What I'm reading these days - 27 November - 6 December

Random articles I've found interesting over the last days or so, posted in each section from the oldest to the newest. Mostly for my own reminder, but if you feel like commenting, I'm always up for an interesting discussion in the comments! Stars indicate articles I found more interesting than the average.

Top Spot:
☆☆☆☆ The high risk of living on a low flood plain
☆☆☆☆ Moral Machines
☆☆☆☆ The problem with the return of manufacturing
☆☆☆☆ Childless couples have higher risk of dying prematurely but adopting may reduce chances of an early death


On the Euro Crisis:
Why the ESM rules OK (says the ECJ)
The Different Paths of Greece and Spain to High Unemployment
Draghi’s ready to get negative

France
French Socialist in Mittal Row: We're Just Doing What Obama Does

Greece
☆ Basic hygiene at risk in debt-stricken Greek hospitals
☆☆☆ You’re in selective default (again), S&P tells Greece
And the most corrupt EU state is…
A bail-out by any other name
How the official sector restructures, Greece edition
☆☆ So, who’s going to sell their Greek bonds?

Portugal
☆☆☆ Portugal follows Spain’s pain
Portugal debates future of welfare state
☆ Portugal GDP shrinks 3.5% Y-O-Y

Spain
☆☆☆ How Spain ended up with 25% unemployment rate
☆ On trying to read the coming Catalan coalition


On the US Economy:
☆☆ U.S. Debt Problems: Brewing for Decades
Unionizing the Bottom of the Pay Scale
☆☆☆ The Myth of American Meritocracy
☆☆ Escalating Delinquency Rates Make Student Loans Look Like the New Subprime
☆☆☆ Obama Signs Bill to Exempt US Airlines from EU Aviation Carbon Tax
Are Prediction Markets Against the Public Interest?
☆ Death of a Prediction Market
Real House Prices, Price-to-Rent Ratio


World Economy and Economics in general:
How cancelling central banks’ holdings of government debt could be a useful thing
☆☆ Satyajit Das: L’Age d’Or, Part 1 – “A Barbarous Relic”
Climate Change Strategies (Including Mangroves)
Cost of Pennies
☆☆ Death Star II nowhere, sadly

HFT
High-Frequency Trading and High Returns
High-Speed Traders Profit at Expense of Ordinary Investors, a Study Says

Argentina
The Debtor Prisoner’s Dilemma
Argentine jujutsu (and enter… Bank of New York)
Stayin’ alive, Argentina edition
All of this has happened before and will happen again, sovereign pari passu edition

Japan
Meanwhile, in Japan...
☆☆☆ Don’t kill the old! Just get them to adopt you


Politics:
☆☆ Sir Rex Hunt, Symbol of British Defiance in the Windswept Falklands, Dies at 86

China
China not a currency manipulator, everyone back to work
China and the Rightshoring Movement

Israel
☆☆☆ Hamas Won?

Italy
Will Mario Monti's government fall?

Mexico
Felipe Calderón’s Legacy in Mexico

USA
Can the States Sabotage Obamacare?
Ross Is Right on Demography


Miscellania:
When we can’t see the world for our phones
☆ The Sublime Sci-Fi Buildings That Communism Built
The impossibility of tablet-native journalism
The Daily’s Demise
☆☆ The 45 Most Powerful Images Of 2012
They're Galadriel you came!
☆☆☆ Killer Swarms
Chinese Architecture, Old and New