Friday Afternoon Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Dan Gardner suggests that we may be better off planning to reduce the damage from most risky elements of our current economy instead of having to convene a new Committee to Save the World every decade:

(A)dmitting uncertainty and unpredictability does not mean we can do nothing. Building codes dramatically reduce the damage done by earthquakes, and insurance makes it possible to clear the rubble and re-build.

So, too, in economies, there is a role for regulation of the sort Flaherty envisions. But what about insurance?

Governments themselves can act as insurers. They did in 2008. But of course that was something of a fiction. The money governments spent to save the financial system was borrowed. Ordinary people and their children will be paying it off for decades.

That’s not fair. Or wise. The wizards of the financial system got rich taking on the risks that ultimately blew up in 2008. By not making them pay for the cleanup, governments gave them a powerful incentive to do the same again. Or worse.

The alternative is to require the financial system to pay insurance premiums: A tiny tax on financial transactions would allow governments to create substantial reserve funds which could be used in the event of financial meltdowns.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy continues to push a variant of this idea. Flaherty and others are adamantly opposed.

The better solution, Flaherty says, is a Committee To Save The World.

They’ll get it all figured out. Sure they will.

- Memo to Scott Simms: No, it isn't worth disassociating yourself with one of the most important opposition lines of clash against the Harper government for the sake of a "gotcha" moment.

- In contrast, it's great to see NDP MP Don Davies' pushback on the Cons' plan to push pardons out of the reach of the people likely to need them most.

- Finally, I know I feel reassured now that the same political communications staffers who have restricted any public comment by Canada's top scientists are declaring that there's nothing to be concerned about.