Category Archives: Uncategorized

Pelle Dragsted is a Danish opposition MP with – and chief spokesperson of – the Red-Green Alliance. HisNordic Socialism: The Path Toward a Democratic Economyis a rousing invitation to reimagine the possibilities of socialism – neither as utopian dream nor Soviet nostalgia, but a successful living example embedded in and underpinning the Nordic model.

For Dragsted, the question isn’t whether socialism is feasible; it’s whether Denmark can go further and build on its existing institutions of economic democracy. For Irish readers enamoured of the Nordic model, a key question is which elements of this ambitious framework can usefully be emulated.

*** A version of this book review was first published in The Irish Times on 16 August 2025 ***

Inflation really started to pick up in the second half of 2021. Coming out of the pandemic, as the economy recovered, demand and supply were out of whack. Buoyed by pandemic-era government supports, but still cautious – or restricted! – in going to pubs or restaurants or consuming any services that require close human contact, we were still buying more stuff. Replicated the world over, this meant relatively high demand for goods and snarled supply chains. This caused prices to rise.

In early 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine, sending oil and gas prices through the roof. This quickly fed through to higher energy prices, at the pump and in our electricity bills. More slowly, it fed through to higher prices for everything that uses energy as an input. That is to say, almost everything. The annual inflation rate seems to have peaked at 9.2% in October 2022, and was expected to fall throughout 2023 as interest rate increases sapped demand and dampened prices. After prices spiked by 1.6% in February alone, only modest progress has been made so far, with annual inflation still at 8.5% as of last month. Still, in the absence of further energy shocks, the expectation is that inflation will moderate as the year progresses.

*** This article was first published at thejournal.ie on 27 March 2023 ***

The era of cheap borrowing is over. Households, businesses and governments are all starting to feel the pinch, and things are going to get harder before they get easier.

Having learned the lessons of the global financial crisis, central banks across the world slashed interest rates and flooded financial markets with money as an immediate response to the Covid-19 pandemic in early 2020. Governments spent money like it was going out of fashion in an unprecedented and synchronized global effort to ward off the worst economic effects of the pandemic. On their own terms, these efforts were superbly successful. The Covid recession was mercifully brief and shallow as a result.

*** This article was first published at thejournal.ie on 26 October 2022 ***

Time will tell whether our post-pandemic economy really takes off like a rocket… and whether a rising rocket lifts all spaceships.

With a wholesale switch from bricks-and-mortar retail to online shopping accelerated by Covid-19, internet behemoths like Amazon have been among the big winners over the past year. While we´ve all been stuck at home, many of us have been lucky enough to have disposable income, but nowhere to spend it. A one-click purchase and a package swiftly delivered to your door can be quick thrill, a small luxury, or sometimes even an urgent need.

Something else that took off in a rocket this summer is Jeff Bezos, Amazon´s founder, world´s richest man, and plausible Lex Luthor super-villain impersonator. Worth more than $200bn, or about half of Irish GDP, he ploughs a reputed $1bn a year into Blue Origin, his hobbyhorse outfit aiming to bring space tourism to the masses. Well, at least to the super rich. On 20^th July, shortly after stepping down as CEO, Bezos boarded Blue Origin´s first manned space flight.

*** This article was first published at thejournal.ie on 20 July 2021 ***

THE IRISH ECONOMY continued to create jobs at a rate of more than 1,000 per week in the three months immediately following June’s shock Brexit vote, defying some of the most pessimistic predictions about the short-term impact.

According to Tuesday’s figures from the Central Statistics Office, 57,500 jobs were created this year to the end of September, signalling robust annual job growth of 2.9%.

The pace of job growth moderated slightly to a seasonally adjusted 13,500 during the most recent three month period, down from 18,900 and 16,100 in each of the first two quarters of the year, respectively. This brought the total number employed to 2,040,500, the highest since the end of 2008, although still 6% below the all-time high of 2,169,600, reached in Q3 2007.

*** This article was first published on thejournal.ie on 23 November, 2016 *** Continue reading →