The Austerity Wars

Why Is Europe So Messed Up? An Illuminating History : The New Yorker

In this summary of why Europe is struggling economically (blame austerity is the gist), I was particularly interested in these paragraphs:

 With so much hinging on Germany, the discussion of postwar German ordoliberalism, which underpins Berlin’s hostility to expansionary policies, is particularly valuable.

As Blyth points out, German politicians influenced by ordoliberalism, such as Chancellor Angela Merkel and Wolfgang Schäuble, the finance minister, aren’t hostile to government activism in the same way conservatives in the United States and Britain are. To the contrary, they believe in a social market economy, where the state sets the rules, including the generous provision of entitlement benefits, and vigorously enforces them. But encouraged by Germany’s success in creating an export-led industrial juggernaut, they believe that everybody else, even much less efficient economies, such as Greece and Portugal, should copy them rather than rely on the crutch of easy money and deficit-financed stimulus programs.

That’s all very well if you are an official at the Bundesbank, or one of the parsimonious Swabian housewives beloved of Merkel, but it ignores a couple of things. First, it’s the very presence of weaker economies in the euro zone that keeps the value of the currency at competitive levels, greatly helping German industry. If Greece and Portugal and other periphery countries dropped out, the euro would spike up, making Volkswagens and BMWs a lot more expensive. Second, it isn’t arithmetically possible for every country to turn into Germany and run a big trade surplus. On this, Blyth quotes Martin Wolff, of the Financial Times: “Is everybody supposed to run a current account surplus? And if so, with whom—Martians? And if everybody does indeed try to run a savings surplus, what else can be the outcome but a permanent global depression?”

 I particularly like the Martin Wolff quote.

Anyway, now all I need to know is:  what's "ordoliberalism"?

UPDATE:   the IMF warns Britain about heavy cuts at this time:

Hit the austerity pause button. Invest more in social housing, schools and road repairs. Growth is more important in the short term than deficit reduction. Couched in suitably polite language, that was the uncomfortable message from the International Monetary Fund to George Osborne .

The chancellor could take some comfort from the fact that the fund was rather more diplomatic about his economic strategy than it was in Washington a month ago, but not all that much. For the past couple of weeks, the government has done its utmost to persuade the IMF that Britain should stick to its current budgetary course. Osborne has tried. The chief secretary Danny Alexander has tried. Sir Mervyn King has tried. They have all failed.

After three years in which it first strongly supported Osborne's austerity programme, then had second thoughts when the economy sank into a double-dip recession, the IMF has finally had enough. It wants further fiscal tightening postponed until the economy is strong enough to take it.

Potentially useful for Labor in Australia if it wants to warn on the effects of a needless hurry to reduce a deficit by harsh spending cuts poorly targetted.
 

An old argument, continued

Cold viruses thrive in frosty conditions 

Ah, it was decades ago now that I was arguing with friends (well, more friends of friend, really) that it was not unreasonable to believe that getting a "chill" in winter made you more susceptible to catching a cold.   "Rubbish" I was told; it's an old wive's tale believed before people understood that colds were caused by a rhinovirus,  and (of course) if you don't have the rhinovirus you don't catch a cold no matter how chilled you get.   But, I said, I would guess that nearly everyone has some exposure to rhinovirus during "cold and flu season", and letting your body temperature dip may lower your immune system enough to become more susceptible to getting ill from the exposure.   "No", I was told, they've done studies about that and you are still wrong.

Well, in fact, the matter has been the subject of some contradictory studies, as I noted when I last addressed this in a post in 2005.  (I have been blogging for a long time...)

And now, further vindication (of a sort) I can claim from another study:

In an attempt to solve the cold conundrum, Foxman and her colleagues studied mice susceptible to a mouse-specific rhinovirus. They discovered that at warmer temperatures, animals infected with the rhinovirus produced a burst of antiviral immune signals, which activated natural defenses that fought off the virus. But at cooler temperatures, the mice produced fewer antiviral signals and the infection could persist.

The researchers then grew human airway cells in the lab under both cold and warm conditions and infected them with a different rhinovirus that thrives in people. They found that warm infected cells were more likely than cold ones to undergo programmed cell death — cell suicide brought on by immune responses aimed at limiting the spread of infections.

Foxman says that the data suggest that these temperature-dependent immune reactions help to explain rhinoviruses' success at lower temperatures, and explain why winter is the season for colds. As temperatures drop outside, humans breathe in colder air that chills their upper airways just enough to allow rhinoviruses to flourish, she says.

This also shows why you shouldn't lose contact with old acquaintances: it removes the fun of claiming vindication 30 years later.

IPA, ABC, ALP

State Liberals propose privatising ABC, SBS

I see that John Roskam of the Liberal Party and the Institute of Paid Advocacy (as someone referred to it recently)  is quoted here as if he is leading the charge to have the Coalition consider privatising the ABC.

The ALP will be delighted that the Liberal Party (Tea Party Subdivision) is now openly talking about it, not just mumbling to themselves on blogs and while listening to Rupert Murdoch talk up the wonder of free markets at the Victorian Art Gallery.

I would say the situation is like this:

1.   the ABC has always had a soft Left bias.   Given that journalists and the artistic community has always leaned left, this is a virtually unavoidable fact.

2.   Despite this, people watch the ABC current affairs shows because of the depth to which they cover issues, which you simply do not see on commercial current affairs.  People adjust to the bias in any individual report.  (I mean, for example, when it comes to gay marriage being dealt with on the ABC, everyone knows how that's going to lean.)

3.   The ABC has actually attempted to address the issue of bias in the last several years, and as a result has been the major outlet via which the IPA talking heads have managed to get their mysteriously funded message out.   Shows such as Insiders, the Drum and Q&A specifically seek Right wing commentary on their panels, and the IPA in particular has never had any where near the amount of  air time as they have had over the last few years at the ABC.   A major ABC journalist (Chris Uhlmann) some years ago expressed muted skepticism of climate change, muttering about it being believed like a religion.  Sure, he's married to a Labor politician, but I still think he is the softest handler of Coalition figures we have seen on ABC flagship current affairs for years.

4.   Despite this, because the (large) Tea Party rump of the Liberals has moved to the Right and absorbed the silly Fox News "culture wars" attitude, they are still complaining about bias and the lack of Right wing voices on the ABC.   Yet no one ever nominates who in journalism or the media generally is a Right wing figure who is being unfairly denied his or her own gig on the ABC.   Bolt went off and got his own show on commercial TV;  Gerard Henderson still goes on Insiders but no one in their right mind (ha! a pun) could imagine his dour delivery being listenable on its own for a whole hour;  same with Piers Ackerman.  And besides, have any of the current Righties in the media said they actually want a full time job at the ABC?   They may be perfectly happy with their hours and salary where they are for all we know.

The talent pool of Right wing broadcast media figures is very limited - that's just always going to be a fact of life.

And as for the IPA - if they are going to start campaigning for privatisation of the ABC, a major change to Australian media landscape - then now more than ever people ought to be telling any ABC host talking to someone from the IPA about the topic to ask if their salary is being part funded by someone who perceives a commercial interest in that happening. 

A lower dollar could only help

Australian dollar could dive below 90 US cents in coming weeks - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

The big economic factor that does not attract as much attention as it should in the mind of the public is the  high Aussie dollar.

The Gillard government has been very unlucky to be caught in a period of a sustained high dollar, and a new Abbott government would be very lucky to have it sink to a permanent, more realistic level.

To Containers: hip hip...

Free exchange: The humble hero | The Economist

I would have always assumed that the use of shipping containers had been a major innovation for trade, but I had no idea it had been as significant as shown in the above article.  For example:

  It was the brainchild of Malcom McLean, an American trucking magnate. He reckoned that big savings could be had by packing goods in uniform containers that could easily be moved between lorry and ship. When he tallied the costs from the inaugural journey of his first prototype container ship in 1956, he found that they came in at just $0.16 per tonne to load—compared with $5.83 per tonne for loose cargo on a standard ship. Containerisation quickly conquered the world: between 1966 and 1983 the share of countries with container ports rose from about 1% to nearly 90%, coinciding with a take-off in global trade (see chart)....

In 1965 dock labour could move only 1.7 tonnes per hour onto a cargo ship; five years later a container crew could load 30 tonnes per hour (see table). This allowed freight lines to use bigger ships and still slash the time spent in port. The journey time from door to door fell by half and became more consistent. The container also upended a rigid labour force. Falling labour demand reduced dockworkers’ bargaining power and cut the number of strikes. And because containers could be packed and sealed at the factory, losses to theft (and insurance rates) plummeted. Over time all this reshaped global trade. Ports became bigger and their number smaller. More types of goods could be traded economically. Speed and reliability of shipping enabled just-in-time production, which in turn allowed firms to grow leaner and more responsive to markets as even distant suppliers could now provide wares quickly and on schedule. International supply chains also grew more intricate and inclusive.

 And a study claims this:

In a set of 22 industrialised countries containerisation explains a 320% rise in bilateral trade over the first five years after adoption and 790% over 20 years. By comparison, a bilateral free-trade agreement raises trade by 45% over 20 years and GATT membership adds 285%.

I have been impressed by containerisation ever since I saw the automated container straddle carriers at the Port of  Brisbane in 2007.   My post about that trip is here.

Lust and that disease in history

Syphilis, sex and fear | How the French disease conquered the world | Books | The Guardian

I think I find reading about the history of syphilis so interesting because I just find it hard imagining societies coping for so long with an illness that was so devastating to the individual and their family, and so closely tied  to personal behaviour.    It's like the first decade of AIDS, but going on for four or five centuries.

Here are some bits of information about syphilis which I don't think I had heard before:

The theories surrounding the disease were are as dramatic as the symptoms: an astrological conjunction of the planets, the boils of Job, a punishment of a wrathful God disgusted by fornication or, as some suggested even then, an entirely new plague brought from the new world by the soldiers of Columbus and fermented in the loins of Neapolitan prostitutes.  

The boils of Job seems a pretty apt guess, I suppose.

There seems to be a hint of exaggeration here:

 Whatever the cause, the horror and the agony were indisputable. "So cruel, so distressing, so appalling that until now nothing more terrible or disgusting has ever been known on this earth," says the German humanist Joseph Grunpeck, who, when he fell victim, bemoaned how "the wound on my priapic gland became so swollen, that both hands could scarcely encircle it."

 I don't think I knew wet nurses could pass it on to babies:

 Erring husbands gave it to wives who sometimes passed it on to children, though they might also get it from suckling infected wet-nurses.

 This seems a novel suggestion:

 In a manifestly corrupt church, the give-away "purple flowers" (as the repeated attacks were euphemistically known) that decorated the faces of priests, cardinals, even a pope, were indisputable evidence that celibacy was unenforceable. When Luther, a monk, married a nun, forcing the hand of the Catholic church to resist similar reform in itself, syphilis became one of the reasons the Catholic church is still in such trouble today.

 I hadn't heard this suggestion before either:

Those who could buy care also bought silence – the confidentiality of the modern doctor/patient relationship has it roots in the treatment of syphilis.

What about this horrible plan for husbands who wanted to secretly treat their spouse:

The old adage "a night with Venus; a lifetime with Mercury" reveals all manner of horrors, from men suffocating in overheated steam baths to quacks who peddled chocolate drinks laced with mercury so that infected husbands could treat their wives and families without them knowing. Even court fashion is part of the story, with pancake makeup and beauty spots as much a response to recurrent attacks of syphilis as survivors of smallpox.

And what about that last sentence - as you can tell, there is a lot here that is new to me.

As to the famous who may had suffered from it, there are a few names on this list I hadn't heard mentioned before:

Detective work by writers such as Deborah Hayden (The Pox: Genius, Madness, and the Mysteries of Syphilis) count Schubert, Schumann, Baudelaire, Maupassant, Flaubert, Van Gogh, Nietzsche, Wilde and Joyce with contentious evidence around Beethoven and Hitler.

The mystery of how "hysteria" became the fad of the day that Freud and his ilk were so interested in may also be connected: 

Late 19th-century French culture was a particularly rich stew of sexual desire and fear. Upmarket Paris restaurants had private rooms where the clientele could enjoy more than food, and in opera foyers patrons could view and "reserve" young girls for later. At the same time, the authorities were rounding up, testing and treating prostitutes, often too late for themselves or the wives. As the fear grew, so did the interest in disturbed women. Charcot's clinic exhibited examples of hysteria, prompting the question now as to how far that diagnosis might have been covering up the workings of syphilis. Freud noted the impact of the disease inside the family when analysing his early female patients.

All very fascinating.  I should read an entire book on the subject, perhaps.

Spend less, get the tick of approval

Budget polling: Newspoll 56-44, Nielsen and Galaxy 54-46 | The Poll Bludger

The most surprising outcome from the post budget polls is the strength of the popularity of decision to reduce the "Baby Bonus":

 Abolition of the baby bonus has received strikingly strong support: 68% from Nielsen and 64% from Galaxy, with opposition at 27% and 22%.

Who'd have thought:  the public can identify overly generous middle class welfare when they see it.

Doesn't this suggest that Labor's move towards tighter means testing of benefits is a winner, too?

It's not just me - Part 3

I'm encouraged to read, via this spectacularly wrong headed assessment that Dr Who is still a fantastic show, that there are indeed a large number of former fans pretty much abandoning it due to the woeful trajectory it has been on with Steven Moffat in control.     

Have a look at this blog post, for example, found via from the previous link.  It correctly identifies the obvious current problem:  Moffat sets up big story arcs that end with a pathetic, uninteresting and un-engaging  deus ex machina fizzle.  (And, I would argue, even the "stand alone" stories now frequently have pathetic resolutions.)  From the last link:

Notably, both season five and season six end with a wacky aborted universe and a wedding. If there’s not a wedding and a wacky alternate universe at the end of season seven, I’ll be worried Stefan Moffat forgot to rip himself off. Now, I’m not saying Doctor Who should be a champion of stories that make sense all the time, but it should at least be consistent with its own mythology. The excellent Tennant/Davies era episode “The Waters of Mars” showed us the huge consequences (mostly emotional) when you screw with fixed points in time. These days that doesn’t mean jack shit, because the Doctor seems down with rewriting time whenever it suits the needs of the script.

Rest the show.  For 5 years.

But can he make them have babies?

Japan: Abe’s master plan | The Economist

"Abenomics"  is getting some good reviews for its sudden improvement to the Japanese economy.  It also seems to be a massive experiment which, if successful, would be seen as a strong win by Krugman for his take on economics.

Yet, in this Economist article, there is little to suggest what he can do about the major long term demographic problem for his country.   In short, if the Japanese are never going to accept high levels of immigration, how are they ever going to be persuaded to have more babies?

It's not just me - Part 2

Hoppy beer is awful—or at least, its bitterness is ruining craft beer’s reputation. - Slate Magazine

The boutique beer business is big in the US as well as Australia, and I am happy to hear that I am not the only person who is finding too many of these beers just too overpoweringly hoppy.

While different hops are supposed to have different taste characteristics (other than simple "bitter"), it's good to read that there really is no point in making it too bitter:

From a consumer’s standpoint, though, beers overloaded with hops are a pointless gimmick. That’s because we can’t even taste hops’ nuances above a certain point. Hoppiness is measured in IBUs (International Bitterness Units), which indicate the concentration of isomerized alpha acid—the compound that makes hops taste bitter. Most beer judges agree that even with an experienced palate, most human beings can’t detect any differences above 60 IBUs. Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, one of the hoppiest beers of its time, clocks in at 37 IBUs. Some of today's India pale ales, like Lagunitas’ Hop Stoopid, measure around 100 IBUs. Russian River’s Pliny the Younger, one of the most sought-after beers in the world, has three times as many hops as the brewery’s standard IPA; the hops are added on eight separate occasions during the brewing process.

Craft brewers’ obsession with hops has overshadowed so many other wonderful aspects of beer. So here’s my plea to my fellow craft beer enthusiasts: Give it a rest.

 Hear here.

It's not just me - Part 1

“Star Trek Into Darkness”: Who made J.J. Abrams the sci-fi god? - Salon.com

Readers will know I don't care for the directorial work of JJ Abrams, so it's good to read a review by a critic who seems pretty lukewarm on him too.   (He's enjoyed him more than me, though. I think.)

I'm also lukewarm on the new version of Star Trek, and was bored with Abram's first effort. 

This new movie has good reviews, but after reading Andrew O'Hehir's, I don't think I'll bother seeing it.

O'Hehir's review is pretty witty, if you ask me.  It ends on this note, for example:

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with “Star Trek Into Darkness” – once you understand it as a generic comic-book-style summer flick faintly inspired by some half-forgotten boomer culture thing. (Here’s something to appreciate about Abrams: This is a classic PG-13 picture, with little or no sex or swearing, but one that never condescends.) That’s the way almost everyone will experience it, and fair enough. Still, if you feel like bitching about it, come on over. We’ll crack a couple of watery brews and complain (in Klingon) about Uhura’s ill-fitting romance with Spock, or Chris Pine’s frat-boy weightlifter Kirk, who completely lacks the air of provincial, semi-educated suavity that made William Shatner the greatest bad actor in TV history. Or the fact that those in charge of the “Star Trek” universe could have entrusted its rebirth to someone who actually liked it.

Tank love

Sensory deprivation, flotation tanks: I floated naked in a pitch black tank, and you should too. - Slate Magazine

Well, I didn't know that floatation tanks were making a bit of a come back.

This article explains their history, and re-arrival, and tries to describe what the experience is like.

I wouldn't mind trying it myself, actually.

Coolest holiday home, ever?

Found in Dezeen, a remarkable looking holiday home in upstate New York:

From another angle:

 

It reminds me a bit of the sky apartment in Oblivion; especially in the oh-so-white interior:

Yes, sure, it looks fantastic.  But you would have to like stairs.

Unwise tax cuts, unwise spending cuts

BUDGET 2013: Who framed the budget bloopers? | Business Spectator

Here's a good summary of the Australia Institute work which pins current budget deficits on tax cuts which Costello invented and Labor implemented:
 

In a pre-budget briefing paper, Australia Institute senior economist Matt Grudnoff said: “The impact of the Howard/Costello income tax cuts on the federal budget has been huge. They were delivered at a time of strong economic growth, ignoring what would happen when that growth slowed.

“Costello chose to take the windfall generated by the mining boom to fund large and permanent cuts to income tax. What he didn’t say at the time was that he was funding a structural change to the budget with a cyclical boom. This was simply unsustainable.”

This is not a new story. However, Grudnoff has used the same economic modelling tool used by many government forecasters, NATSEM, to work out how many more billions would have flowed into government coffers had Swan and Rudd just said ‘No’ to the Costello cutting program.

Grudnoff found that not only would the budget likely be into the black by now, but that the cuts disproportionately benefited higher socio-economic groups. He found that “income tax cuts between 2005-06 and 2011-12 have taken a massive $169 billion out of the federal budget, meaning the deficit announced by Prime Minister Gillard might not have eventuated”.

He adds: “Had the tax cuts not taken place, the 2011-12 budget would have been $38 billion better off. Instead, the top 10 per cent of income earners gained $16 billion. This was more than the total benefit to the bottom 80 per cent of income earners.”

You might have expected, therefore, that a Labor government would have done its sums, worked out that the cuts didn’t further the cause of ‘fairness’, and stopped the madness of rolling tax cuts that were funded by an unexpected mining-revenue windfall at the start, and during the GFC, funded by issuing billions of dollars worth of government bonds.
But they didn’t.

Sounds pretty convincing, but the political problem for Labor is that it is hard for them to admit that they made a bad call by promising to deliver the Costello tax cuts.  

What I can do, on the other hand, is ridicule those who argue that lower taxes always works for the good. 

And back to the matter of the effect of further cutting as promised by a future Abbott government:

But Swan bashing aside, there is a more sinister aspect to the chart above, given that it’s likely to be Treasurer Hockey giving next year’s budget speech.

Think for a minute what would have happened to the economy, and tax receipts, if Rudd and Swan had tried to balance the budget not by ending the Costello tax-cut program, but by cutting spending.

Had they been cutting spending to the bone from 2008 to the present, the mistakes of the European austerity programs would have been repeated here, albeit in milder form. That is, by cutting into a downturn, many more businesses would have collapsed, GDP growth would have slowed or gone backwards, and tax receipts would have plunged lower still.

But that is exactly what Tony Abbott and Joe Hockey have planned for next year. Their hope is that business, buoyed by the scrapping of the carbon and mining taxes, red tape reductions and less regulation, will create a new surge of economic activity that will start to refill the coffers.

It’s not impossible, and we’re certainly not in Europe’s dire predicament. But it does seem like a gamble as big as some of the punts Swan and Rudd took during the GFC and which, thankfully, mostly worked out.

The federal budget may be $19.4 billion in the red for 2012/13, but the economy is still growing, unemployment, inflation and interest rates are low. That may be a scenario we look back on with some nostalgia if the Abbott/Hockey punt doesn’t work out.

About that reduced revenue

From the 22 minute mark, I think there is a very decent discussion about Treasury's way optimistic (and wrong) budget forecast for revenue for this year.  (Down $17 million or so, which is very close to the year's budget deficit of $19 million.)



Andrew Leigh does the talking for Labor.  He always impresses as a smart and decent politician economist.   What's peculiar is that, even though the way Sinclair Davidson spins Labor's economic management must drive Leigh berserk, Davidson does always speak up for Leigh as being a "good guy".   Odd.

Tony Abbott: a weak leader with poor judgement

So, Tony Abbott is now vacillating on support for the "recognition of local government" referendum to be held at the next election:

On Monday, Mr Abbott said that while he supported the idea of allowing the federal government to directly fund local councils, he thought the government was rushing the referendum at the last minute. Mr Abbott added that the government should not be ''muddying the waters'' of the election with another vote.

''(The election) ought to be a referendum on Julia Gillard and the carbon tax rather than a referendum on local government,'' he said.

Why doesn't he just say "I'm more interesting in playing politics than seeing something useful gets done"?

His wavering comes after strong complaint from the old guard that he shouldn't support it:

This week former Liberal heavyweights Nick Minchin and Peter Reith spoke out against the idea. It is up to the Federal Government to propose the referendum but in-principle support from the Coalition makes it more likely that will happen.

and the "new guard" of dimwits as led by Andrew Bolt,  and his best friends forever in the IPA, and shared by such shining luminaries as Cory Bernardi. 

Sure, this issue has been raised before by Labor and failed, but this time there is solid, practical, court decision based reasons as to why the constitutional amendment is warranted.

Some in the Coalition (Barnaby Joyce, of all people!) recognize this, but more are interested in re-hashing the idea of it being about ideology and Labor power grabs. 

The IPA and their friends in the large, stupid, ideologically driven climate change skeptic faction of the Coalition (which, apart from Joyce, seem to compromise the bulk of the opposition to the referendum) should explain to me - in the current budgetary and economic conditions, what Labor Federal government is going to be interested in directly funding a huge amount of local government responsibilities just so they say "ha ha, we're in control"?

But back to Tony:  his new, barbed wire fence straddling attitude on this is just like his "it depends who I'm talking to"  approach to climate change.   His vacillation on an ETS, and final decision to take an opportunistic stand against it at the beck and call of Right wing talk back radio and Andrew Bolt is how he got the leadership.

The only policy which he has ever owned totally is one which virtually no one, except a hand full of feminist commentators, thinks makes economic sense (his overly generous parental leave plan.)

In short, the policies on which he chooses to dig his heals in are weak and ill founded; on those things which are practical and worthy he's still sniffing the wind as to what he should do.    (Another vacillation - the NBN lite plan.)

He is a crook leader who does not deserve to win government. 

Speaking of Parkinson's

Brain damage 'crisis' looms from illicit drug use - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Researchers in Adelaide are investigating links between stimulant use and an increased risk of people developing Parkinson's disease.

They said many drug users were developing a brain abnormality which also was seen in people afflicted with Parkinson's.

"People who have used illegal stimulants in the past have a change in a brain region that's right in the middle of their brain called the susbtantia nigra," explained Dr Gabrielle Todd, a senior researcher at the University of South Australia.

A recent German study found otherwise-healthy people with that abnormality were 17 times more likely than others to develop Parkinson's.

"When we looked at the brain stems of fairly young people, all less than 45 years old, they had the same changes that we saw in people with Parkinson's disease," Flinders Medical Centre neurologist Dr Rob Wilcox said.

It does look watchable

The Michael J. Fox Show trailer: watch the actor return to TV. (VIDEO)

I guess I was not the only person to doubt that it was wise of Mr Fox to head back to regular TV:  the person writing at Slate seems as surprised as me that the trailer for his new show looks so smart and witty.

People who don't find something appealling about Fox need therapy.  Sorry, that's the only sound thing to be found in the new DSM.

The free market of (rodent) death

Of mice and markets | Ars Technica

This study which was reported last week was not well reported in some places, but I think this explanation at the link does it pretty well.  The opening paragraphs:

How do ethics and the free market interact? As the authors of a new paper on the topic point out, the answer is often complicated. In the past, Western economies had vigorous markets for things we now consider entirely unethical, like slaves and Papal forgiveness for sins. Ending those practices took long and bloody struggles. But was this because the market simply reflects the ethics of the day, or does engaging in a market alter people's perception of what's ethical?

To find out, the authors of the paper set up a market for an item that is ethically controversial: the lives of lab animals. They found that, for most people, keeping a mouse alive, even at someone else's cost, is only worth a limited amount of money. But that amount goes down dramatically once market-based buying and selling is involved.

 The article then goes into detail as to how the experiment worked.  It's pretty fascinating.

Fortunately, while the study could be used by to attack markets and capitalism, the authors do recognize something important:

....they're well aware that other forms of resource distribution have fostered some fantastically unethical behavior. Or, as they put it in more academic terms, "Other organizational forms of allocation and price determination such as in totalitarian systems or command societies do not generically place higher value on moral outcomes."

Still, it probably does have something useful to think about in terms of markets and ethics.

 

George in Space

This teaser trailer for a movie featuring George Clooney and Sandra Bullock (?!) in what appears to be an attempt to do a very accurate kind of near future science fiction, looks very impressive: