WEEKEND READING: 21-22 DECEMBER

1. Reporters without Borders have published their 2013 World Press Freedom Index report. Greece is in freefall, sandwiched between Kosovo and Togo at 84th place, down from 70th last year. Reporters without Borders' mini-site on Greece is dated, but interesting nonetheless.
2. A new paper by IMF researchers measures different countries' efforts to bring in tax revenue. Greece ranked high by global standards in 2011 (higher than, say, Canada) but lower than most core EU countries. Once again, revenues in excess of 43% of GDP turn out to be impossible. Note the similarity in estimates of maximum revenue between the paper I review here (42.7%) and this paper (42.4%), even though the methodologies are completely different. 
3. On that same topic, the OECD releases its latest figures on tax revenues in the OECD countries, noting Greece's 'progress' in increasing revenue.
4. The World Bank's researchers continue to plug away at the issue of global income inequality with a new paper. This one finds that the change in global income distribution since the 80s is essentially a swap of income between Western middle classes and Asian middle-classes. Presumably if Africa should ever get its act together we'll have another round of this.The paper also finds that, after accounting for the rising incomes of the super-rich (which are largely missing from household surveys and must be extrapolated from power laws), global inequality has remained almost unchanged since the 80s.
5. The IMF's researchers are doing a Naomi Klein tribute this week, first with a paper that links income inequality and financial instability, and then with a paper on the redistributive aspects of financial regulation.
6. But the opposite is also true: a very good research piece has also come out this week revisiting the Reinhart & Rogoff debate with what I think is amazing rigour; the authors find what they call 'tentantive' evidence that debt slows down long-term growth, but also find that it's pointless to expect a single threshold to signal the onset of debt overhang across all countries, and that the relationship between debt and growth is non-linear across countries, though probably linear within countries.
7. Still with the IMF - this new paper suggests that countries can usually only sustain massive public debt loads because if their reliance on 'real money investors': central banks (foreign and domestic) and domestic non-financials, presumably including households. 
8. Somewhere in a parallel universe, the UK Office for National Statistics explains the rationale behind the reclassification of Network Rail as a Central Government Entity, and the head of the agency is not accused of treason by illiterate trolls. Sigh.

WEEKEND READING: 14-15 DECEMBER

1. And the fastest-growing consumption category in Greece (latest figures 2011) is.... Narcotics. (Full definition of this COICOP code here)
2. Athens Stock Exchange emerges as one of the best places one could have put their money in 2013. I'm going to throw up. 
3. Eurostat publish their first-ever set of figures on money laundering in Europe - not actual money flows of course, but reports of suspicious transactions as well as resources devoted to the fight against money laundering. Note that Greece has provided almost no figures at all, despite a three-year delay in the publication, plus how woefully under-resourced our public administration is when it comes to detecting money laundering activity.
4. The Commission publish their Product Market Review, focusing on firms' access to finance
5. Coming soon to a busted bank near you: the European Parliament and Council have reached an agreement which paves the way for bail-ins around Europe.
6. Looking forward to what the Greek commentariat will make of this ECJ ruling that obliges them to consider asylum bids from homosexual African immigrants facing persecution back home.
7. Mind you, banning same-sex marriage may be a public health risk.
8. Financial liberalisation in China marches on. Here's the Bank of England's latest note on what it might all mean.
9. Argentina is one step away from mending bridges with the IMF, or going broke, or both.
10. Ireland's bailout is officially over. Feast your eyes on an infographic we can't reproduce in Greece.

WEEKEND READING: 7-8 DECEMBER

1. Remember when a map of Greek grassroots organisations was published to counter stereotypes of laziness and apathy? Well there is that, and then there are slightly harder figures from the World Giving Index showing the kindness of strangers is flagging in Greece, even when it comes to gestures that cost nothing.
2. As promised, the OECD's PISA results for 2012 are out - PISA being the triannual international assessment of school systems around the world. Greece still lags behind the OECD average and our children are among the most stressed pupils in the developed world, but our performance in mathematics is apparently improving. Check out more detailed results at the end of this page.
3. What a week for international assessments, eh? the latest Corruption Perceptions Index is also out and Greece ranks 80th, right beneath China
4. The OECD publishes its latest review of sub-national fiscal consolidation. Greece shines once again as one of the least decentralised countries in the developed world, but with an endless appetite for sweeping debt under the local government rug.

WEEKEND READING - 30 NOVEMBER & 1 DECEMBER

1. The OECD's review of barriers to competition in Greece has now been published. Full report here.
2. Latest Eurobarometer survey on the state of the Eurozone finds that the Irish and the Greeks are still supportive of the common currency (see pg 9), although other PIIGS are disillusioned. See also pp 49.  Killer graph on page 58, where the Portuguese, Greeks and Spaniards turn out to be the Europeans least convinced of their countries' need to reform.
3. Still with the Eurobarometer folks, Greece has some of the longest traineeships in Europe.
4. And 7% of Greeks own handguns, 19% of which for 'personal protection.'
5. The 2013 Health Consumer Index ranks Greece 25th out of , down from 22nd in 2012. Read the full report here, with particular emphasis on pp. 14-15, where the researchers find Greece's reported reduction in health spending unreliable. 
6. Speaking of public health, the findings of this decade-old survey of excess winter mortality in Europe clearly reflect the distinction between European core and periphery. Discuss.
7. The OECD has released its economic survey of Greece for the coming year, anticipating much slower growth than the government's estimates. Please note that the OECD has so far predicted Greece's fiscal multiplier more accurately than the Commission or the IMF, although it's unclear why. 
8. Still with the OECD, the results of the PISA 2012 survey, the latest in the definitive series of studies comparing educational outcomes across the world, are due this Wednesday, 3 Dec. Stay tuned here.
9. PwC and the World Bank have released its 2014 Paying Taxes index report, looking into the administrative cost of paying business taxes around the world. Some Greek figures included.

WEEKEND READING: 23-24 NOVEMBER

1. Among many other dubious distinctions, did you know Greece is one of the worst places for employers trying to hire skilled expats? Anyone surprised? 
2. A warning for Greece - electronic tax filing may not reduce compliance costs.
3. The Ukraine's celebrated drift towards Europe is apparently over.
4. The World Bank finds a negative correlation between indicators of good bank governance and bank capitalisation. Discuss.
5. Still with the World Bank: the latest financial development report looks into what happens when individual borrowers benefit from debt forgiveness. No spoilers, turn to pg 99.
6. How much inequality is there in the world?

WEEKEND READING: 16-17 NOVEMBER

1. The new EU Directive on the mutual recognition of professional qualifications has arrived! It's going to be Bolognia all over again!
2. The EU announces that member states are now allowed to channel a great deal more State Aid to their film industries than previously - including funding the 'modernisation' of individual cinemas. Apparently, Europe produces more films than India, and that's somehow a good thing. 
3. The World Bank's study tracking the size of the high-seas piracy sector off the horn of Africa is now out, and makes for fantastic reading. Also note the Creative Commons 3.0 Unported licence. A bit more detail here.
4. I almost never post these but ACCA's Global Economic Conditions Survey, of which I am the editor, came out a few days ago and is very interesting. 
5. The IMF's mea culpa team has kind of over-done it here - a study with a very limited sample up to 09 finds that fiscal multipliers increase during rapid consolidations. Still, interesting for its approach to measuring the speed of fiscal consolidation. 
6. More from the IMF - how sovereign wealth funds work.
7. Post-bailout Ireland's industrial production exploded last month, but Europe's production fell by 0.5%
8. A recent paper explores the effect of cigarette taxes on consumption in Greece, and the potential benefits of smokers cutting down. 
9. Venezuela slides further down towards shithole status.

WEEKEND READING: 9-10 NOVEMBER

1. As a response to the question on how young people's faith in democracy can be restored in Greece, the Greek PM pledges nationwide free wifi within a year. The full grotesque video and PR #fail, which unleashed a torrent of well-deserved trolling, is available at the bottom of the page.
2. The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that Greece's rationale for excluding same-sex couples from its civil unions law (a distinction we share with Lithuania) is unconvincing. More details on the case here.
3. Greek pension funds delivered returns of about 5% in 2012, in return for admin costs of 0.7% according to the OECD. While returns are very poor, this is actually standard across countries, and the admin costs are not comparably high either. About 40% of assets are bills and bonds. 
4. In case anyone had any doubt that UKIP are not in fact 'libertarians,' as they claim, a YouGov poll reveals that their voters are more supportive of nationalising key industries than those of any other major UK party - apart from Labour, by a narrow margin.
5. A new index ranking works out the most influential thinkers of all time. No. 1 is Karl Marx, if counted as a historian. He's more like no. 9 if counted as an economist, but still, way up there.
6. Argentina is in deep trouble again. Or maybe it's the target of an orchestrated PR attack. No wait. It is in trouble. Which reminds me of my old post about why Greece is not (even) Argentina. 
7. Dagong downgrades the US and S&P downgrades France.
8. For Greek readers only unfortunately: how the Greek left misappropriated Behan's 'Laughing Boy'.

Δηλώσεις Σαμαρά για το #freewifi by CDemo83

BELATED WEEKEND READING: 26-27 OCTOBER

1. ELSTAT celebrates the seventh set of deficit figures in a row to be published without reservations by Eurostat.
2. Note also that ELSTAT now publishes figures on the impact of support to financial institutions on the government deficit. Q2 2013 was a whopper. Note also that compensation of state employees and social benefits are now less than 50% of all government spending - down from 68% two years ago.
3. The Commission launches a consultation on State Aid in agriculture, forestry and rural areas. Expect the Greek authorities to respond quickly and at length.
4. The IMF publishes a brief history of fiscal transparency through the ages, which shows that the modern Greek state was actually a pioneer of fiscal transparency in its early days - because it came into being deeply in debt.
5. Some tourism/immigration figures to take note of. The number of Serbs and Russians arriving in Greece increases by 50% yoy in H1 2013. Visitors from 'Syria-Lebanon' (?) increase threefold, and a mysterious near-tenfold increase in Estonian visitors.   

BELATED WEEKEND READING - 19-20 OCTOBER

1. Greek deficit revised downwards by 1 percentage point.
2. Presenting the Group of States Against Corruption - somehow, its acronym is GRECO.
3. Nearly two years on, Greece has still failed to recover illegal state Aid from Ellinikos Xrysos, says the European Court of Justice.
4. On the other hand, State Aid to DESFA to expand gas infrastructure is a-OK says the Commission.
5. And so is the merger of Aegean and Olympic, says the Commission. Why? Because they received assurances that Olympic could not continue to operate as a going concern and thus further consolidation in the sector was inevitable - presumably no one would buy the company's assets in a fire sale? The reality, of course, is that the merger aims to ensure that long-distance routes remain expensive enough to cross-subsidise the politically sensitive but irreversibly loss-making internal routes. Note the phrasing on the 'Prices' section here. The effects were plain to me when I realised, way back in August, that holiday-time prices for the London-Athens route were already at the levels I was accustomed to seeing when booking last minutes in November.
6. The IMF's researchers weigh in in favour of a Pan-European fiscal stabilisation mechanism.
7. Construction in Greece surges by 20% yoy in Q2 2013. I smell a massive rat. Meanwhile, industrial production crashed year on year during the summer.
8. Some things I did not know about the Greek Labour Force Survey: a) it only covers people who intend to stay in Greece for at least one year. b) taking the survey is compulsory c) the new census figures are still not being used to weight LFS responses - i.e. we can expect the LFS to be re-based sometime soon, with unpredictable results. d) 42% of interviews are carried out by proxy (!) This casts some doubt on statistics involving intentions (e.g. whether people working part-time would prefer a full-time job)
9. The IMF's researchers warn against expecting structural reforms to deliver short-term growth in the European periphery.
10. Switzerland has become the 58th country to sign up to the Multilateral Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance on Tax matters. Greece is also a signatory.
11. Greece continues to lag the rest of Europe for online purchases - especially (surprise!) those of books, which only 7% of Greek internet users (i.e. a sub-set of the population) have ever bought online.

WEEKEND READING 5-6 OCTOBER

1. Gallup delivers a very poor piece of polling for Debating Europe to 'prove' that austerity doesn't work. I'm not one to rubbish survey data as you know but I note a number of weakenesses.  a) the survey never bothers to define austerity, and adds to the confusion by portraying it as an EU-wide policy b) 23% of those who believe that 'only some countries' benefit from austerity cite Greece as one of its beneficiaries, c) the Eurozone country with the highest level of support for austerity is austerity-hit Ireland, and d) the survey doesn't bother to ask what policies might have served Europe better.
2. How conspiracy theorising correlates with rejection of science.
3. China's 50 wealthiest politicians are far, far wealthier than their American counterparts.
4. Greek procurement transparency portal Diavgeia weakened by poor legal phrasing- but the damage is repaired and seems to have been a case of cock-up rather than conspiracy. See comments below for clarifications.
5. The latest edition of the Global Financial Centres Index is now out. Athens singled out as a case study of reputational fallout.
6. The WEF Human Capital report for 2013 is now out. Watch out for the Greek section.
7. The IMF's Global Financial Stability Report is out.
8. People chuckling at Eurostat statistics on poverty need to note just how robust the methodology is.
9. European Commission consults on the need for European regulation on crowdfunding.
10. Skilled migration - a review of the economic literature

WEEKEND READING: 28-29 SEPTEMBER

1. Greek Golden Dawn leadership arrested. This one comes complete with hilarious photo:
   
2. Cato releases its second economic freedom of the world report. All data are two years old. Come on guys.
3. The sociology of the hipster: one of the best NYT articles I've read, ever. Plus, just substitute 'taste' and 'culture' with 'politics' and you've got an equally valid theory. Also check out the anti-hipster backlash in Berlin.
4. First the OECD, now the IMF examines how global value chains really work
5. Apparently someone at the World Bank has access to estimates of income inequality in the Byzantine empire. Read the article though, it's interesting.
6. The Dutch embassy and the Greek-Dutch business community have invested in Orange Grove, a business incubator in the centre of Athens. We should be more grateful.
7. Greek readers can have a quick chuckle at this (spoof, I should hope!) chronicle of the rise and fall of a Greek petrolhead: http://www.car.gr/classifieds/cars/view/4099986/ 

WEEKEND READING: 21-22 SEPTEMBER

1. Venizelos to Asmussen: Let's reorganise the figures. Not as embarrassing as Neo-Nazis in Parliament, but still very embarrassing. Predictably, Benito denies everything, convincing no one.
2. A fascinating meta-analysis suggests that Greece may be one of relatively few countries where punishment fails to encourage contributions to public goods. The researchers find that punishment generally doesn't work as well without trust - because trust helps frame how enforcement is perceived.
3. ELSTAT publishes a new edition of Living Conditions in Greece. Key figure, as I'd suspected, is that civil ceremonies have overtaken marriages in church for the first time in the history of modern Greece. Note also, on p. 116, the increasing use of incarceration by the Greek legal system.
4. Speaking of ELSTAT, have a look at the report of its Good Practice Advisory Committee on ELSTAT's work so far. Check p. 31 for a list of Committee members.
5. A new batch of UN global population projections were released earlier this summer and somehow I missed them. An interesting finding - under all but the most optimistic scenarios, the Greek population will peak in 2015, never (well, never before 2100) to rise again. 
6. The IMF reviews the relationship between income inequality and fiscal consolidation. Someone needs to tell them that using large datasets that end in 2009 is deeply unhelpful - and even makes them look dishonest.
7. The IMF has also released a policy paper on the realities of fiscal adjustment in advanced economies and what lessons need to be learned - some of it is too dated for my taste but it's a very ambitious document.
8. In other news, EU member states have dealt with the overlap between development and climate change funding by simply double counting it to help meet their commitments. 
9. Researchers find that voters are much less attached to parties than we think; and being told they are on the 'left' or 'right' of the spectrum makes people reassess their allegiances.
10. Political patronage in state-owned enterprises seems inescapable - even the Austrians are doing it.
11. Another massive dataset: wealth to income ratios in developed countries from the industrial revolution onwards.

WEEKEND READING: 14-15 SEPTEMBER

1. New labour market figures out for Greece - unadjusted figures suggest recovery, but then June is a traditionally 'good' month for Greece.
2. A fuller account of European economic linkages - distinguishing between the effects of trade and financial flows.
3. A real similarity between Argentina and Greece for once: publishing accurate national statistics gets you into trouble. Faking them does not.
4. The OECD compares income redistribution policies in Europe and the US
5. OECD figures document the fiscal benefits of migration for Greece. Full table embedded below.
6. Still with the OECD: Greece is the only OECD country in which health risks from smoking increased significantly throughout the boom years.
7. The Athens cellphone-tapping affair, revisited in detail. Must-read.
8. Revolutionary #FAIL: a call to deface the newly-painted walls of the School of Applied Mathematics and Natural Sciences at the National Technical University of Athens attracts slightly less solidarity than expected.
9. I don't like sensationalist headlines, especially the ones likely to inflame racist rhetoric, but I just can't not report this - it's proper academic research. One in four men in the Asia-Pacific region have raped their partner or another woman, with 'sexual entitlement' the leading motivation, according to research published in the Lancet. 
10. In the US, an increase in the minimum wage 'unequivocally' affects employment by forcing businesses to grow more slowly.

WEEKEND READING 7-8 SEPTEMBER

1. The WEF's new Global Competitiveness rankings are out. Greece is 91st, up from 96th, due to a slightly more flexible labour market, a slightly improved macro environment (first time in years) and a continuing improvement in businesses' use of technology. Try here for the full dataset or click on different countries in the infographic below.
2. The ECB explains TARGET balances in 8 minutes
3. The WSJ documents in great detail the stock, flow and lives of Syrian refuggees. And Sweden grants blanket asylum to any Syrian refugees that manage to make it there.
4. Evidence from Canada suggests real-time search and online payments data are very good predictors of recessions. 

WEEKEND READING 31 AUGUST - 1 SEPTEMBER

1. The Greek Government demanded information from 141 Facebook accounts last year. Information was granted in 54% of cases.
2. Remember, Greece will give you a residency permit if you buy EUR250k worth of property. Wonder how that's working out...
3. Eurostat gives us the lowdown on calculating unemployment and alternative measures of under- and un-employment. Brilliant. Note page 33 - in Greece, and indeed throughout Europe, the distribution of work intensity is much more unequal than the distribution of income (see Image).
4. Months before the UK finally managed to keep out of a misguided war in Syria, a YouGov poll suggested the use of chemical weapons would not not increase support for war among UK citizens, and the more conservative parts of the British public are the least inclined to support intervention. Full data here. Slightly similar findings in the US - support for war is not exactly a Conservative choice.
5. The Financial Stability Board reports on countries' progress in reducing the financial system's reliance on credit rating agencies and publishes recommendations on the oversight of the Shadow Banking sector.
6. Worrying about money problems causes a cognitive disadvantage equivalent to a sleepless night, or 13 IQ points.
7. Does the way languages deal with the future impact savings rates? A rigorous debate summarised here.
8. My personal obsession for the week - the uncanny valley.
9. Interesting factoid - no major social media platform is growing exponentially anymore.

WEEKEND READING: 24-25 AUGUST

1. An otherwise unhelpful IMF paper on the volatility of capital flows contains some excellent data on capital inflows in and out of Greece.
2. So the rise of the Far Right is down to recession/austerity? Sure, if you're a lazy journalist.
3. Ditto for the rise of drugs in austerity Greece. Try North Korea's Crystal Meth craze on for size.
4. The BAMS 'State of the Climate' report is set to be, for the next year at least, the world's definitive source of climate change data. Note how coverage of climate change is slowly dying out.
5. A dissenting voice in the IMF - a new paper says that the Fund may not have underestimated fiscal multipliers after all - it may have overestimated potential output. The paper is about the wider topic of designing fiscal consolidation programmes, and is definitely worth reading as it could influence IMF policy going forward.
6. Hidden in the European Commission's proposals for a European Public Prosecutor (pg. 18 here), some interesting data on the number of cases of possible misuse of EU funds referred to member states for investigation, and the states' track record of decisions:

WEEKEND READING: 17-18 AUGUST

1. Corporate balance sheet adjustment drove much of the rise in unemployment in post-crisis Europe. Except in Greece, where it was mostly down to output growth (see right).  
2. Business Cycle Synchronisation in Europe: new evidence shows the unsynchronised part of the EZ isn't the PIIGS. It's actually Greece, Belgium and France. See pg 29 onwards.
3. Awesome data alert! IMF researchers look at commodity price volatility since effing 1650 in order to test the Singer-Prebisch hypothesis which underpins many standard critiques of international trade.
4. Corruption perceptions are misreported. Small business owners may misreport by 90%, says this study.
5. A world map of labour mobility costs, and their implications for the impact of trade shocks
6. Don't confuse income inequality with injustice: evidence from Egypt's income distribution.
7. A very strong dataset (if badly presented) mapping changes to educational quality over time. With some Greek data.
8. Unemployment as an adult hurts more if you were bullied as a child, says LSE researcher. Some findings in the same direction from the US here.
9. Wonkfest: is China the world's biggest economy? And how would we know?
10. The argument for being pro-market, not pro-business, even if you're a CEO.
11. The most epic blog I've read in ages - a history of MI5 and how crap they were/are?
12. UK Border Agency staff say Greek ID cards are too easy to fake, according to the UK Labour Party's spokesman on immigration. My first thought is that this is another example of anti-immigration rhetoric, and I've found very little evidence to suggest there is widespread abuse by people travelling abroad. But then google isn't where this sort of information ends up. If readers know more, perhaps they could help?
13. Speaking of the UK Border Agency - did you know about their Go Home of Face Arrest vans? They were a very ugly piece of work, turning a rather enlightened policy (a resettlement service that could help trafficking victims and some illegal immigrants return home without criminalising them) into a hostile statement. Well, here's what happens when you respond to low-intensity racism with self-righteous indignation instead of argument. 'They' win.
14. While we're on the subject of right-wing extremism: Russia. You can't make this stuff up: Good ol' Putin plans to stimulate the economy by releasing some of the thousands jailed for 'economic crimes.' We missed a trick in Greece. We could have jailed businesspeople pre-emptively in the good days so that we could have them ransomed now, at a price. 

WEEKEND READING: 10-11 AUGUST 2013

1. Troika demonisers, prepare for brain overload: Guaranteed Minimum Income is introduced in Cyprus. I'll write more on this unexpectedly libertarian idea soon, unless I can't be bothered of course.
2. An interesting paper on the social networks of banks as a risk to global financial stability.
3. Latest Greek Labour Force Survey (May 2013) is out - unemployment is up.
4. The Porsches aren't back - The last 12 months have seen just 16 Porsches registered for the first time in Greece (6 new, 10 used). 
5. How prices are weaning Greek industry off Eurozone intermediary inputs
6. How did Greece's economic elites function in the Bronze Age? - a new study rediscovers the archaeological evidence.
7. Some additional evidence on the interplay between tax administration and the Greek shadow economy
8. I've updated my old post about whether Greeks are lazy, adding some excellent European Values Survey data.
9. The IMF's researchers discuss what makes, or could make, a stress test credible.
10. Remember that story about the hedge fund trader who was forced to take female hormones? I did yesterday, and looked further into it. The story gets much worse.
11. Lost money in the Greek PSI? You can sue.

WEEKEND READING: 3-4 AUGUST

1. The IMF's latest review of Greece's programme, and the Greek Government's Letter of Intent.
2. Eurostat publishes the latest figures on asylum applications for Q1 2013. In keeping with past trends, Greece rejected 2,785 out of 2,855. Syria tops the list for the whole of Europe, but Pakistan and Bangladesh top the Greek list. And have you seen how many Russians are seeking asylum?
3. A history and discussion of fiscal councils

WEEKEND READING: 27-28 JULY

1. The OECD publishes its Action Plan against Tax Base Erosion and Profit Shifting - depending on where you stand it's either the beginning of the end for tax havens, or the biggest ever diversion dreamt up by tax-dodging elites. It's probably a little bit of both.
2. Eurostat publishes the latest estimates of government debt among EU members.
3. The Commission publishes its assessment of the pre-accession economic programmes of Iceland, the FYR of Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey
4. And the first casualty for Greece's shipping sector as Restis goes to jail.
5. Interesting paper: "Hidden in plain sight: recognising the centrality of anarchist places of work in 'capitalist' society"
6. You need half a million dollars to do a documentary on the Greek Crisis? Really dude? Oh, and just to be clear: doing localisation for Apple as a contractor is not the same as working for them.