Economics Roundtable

In a post last year, I argued that one reason economists have not successfully forecast recessions is that recession forecasts, or near-recession forecasts, prompt policymakers (usually the Fed) to act so as to prevent a recession. Only when the recession is unexpected (i.e. not forecast) will policymakers fail ...

I started this post last Monday and then got distracted. Looking at it now, I think the fragment is worth preserving.

I’ve spent the past week being pissed off at all the people who were pissed off about the so-called “bailout” of Bear Stearns. In the light of ...

This business with Eliot Spitzer is bringing up issues in labor economics for me. In particular, how should we refer to Ms. Dupré’s occupation? Some people insist that she was a “sex worker.”

I have a number of problems with this terminology. For one thing, is ...

In Paul Krugman’s latest column (hat tip: Mark Thoma), he compares the current financial crisis to the bank runs of 1930 and 1931:

The financial crisis currently under way is basically an updated version of the wave of bank runs that swept the nation three generations ago. People aren’t ...

Some people (Yves Smith and Tim Duy, to name two, but I’m sure there are many others that I haven’t gotten around to reading yet) are worried that concern about capital flight is going to have to be a constraint on the Fed’s ability to deal with this ...

[Hypothetical future investor]: I own a major stake in an investment bank, and I’m getting concerned about their risk management. Should I bring this up at the shareholders’ meeting?

[Hypothetical friend]: I don’t see why. What’s the worst that can happen? The bank will ...

In one of the latest blogospheric analyses of the Fed’s plans to accept private-label mortgage backed securities as collateral, James Hamilton concludes that the government is taking on a definite risk (specifically, although the Fed is the agent, it is really the Treasury’s risk, since the Fed’s profits are ...

Eliot Spitzer has always struck me as a pompous, self-righteous, arrogant, heavy-handed, politically motivated ass. I find the publicly disgraced hypocrite to be a much more sympathetic character. Pretty much the bad things about Spitzer were things I already knew. I didn’t know the specifics of his ...

Quoting myself from the comments section of my last post:

...Japan had plenty of missed opportunities in the early to mid 90s to prevent the depression from getting out of hand. It was only when the inflation rate went to zero...that it really became intractable.

Speak of the devil, and ...

Suppose that Greg Mankiw and others are correct in suggesting that inflation expectations have risen dramatically. Is this bad news or good news?

By way of full disclosure, I should note that it’s clearly good news for me, since I’m short nominal Treasury notes. If you ...