by Rebecca Wilder The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) is making tough decisions right now. Its mandate, “to promote effectively the goals of maximum employment, stable prices, and moderate long-term interest rates”, is a seriously tall order given current economic conditions. The unemployment rate sits at 9.7%, while prices have bounced back to 2.6% Y/Y […]

A conference on financial reform has just begun at 8:00 AM today 3/3 with some major names in the lineup. It is hosted by the Roosevelt Institute and will be webcast in full from 8:00 AM to 11:00 AM at www.makemarketsbemarkets.org by CNN. Bloomberg will cover the 9:30-11:00 AM segment live. Participants include George Soros, […]

by Tom aka “Rusty Rustbelt” Health Care Reform is Already Happening Ohio State University Medical Center has built an affiliated physician group of more than 600 physicians. Effective by January 1, 2011, the physicians will be merged into OSUMC (not as medical school faculty) and will be full employees of OSUMC. OSUMC will do all […]

by Linda BealeSpeculation and Finance: Good for you? (part III) In a couple of prior postings (Part 1 and Part 2), I considered (1) Darrell Duffie’s op-ed in the Wall St. Journal asserting that financial institution speculation in the markets is “good” for us and (2) the question of financial institution speculation in credit default […]

by Rebecca Wilder This is expansionary monetary policy… … this is expansionary monetary policy on drugs Note: Japan’s M1 growth is labeled on the RHS, with range -1.5% to 1.5%. Any questions? I know, kind of corny; and I did grapple over which set of economies should be labeled “on drugs”, the BIICs or the […]

by Linda Beale More on speculation: Banks, Credit Default Swaps, and Greece’s Debt (Part 2) Yesterday, I commented on Darrell Duffie’s defense of speculation in the Wall Street Journal, here. I noted that the idea that speculation is a positive because it absorbs risk others don’t want and helps reveal the “true price” by providing […]

by Linda Beale Bankers Bonuses and Bank Reforms: why they are needed, what they might include, and are you angry yet? A big title for a tiny little sketch of a post, I know. Not much time today folks, but if you can read only one blog posting, read the one at Naked Capitalism at […]

by cactus Yeah, I Felt the Big One: Memories of the Chilean Earthquake My father had something of a Forrest Gump college experience, being “there” at a couple of unfortunate historical events. One example – in 1960, he was studying Physics at the institute in Bariloche, a town in the Andes in Argentina. That’s about […]

The Bell has an op-ed worth reading. When Economic Stress Becomes Terrorism Poverty, Rather Than Anti-Anything Ideology, Is the Common Thread Joseph Stack is not a terrorist in the sense that we apply this word to operatives for al-Qaida and other groups and he certainly is not a Tea Party terrorist. The same is true […]