sirabhop's blog

Month: October 2025

  • Japan’s First Female Prime Minister

    Japan has made history on 21 October 2025, Sanae Takaichi was elected by the National Diet as the country’s first female prime minister. She succeeded Shigeru Ishiba. Observers view her ascent as a symbolic breakthrough in the Japan political landscape after a long domination by men. This milestone invites us to reflect on what research…

  • What 1980s Economists Can Teach Southeast Asia Today: Median Voters, Redistribution & Debt

    In 1981 Allan Meltzer and Scott Richard published a paper that has been taught in a political economics class at MIT. Their simple model starts with two observations. When the median voter decides the tax rate under majority rule, the size of government is struggling by the force between mean income and the median voter’s income. If…