what's funny is that OPEC is literally a cartel preventing supply constraints but applying a similar lens to the Anglosphere housing market would uh, turn the vast majority of suburban homeowners into Housing OPEC

Why? The US has never paid Vietnam any reparations, and its cultural reception of the war is "our troops were so sad having to kill all these people." (Count Vietnamese speaking parts in Apocalypse Now and FMJ.) There's already a "good Tsar America, bad Boyar Israel for forcing us to do this" meme.

A Scot praising Yugoslav railways as a model (looks at absence of commuter rail in former Yugoslav cities). I mean really, he is everything I hate about UK.

Went to see an exhibit today on art/objects inspired by Ariwara no Narihira to celebrate his 1200th anniversary 👴 (Narihira looks so cute in that last wall scroll 🥹)

Alas one of cutest but silliest railways in Japan is looking at death. The Aigan railway in the mountains of Tochigi-Fukushima. Completed in the 1980's, part of the resort boom of those years. (I do think it would have viable had other choices been made, but alas).

The Iceland referendum on EU accession is now slated for 29 August this year. Note: The referendum will first only be on restarting the negotiations, but clearly a sign of shifting geopolitical thinking.

We are several decades into mass South Asian/Arab migration into the Gulf. That this happens despite poor conditions suggests rather negative things about working conditions in their home countries.

The thing about slavery is that you have to capture people if you want them to become your slaves. You don't put out an ad for slaves on the internet and have them text you, sign a contract, and then show up at the airport to get on a plane and become your slave. Laborers in the UAE are not slaves.

Another person thinking that Labour is a left-Liberal party rather than what is as and still is, a left-inflected British nationalist party whose guiding ideology is that the property owning yeomen of Outer Britain are the master class of the universe. (Mahmood is of that class).

#SaveOurCarPark www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/may...

For the first time in 40 years JR East has raised its fares. Which tells you 1. How bad deflation was in Japan. 2. How inefficient JNR was. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hitn...

The problem with this is 1. FPTP has already broken the legitimacy of Parliament. And breaking the Union state asymmetrically has broken legitimacy further. 2. Why do you think 52% Brexit destroyed all opposition, it had something nothing else ever had; majority support in England.

@sundersays.bsky.social belief that the state should coerce people's options for convienence of power is consistent with his book where he goes "The English may feel bad because Barnett etc discriminate but they should shut up and embrace my Imperial Vision of GREAT BRITAIN".

Wait has hell frozen over?

To speed up progress towards gender equality, it would help to cast aside Western centrism and tackle local obstacles. Me, for @economist.com www.economist.com/by-invitatio...

i don't get it. you can lift at the gym. being a softhanded scribe is like the pinnacle of civilized life, tens of thousands of generations of your ancestors would have murdered to be a softhanded scribe

Made more compelling by the fact that my current impression fits more neatly with the fact she dines out on this v damning anecdote. I don’t understand how her very sensible engagement with CRED and at the DTI fit with either her pre-20 or her post-24 approach at all.

I’m sorry l, but I had been assured that The Modern State Is But A Committee For Managing The Affairs Of The Entire Bourgeoisie and I am seeing little evidence of this. Is there someone I could speak to?

Problem with this. 1. Its too American. 2. Thatcherism is practically distinct from Reaganism i.e. austerity minded, much more keen on state control. 3. Ignores the durability of welfare states especially for aged. 4. Centre right is alive in Europe. It would be in England sans FPTP. US is unique.

more and more people are saying that radical social democracy with RAND corporation characteristics is the wave of the future

Also important to note that the Home Office's *own figures* imply that care workers/dependents are a fiscal *benefit* in terms of the government's fiscal rules (and on every year for next 30 years). It is Mahmood who has a fiscal "black hole" to fill.

Labour party affiliated think tanks, outriders etc obsess about spending money on helping people and proving poor people are poor. Even at the Resolution Foundation level. I mean the right has "tax cuts and scapegoating" as its opposite obsession.

Feel like a big but understated reason for why Labour are struggling so much in office is that they never seem to honestly appraise the economic consequences of their actions

Dangers of the reliance on China for renewables are tiny. Batteries serve for 15 years, panels for 25, turbines are European. Even if you are unable to procure anything outside of China, and the Chinese cut you off entirely, you’ll have 92% of the batteries and 96% of the panels 1 year in

In practice, the way responsibilities are divided in the UK, every party hoping to get a seat/councillor has to pitch to NIMBY's - and the more dependent your party is on winning local/by-elections (Greens/Lib Dems) the more people see you pitching to NIMBY voters.

⦵🚍 London Bus policy: 1933: LPTB unification 1956: Routemaster 1966: Reshaping Plan/OPO 1973: Speedbus proposal 1984: Competitive tendering 1994: Full privatisation 2002: Bendy buses 2011: Bendy bus ban 2012: New Routemaster 2016: Hopper fare 2024: Superloop 2034: Zero-emission

The problem with this argument from @chakrabortty.bsky.social is that - in contrast to the 1990s and 2000s when, as he says, things *did* get better - since 2010 we've had very low growth (and stable/falling inequality). www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

I recall reading a Brzezinski book in undergrad that argued Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Turkey & Iran were going to be the pivot points for the 21st century, and what happened to them would be indicative of the broader flows of power. Have to say, he may have been on to something!

1. Taiwan's consumption share of gdp is....low. 2. Its overclocking its gdp with high work hours, end of demographic dividend and the AI-TMSC boom....that will end well I'm sure.

Once again, another mealy-mouthed half defence of the earned settlement proposals from someone who clearly hasn't read them/doesn't understand them. As Badenoch's letter (accurately) makes clear, there is only a modest difference in degree between Mahmood's proposals and Tory policy.

what I love about all this is that the actual product getting back to Beijing was probably incredibly trivial stuff. Like, 'smart Google search' levels.

I once acidly observed on a random Twitter thread that he was a fraud, being an anarchist working at the LSE a global elite finishing school. He clearly having search his own name, suddenly came at me yelling about his working class credentials. (He died living Pimlico)

Incredibly illuminating to compare income and hours worked across countries and states for ***the bottom 95% of earners only***. The typical Belgian earns as much as the typical Californian but works about 24% less via sethackerman.substack.com

Progressive patriotism always means 2 things. 1. Maintain the racially gerrymandered constitution labour designed in 1999. 2. Say that any opposition to racial gerrymandering is racist and anti-national. Unless its Celtic. 3. Be surprised voters absorb 1-2 and vote Reform.

Decolonising Economics from... London? (I'm a SOAS grad so I get emails). I mean Anglo-saxon economics insular, but actually pays more attention to "Global south*" than it does to say Italy or Poland or Turkey. www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6y1...

Bluesky overindexes on humorless scolds and people doing identity formation by arguing with something you didn't say but that doesn't make it an echo chamber; it means the place has an institutional culture, and I much prefer that culture to fending off Nazis with a block button that doesn't work

My new @iza.org/LISER paper Control Without Credibility: Immigration to the UK Since the Brexit Referendum docs.iza.org/dp18419.pdf

Jesus Christ this is more humiliating than Far Right having an America fetish. Say what you will about the US, it a big impressive beast.

Hadn't clocked quite how Dubai-coded Reform was before this piece www.economist.com/britain/2026...

The contrast between Rhun ap Iorwerth current leading Plaid Cymru to victory because he gets that only a minority are keen on Independence and PSPP pissing away a majority because he can't admit its not 1995 anymore.

Interesting, subtle difference between these attacks Mahmood put out today. Against Reform it's "unless we address these concerns, people will vote for them" but against the Greens it's just "their policies are bad". People who support Green policies are not a group that needs to be appeased.

Shabana Mahmood shows the other side of integration, i.e. being a typical West Midlands xenophobe.

We asked people around the world to rate the morality and ethics of others in their country. The U.S. is the only place we surveyed where more adults describe the morality and ethics of others living in the country as bad than good. See our full morality report here: www.pewresearch.org/...

"If they're not awful and bloody, then they're not the right ones" @gilesyb.bsky.social spoke to us about the difficult choices still facing the Government, as we discussed the aftermath of the Spring Forecast. Subscribe to our podcast here 👉 buff.ly/lJaDs3C

Curtis alas is junior and one of the newer Southern English professional that rest of the Labour party in Outer Britain hates more than the Conservatives/Reform. It would be great for MK, death to Wigan, Paisley and Ebbw Vale, who need the gerrymanders.

Marja Donald Al Mar al Lago

Last week, UK lobbying regulator closed investigation into ex Tory MP Ben Howlett We offered Howlett money to work for a fake Chinese investor. He introduced us to a dozen Labour MPs Regulator didn't even speak to us. Our system is broken New, by me: democracyforsale.substack.com/p/we-paid-an...

People have strategies when they refuse to admit tradeoff and build systems. A long term system means abolishing Parliamentary soviergnty and FPTP single party rule. Hence chaos.

The long term housing strategy was due to be published "shortly" a year ago. So I won't be holding my breath....

Reform UK and the Greens are hoovering up financially insecure voters. My piece this week looks at the return of Britain's class politics (with a twist) www.economist.com/britain/2026...