Relevant and even prescient commentary on news, politics and the economy.

Why would anyone still talk about a Phillip’s Curve?

Which of these models would you trust to evaluate inflation? (quarterly data since 1957) Phillip’s curve… core inflation plotted against unemployment. (link) My model plotting core inflation against corporate profit rates minus a mix of short & long-term nominal rates… (link) Who in their right mind would still talk about the Phillip’s curve after seeing […]

Prediction about Future of Inflation

The Phillip’s curve is obsolete. Inflation does not reliably depend on employment. So what other model could we depend on? This one showing core inflation plotted against an aggregate corporate profit rate minus a mix of nominal rates. (FRED data link) Mixed nominal rate = 0.56*Fed rate + 0.44*10-year treasury Here we have quarterly data […]

Women New School Econ PhDs Hit The Big Time

Barkley Rosser notes at Econospeak: Women New School Econ PhDs Hit The Big Time Dr. Stephanie Bell Kelton served as the top economic adviser of Bernie Sanders.  She has apparently recently returned to her old position in the economics department at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. It has now been announced that Dr. Heather Boushey […]

While we watch political trash talk in the USA

Doug Higgins sent a note on China from  Nikkei Asian Review Doug adds “The size of the layoffs—as well as their nature—may be quite significant.  China has been economically stuttering—closing factories, slowing its export machine.  Of course, the U.S. trade deficit continues.  The Neoliberals and elites studiously ignore trade as a sign of anything important. […]

Velocities of M2 & MZM

I wrote a post about the velocity of M2 money supply. There were comments that the M2 money supply is a dying indicator. Well, let’s look… There are 3 indicators for the money supply, M1, M2 and MZM. M1 is the narrowest. MZM is the broadest. M2 is in the middle. “M1 is the money […]

Estimated Path of the Fed Rate

Using my model of core inflation, nominal rates, profit rates, labor share & capacity utilization, here is a graph of the present situation. The estimated natural real rate for this graph is 1.7%. The vertical dashed green line shows where capacity utilization is now at 75.2%. The solid red line shows the path of the […]

Trump claimed today that Clinton’s donors won’t let her reduce taxes for corporations and the wealthy. Wonder whether anyone else will notice that he said that.

Outside the factory setting [which Clinton toured today before she gave her economic-policy speech], a scattering of pro­-Trump protesters held “Hillary for Prison” signs and criticized Mrs. Clinton’s connections to Wall Street. And more than 1,000 miles away in Florida, Mr. Trump echoed that critique. “She doesn’t have the talent” to jump­start the economy, Mr. […]