by Joseph Joyce Global Stability, National Responsibilities The global financial crisis demonstrated clearly how the flow of money across borders could deepen and widen a financial crisis. A decline in U.S. housing prices led to a re-examination of the safety of financial securities based on them and an implosion in credit markets as financial institutions […]
by New Deal democrat The Phillips curve in the 21st century (or, The Phillips curve as a 3 dimensional foil) This is my third post about the possibility of the Fed raising rates as early as June. In the first post, I pointed out that both wage growth and inflation are at historic, half-century lows. […]
If the Fed raises interest rates and marginal companies are pushed into struggling for survival, is this a bad thing? Won’t we lose jobs? Won’t wages be hurt? Well, the question is… Are the healthier companies (those that can better survive a higher Fed rate) willing to make employees happier? Well, we now have a […]
The Flow of Funds report from the Federal Reserve came out today for the 4th quarter of 2014. Non-financial business debt grew quite fast. “Non-financial business debt rose at an annual rate of 7.2 percent in the fourth quarter, a somewhat larger increase than in the previous quarter. As in recent years, corporate bonds accounted […]
I am trying to think of issues on which there is a marked difference between the views typical of economists and those of non-economists. It is certainly true that non-economists (especially social scientists other than economists) think there are typical economists’ views. These views are held by a solid majority of professors at the University […]
The President of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, John Williams, gave a presentation on March 5th about the outlook for monetary policy. He basically is easing our understanding towards accepting the rationale for normalizing (raising) nominal interest rates. I personally am in agreement with what he says and how he says it. He […]
by New Deal democrat Dear Federal Reserve: *Now* is the time to raise interest rates? RLY?? SRSLY?!? I am at a complete loss as to why the Federal Reserve might think that now is the moment to begin raising interest rates. I cannot see a scintilla of hard evidence in support, and potent evidence against. […]
James Carville was certainly right: “It’s the economy, stupid.” And under Democrats (compared to Republicans), the economy kicks ass: This is GDP growth, but that kick-assness is blatant in any economic measure you look at, from job growth to stock-market returns to household income to government deficits. And it’s true over any lengthy period (say, 30+ years) […]
Guest post: by Nathan Salminen (Politics that work) Comparing performance between Republican and Democratic years The performance gap we see at the state level could still theoretically be the result of factors other than policy. It could be that the red states have simply drawn the short straws and happen to have inferior access to […]
by New Deal democrat (Bondaddblog) How wages in services vs. goods-producing jobs explain relative GDP growth during Recoveries (Hint: producing goods is better) This week I will put up several posts discussing the relative impact of goods-producing vs. service jobs in the economy, prompted by an article by Kevin L. Kliesen and Lowell R. Ricketts […]