Raised in modern-day East Egg, Nick has watched two boom-bust business cycles up close. After concentrating in physics and modern critical philosophy at Brown, he has begun studying the history of modern physics and political economy. Currently an Affiliated Scholar at the Pembroke Center studying the history of physics and political economy, he teaches economics at The Wheeler School, in Providence, RI, and works as a writing tutor at the Brown University Writing Center. In addition to reading and writing, Nick enjoys long distance backpacking, cooking, and arguing.Email: nickwerle [at] gmail.comWebsite: www.runningthezoo.com
by Nick Werle The most striking aspect of Isaac Asimov’s Foundation is the pacing of its narrative. The story, which tracks the fall of the Galactic Empire into what threatens to be a 30,000-year dark age, never tracks characters for more than a few chapters. The narrative unfolds at a historical pace, a timescale beyond…
by Nick Werle In the wake of Osama bin Laden’s killing on May 2, veterans of the Bush Administration have hit the airwaves in an effort to reserve for their policies a portion of the credit for the success of SEAL Team Six’s covert lethal mission in Abbottabad. Chief among the many Bush policies they…
by Nick Werle David Attenborough reserves a certain mournful tone for narrating death in the natural world. In the Jungles episode of BBC’s epic documentary series Planet Earth, we hear that voice, interspersed with the rich, crackling sound of splintering wood, as we see a massive rain forest tree collapse under its own weight after…
By Nick Werle The late economist Hyman Minsky wrote that after fortunes inflate on the back of a speculative bubble, and after investors’ irrational optimism and overvalued assets inevitably collapse, an economy enters a “period of revulsion,” when people remember that it’s risky to bet big on an uncertain future. Likewise, it’s always during the…
As the New Orleans Saints lined up to kick off the second half of Super Bowl XLIV, CBS Sports color commentator and former Super Bowl MVP Phil Simms was explaining why the Saints should have deferred getting the ball after winning the pregame coin toss. Simms suggested that the Saints, 4½-point underdogs to the Indianapolis…
People are worried about the Euro. As bad news flows out of Europe – persistent unemployment, popular discontent over painful austerity measures, and catastrophic bank losses tied to still-deflating real estate markets – international investors continue to cast doubt over the Euro-Zone’s short- and long-term stability. Fear of at least a partial disintegration of the…
Public sector austerity has come back to the West in a big way. Governments throughout the European Union are wrestling against striking civil servants, a stagnant private sector, and an entrenched public welfare system to drastically reduce spending. The budget cuts are broad, and they run deep. Under pressure from global financial markets and the…