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

QE-II MMMCLXXVI

Another edition of my diatribe on QE-II. Here I reply to Noah in comments who discussed debt deflation and also explain my guess about what happened going beyond the evidence. Why does expected inflation matter (so that we should be pleased at an increase in nominal interest rates not matched by an equal increase in […]

Fahrenthold 538

I think this article “GOP freshmen get a tough lesson in politics” by David Fahrenthold in the Washington Post perfectly illustrates everything which is wrong with US political journalism. The theme of the article is explained as follows “the same hoarse-throat tactics that helped them bring down incumbents last year — attacks on a health-care […]

How to solve many problems

Post stimulated by Steve Benen. Content due to John Quiggin. This is arithmetic “Arithmetic tells us there are two ways to achieve the goal: the government can bring in more money and put out less.”This isn’t “a combination of cuts and tax increases were necessary when the deficit got really big” Revenue doesn’t come from […]