Top 10 articles that I enjoyed reading in 2016

Robert Skidelsky’s Economists versus economy - it highlights the limitations of relying too much on mathematics in economic analysis, and suggests that economists should also care about history, political science, psychology and sociology when analyzing economic events.

Vivek Wadhwa’s Love of learning is the key to success in the jobless future – it says skills that one possesses will become obsolete sooner than one realizes so continuous learning is the key to survive in the fast changing job market.

Ian Bremer’s ‘The era of American global leadership is over. Here’s what comes next’ – it nicely discusses implications of American withdrawal of global leadership after the election of Donald Trump as the next US President with one of key implications being increased global uncertainty.

Mohamed A. El-Erian’s The international barriers to Trump’s economic plan – this article lucidly details what could derail Trump’s economic plan (which is primarily derived from Reaganomics) and relies on infrastructure investment, tax reform and deregulation to push growth and create jobs.

Mihir Sharma’s India can't be smug about Trump and should be beware of rising Trumpism – it says the major reason for manufacturing job losses in the US is technological change and not immigration or China and free trade as Donald Trump & Co is claiming. And there are lessons in it for India (and China as well) which may have to face backlashes against internal migration triggered by job losses or lack of enough jobs for 1 million youths who’re joining the country’s workforce every month.

The Economist’s Gain and Pain - this is a real nice article that highlights the unpleasant side effects of Trump’s plan to cut corporate tax to 15- 20%. Another piece that I enjoyed reading is Paul Krugman’s How Donald Trump’s protectionism can disrupt global value chains and with it the fortunes of the US companies.

Liz Ryan’s No - I won't rank my employees against one another - this post makes a strong case about why stack ranking for measuring and comparing the performance of the employees is a bad idea.

Ajay Srivastava’s Good time for small exporters – it says that express couriers and e-commerce companies have made it easier for small exporters - craftsmen & women, and SMEs to export, and details what the Indian government could do to push small value exports.

Subhash Chandra’s why people hate Narendra Modi – though it’s a long post, but it’s an interesting analysis and well summarized by the author: “We tend to like people who match our values and generally tend to dislike people who appear not to share our values. Politicians who do their best to match with our values tend to win more of our support and votes versus politicians who do not. The smartest politicians are the ones who figure out which value/values will deliver the most votes at any point in time”. That may explain the success of Modi – so many people hate him to the core but there are many who love him.

Prerna Sharma’s what’s wrong with India’s sugar trade policy – this article gives a holistic picture of what’s wrong with India’s sugar trade policy and how to deal with them in a non-market distorting way. It’s very easy to read as well.

This is what I could remember. I would love to hear which articles and posts you liked reading as 2016 is about to end. Wishing you all my friends: Happy New Year 2017.

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Some articles that I forgot are here:

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