All (somewhat***) via Mark Thoma: Thomas Frank in the WSJ tells me why I always disagree with Robert (and the Other Economists) on the role of rating agencies: And who…

Among their editorial suggestions for replacing Tim Geither as head of the New York FRB: Better choices would include …David Malpass, an economist who worked at the Reagan Treasury and…

Or does he know better? This year’s election coincided with an important moment in the financial crisis. The credit markets have stabilized in the last few weeks and even improved…

Ms. mochi-tsuki discovers that the Washington Post has no copyeditors and cannot do math. If this were another blog, I would be typing “Why, oh why, can’t we have a…

L’Shana Tovah, and let’s talk about something near and dear to Fox News’s heart: the evil Canadian press. CBC has apologized for an opinion piece: In the article, Mallick said…

by Ken Houghton I don’t believe David Leonhardt is an idiot, but that’s not based on the evidence at hand: There are really only two [questions]: What steps are most…

Ladies and gentlemen, Tyler (“So Right It Hurts“) Cowen presents the following, er, argument: Excessive bank regulation is another danger. To be sure, the regulatory structure for financial institutions failed…

Is there a sane purpose to this? As long as more homeowners default on mortgages, losses to financial institutions will mount. Those losses already exceed $400 billion, and some analysts…

…natural gas, other than the odd city bus or garbage truck in random municipalities? The answer is a simple but unpleasant one. See, we in the US would label the…

…considered almost risk-free because if the borrowers default, Fannie or Freddie will pay off the loans (assuming Fannie and Freddie remain solvent). Non-conforming loans go into pools known as private-label…