London 2012: The medal table of commerce

From The Huffington Post: Were there a medal table for making money at London 2012, there’d be few surprises at its summit.

Just as China and the U.S. were a shoo-in for the top spots in the official standings, the International Olympic Committee’s ascendancy would be assured alongside McDonald’s and Coca-Cola in the commercial Games.

The British taxpayer, meanwhile, would be a dark horse. Spending £9.3bn to organise the Games, we’ve certainly mirrored Team GB in starting slowly. But, in a damascene conversion to Keynesian economics, David Cameron claims that UK Plc can replicate our athletes’ subsequent success and harvest £13bn worth of tourism income, trade deals and inward investment over four years.

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Sydney versus Melbourne: Australia’s epic rivalry

Living in London, I’m aware of how a country’s capital city can draw all talent and resources to it like a magnet. The UK capital’s sheer size attracts wealth, in turn accelerating its growth further. 

Which is why I was fascinated to discover that Australia’s largest city – which isn’t even its capital – was only marginally bigger than its nearest rival. Unsurprisingly, Sydney and Melbourne share an intense economic rivalry, which I examine in this  article for BusinessesForSale.com. 

881km apart, the two cities are actually comparatively close to one another in the context of an ‘island-continent’ spanning 4,000km from its western coast to its eastern seaboard. There’s very little between the two great metropolises, with one or the other marginally ahead on a range of measures relating to culture, sport, infrastructure, commerce and living standards.

Worker Cooperatives: A Route To A Fairer, More Productive Capitalism?

From Bdaily: There used to be an unspoken bargain at the heart of western capitalism: bosses happily raised wages, which were then spent on goods and services, thereby boosting bosses’ profits.

Income inequality in the industrialised economies shrank sharply between the end of World War Two and the 1970s.

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Doing business in Germany

Keynes, Balls, austerity and what voters deserve

From The Commentator: Ed Balls’ recent announcement that Labour would prepare its Shadow Budget within Coalition spending limits came less than two weeks after the IMF urged George Osborne to slow the pace of cuts.

So why did the Shadow Chancellor meekly abandon his position just as it received tacit endorsement from an organisation that was hitherto austerity’s biggest cheerleader?

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