The agendas and roadmaps for the future of digital policy in Europe have been debated extensively. This column proposes a menu of different policy instruments for the new European Commission in order to achieve this transformation. These include reforming the framework of the e-commerce Directive, regulating super-dominant digital platforms, facilitating data intermediaries as counter-balancing actors, facilitating the rise of European platforms, and pushing blockchain.
Economic anxiety and insecurity are often cited as drivers of populism, so why has populism emerged over the past few years in rich countries and in good times? This column, part of the Vox debate on the topic, argues that income inequality plays a role. When the economy is strong, everyone fares well but the rich fare especially well, fuelling inequality and resentment. Populism in the form of anti-globalisation may reduce everyone’s consumption, but it affects the rich disproportionately and thus appeals to many voters in richer countries. In poorer countries, however, voters are less willing to give up consumption for equality.
Artists and music labels have always had to negotiate with the platforms that provide their content to listeners. This column examines the ways that digital platforms, and YouTube in particular, have reshaped the music industry and finds that they fulfill an important promotional function. Because everyone can upload content to YouTube – unlike, say, to MTV – the promotional effect of free music availability outweighs the substitution effect. For artists, this makes any exposure valuable – even user-generated YouTube content promotes sales of the underlying song.
Economists continue to disagree about whether international trade exacerbates or diminishes volatility. This column presents firm-level evidence from French exporters and their European trading partners over 15 years to show that firm-level volatility increases individual-level and aggregate-level volatility. High concentration among buyers as well as suppliers can amplify these shocks.
If properly designed, even a small fiscal capacity can maximise its stabilisation effect. The column studies the macroeconomic stabilisation provided by the federal budget in the US as an example for monetary unions. Corporate income tax, on the revenue side, and social security, on the spending side, are the two most effective items. The key is to collect revenues based on the income of the most mobile factor, and to provide support to the income of the least mobile factor.
Other Recent Columns:
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- Climate migration frightens... climate poverty is frightening!
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- Heterogeneous drivers of heterogeneous populism
- Comparative European institutions and the ‘Little Divergence’, 1385–1800
- The art of assessing public debt sustainability
- Financial integration and external adjustment
- Using history to understand hidden wealth in the UK
- Research on humanitarian social protection is not only possible, but desperately needed
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- Elite violence and elite numeracy in Europe from 500 to 1900 CE: A co-evolution
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- Post-disaster subsidies for small and medium firms
- Sluggish updating of information and consumer spending
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