More Good Results from Argentina

The most important election of 2023 took place in Argentina, where that nation’s voters elected the libertarian candidate, Javier Milei, as their new president. I discussed the outlook for Milei’s agenda on a recent appearance of the Schilling Show. Here’s a brief excerpt. As you can see, I’m worried that Milei faces enormous obstacles. Argentina […]

More Good Results from Argentina

The Pandemic and Swedish Fiscal Policy

When I wrote about long-run policy lessons from the pandemic, I mostly focused on the incompetence of the bureaucrats at the FDA and CDC. I also wrote that Sweden had a very sensible approach. Politicians did not panic. They advised prudence, but kept schools open and did not mandate lockdowns. Interestingly, Sweden also had better […]

The Pandemic and Swedish Fiscal Policy

The US debt is worse than it was after WWII

Over the last few years I’ve made a number of posts about the ever growing US government spending, deficits and debt, which has reached the point where US Debt is now rising $1 trillion every 100 days. But there are many people who look at the debt as 120% of GDP and shrug their shoulders that […]

The US debt is worse than it was after WWII

MICHAEL REDDELL: Not very bothered by deficits

I was away last week so have been rather late in getting to the Budget Policy Statement and associated material released last Wednesday. It does not make for pleasant reading, at least if one cares at all about governments not borrowing to pay for the groceries. Once upon a time – still not that long…

MICHAEL REDDELL: Not very bothered by deficits

NZ’s problem is too much spending, not a lack of tax

Labour and Greens in 2017 campaigned on capping core crown expenditure at no more than 30% of GDP. This was their election pledge. At one Budget I asked Grant Robertson about the policy and he (admirably) replied it was a limit, not a target. The latest forecast had expenditure at 33.4% of GDP. That 3.4% […]

NZ’s problem is too much spending, not a lack of tax

How credible is the Milei plan?

Here is a good Substack essay by Nicolas Cachanosky, excerpt: Inflation expectations depend on what is expected to happen to the budget in the months to come. It is natural, then, to ask whether the observed surpluses are sustainable in the months ahead. Answering this question requires looking at two things. First, how was the fiscal […]

How credible is the Milei plan?

Debt ratios

Image

The Conway speech

I’ve been rather tied up with other stuff for the last few weeks (including here) which is why I’ve not previously gotten round to writing about the first piece of monetary policy communications from our Reserve Bank this year.  That was the “speech” by the Bank’s chief economist (and MPC) member Paul Conway given to […]

The Conway speech

The Euro at 25

The euro technically started in 1999, when the 11 founding European members of the currency agreed to keep their exchange rates fixed and to hand over monetary policy to the European Central Bank. The euro then became the actual currency that people and firms used in 2002. I confess that, back in the early 1990s,…

The Euro at 25

Will Milei succeed in Argentina?

I give him a 30-40% chance, which is perhaps generous because I am rooting for him.  Bryan Caplan, who is more optimistic, offers some analysis and estimates that Milei needs to close a fiscal gap of about five percent of gdp. I have two major worries.  First, if Milei approaches fiscal success, the opposing parties […]

Will Milei succeed in Argentina?

Mattei Misjudges Hawtrey

Clara Mattei, associate professor of economics at the New School for Social Research, recently published a book, The Capital Order: How Economists Invented Austerity and Paved the Way to Fascism, (University of Chicago Press) in which she argues that the fiscal and monetary austerity imposed on Great Britain after World War I to restore the […]

Mattei Misjudges Hawtrey

Pension crisis

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How Were So Many Economists So Wrong About the Recession?

That is the topic of my latest Bloomberg column, I thought it was time to call out all the Orwellian rewriting of intellectual history going on, so here goes: As Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said last week: “So many economists were saying there’s no way for inflation to get back to normal without it entailing a […]

How Were So Many Economists So Wrong About the Recession?

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