After what we discussed in the first part of the blog, the book then turns to a key question: Why should economic freedom be connected to political freedom at all? Friedman proposes two explanations, one direct and one indirect. He begins by showing that markets themselves directly embody freedom, and then explains how they indirectly support political liberty. Freedom, he notes, only has meaning within relationships among people, it does not apply to someone isolated, like R

We often talk about the environmental cost of cars, planes, trash and plastic. But we rarely talk about the environmental cost of clouds. Yes, you’ve heard it right, clouds. Not the ones in the air, but the digital ones that store our documents, pictures, and videos. The name “cloud” sounds clean and harmless, nevertheless there are huge data centres sustaining them. They are physical buildings filled with servers that consume huge amounts of energy. Every file we upload, p

Digital nomadism—the practice of performing remote work while traveling across countries—has evolved from a niche lifestyle into an economic force backed by measurable demographic and policy trends. Around 35 million people worldwide identify as digital nomads today, making it one of the fastest-growing labor subcultures of the 21st century. Case Study: Portugal’s Digital Nomad Visa and Economic Ripple Effects Portugal became a major hub after launching the D7 visa and later

In the contemporary workplace, technology has become inseparable from productivity. Emails, messaging platforms, and real-time collaboration tools have allowed companies to operate faster and more efficiently than ever before. Yet beneath this accelerated flow of communication lies a growing psychological burden: constant connectivity. The expectation to remain reachable at all hours has quietly reshaped workplace culture, blurring the boundaries between professional and pers

Tariffs are essentially taxes on imported goods. Recent developments involving U.S.-imposed tariffs not only impact its own market but also create ripple effects across the globe, particularly in countries like Türkiye. The central theme here is interdependence , emphasizing how economies are intricately linked through global trade. The situation can be understood through a simplified economic model representing the U.S. domestic market. Although the model assumes a small-cou

Menu price anchoring can be understood rigorously by treating a menu not as a list of prices, but as a bounded decision space in which customers optimise under uncertainty. (This means customers are making choices within a closed system, the menu, without knowing what prices “should” be, so they rely on internal comparisons rather than external benchmarks.) From a technical standpoint, the customer does not solve for absolute utility; instead, they perform relative utility ma

The global skills mismatch is one of the most pressing yet least visible challenges in economics, it refers to the disconnect between the skills of the workforce and what employers seek in employees. Despite many developed nations having relatively low unemployment rates on paper, employers report being unable to locate qualified candidates to fill vacant positions . This conundrum indicates that there is a systematic disparity

Remote work is no longer just a niche concept. It has become a major trend in the labor market especially post COVID, changing how companies and employees think about the whole concept of employment. Before the pandemic, working from home was super rare, mostly for tech or freelance jobs. Now, between 154 million and 435 million people around the world work remotely at least part of the time, and many companies plan to keep it permanent. One of the biggest things that this c

In this blog entry we will discuss how 4 major airline companies: Ryanair, easyJet, Wizz air and ITA have been accused of colluding on routes to and from Sicily from a very theoretical and analytical lens. The airline industry is an oligopolistic market structure; this occurs when small number of large firms dominate the industry. Interdependence is a feature of an oligopolistic market structure because firms must consider the actions of their competitors when making decision

The U.S. Federal Reserve has cut interest rates for the first time since December, lowering its benchmark rate by 25 basis points to a range of 4.00–4.25 percent. The decision, announced on Wednesday, came as a slowing labour market stalls economic growth. Markets widely expected this move, with CME FedWatch placing the probability at 96 percent. Why the Fed Cut Rates The cut was driven by weakening employment data. As jobs decrease, household income falls, reducing consumpti

Arguably the most powerful idea in classical economics is how the free market enables unanimity without forcing conformity. In simple terms, the market lets people make their own choices without needing everyone to agree or follow the same lifestyle. This isn’t the case with some public services like national defensewhere customization isn’t possible. You can’t have one person more protected than another. For things like this, we need collective decisions through voting and g

In many developing countries, lack of access to credit is a major barrier for small entrepreneurs. Microfinance, providing small loans to low income individuals has emerged as a method to fight poverty. One great example is the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh. Founded by Muhammad Yunus, it offers loans to villagers, especially women, without requiring collateral. Recipients use these funds to start businesses, buy livestock, or invest in small-scale agriculture. Studies show that

When it comes to spending and saving, humans are far from perfectly rational although all the economic models are based on human rationality and perfect self interest. Behavioral economics studies how psychological biases shape economic decisions, often leading people to act against their own self interests. Take, for example, the anchoring effect. Retailers often place a high-priced item next to a mid-priced one, making the latter seem like a bargain. Even though the absolut

First, let's get our terms right, logistic is the globalisation of resource management from every local unit to the entire network of production points. Think of logistics as the Tinder of resource management, it’s all about finding the right match between what you have and where it needs to go. On the other hand, supply chain management contains logistics, but it is also the entirety of optimisation. Whereas warehousing is a commercial building where goods or raw materials

After World War II, the Bretton Woods system seemed stable, but a hidden tension quickly emerged. World trade was growing and countries needed more international reserves to finance it. Under Bretton Woods, these reserves were mainly U.S. dollars, but every dollar was supposed to be convertible into gold at $35 an ounce. This created a contradiction: to supply the world with reserves, the United States had to run balance-of-payments deficits, sending dollars abroad. Yet the m

Climate change poses one of the most pressing economic and social challenges of the 21st century. Economists argue that the best way to address it is to put a price on carbon emissions, thereby aligning market incentives with environmental responsibility. By making pollution costly, businesses and consumers are encouraged to adopt cleaner alternatives. There are two main mechanisms for carbon pricing: carbon taxes and cap-and-trade systems. A carbon tax sets a fixed price per

The setup (1941–1944) Following the Great Depression and the currency wars in the 1930s, to keep exchange rates and trade stable, countries demanded a post WW2 system. On one hand, Sir John Maynard Keynes suggested a global clearing union with a new currency (“bancor”). Bancor was managed by a world central bank he called the International Clearing Union. By keeping the Bancor exclusive to cenntral banks, he aimed to limit speculation. Unlike the U.S. plan, which made the do

On 8 th of October 1990, sterlin joined the ERM (Exchange rate mechanism), a system designed to stabilise exchange rates between currencies by setting a central rate and allowing limited fluctuations within a predefined band. The UK pegs to the Deutsche Mark (DM) at DM 2.95/£ with a ±6% band. That put the legal floor near DM 2.773–2.778/£; if the rate hits the floor, authorities must buy pounds and vice versa. The timing was unfortunate. While Britain slid into recession i

In finance, an asset is a sequence of cashflows. This statement seems a bit abstract, yet—it is a precise way to describe how value is created and measured. When we assess the worth of any asset, what we are really doing is estimating the future money it will generate, and determining what that stream of money is worth today. An Example: Boeing’s Regional Jet Project To illustrate this, consider a real business decision. Boeing is evaluating whether to develop a new regional

Finance can seem super complex due to jargon, calculations, or diagrams. But at its core it can be explained through two simple actions, valuation and management. Valuing assets and managing assets. No matter what you are doing you’re constantly engaging in these two actions: first understanding the value of something, and then deciding what to do with it. The Challenge of Valuation While managing assets is often simple (you choose between clear options (buy, sell, hold)) va