Talking worth hearing: China

Tyler Cowen talks about the rise and fall of the Chinese economy: how they grew so fast, and why they're in trouble now.

~12 minutes

I like Tyler's insight that decades of high growth distorted the assessment of the risk/return of new investment projects, which is distinct (but compatible) from a decline in the marginal productivity of capital.

Talking worth hearing: GDP

Stan Pignal and Ryan Avent (from The Economist), and Mike Jakeman (from the Economist Intelligence Unit), discuss whether GDP is an appropriate indicator of an economy's health.

~12 minutes

(I wish they wouldn't implicitly endorse the popular definition of recession, i.e. two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth. It's truly an awful notion.)