From “Dark Continent” to “Sun Continent”: a story of power

Africa: a continent full of colours and great potential, yet suffering from being poorly developed. One way to see it is to have a look on the state of the electricity market in Sub-Saharan Africa. While 87% of the world population have access to electricity in 2016, only 42% of Africans have this privilege, thus …

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The winners and losers of the French 2008 feebate policy

In 2008, the French government introduced a policy taxing cars with high carbon emissions and rebating low carbon emission cars, better known as a feebate policy or bonus-malus écologique. This type of policy is appealing for two reasons: first, because it provides incentives to purchase less polluting cars, and secondly, because it can be designed …

An interview with Daron Acemoglu on artificial intelligence, institutions, and the future of work

The recipient of the 2018 Jean-Jacques Laffont prize, Daron Acemoglu, is the Elizabeth and James Killian Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The Turkish-American economist has been extensively published for his research on political economy, development, and labour economics, and has won multiple awards for his two books, Economic Origins of Dictatorship …

The price of two percent inflation

Though it is still considered a rather unconventional form of monetary policy, quantitative easing (QE) has become a commonly used tool of central banks around the world. It involves the central bank purchasing government bonds and other financial assets from the market.  First used in Japan in the 2000s and later in the US in …

Is your internet service provider throttling you?

Net neutrality can be defined as the principle that an internet service provider (ISP) such as AT&T or Verizon treat all the legal data online equally regardless of its sender and receiver.  Thus, under net neutrality, ISPs are not able to slow down, block or charge an extra fee to consumers for certain content. It …