Editors' Picks - 27 April 2014

This week in Editors’ Picks we examine a diverse set of issues and topics, including Australian university fees, the legalisation of drugs, Piketty’s Capital, prospects for Russian businesses, and Australia’s general good fortune socially and economically.

Uni fees: Let the free market rip to create an Aussie Harvard – Matthew Knott

Australia’s top universities are pushing for drastic changes to university funding, suggesting that market forces should be left to determine how much students pay for their degrees. It is suggested that this will allow Australian universities to compete on quality with the likes of Harvard and Stanford.

Australia has it pretty damn good – so why aren’t we cheering? – Greg Jericho

An OECD report recently found that Australia was above average across a number of social and economic indicators. With such good fortune both monetarily and socially, Greg Jericho claims that most of the world holds us in high regard and we have the right to be proud about it.

Assessing the costs and benefits of legalising cannabis – Marian Shanahan and Alison Ritter

In June 2012, Uruguay became the first nation to legalise the production and consumption of cannabis. Shanahan and Ritter weigh in on the heated issue of cannabis legalisation by firstly proposing a hypothetical legalisation policy, before the evaluating costs and benefits of such a scheme.

Piketty’s “Capital,” in a lot less than 696 pages – Justin Fox

Two weeks ago we selected a discussion on influential French economist Thomas Piketty’s work by Paul Krugman. This week, we feature Justin Fox’s lucid guide to the key elements of Piketty’s highly acclaimed book, Capital in the Twenty-First Century.

From bad to worse – The Economist

Diminishing economic growth in Russia has been exacerbated by the current standoff between the Kremlin and the West over Ukraine. The Economist examines the effects of increased sanctions on Russian businesses, with a bleak outlook.