Here’s a list of articles that I have been reading today (organized by topic):

Catastrophes

• Nations Focus On Disaster Planning
  WSJ: “Two major earthquakes in Asia refocused attention on incomplete efforts to improve emergency planning after a tsunami killed more than 200,000 people in 2004.”

Economics

• Wonky Talk about Carbon Taxes, by Greg Mankiw
  My favorite econblogger provides a succinct explanation of the welfare economics of income taxes and carbon taxes.

Finance

• Obama Unveils Derivatives Plan
  WSJ: “The Obama administration detailed a sweeping plan to more closely oversee the giant market for derivatives.”
• Banking on a Rescue
  James Freeman’s review of Lawrence G. ­McDonald’s new book entitled “A Colossal Failure of Common Sense,” which portrays Lehman Brothers in crisis as it headed toward collapse last fall.

Health Care Reform

• Consumer Driven Health Care Plans, by Alex Tabarrok
  As the author notes, “It’s remarkable that in the current debate over how to control health care costs so little attention is being given to the important results of our 10-year experiment with consumer driven health plans.”

• The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare, by John Mackey
  John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, outlines “Eight things we can do to improve health care without adding to the deficit.”