The right is rising, even in Ireland. Each country has its own drivers but immigration is a unifying grievance. How big a problem is this in Ireland? Should we all abandon social media? Follow the example of the mayor of Paris? What are the economics of immigration? When people say "we should spend our money on our own citizens" are they right? Or just not able to do arithmetic? The grass isn't always greener elsewhere. Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-an...
Nov 28, 2023•30 min•Transcript available on Metacast What will be the business and economic consequences of the Dublin riots? There is often trouble when large pools of uneducated, unemployed young men are organised by old men - mad mullahs, army councils, Trump-style demagogues. The list of suspects is a long one. Whether that trouble fizzles out or leads to revolution depends on many things. Mostly how the rest of us react to far right (or left) neo-fascism. Data continue to point to a very robust Irish labour market. Export (especially chemical...
Nov 26, 2023•33 min•Transcript available on Metacast Argentina is a study in not how to do it. For a very long time. And here they go again. Weep for Argentina. Given the serial objections by Sinn Fein to house building in their back yard, NIMBY's should probably vote for them. But where are the houses going to be built? At what cost? Shinner published targets for house buliding on their watch are close to being met by the current government. If house building and rental property supply greatly improve, but prices and rents don't fall, is teh hous...
Nov 21, 2023•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast Solving the Irish housing crisis is, in principle, easy: just build 50,000 units a year until the word 'crisis' disappears from the headlines and public consciousness. Is that a practical, realistic proposition - for any government of any persuasion? Why not just do it? Lots of trade data, particularly for exports, suggest that economies are slowing down. Irish exports are really hurting from the slowdown in general and the weakness in Pharmaceutical trade in particular. Far fewer people are get...
Nov 19, 2023•31 min•Transcript available on Metacast The only way to understand the latest outbreak of fighting in the ongoing Conservative Party's 30 year war is to look back at history. This has all been going on for a long time. To paraphrase (only a bit) John Major, this is now the Battle of the Bastards. It really is Game of Thrones stuff. But the country - the UK - is being laid to waste. The fight to succeed Sunak is well and truly on. It could well be that Donald trump's future will determine who wins. Farage may be in the jungle, but he c...
Nov 15, 2023•38 min•Transcript available on Metacast Rishi Sunak surprises everybody - he is even capable of a surprise! Cameron is back in, Braverman is back out. Sunak wants to be the candidate for change? Look at Cameron's track record and weep. But could his return be a really smart move by Sunak? Or will it merely invite the right-wing nut-jobs to try and defenestrate him? Just when there was a chance for UK politics to become boringly predictable! Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hos...
Nov 14, 2023•39 min•Transcript available on Metacast In this episode Jim asks Chris if he is ghost writing articles for the FT. An actual FT journalist, one of their best, wrote an article about the things that Chris has been banging on about since The Other Hand started. Life in the Uk is getting steadily worse. Tim Harford cites three personal anecdotes and lots of data to make the point that public sector services have collapsed in the UK. Chris agrees and extends the point to a lot of private sector services. One reason why both private and pu...
Nov 13, 2023•32 min•Transcript available on Metacast The peak in interest rates grows closer. Maybe Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Nov 10, 2023•31 min•Transcript available on Metacast We will not be cancelled Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Nov 07, 2023•37 min•Transcript available on Metacast Lots of economic data on both sides of the Atlantic are now pointing to slowing growth. Very slow in the case of Europe, a bit slower in the US. Even the US labour market is no longer defying gravity. Is Ireland just an extension of the US economy? It certainly is extremely correlated with US economic performance. It looks like the Corporation tax boom is over. For once, economists can say 'we told you so' ECB tries its hand at forecasting, again. Probably with the same degree of accuracy as bef...
Nov 05, 2023•38 min•Transcript available on Metacast With Professor Shane O'Mara Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Nov 03, 2023•43 min•Transcript available on Metacast The US Congress is not a serious legislature Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Nov 02, 2023•34 min•Transcript available on Metacast With Nathan Johns of The Irish Times. Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Oct 30, 2023•34 min•Transcript available on Metacast Is ESG investing getting it right? Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Oct 27, 2023•37 min•Transcript available on Metacast Will the ECB this week do the right thing? (Spoiler alert: nothing) Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Oct 24, 2023•33 min•Transcript available on Metacast Nathan Johns @nathanrjohns of the Irish Times discusses all of the action in this weekend's quarter finals of the Rugby World Cup. One unfancied team making the semis is ok, two reveals poor RWC seeding & planning. But Nathan convincingly argues that calibrating these things is difficult. Nathan persuades Chris that the 'technical' aspects of the game are as important as the flashier, more 'entertaining' stuff. But isn't rugby all about tries? What about the big one, the final? Become a member a...
Oct 23, 2023•34 min•Transcript available on Metacast The end of liberal conceits? Chris thinks there is evidence for the existence of more anti-Semitism in the world, latent or otherwise, than most are prepared to admit. In the UK, few people can quite bring themselves to believe the evidence of their own eyes and admit to the anti-Semitism present in the Labour party - at least until Starmer began to clean the stables. Everyone, everywhere, says they are not anti-Semitic but despise Israeli policies.For many that is true, genuine and honest. For ...
Oct 21, 2023•39 min•Transcript available on Metacast Octabuild were kind enough to host Jim & Chris for a Webinar discussing all things Budget 2024, with a special focus on the construction industry. The 8 member companies of Octabuild are Dulux Paints, Etex Ireland, Glennon Brothers, Grant Engineering, Gyproc, Irish Cement, Kingspan Insulation and Wavin Ireland ’. The national housing crisis puts the construction industry at the heart of what happens next. So, all things considered, this was an extremely timely event with a focus that c...
Oct 18, 2023•1 hr 6 min•Transcript available on Metacast Ireland's export data weakens again. It's beginning to look like a trend. And maybe the world economy is weaker than we thought. The Health Service needs more money. How many countries can say that? It's as true in Ireland as elsewhere. But the suspicion grows that you could give the HSE any amount of money and it would still have a budget hole of €2 billion at the end of the year. Any year. Somebody needs to find teh cure for fiscal incontinence. The world looks ever more dangerous by the day. ...
Oct 17, 2023•34 min•Transcript available on Metacast Why Ireland lost in a game of the finest of margins - really. On the numbers, Ireland and New Zealand could replay that game, deploy the same players and tactics, and Ireland would win 9 games out of 10. This was the tenth game. What about Ireland going forward - looking good, even in terms of replacing Jonny Sexton. Tight Head Prop, a massively under-rated position, could be more problematic. How is it possible that England are the only undefeated side in the World Cup? Become a member at https...
Oct 16, 2023•33 min•Transcript available on Metacast Everything really is connected to everything else Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Oct 13, 2023•32 min•Transcript available on Metacast We really are doing economic policy all wrong Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Oct 10, 2023•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast They really deserved to win this one Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Oct 09, 2023•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast Professor Charlotte Cavaillé is a global expert on inequality and redistribution. Her extensive research program has reframed the discussion such that our perceptions of fairness are front and centre. With some surprising results. In many countries, particularly the US and UK, inequality has risen. Economists might argue that self-interested electorates, which contain increasing numbers of people suffering form inequality, might start calling for more redistribution. But the evidence says not. M...
Oct 08, 2023•50 min•Transcript available on Metacast Do we have a right brain problem? Author and journalist Matthew Syed said so in a recent fascinating Sunday Times column. Professor of Neuroscience at Trinity College Dublin, Shane O'Mara, says no. So why is our political discourse, pretty much everywhere, so polarised, context & nuance free, and just so nasty? Why, when we know, with as much certainty as we can muster, that the world is a very uncertain place, is everyone so certain? Shane is tempted to say that the world was ever thus and Chri...
Oct 05, 2023•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast Are equities heading for an October event? Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Oct 04, 2023•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast Batten down the hatches? Fat chance Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Sep 30, 2023•33 min•Transcript available on Metacast Time for rocket scientists to stop blowing up the (economic) world Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Sep 28, 2023•37 min•Transcript available on Metacast In an Irish Times Article that has gone globally viral, journalist Nathan Johns, @nathanrjohns, analysed data that suggests S. Africa might have won that match. Perhaps even deserved to win that match. But they lost. Why? Numbers are not quite everything it seems. Nearly everything, but not everything. Chris looks forward to a Wales victory in the semi final. Maybe even against Ireland. Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns . Hosted on Acast. S...
Sep 26, 2023•30 min•Transcript available on Metacast A big week in financial markets: bond yields are up to multi-year highs. All other asset prices have been affected. Equities are down, exchange rates are all over the place. The new narrative is interest rates 'higher for longer'. Wethink this could be yet another narrative fallacy. Interest rates were left unchanged in the US and UK following the ECB's latest dopey hike. Economies are weakening under the strain of past rate hikes. Particularly the dopey ones. Is Euroscepticism, pre-Brexit style...
Sep 24, 2023•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
