Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
10 Jan 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, Austrian economics, budget deficits, business cycles, comparative institutional analysis, constitutional political economy, development economics, economic growth, economics of regulation, financial economics, fiscal policy, growth disasters, growth miracles, history of economic thought, income redistribution, international economics, labour economics, law and economics, liberalism, libertarianism, macroeconomics, Marxist economics, monetarism, monetary economics, political change, politics - USA, property rights, Public Choice, public economics, rentseeking, unemployment Tags: Argentina
It’s easy to mock economists. Consider the supposedly prestigious left-leaning academics who asserted in 2021 that Biden’s agenda was not inflationary. At the risk of understatement, they wound up with egg on their faces.* Today, we’re going to look at another example of leftist economists making fools of themselves. It involves Argentina, where President Javier […]
Left-Wing Economists Were Wildly Wrong about Javier Milei and his Libertarian Agenda for Argentina
29 Dec 2024 Leave a comment
in budget deficits, comparative institutional analysis, development economics, economic growth, economics of bureaucracy, economics of regulation, F.A. Hayek, financial economics, fiscal policy, growth disasters, income redistribution, international economics, labour economics, law and economics, liberalism, libertarianism, macroeconomics, Milton Friedman, monetarism, monetary economics, property rights, Public Choice, rentseeking, unemployment Tags: Argentina
Argentina’s bonds have already rallied dramatically. One gauge of the nation’s hard-currency debt, the ICE BofA US Dollar Argentina Sovereign Index, has generated a total return of about 90% this year. Meanwhile, the S&P Merval Index has risen more than 160% this year through Monday, far outpacing stock benchmarks in developed, emerging and frontier markets […]
Argentina facts of the day
27 Dec 2024 Leave a comment
in budget deficits, economics of bureaucracy, fiscal policy, inflation targeting, macroeconomics, politics - New Zealand, Public Choice
I wasn’t envisaging writing anything more for a while, but….Welllington’s weather certainly isn’t conducive to either the beach or the garden, and the Herald managed to get an interview with Iain Rennie, the new Secretary to the Treasury (not usually the sort of stuff for 27 December either). I’ve always been rather uneasy about heads […]
The Secretary to the Treasury defending govt fiscal policy
18 Dec 2024 Leave a comment
in budget deficits, business cycles, economic growth, economic history, fiscal policy, macroeconomics, monetary economics, politics - New Zealand
High profile US Economist Paul Krugman has written a New York Times article in which he shows in one graph the incredible resilience and performance of the American Economy. The dark blue line below tracks the pre-pandemic long-run trend in Real GDP. Meanwhile the orange line is actual real GDP. Krugman remarks that now, in…
Nobel Laureate Paul Krugman’s GDP Graph Confirms the Bottom has Fallen Out of the New Zealand Economy
30 Nov 2024 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, budget deficits, business cycles, economic growth, fiscal policy, labour economics, liberalism, macroeconomics, Marxist economics, monetary economics, politics - New Zealand, Public Choice, public economics, unemployment Tags: monetary policy
A group of economists have written to Nicola Willis complaining about the modest fiscal restraint imposed on the public sector. Grant Robertson grew government expenditure by $76 billion/year or a massive 7.6% of GDP, leaving NZ with a structural deficit. Many were champions of his policies or worked for him, and now they complain his […]
Usual suspects want more debt
23 Nov 2024 1 Comment
in applied price theory, budget deficits, comparative institutional analysis, constitutional political economy, development economics, economic growth, economics of bureaucracy, economics of regulation, fiscal policy, growth disasters, income redistribution, macroeconomics, monetarism, monetary economics, Public Choice, rentseeking, unemployment Tags: Argentina
Bryan Caplan and Daniel Klein both opine on Milei and populism, Dan being very enthusiastic, while Bryan praising Milei but more reserved in his praise of populism. I too am a big fan of Milei, and I think he is still on a good track. If his reforms do not succeed, likely it will not […]
Milei and populism
30 Oct 2024 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, applied welfare economics, budget deficits, business cycles, econometerics, economic growth, economic history, economics of bureaucracy, economics of regulation, energy economics, entrepreneurship, environmental economics, financial economics, fiscal policy, global warming, health economics, income redistribution, industrial organisation, law and economics, macroeconomics, monetary economics, politics - USA, property rights, Public Choice, public economics, rentseeking Tags: 2024 presidential election, drug lags, taxation and entrepreneurship, taxation and investment
Milton Friedman used to advise researchers to focus on large policy changes rather than attempting to separate a small change’s signal from the noise. In this sense, the “ambitious” policy agenda of the Biden-Harris administration was expected to be a gift to the research community. Accepting this gift, since 2020 I have been making forecasts…
Biden-Harris policies and their consequences were no surprise to those paying attention
01 Oct 2024 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, budget deficits, comparative institutional analysis, economic growth, economic history, economics of regulation, environmental economics, fiscal policy, labour economics, labour supply, law and economics, macroeconomics, property rights Tags: Canada
Economists widely agree with the theory of “convergence,” which is the (mostly true) idea that poor nations should grow faster than rich nations as they catch up (converge). But there are exceptions. Sometimes a richer country will grow faster than a poorer country over a significant period of time, and we can learn from these examples. This is […]
Canada Is Part of the Anti-Convergence Club
28 Sep 2024 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, budget deficits, business cycles, economic growth, fiscal policy, history of economic thought, labour economics, macroeconomics, monetary economics, public economics, unemployment Tags: New Keynesian macroeconomics
Popular New Keynesian macroeconomic models predict that cuts in various types of distortionary taxes are contractionary when monetary policy is constrained at the zero lower bound. We turn to a long span of history in the United Kingdom to test this hypothesis. Using a new long-run dataset of narrative-identified tax changes from 1918to 2020, we […]
Another zero lower bound prediction bites the dust
04 Sep 2024 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, budget deficits, business cycles, development economics, econometerics, economic growth, economic history, Edward Prescott, fiscal policy, great depression, history of economic thought, labour economics, law and economics, macroeconomics, Milton Friedman, monetarism, monetary economics, politics - USA, Public Choice, Robert E. Lucas, unemployment
Jon Hartley interviews Greg Mankiw on topics including New Keynesian macroeconomics, growth, and economic policy more broadly at his Capitalism and Freedom website (August 20, 2024, video and transcript available). Here are a few of the comments that caught my eye. On big models and small models in studying the macroeconomy: [O]n the issue of…
Interview with Greg Mankiw: New Keynesian Macro, Growth, and Economic Policy
27 Aug 2024 Leave a comment
in budget deficits, business cycles, econometerics, economic growth, economic history, financial economics, fiscal policy, history of economic thought, inflation targeting, macroeconomics, monetary economics, politics - New Zealand Tags: monetary policy
Over the last few years, The Treasury seems to have been toying with bidding for a more significant role for fiscal policy as a countercyclical stabilisation tool It seemed to start when Covid hubris still held sway – didn’t we do well? – and the first we saw of it in public was at a […]
Fiscal and monetary policy
14 Aug 2024 Leave a comment
in budget deficits, business cycles, econometerics, economic history, financial economics, history of economic thought, inflation targeting, macroeconomics, monetary economics, politics - USA Tags: exchange rates, monetary policy
Exchange-rate models fit very well for the U.S. dollar in the 21st century. A “standard” model that includes real interest rates and a measure of expected inflation for the U.S. and the foreign country, the U.S. comprehensive trade balance, and measures of global risk and liquidity demand is well-supported in the data for the U.S. […]
Finally, exchange rate models seem to work pretty well
30 Jul 2024 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, budget deficits, business cycles, economic growth, economic history, history of economic thought, labour economics, macroeconomics, monetarism, monetary economics, unemployment Tags: monetary policy
The Fiscal Theory of the Price Level has been percolating among monetary theorists for over three decades: Eric Leeper being the first to offer a formalization of the idea, with Chris Sims and Michael Woodford soon contributed to its further development. But the underlying idea that the taxation power of the state is essential for […]
Thought and Details on the Fiscal Theory of the Price Level
28 Jul 2024 Leave a comment
in budget deficits, business cycles, economic growth, fiscal policy, inflation targeting, labour economics, macroeconomics, monetary economics, politics - New Zealand, unemployment Tags: monetary policy
I picked up The Post this morning to find the lead story headlined “Recession hits homes harder than businesses”, reporting a speech given earlier this week by Treasury’s deputy secretary and chief economic adviser Dominick Stephens. There was an account of the same speech, but with some different material, on BusinessDesk a couple of days […]
Treasury says one thing in a speech but quite another in the BEFU
28 Jun 2024 Leave a comment
in budget deficits, business cycles, economic growth, economic history, fiscal policy, income redistribution, labour economics, macroeconomics, monetary economics, Public Choice Tags: France
The RN intends to move ahead with a proposed law that states as its aim “to combat Islamist ideologies”. It includes measures to make it easier to close mosques and deport imams deemed to be radicalised, and a ban on clothing that “constitute in themselves an unequivocal and ostentatious affirmation” of Islamist ideology. Bardella said […]
What does RN stand for in the pending French election?
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
A History of the Alt-Right
Econ Prof at George Mason University, Economic Historian, Québécois
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Scholarly commentary on law, economics, and more
Beatrice Cherrier's blog
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
A rural perspective with a blue tint by Ele Ludemann
DPF's Kiwiblog - Fomenting Happy Mischief since 2003
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
The world's most viewed site on global warming and climate change
Tim Harding's writings on rationality, informal logic and skepticism
A window into Doc Freiberger's library
Let's examine hard decisions!
Commentary on monetary policy in the spirit of R. G. Hawtrey
Thoughts on public policy and the media
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Politics and the economy
A blog (primarily) on Canadian and Commonwealth political history and institutions
Reading between the lines, and underneath the hype.
Economics, and such stuff as dreams are made on
"The British constitution has always been puzzling, and always will be." --Queen Elizabeth II
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
WORLD WAR II, MUSIC, HISTORY, HOLOCAUST
Undisciplined scholar, recovering academic
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Res ipsa loquitur - The thing itself speaks
In Hume’s spirit, I will attempt to serve as an ambassador from my world of economics, and help in “finding topics of conversation fit for the entertainment of rational creatures.”
Researching the House of Commons, 1832-1868
Articles and research from the History of Parliament Trust
Reflections on books and art
Posts on the History of Law, Crime, and Justice
Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
Exploring the Monarchs of Europe
Cutting edge science you can dice with
Small Steps Toward A Much Better World
“We do not believe any group of men adequate enough or wise enough to operate without scrutiny or without criticism. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it, that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire. We know that in secrecy error undetected will flourish and subvert”. - J Robert Oppenheimer.
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
Recent Comments