week, why India is indispensable to America, how to make Britain an AI superpower (10:35) and Lula’s unsustainable plans to save the Amazon (18:45).
Joe Biden and Narendra Modi are
drawing their countries closer
India does not love the West, but it is indispensable to America
India’s prime minister has been afforded the honour of a state visit by President Joe Biden. Mr Modi will be one of the few foreign leaders, along with Winston Churchill, Nelson Mandela and Volodymyr Zelensky, to address a joint session of Congress more than once.
How Britain can become an AI superpower
Rishi Sunak’s enthusiasm is welcome. But his plans for Britain fall short
Britain, says Mr Sunak, will harness ai and thus spur productivity, economic growth and more. As he told an audience in London this week, he sees the “extraordinary potential of ai to improve people’s lives”.
Lula’s ambitious plans to save the Amazon clash with reality
The Brazilian president faces resistance from Congress, the state oil company and agribusiness
“There should be no contradiction between economic growth and environmental protection,” he said. Yet Lula’s green agenda is suffering setbacks.
Boomers Daily 