Via Think Progress comes Alyssa Rosenberg’s comments on one lesson from the news of Chris Christie’s politics in NJ: What happened to people who were affected by the traffic closure was ridiculous. But a willingness to inflict ridiculous consequences on innocent people is actually a rather serious thing to do. People who want Chris Christie […]

As the Euler equation begins its descent into history, where will we go from here? Well, we must understand the social psychology impacting consumption. It is not always true that higher interest rates leads to less consumption and more saving. Just look at the financial repression in China, where higher returns to savings increase consumption. […]

Maggie Mahar at healthinsurance.org takes a look at stories easily fact checked in Anatomy of an Obamacare horror story For months, health reform’s opponents have been feasting on tales of Obamacare’s innocent victims – Americans who lost their insurance because it doesn’t comply with the ACA’s regulations, and now have to shell out more than […]

by Linda Beale Time to end redistribution upwards: minimum wage increases would boost economy and lift all boats. No matter how much the business lobby complains about the “business costs” of increasing the minimum wage, legislators should look past that self-serving ideology and look at reality.  Workers have contributed to increased productivity but received a […]

Noah Smith wrote a GREAT! post about how the data does not support the Euler equation. His post strikes at the heart of why economics and monetary policy is failing. Hopefully, we will see a revolution in thought about interest rates and monetary policy. The one sentence from his post that empowers the rebels is… […]

Labor’s share of national income sets a limit upon the utilization of labor and capital. That is the basic principle of effective demand. Domestic production periodically hits the effective demand limit. But are imports also constrained by the effective demand limit? Yes, they are, at least for the US. Let’s look at imports to exports. […]

House Speaker John Boehner told a closed meeting of his colleagues that a Republican pollster found that for the first time, most Americans blame President Barack Obama for the economic troubles, not George W. Bush. “Barack Obama came into office blaming George W. Bush for the state of the economy and the lack of job […]

by Robert Waldmann, lifted from Stochastic Thoughts Ross Douthat may be a “total tool” Ross Douthat is such a tool. He starts with a case of a liberal threatened with rape. He argues ” it may be that the culture war cuts both ways” That may be an insinuation which relies entirely on what may […]

Via an Economic Policy Newsflash (hat tip KH): On Tuesday, January 14, 2014 at 9:15 a.m. ET, Jason Furman (Chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers), Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) will join EPI President Lawrence Mishel to discuss the economic case for raising the federal minimum wage and their […]