The labour party is seemingly about to appoint a leader, Jeremy Corbyn, who almost everyone considers unelectable as prime minister. The apparent 'problem' with Mr Corbyn is that he is too left wing. But, according to simple political choice theory this should be an asset rather than a problem. So, where is the catch? Let us look first at the basic theory. To win an election a candidate (or party) needs majority support. Now, we all know that wealth is highly asymmetrically distributed - the top 1% own most of our wealth, the top 10% own even more, and so on. The flip side of this asymmetry is that the poorest 50% are a relatively homogeneous bunch that should, in principle, easily be able to gang up on the rich. To be a more specific, they could vote for redistribution of wealth from the rich to the poor and the rich would be powerless to do anything about it. In some countries the theory seems to work pretty well. Both Vladimir Puti...
Some random thoughts on game theory, behavioural economics, and human behaviour