My Econblogs feeds
Recent posts on Economists Blogs
Beat the Press
And, I Am Out of Here! — Thanks TAP — See You at CEPR –
Today is the last day that Beat the Press will be appearing on The American Prospect's website. You'll have to go to Beat the Press' new home page (or new RSS feed) from now on to read it. Thanks again to TAP for hosting BTP and exposing it to its well-informed and thoughtful readership over the past four years, as … [Link]
Which Country Got All the Royalties in February? –
That might have been a good question for reporters to address when they reported on the February trade data released yesterday. The data showed that royalties and licensing fees had increased by $883 million from January, a rise of more than 40 percent. This has occasionally happened in prior months and presumably reflects one-time payments to a producer or set … [Link]
People Are Losing Their Homes and Their Jobs, But They Are Really Mad About the Deficit –
That's effectively what the Washington Post told readers in another front page editorial highlighting the need for deficit reduction. The article said: "But by suggesting the deficit may have peaked, administration officials are taking a political gamble. If the favorable number does not hold up in coming months and the budget shortfall surpasses the $1.4 trillion recorded last year, voters … [Link]
Econbrowser
The "Ever-Expanding" Government Sector, Illustrated –
Just some numbers to bring reality into the general discussion: Figure 1: Employment in government (blue), in thousands, seasonally adjusted (blue), and excluding temporary Census workers (red). Total series is "USGOVT" from FREDII. NBER defined recession shsaded gray, assumes last recession ended 2009M06. Source: BLS, August employment situation release. Update 8:50am Pacific, Thu 9/9: Reader John Eckstein was kind enough … [Link]
The Budgetary Impact of EGTRRA/JGTRRA Extension and AMT Fixes –
…According to the CBO In evaluating the advisability of extending either completely or partially the tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 (aka EGTRRA and JGTRRA), and implementing additional fixes to the AMT, one should consider the impact on the budget. True fiscal hawks, for instance, should be interested in the gap between the CBO baseline (red) and the extending EGTRRA … [Link]
Budgetary Impact of EGTRRA/JGTRRA Extension and AMT Fixes –
…According to the CBO. In evaluating the advisability of extending either completely or partially the tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 (aka EGTRRA and JGTRRA), and implementing additional fixes to the AMT, one should consider the impact on the budget balance. True fiscal hawks (i.e., not the ones who want to hold up UE extensions in order to reduce expenditures … [Link]
Economists' Forum
Why Putin's rule threaten's Russia and the west –
By Martin Wolf At least he made the trains run on time. That was said of Benito Mussolini, Italy’s fascist dictator from 1922 to 1943. Much the same is now said of Vladimir Putin, Russia’s authoritarian president. He may have crushed the fragile shoots of democracy, but he has at least restored the economy, the state and his country’s place … [Link]
Why it is so hard to keep the financial sector caged –
By Martin Wolf When will the next financial crisis come? We do not know. Yet of one thing we can be sure: unless we learn from this crisis, another one will put the world economy back on to the rocks in the not too distant future. The FT has published a number of contributions on the lessons: Charles Goodhart of … [Link]
China may yet be the economy to lose sleep over –
By Kenneth Rogoff Given the highly vulnerable state of the US and European economies, what would happen to global growth if the Chinese juggernaut also started sputtering? Few investors or policymakers seem to be seriously contemplating this scenario. China’s remarkable resilience to both the 2001 global recession and the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis has convinced almost everyone that another year … [Link]
Eurointelligence RSS Feed
Germany and Spain to announce stress test results –
This is possibly looks like to become one of the most interesting turns in the European banking crisis. We are just not sure whether this will be a turn for better or worse. Yesterday the Spanish central bank anounced it would publish the results of the stress tests carried out by national regulators, thereby putting pressures on others, which have … [Link]
European Commission wants Spain to cut even more –
Considering that the latest financial crisis in Spain is triggered by uncertainty over the economic impact of the announced austerity programme, the European Commission now wants the Spanish government to do even more. On top of the €11bn cuts already announce, Brussels wants the Zapatero government to nail down another €8bn to achieve the total structural adjustment of 1.75% next … [Link]
The limits of the small-country mindset –
The European Union is a tyranny of small countries, and this has served it well. But the small-country syndrome is counterproductive when it comes to macroeconomics. I was struck last week by two remarks from Herman Van Rompuy, the president of the European Council. He defended the fast spreading austerity programmes on the grounds of the robust economic recovery. And … [Link]
macroblog
Optimism…pessimism…and a bit of perspective –
Here's how I'm tempted to summarize today's release of the August employment report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: more of the same. That theme fits nicely with comments this morning from Atlanta Fed President Dennis Lockhart, in a speech at East Tennessee State University. Here he calls for a little perspective: "Some commentators are reading recent economic data … [Link]
Just how curious is that Beveridge curve? –
A few weeks back I made note of the following: "Since the second quarter of last year, the unemployment rate has far exceeded the level that would be predicted by the average correlation between unemployment and job vacancies over the past decade." The focal point of that comment was the so-called Beveridge curve described by the Cleveland Fed's Murat Tasci … [Link]
What makes forecasting tough –
Bloomberg's Caroline Baum recounts her recent conversation with the Atlanta Fed's own Mike Bryan under the headline For Good Economic Forecasts, Try Flipping a Coin: "How do economists fare when it comes to real forecasting, to predicting [gross domestic product] GDP growth and inflation one year out? About as good as a coin toss, according to Bryan's research. Less than … [Link]
Multiplier Effect
New data JOLTS claim that extended benefits breed unemployment –
Last week, my colleague Tom Masterson commented on an op-ed piece by Robert Barro, which argued that much of the U.S. unemployment problem―perhaps 2.7 percentage points of the June unemployment rate of 9.5 percent―could be attributed to the availability of extended unemployment insurance benefits. According to Barro’s argument, huge numbers of people are out of work [...] [Link]
Less stimulating than it should be –
The Free Exchange blog calls President Obama’s proposed $50 billion infrastructure stimulus “A New Hope.” Our research begs to differ. We find that spending $50 billion on infrastructure would create little more than half a million new jobs. That’s not an inconsiderable number, but it’s a drop in the bucket compared to the 14.9 million [...] [Link]
Levy Senior Scholar L. Randall Wray explains the foresight of Hyman Minsky in this video. [Link]
Nouriel Roubini's Global EconoMonitor
The New Bubble in the Barbarous Relic that Is Gold –
In recent months gold prices have risen dramatically, first breaching the US$1000 barrier, then jumping another 20% in the past few weeks, surpassing US$1200 before correcting downward again to around US$1100. Some gold-bug bulls say the gold price could eclipse US$2000 in the next couple years. Is that possible? Is the recent rise of gold prices justified by fundamentals? An … [Link]
Check out all the great contributions that were published during the past week on RGE’s Nouriel Roubini's Global EconoMonitor, RGE Analyst’s EconoMonitor, Finance & Markets Monitor, Peterson Institute for International Economics Monitor, Global Macro EconoMonitor, U.S. EconoMonitor, Emerging Markets Monitor, Asia EconoMonitor, Latin America EconoMonitor and Europe EconoMonitor. On Nouriel Roubini's Global EconoMonitor, Kavitha Cherian and Rachel Ziemba discuss negotiating … [Link]
RGE Wednesday Note – The Economics of Copenhagen –
As global leaders begin meeting in Copenhagen to craft a new climate change deal, we take a look at what sort of deal might emerge, what different countries are bringing to the table and the likely economic costs of such a deal. This piece is excerpted from a longer piece, "The Economics of Copenhagen," available in full to RGE clients. … [Link]
Paul Krugman
Japan gets it, why don't we? [Link]
In The Long Run, Some Of Us Are Very, Very Confused –
Different horizons, always the same answer. [Link]
About that "blaze". [Link]
