morning wow moment: Uruguay of Mujica and Tabare Vazquez, utopia of the leftists disappointed with Nicaragua and Venezuela, was a staunch promoter of PPPs in health, education, prisons, roads
fascinating, a 'left PPP' framework:
1. ceiling on state risk-proofing private investors (no all you can have demand derisking we see in African countries.)
direct and contingent transfers to private sector below 7% GDP, yearly compensation below 0.5% GDP.
2. Accountability mechanism: fiscal transfers to PPP operators and investors must be reported to Parliament.
3. Some restrictions on what public services get commodified via PPPs. The Uruguayan left did not trust the private sector to deliver:
- educational services
- health services (but yes to health infrastructure)
- safety and rehabilitation in prisons
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We are badly governed: shit macroeconomic policies (we've maxed out the credit card), shit health policies (COVID19 is taking a Xmas break), shit Brexit (Dover truck queues) and shit climate policies (COP26 greenwashing coming your way next year)
And for those who can't do sarcasm at this joyful juncture, no there is no credit card except in the warped minds of the clowns in power
how did I miss this - Blackrock, advisor to the European Commission on greening European banks, holds 20% in FTI - a US lobby firm for fossil fuels, with some seriously aggressive tactics.
oh hello today's 'greenwashing, an ESG love-story'
'the world is marvellous, Blackrock edition':
you design an ESG framework for your friends at the Independent Petroleum Association, and then you use it to advise the European Commission on ESG-ing European banks.
imagine you're a powerful hedge fund owner, powerful enough to count a Chancellor of the Exchequer as former employee.
But your daily job of counting the billions is not fullfilling enough.
you want to do good.
not by moving your hedge fund from an offshore haven so you pay proper taxes, but by helping those in need, your way.
Philanthropy, you believe, is far more effective than government interventions, because you have control over it.
so you set up a hedge fund that doubles down as NGO in the Global South.
you choose your target underprivileged group carefully, those glossy brochures need the right smiles to melt down philanthropic hearts.
fascinating Sintra @ecb Forum for insights into where the DSGE world is moving
- Fiscal strikes back (though not formally)
- we're all into average higher inflation targeting
- r* (natural rate of interest) is now so close to ZLB that QE for ever
who said that academics dont have superpowers?
and we're back to the 1990s, greetings from Alan Greenspan.
good morning to @EBRD who illustrates their 'neutral' position in the 'Empire strikes back vs 'The Return of the Jedi' takes on state with, literally, a 'Nanny State'
seriously, this is the least effort ever put into pretending you're not in the neoliberal 'shrink the state' camp ever .
Literally announcing it on the cover.
Not surprising though for long-term observers of the EBRD