Economics Roundtable
Calculated Risk
Read the Bill McBride interview.
Jobs
The best summary of the state of our economy is the graph (below) of employment as a fraction of population for people over 16 years old. The decrease is large, but the most troubling feature of the graph is the flat trend .
Click on the image to get a bigger version.
June Payroll Employment
The slowndown in employment growth over the past few months is starting to become more apparent in the graph below.
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Focus on the Problem
U.S. payroll employment peaked at 132.5 million jobs in February 2001. For April 2012, U.S. payroll employment had reached 133.0 million jobs, marking the third month in a row above the February 2001 level.
Click on the image to get a bigger version.
Graph-of-the-Year Candidates
Donald Marron likes European interest rates. Click on the image to get a bigger version. Can you find three distinct subperiods?
Brad DeLong favors the U.S. gdp gap.
Finally, it's hard to argue against the payroll employment graph below (straight from FRED) and the comparison across recessions (courtesy of Calculated Risk).
Looking Up At 2001
In February 2001, U.S. payroll employment peaked at 132.5 million. The November 2011 figure of 131.7 million still falls 800,000 jobs short of the earlier peak.
Click on the chart for a larger version.
Remember M1?
Money Supply M1 growth is now over 20% per year over a 12 month lag. M1 growth has touched 20% before, but not with excess reserves of $1.6 trillion. Where is M1 headed?
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EconModel
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Institutional Economics (S. Kirchner)
Stephen Kirchner
The Future Fund’s creator, former Treasurer Peter Costello, does not have much faith in the ability of sovereign wealth funds to promote fiscal responsibility:
Now I put aside $60 billion in the Future Fund. People say “oh well you could have put aside 70 or $80 billion or something like ...
I have an op-ed in the Business Spectator arguing that foreign exchange market intervention is a risk to taxpayers who would be better served if the RBA matched its foreign currency assets and liabilities. I also debunk the notion that Australia is a victim of a ‘currency war’:
It has ...
In 2012, not so much. Monetary policy too tight.
I have taken over as the editor of Policy, journal of the Centre for Independent Studies. I am currently finalising the Autumn (southern hemisphere!) issue, but I am looking for contributions to the Winter issue with a deadline of 30 April.
Please keep Policy in mind as an outlet ...
The Centre for Independent Studies has released my Policy Monograph, Compulsory Super at 20: ‘Libertarian Paternalism’ Without the Libertarianism. Adam Creighton writes up the main points in today’s Australian.
I have an article in the latest Australian Economic Review, Foreign Direct Investment in Australia Following the Australia-US Free Trade Agreement. Here is the abstract:
A model of inward foreign direct investment for Australia is estimated. Foreign direct investment is found to be positively related to economic and productivity growth ...
I have an op-ed in today’s Australian making the obvious comparison between the Asian Century White Paper and the 1989 Garnaut report. As I note in the op-ed, Garnaut’s most significant recommendation, the abolition of protection by the beginning of the 21st century, remains unrealised.
If the Garnaut recommendations could ...
My interview with Jan Libich on all things fiscal policy. This is part of a great series of interviews with a wide range of economists that can be viewed on Jan’s Youtube channel.
An excellent op-ed by Doug Irwin on why US monetary policy is too tight:
The Divisia M3 and M4 figures for the US money supply, calculated by the Center for Financial Stability, show that the money supply is no higher today than in early 2008. For all the fretting about ...
‘Restructuring Prudential Bank Regulation in the Light of the GFC’ is the topic of this year’s free Warren Hogan Memorial Lecture to be given by Professor Charles W. Calomiris, Henry Kaufman Professor of Financial Institutions at Columbia Business School, a Professor at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, ...