Last week was the Tour of California, so you probably didn’t have much reading time. Luckily, I kept a short list of last weeks best reads for you:
Welcome, Robot Overlords – Want to guess who’s going to come out on top in the battle between Capital and Labor? You might want to put your money on Capital. Why? Robots. (Kevin Drum for Mother Jones)
Why Are Birthrates Falling All Over The World? – Education? A shift away from fundamentalism? Birth control? This author posits that it’s the result of the spread of cable TV, with all the enlightenment that entails. (Brad Plummer for the Washington Post)
What We Mean When We Say ‘Race Is A Social Construct’ – Do you (like me) think that race refers to natural differences in physical traits? Here’s a thought-provoking argument that no coherent, fixed definition of race actually exists. (Ta-Nehisi Coates for The Atlantic)
How The Case For Austerity Has Crumbled – A good overview of the roots of the recent austerity craze, and how the problems of pushing for austerity during poor economic times are even deeper than the recent spreadsheet errors by Harvard economists Reinhart and Rogoff. (Paul Krugman for the New York Review of Books)
Why Is Finance So Complex? – Mind blowing summary of what a bank really is, and why we must lie to each other and ourselves about the “safety” of a bank in order to pool our money and invest in large enough projects to create a society. (interfluidity.com)
Extras
Geoguessr – Best geography/browser game ever. Get dropped somewhere in Google street view and take a guess where in the world you are.
Coolest Bridge Ever? – The new Millau Viaduct in France pushes the envelope of both complexity of design and simplicity of look as it flies 885 feet in the air above the Tarn river valley.
