Karthik Sankaran
@rajakorman.bsky.social
Bay Area US. Aging macro expat. Cheap lunch guy. 1st to ever rhyme Duce and Juche. Neoliberal peacenik. Has Herder immunity. Virulent vector of dad jokes. 1/3 each phlegm, spleen & dad humors.
Pinned
My colleague Dan Ford and I just completed a brief on a bigger DFC. We welcome its likely reauthorization and suggest how it can combine the pursuit of US interests with global development without taking on an overly securitized or exclusionary approach.
quincyinst.org/research/inv...
quincyinst.org/research/inv...
Reposted by Karthik Sankaran
Since Christmas is just around the corner, giving another nudge to this one because it's (genuinely) beautiful and a great gift
Anna’s new recipe book - Vegetable Genius - is out today and (even though I’m sure I’m biased) I think it looks amazing. Go check it out! amzn.eu/d/8LZKCFX
November 26, 2025 at 3:28 PM
Since Christmas is just around the corner, giving another nudge to this one because it's (genuinely) beautiful and a great gift
Reposted by Karthik Sankaran
Allow me to introduce you to my corpus of substacks yelling at Michael Pettis much the way Homer Simpson’s father yelled at clouds. open.substack.com/pub/sankaran...
Area Man Says "It Depends."
This is something I wrote for Most Favoured Nation, the substack of my friend, trade expert and all round good-guy, Sam Lowe.
open.substack.com
October 29, 2025 at 4:25 AM
Allow me to introduce you to my corpus of substacks yelling at Michael Pettis much the way Homer Simpson’s father yelled at clouds. open.substack.com/pub/sankaran...
Reposted by Karthik Sankaran
All that "post-neoliberalism" has accomplished so far is to make tradable sectors less efficient and more expensive, while doing nothing to curb the costs of non-tradable services. 🙃
November 26, 2025 at 3:22 PM
All that "post-neoliberalism" has accomplished so far is to make tradable sectors less efficient and more expensive, while doing nothing to curb the costs of non-tradable services. 🙃
Please stop blaming on trade the things (or putative things like the $140k number) that are pretty much entirely the fault of America’s terrible nontradeable sectors. www.wsj.com/opinion/trum...
November 26, 2025 at 3:15 PM
Please stop blaming on trade the things (or putative things like the $140k number) that are pretty much entirely the fault of America’s terrible nontradeable sectors. www.wsj.com/opinion/trum...
Reposted by Karthik Sankaran
Parties on zeppelins are a gas!
November 26, 2025 at 10:48 AM
The Nixon goes to China moment of domestic policy is a Republican president exercising the functional monopsony power of the American state in pharmaceutical pricing.
November 26, 2025 at 12:52 AM
The Nixon goes to China moment of domestic policy is a Republican president exercising the functional monopsony power of the American state in pharmaceutical pricing.
Reposted by Karthik Sankaran
In all fairness,
November 25, 2025 at 2:15 PM
In all fairness,
I wonder if the new Chair might be someone wholly on board with the Fed’s 3rd mandate of moderate long term interest rate, and if yes, would it be an instance of Hasset-Liability Matching.
November 25, 2025 at 6:04 PM
I wonder if the new Chair might be someone wholly on board with the Fed’s 3rd mandate of moderate long term interest rate, and if yes, would it be an instance of Hasset-Liability Matching.
I wonder if Germany’s transport minister tells them to stop complaining and dress the way they did on the Zeppelin.
November 25, 2025 at 3:51 AM
I wonder if Germany’s transport minister tells them to stop complaining and dress the way they did on the Zeppelin.
A world where the EU is objectively less threatened by Russia (a fear that IMO was somewhat overwrought as regards actual EU members) and subjectively much more annoyed at the US may not be a bad place for the EU fiscal/monetary/defense/institutional/geopolitical mix.
November 25, 2025 at 1:57 AM
A world where the EU is objectively less threatened by Russia (a fear that IMO was somewhat overwrought as regards actual EU members) and subjectively much more annoyed at the US may not be a bad place for the EU fiscal/monetary/defense/institutional/geopolitical mix.
Mnuchin as Cincinnatus would be plot twist.
RealClear journalist also says White House and cabinet officials bracing for massive personnel shakeup soon because of the economy
November 24, 2025 at 11:15 PM
Mnuchin as Cincinnatus would be plot twist.
A Man, No Plan, A Canal —Suez.
Declining hegemons often lash out in an attempt to shore up their remaining power in the world system (hello, Suez crisis) — a fact that “American exceptionalism” narratives make both likelier and hard to perceive.
November 24, 2025 at 7:05 PM
A Man, No Plan, A Canal —Suez.
What do you call a Mrs. RFK Jr.?
A Trofim Wife.
A Trofim Wife.
Over many interviews, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told Michael Scherer about how he plans to remake America’s public-health system. Can he lead the scientific establishment he’s spent much of his life crusading against?
Read more in our new cover story: theatln.tc/q9hXxlbM
Read more in our new cover story: theatln.tc/q9hXxlbM
November 24, 2025 at 5:13 PM
What do you call a Mrs. RFK Jr.?
A Trofim Wife.
A Trofim Wife.
Reposted by Karthik Sankaran
$32k/year is not unreasonable for two kids in full-time care (that's less than $10/hour per kid), but that's only for a few years. Once the kids are in school you only have to pay for afterschool and summers – which is still high, but not quite as expensive.
November 24, 2025 at 4:06 PM
$32k/year is not unreasonable for two kids in full-time care (that's less than $10/hour per kid), but that's only for a few years. Once the kids are in school you only have to pay for afterschool and summers – which is still high, but not quite as expensive.
About that cost of living piece—insofar as the single biggest cost item is childcare for a dual-income family at 32k annually (which may be too high but still), its a reminder of how things might have been different had Nixon not vetoed a national childcare bill in 1971 that passed the Senate 63-17.
November 24, 2025 at 3:55 PM
About that cost of living piece—insofar as the single biggest cost item is childcare for a dual-income family at 32k annually (which may be too high but still), its a reminder of how things might have been different had Nixon not vetoed a national childcare bill in 1971 that passed the Senate 63-17.
Starting soon!
Please join my colleague Sarang Shidore for his book talk with Dr. Aileen Teague at 11 am EST on November 24 on the US, Mexico, and the origins of the modern drug war.
quincyinst.org/events/polic...
quincyinst.org/events/polic...
Policing on Drugs: The United States, Mexico, and the Origins of the Modern Drug War, 1969-2000
A discussion of Aileen Teague's new book.
quincyinst.org
November 24, 2025 at 3:48 PM
Starting soon!
Reposted by Karthik Sankaran
It’s not going to find many adherents in the US, though there will certainly be some (more GOPs than Dems I suspect), but one way to think about a possible intersection of interests between US and RoW is framing a shared agenda to Make America Dispensable Again. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Carney Says World Can Move on Without The US, Stresses New Ties
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said the world can make progress on a range of issues without the US, and that consensus reached at a Group of 20 leaders’ meeting in Johannesburg this weekend carr...
www.bloomberg.com
November 23, 2025 at 10:22 PM
It’s not going to find many adherents in the US, though there will certainly be some (more GOPs than Dems I suspect), but one way to think about a possible intersection of interests between US and RoW is framing a shared agenda to Make America Dispensable Again. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
That’s a stile with substance!
Absolute unit of a stile
Now, that's how you build a stile.
November 23, 2025 at 9:51 PM
That’s a stile with substance!
This is a scary level of addictive.
November 23, 2025 at 9:19 PM
This is a scary level of addictive.
It’s as if a lab developed a living human hybrid of Eddie Haskell and Smithers….
November 23, 2025 at 5:34 PM
It’s as if a lab developed a living human hybrid of Eddie Haskell and Smithers….
I cant even remember why I did this almost 3 years ago, but here it is.
November 23, 2025 at 5:11 PM
I cant even remember why I did this almost 3 years ago, but here it is.
I have a new and (perhaps) improved scheme if people worrying about being left out want to go there. The picture on the left is from March 27, 2020 btw.
November 23, 2025 at 4:21 PM
I have a new and (perhaps) improved scheme if people worrying about being left out want to go there. The picture on the left is from March 27, 2020 btw.
Reposted by Karthik Sankaran
At our Munich Security Retreat in South Africa, Sophie Eisentraut presented & discussed her new Munich Security Brief "Going South?" on global public goods.
Read the full analysis here: securityconference.org/en/publicati...
Read the full analysis here: securityconference.org/en/publicati...
November 23, 2025 at 3:44 PM
At our Munich Security Retreat in South Africa, Sophie Eisentraut presented & discussed her new Munich Security Brief "Going South?" on global public goods.
Read the full analysis here: securityconference.org/en/publicati...
Read the full analysis here: securityconference.org/en/publicati...