{
  "title": "Economics Authors Confront Toughest Questions on Data, History, and Theory",
  "publication": "IMF Blog, August 21, 2024",
  "sourceUrl": "https://www.imf.org/en/blogs/articles/2024/08/21/economics-authors-confront-toughest-questions-on-data-history-and-theory",
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  "summary": "New books offer fresh perspectives on climate, China, and John Maynard Keynes",
  "sections": [
    {
      "heading": "Overview",
      "content": "- Publication: The Editors, August 21, 2024.\n- Theme: Recent books highlighted in IMF’s quarterly magazine, Finance & Development, offer fresh perspectives on climate, China, John Maynard Keynes, civil society’s role in tax policy, gender and economic equality, and rethinking growth.\n- Framing: Beyond benchmark measures like employment, growth, and inflation, economics “encompasses the full spectrum of humanity” and is presented as a tool to improve people’s lives. Central bankers and interest-rate setters are noted as particularly attuned to the high stakes of economic policy."
    },
    {
      "heading": "China and global trade",
      "content": "- Book: Made in China: When US-China Interests Converged to Transform Global Trade by Elizabeth O’Brien Ingleson.\n- Key points:\n  - Traces cultural, diplomatic, and economic factors that shaped China’s 1970s transformation and its relationship with the United States.\n  - Explores why China converged with US capitalism and why American capitalists incorporated China into their vision of the future."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Climate and human welfare",
      "content": "- Book: Slow Burn: The Hidden Costs of a Warming World by R. Jisung Park.\n- Findings:\n  - Documents how climate change affects human welfare and the global economy.\n  - Links higher temperatures to outcomes in standardized testing, professional tennis, manufacturing, and crime rates.\n  - Argues that “Hotter temperatures … may already be affecting companies’ bottom lines,” and that climate change can “significantly alter the economic playing field.”"
    },
    {
      "heading": "Civic actors and tax policy",
      "content": "- Book: A Taxing Journey: How Civic Actors Influence Tax Policy by Paolo de Renzio.\n- Findings:\n  - Shows how nongovernmental and civil society organizations influence tax reforms through case studies across countries at various stages of development.\n  - Presents real-world examples, including:\n    - Former public officials in Guatemala holding an opaque and ineffective tax administration to account.\n    - A campaign for higher taxes on alcohol and tobacco in the Philippines.\n  - Situates the book within a broader rethinking about tax policy."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Gender, wealth, and social influence",
      "content": "- Book: Women Money Power: The Rise and Fall of Economic Equality by Josie Cox.\n- Findings:\n  - Weaves stories and statistics in an exploration of gender, wealth, and social influence.\n  - Highlights longstanding structural and cultural barriers that hinder women’s economic advancement."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Rethinking economic growth",
      "content": "- Book: Growth: A History and a Reckoning by Daniel Susskind.\n- Argument:\n  - Persuades readers that economic policy should broaden its focus from aiming primarily to boost economic growth to also considering the costs of such growth.\n  - Positioned as part of a growing literature calling for policy attention beyond income."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Keynes and historical impact",
      "content": "- Book: Keynes’s Economic Consequences of the Peace after 100 Years: Polemics and Policy (edited by Patricia Clavin, Giancarlo Corsetti, Maurice Obstfeld, and Adam Tooze).\n- Findings:\n  - Reexamines The Economic Consequences of the Peace by John Maynard Keynes, a volume noted for its lasting influence a century after publication.\n  - Considers the 1919 book’s presaging of the wider and bloodier conflict that would engulf Europe two decades later."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Publication note",
      "content": "- Readers are invited to subscribe to Finance & Development for “agenda-setting explorations of economic and financial issues.”\n\nSource: IMF blog post — Economics Authors Confront Toughest Questions on Data, History, and Theory, The Editors, August 21, 2024.\n\n---\n\n\n References\n\n- Finance & Development\n- Made in China: When US-China Interests Converged to Transform Global Trade\n- Slow Burn: The Hidden Costs of a Warming World\n- A Taxing Journey: How Civic Actors Influence Tax Policy\n- Women Money Power: The Rise and Fall of Economic Equality\n- Growth: A History and a Reckoning\n- Keynes’s Economic Consequences of the Peace after 100 Years: Polemics and Policy\n\nSource: https://www.imf.org/en/blogs/articles/2024/08/21/economics-authors-confront-toughest-questions-on-data-history-and-theory"
    }
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    "Authors: The Editors",
    "Published: August 21, 2024",
    "Publication: The Editors, August 21, 2024.",
    "Theme: Recent books highlighted in IMF’s quarterly magazine, Finance & Development, offer fresh perspectives on climate, China, John Maynard Keynes, civil society’s role in tax policy, gender and economic equality, and rethinking growth.",
    "Framing: Beyond benchmark measures like employment, growth, and inflation, economics “encompasses the full spectrum of humanity” and is presented as a tool to improve people’s lives. Central bankers and interest-rate setters are noted as particularly attuned to the high stakes of economic policy.",
    "Book: Made in China: When US-China Interests Converged to Transform Global Trade by Elizabeth O’Brien Ingleson.",
    "Key points:",
    "Book: Slow Burn: The Hidden Costs of a Warming World by R. Jisung Park.",
    "Findings:",
    "Book: A Taxing Journey: How Civic Actors Influence Tax Policy by Paolo de Renzio.",
    "Findings:",
    "Book: Women Money Power: The Rise and Fall of Economic Equality by Josie Cox.",
    "Findings:",
    "Book: Growth: A History and a Reckoning by Daniel Susskind.",
    "Argument:",
    "Book: Keynes’s Economic Consequences of the Peace after 100 Years: Polemics and Policy (edited by Patricia Clavin, Giancarlo Corsetti, Maurice Obstfeld, and Adam Tooze).",
    "Findings:",
    "Readers are invited to subscribe to Finance & Development for “agenda-setting explorations of economic and financial issues.”",
    "[Finance & Development](https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd)",
    "[Made in China: When US-China Interests Converged to Transform Global Trade](https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd/issues/2024/03/Book-review-trading-partners-Obrien-Ingleson-Van-Heuvelen)",
    "[Slow Burn: The Hidden Costs of a Warming World](https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd/issues/2024/03/Book-review-warmer-world-slower-growth-Simon-Black)",
    "[A Taxing Journey: How Civic Actors Influence Tax Policy](https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd/issues/2024/03/Book-review-tax-matters-Paolo-Mauro)",
    "[Women Money Power: The Rise and Fall of Economic Equality](https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd/issues/2024/06/Book-Reviews-Stepping-up-for-Equality-Lisa-Kolovich)",
    "[Growth: A History and a Reckoning](https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd/issues/2024/06/Book-Reviews-High-Quality-Growth-Vivek-Arora)",
    "[Keynes’s Economic Consequences of the Peace after 100 Years: Polemics and Policy](https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd/issues/2024/06/Book-Reviews-Lessons-from-Keynes-Douglas-A-Irwin)"
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