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A roundup of the best economic posts on the Web
What if China's GDP is seriously overstated?
Naked Capitalist weighs in on a post by Michael Pettis on the difficulties in determining China's actual GDP:
"What if China's GDP numbers seriously overstate the true value of China's economy? There are at least two very good reasons to believe that they might. The first is environmental degradation. To understand why, it is worth remembering that if an individual earns $100, but in so doing destroys $100 worth of his own assets, then a strict accounting would say that he earned nothing."
Mobile Banking Takes Off in Kenya
Freakonomic looks at a new study on the success of mobile banking in Kenya:
The authors conclude that M-PESA has been wildly successful in Kenya: "We estimate that M‐PESA had reached nearly 40 percent of the adult population after a little more than 2 years of operation, and that now, approaching only the fourth anniversary of its launch, is used by more than two‐thirds of households."
A related post looks at why such innovative products are gaining traction in emerging markets but not in the developed world.
When it comes to carbon pricing, you have to take the good with the oil sands
Recommended by Economy Lab contributors Stephen Gordon and Mike Moffatt ... Andrew Leach on his blog Rescuing the Frog:
"Carbon pricing is hard, and not just because you need to know a lot of terminology or because it's a political minefield. Supporting carbon pricing means that you hand control of who wins, who loses, and where emissions come from in the economy to the market. True carbon pricing also likely means, sin of sins, that environmentalists might have to give the oil sands a pass."