Economics in the News : Archive for July 2006
The following articles on Economics in the News were published during July 2006

Today we are launching our partnership with The Enterprise Library to promote Liveecon - an innovative teaching and learning resource designed for undergraduate students of economics.

Building and protecting a global brand is an essential part of the being competitive and successful in markets which have become truly global. A few days ago, Interbrand released its latest survey of global brands and finds that Google is making fast progress in rivalling the likes of Microsoft and Coca Cola as the world’s top brand name

The days of stashing your cash as you win at Monopoly are coming to an end as Parker Brothers release an electronic version of the game.

The Freakonomics web site announces that HarperCollins has commissioned a Freakonomics Instructor’s Guide and Student’s Guide – free and downloadable as a pdf file.

No one can agree on which are the most expensive cities to live in around the global economy!

Sarin survives shareholder revolt - for now. Just a few months after posting the largest corporate loss in UK history, there was a fascinating example of shareholder activism yesterday with the rebellion of shareholders in the troubled telecoms business Vodafone having a real go at CEO Arun Sarin.

The BP Statistical Review of World Energy 2006 has been published as it remains a veritable goldmine of information for teachers on different aspects of the world energy market.

Reading up on the suspension (aka collapse) of the Doha trade talks, I hit upon a lively and authoritative website and blog from Phillipe Legrain, author, commentator and columnist.

I quite like this online version of the Prisoners' Dilemma based on the idea of the Big Brother house! Your choice is to be nice or bitchy - can you avoid being put up for eviction?

Dominos Pizza the market leader in the UK pizza market has reported very strong interim growth of sales and profits for the first six months of the year.

Frequently in our study of microeconomics we discuss the role that incentives can play in altering the behaviour of consumers and producers in all sorts of different markets. There have been several examples in the media in the last few days of interest groups (pressure groups) looking to bring about changes in government policy in several key areas and they all relate to the issue of incentives.

Are we being mislead or badly informed by the cereal producers? A new survey from the consumer watchdog Which? claims that a bowl of cereal can have as much sugar as a large bar of chocolate and with plenty of extra salt added into the bargain.

The scale of daily trading in the world's foreign exchange markets is simply vast! The results of a new survey on foreign exchange dealing published on the Bank of England's website a couple of days ago made me sit up and take notice.

Economics in the News (18-07) - Finding the cheapest petrol!

Is the £1 per litre of fuel an absolute certainty given the political crisis in the middle-east which is sending the price of a barrel of crude oil to new peaks?

Is the cost of financing staff pension schemes now really starting to hit business capital investment? That appears to be the message from a CBI survey released today.

The Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone is proposing to lift the charge for drivers of petrol-guzzling cars to £25 - more than three times the current charge.

In a bold move to impact directly on the prices for people using their mobile phones while overseas, the European Union telecommunications commissioner has proposed imposing a maximum price for the mobile phone operators.

We like to track the prices of commodities here on the Economics blog, partly because these are exciting times for the commodities market but also because they provide a super window on the laws of market supply and demand in determining prices.

The phenomenal performance of the Chinese economy in using trade as an engine for economic growth is shown by another landmark, a record trade surplus for China of $14.5 billion in June!

A new report offers evidence on the damaging effects of persistent relative poverty and social and economic exclusion on the quality of life and average life expectancy of people in our poorest households.

The postal market was opened up to competition at the start of this year and in recent months some of the emerging competitors to the Royal Mail have been winning some large scale contracts to deliver mail.

Economist Mike McDonald considers the economics of sustainable growth.

The Office of Fair Trading is starting an inquiry into the school uniforms markets to see if the current market arrangements give parents value for money.

A student exercise which might work for new students beginning their AS course. Download the exercise as a word file. You have been asked to create your own income tax system for a fictitious country.

An online treasure hunt designed for AS level students new to economics, this can also be downloaded as a word file if you want to develop / amend the idea for your teaching.

The UK housing market has enjoyed a strong first half of 2006 with a rebound in buyer confidence, rising prices and higher output and profits for firms working in the construction industry. This presentation provides a graphical overview of the latest changes in the market.

Our regular update on what is happening to commodity prices around the world, the presentation contains 20 charts mainly dated from the start of 2000 but bang up to date to the start of July.

Illegal fishing and over-exploitation of existing fish stocks risk causing the permanent destruction of Mediterranean stocks of blue fin tuna according to a new report from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

Service industries are now making record profits but manufacturing industry continues to suffer from a long term decline in profitability according to new data released by the Office for National Statistics.

With typical understatement, the Sun's headline yesterday proclaimed "cheaper sex for Brits" and now that Ingerland have been knocked out of the word cup through the traditional transmission mechanism of the penalty shoot out (classic game theory!), it will come as some relief for disappointed footy fans to find out that from today the rate of value added tax (VAT) on condoms has been reduced from the standard rate of 17.5% to just 5% (the minimum rate allowed under current EU single market rules).

The British economy is looking stronger than previously thought after the Office for National Statistics released revisions to the national income accounts which show that the statisticians have under-recorded economic activity in the last few years.