Economic Policy

Fracking: The Key to a Combating Climate Change?

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Fracking: The Key to a Combating Climate Change?

Fareed Zakaria recently disgusted how increase access to natural gas has led tode decreased CO2 admissions.  Zakaria posits further gains may be made by sharing our hydrofracturing technology with China.  Here is a description of the story: 

We have been thinking about an idea in the opinion pages of the New York Times to tackle one of the great challenges of our times: cutting carbon emissions to slow down climate change. It would result in the single largest reduction of CO2 emissions globally of any feasible idea out there. But there are a couple of hitches. Let’s explain.

Here’s the idea: it’s time to help China master fracking safely.

By now it’s clear that fracking (the process of extracting shale gas) has dramatically lowered America’s CO2 emissions. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, in 2006, a fifth of our electricity came from natural gas, while almost 50 percent came from coal. By 2012, natural gas had increased its share to 30 percent of our electricity. Coal’s share dropped to 37 percent. The change was because of fracking: over that same period, shale gas production grew 800 percent.

“America Doesn’t Need A Strong Dollar Policy

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“America Doesn’t Need A Strong Dollar Policy

That was the proposition debated on NPR’s Intelligence Squared, whose website  describes the debate as follows: 

It’s often taken for granted that America needs a strong dollar.  When the value of the U.S. dollar is strong relative to other currencies, it becomes attractive to investors and allows Americans to buy foreign goods and services cheaply.  But in times of recession, are we better off with a weak dollar that stimulates U.S. manufacturing by making our goods cheaper and more competitive?  Or will the loss of purchasing power and currency manipulation abroad, offset the potential gains?

The debaters included Fredric Miskin (Columbia Business School) and John Taylor (Chairman and Founder, FX Concepts) arguing in favor of the motion and Steve Forbes(Chairman and Editor-in-Chief, Forbes Media) and James Grant (Editor and Founder, Grant’s Interest Rate Observer). 

Lollipops, Politics, and Economics: It’s Complicated

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Lollipops, Politics, and Economics: It’s Complicated

NPR’s Planet Money recently ran a story titled “The Lollipop War.” The story illustrates why regulating economic policy can be difficult.

Sugar costs more in the U.S. than in the rest of the world. If you’re in the candy business — if, say, you make 10 million lollipops a day — that’s a big deal.

On today’s show, we visit a candy factory in Ohio (where they want U.S. sugar to be cheaper) and a sugar-beet field in Minnesota (where they don’t). And, perhaps inevitably, we hear from Washington, where the fight over sugar has been playing out for years.