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Mark Gilbert
For Mark Gilbert's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 31, 2021
Why financial firms can’t be climate change cops
Trying to force an industry that's designed to pursue profit to become the climate-change sheriff sounds a bit like foxes guarding henhouses.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 17, 2020
All aboard the billionaires’ Bitcoin bandwagon?
A surge of 1,000% in 2017 took Bitcoin's value to $19,000. A year later, it had dropped to less than $3,500.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 6, 2020
A currency war is the last thing the world needs
The Federal Reserve's recent shift to an even more dovish stance looks set to exacerbate the dollar's decline.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Tech / Commentary
Feb 5, 2020
Robots, including one by Sony, are coming for fund management jobs
Remember Aibo, the computerized dog Sony Corp. started selling in 1999 as the first personal robot? Hiro Mizuno, the chief investment officer of the Government Pension Investment Fund, does. So he asked Sony's computer science lab unit to build him a cyberhound using artificial intelligence to help oversee the external fund managers who manage GPIF's ¥175 trillion ($1.6 trillion) in assets.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 22, 2017
How space could trigger an economic crisis
The World Economic Forum's annual assessment of global risks, published this month, rates extreme weather events as the most likely risk to the world.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 25, 2016
With all else failing, give rate hikes a try
In most walks of life, if what you're doing isn't working, you should try something else. In central banking, however, the strategy has been to do more of what isn't working.
COMMENTARY / World
May 3, 2016
Trying to save the planet one light bulb at a time
The market, rather than government, is helping to address climate change.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 28, 2015
Emissions bombshell stretches far beyond VW
The revelation that Volkswagen cheated for years on emissions tests raises a mammoth question: Who else did the same?
COMMENTARY / World
May 18, 2015
Uber will spell the end of London's black cabs
While there are sentimental reasons to lament the demise of black cabs, Londoners should treat it as a sign of progress.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 24, 2015
Sea power can eclipse solar in green energy
The sea is constant, reliable — and scandalously underutilized as a resource for producing green energy.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 22, 2015
Three reasons why Merkel acts so stubborn
There are three possible explanations why German Chancellor Angela Merkel seems so relentlessly uncompromising in the standoff between Greece and its euro creditors.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 16, 2014
Scottish referendum asking the wrong question
By allowing the Sept. 18 referendum question to be framed as 'Should Scotland be an independent country?' the U.K. government may have unwittingly skewed the outcome in favor of a 'yes' vote.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 18, 2014
Why euthanasia should become a legal option
As people live longer and better medical technology traps our parents and grandparents in the limbo of not-quite-gone, quality of life will start to outweigh the number of years lived. Euthanasia should not be taboo.

Longform

Historically, kabuki was considered the entertainment of the merchant and peasant classes, a far cry from how it is regarded today.
For Japan's oldest kabuki theater, the show must go on