November 5, 2014

While on vacation, I read a series of interesting tidbits about the U.S. and spying…the economic theory that claims that markets are pretty much always good…and other things that I dislike.

So here are the original articles:

1.  Twitter is suing the U.S. government. Very interesting. And even more interesting because it is published in the Nonprofit Quarterly. I love NPQ’s tagline: “Promoting and active and engaged democracy.” That is, after all, a primary purpose of the nonprofit sector worldwide. It seems that Twitter is really annoyed that the Department of Justice and the FBI don’t want Twitter to inform all of us about how much Twitter is required to turn over, etc. Remember that free speech thing?

2. Here’s another startling article: “The Trillion Dollar Fundraising Time Bomb,” from The Agitator. Roger Agitator comments on a Forbes article about student debt… And just imagine the impact on the economy and giving and fundraising and…

3. And this next article makes me very very very very happy: See the New York Times article (October 13, 2014; author, Binyamin Appelbaum) about the French economist who won the Nobel Prize in Economics…for his work on regulation. YES! Jean Tirole’s work actually questions the “widely held view in academia long associated with the University of Chicago economics department.” Tirole actually thinks that markets fail!!!!! And he has clarified “what sort of regulations…we want to put in place so large and mighty firms will act in society’s interest…”

By the way, apparently it is the “second consecutive year that the [Nobel] committee has honored an economist whose work essentially assumes that markets are often inefficient.” I’m so glad that some people are actually questioning the markets. I only wish that the U.S. Department of Justice had actually jailed some of the 2008 Wall Street people. Fines aren’t good enough for their ilk.

4. And how about a big dose of sexism…violence against women? I shouldn’t be amazed. But I’m continually angered. I wonder when it will stop – if it will ever stop. And what jerks those gaming corporations are.

About Simone Joyaux

A consultant specializing in fund development, strategic planning, and board development, Simone P. Joyaux works with all types and sizes of nonprofits, speaks at conferences worldwide, and teaches in the graduate program for philanthropy at Saint Mary’s University, MN. Her books, Keep Your Donors and Strategic Fund Development, are standards in the field.

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