Economist's View
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Stabilities and Instabilities in the Macroeconomy
More on whats wrong with modern macro, this time from Axel Leijonhufvud: Stabilities and instabilities in the macroeconomy, by Axel Leijonhufvud, Vox EU: Fifty-some years ago, students were taught that the private sector had no tendency to gravitate to full employment, that it was prone to undesi …
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links for 2009-11-20
Interest rates: the phantom menace - Paul Krugman A big Fed mess - Free exchange Relief for States and Families Boosts Employment - CBPP Stabilities and instabilities in the macroeconomy - voxeu.org Do elections in developing countries improve economic policy? - voxeu.org T …
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Fed Watch: The Fed in a Corner
Tim Duy: The Fed in a Corner, by Tim Duy: Over the years, I have warned a seemingly countless number of undergraduates that Feds hold on monetary independence was tenuous at best. Independence is not guaranteed by the Constitution. Congress made the Fed, and Congress can unmake the Fed. The Fed …
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What Causes Employment to Lag Output in Recoveries?
At MarketWatch, I attempt to explain why employment lags output in recoveries, and why the lag has been increased after 1990:What Causes Employment to Lag Output in Recoveries?I give three reasons, and use one of them to explain the increasing lag.
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What’s Wrong With the Dodd Proposal to Restructure the Fed
At MoneyWatch: What’s Wrong With the Dodd Proposal to Restructure the Fed, by Mark Thoma: A proposal from Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd changes the selection process for key positions within the Federal Reserve system. Unfortunately, this proposal makes the selection process …
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The Dodd Proposal to Restructure the Federal Reserve System Concentrates Power and Politicizes Dist …
At MoneyWatch: The Dodd Proposal to Restructure the Federal Reserve System Concentrates Power and Politicizes District Bank Governance, by Mark Thoma: A proposal from Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd changes the selection process for key positions within the Federal Reserve syst …
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Paul Krugman: The Big Squander
The economy needs more help from the government, but its unlikely to get it: The Big Squander, by Paul Krugman, Commentary, NYTimes: Earlier this week, the inspector general for the Troubled Asset Relief Program ... released his report on the 2008 rescue of the American International Group... Th …
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"Threatening the Fed's Independence"
I agree with this: Threatening the Feds independence, by By Alan S. Blinder, Commentary, Washington Post: The Federal Reserves performance in this ... crisis deserves separate grades. For the early crisis period, from the summer of 2007 until a few weeks after the Lehman Brothers failure in mid …
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links for 2009-11-19
China, the Renminbi, and Global Imbalances: A Quantitative View - Econbrowser Bills offer clear path to better health care - Peter Orszag U.S. Mortgage Delinquencies Reach a …
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What Happened to the Public Option
Robert Reich refuses to give up on the public option: Harry Reid, and What Happened to the Public Option, by Robert Reich: First there was Medicare for all 300 million of us. But that was a non-starter because private insurers and Big Pharma wouldnt hear of it, and Republicans and "centris …
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"Transgressing Planetary Boundaries"
Jeff Sachs says that if world population doesnt stabilize relatively soon, were headed for trouble: Transgressing Planetary Boundaries, by Jeff Sachs, Scientific American: We are eating ourselves out of house and home. ... The green revolution that made grain production soar gave humanity some …
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Top-Down versus Bottom-Up Macroeconomics
When Paul DeGrauwe presented this paper at the Whats Wrong with Modern Macroeconomics conference (papers here), his argument that rational expectations models are the intellectual heirs of central planning seemed to ruffle a few feathers: Top-down versus bottom-up macroeconomics, by Paul De Gra …
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links for 2009-11-18
At Failed Banks, Post-Mortems Disclose Excessive, Yet Obvious, Risk - NYT How credit conditions will shape the economic recovery - voxeu.org Dollar Diplomacy Flip-Flop is a Threat to Free Trade - CFR Explaining Time, the Universe, and All That - Discover Fiscal Expans …
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Obama's Wrong-Headed Thinking on the Deficit
Edward Harrison catches this quote from Obama: The president is in Beijing as part of his tour through several Asian countries to address economic challenges. He spoke candidly about the precarious balancing act his administration is trying to perform. He wants to spend money to kick-start the …
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"Obama's Vietnam Syndrome"?
Simple question. If George Bush was president instead of Barack Obama, would the discussion and criticism of the war in Afghanistan be different? Why has there been so little attention to this issue? This has been bugging me for quite awhile, people are dying everyday - many of them are innocent b …
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Housing Starts Fall
I just posted this at MoneyWatch: Housing starts fell unexpectedly last month. The Census report gives the details: Privately-owned housing starts in October were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 529,000. This is 10.6 percent (±8.7%) below the revised September estimate of 592,000 and is 30. …
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links for 2009-11-17
A Case in Antiquities for ‘Finders Keepers’ - NYTimes.com Obamas Economic Policies are Working Effectively (debate) - intelligencesquaredus.org Promise in a ‘Cash for Caulker …
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"The Very Best Short Summary of Adam Smith's Life and Work"
Adam Smith, the "Newton of political economy," may not be quite the "advocate of ‘market forces’, the enemy of government regulation, and believer in something called the ‘invisible hand" that youve been led to believe: The Very Best Short Summary of Adam Smiths Life and Work …
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"China and the American Jobs Machine"
Robert Reich says China wont be abandoning its currency policy anytime soon: China and the American Jobs Machine, by Robert Reich, Commentary, WSJ: President Barack Obama says he wants to "rebalance" the economic relationship between China and the U.S. as part of his plan to restart t …
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The Fed “Refused to Use its Considerable Leverage”
A report on the NY Feds role in the AIG bailout is less than flattering: Audit Faults New York Fed in A.I.G. Bailout, by Mary Williams Walsh, NY Times: The Federal Reserve Bank of New York gave up much of its power in high-pressure negotiations with the American International Group’s trading par …
Economist's View
