Friday Special 118

Greenspan's Cult of Personality... Review topics and articles of economics: Alan Greenspan was a legend in his time and there was no shortage of praise for him back then. For example, who can forget Bob Woodow's 2000 book Maestro: Greenspan's...

Yes Tyler, Low Interest Rates Matte... Tyler Cowen is wondering whether the Fed's low interest rates in the early-to-mid 2000s really were that important to the credit and housing boom of the early-to-mid...

The Eurozone Crisis: Deja Vu... Review topics and articles of economics: Randal Forsyth sees similarities between the current unfolding of the Eurozone crisis and that of the U.S. financial crisis a few years back:Just as the problem on this...

Charles Plosser and the Burden of F... The Economist's Free Exchange blog is shocked to hear this from Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia President Charles Plosser:"Since expectations play an important role...

Arnold Kling and Expected Inflation... Review topics and articles of economics: What do we know about expected inflation? According to Arnold Kling not much if we look to financial markets:I'm also not convinced that we can read expected inflation...

A Paper on Stabilizing Nominal Spen... Given the recent discussion on stabilizing nominal spending as a policy goal I found this article by Evan F. Koenig of the Dallas Fed to be interesting: The article...

Why The Low Interest Rates Mattered... Review topics and articles of economics: This is the second of two posts detailing why the Fed's low interest rate policies in the early-to-mid 2000s was one of the more important contributors to the credit and...

Why The Low Interest Rates Mattered... This is the first of a two-part follow up to my previous post, where I argued that the Fed's low interest rate policy was a key contributor to the credit and housing...

The Stance of Monetary Policy Via t... Review topics and articles of economics: There has been some interesting conversations on the stance of monetary policy in the past few days between Arnold Kling, Scott Sumner, and Josh Hendrickson. Part of...

Scott Sumner's New Best Friend:... Joseph Gagnon is calling for $6 trillion more in global monetary easing. This should not be too hard to implement since the Fed is a monetary superpower.Update: The...

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Jeremy Siegel Gets It... Review topics and articles of economics: Jeremy Siegel is making the case the case that rising yields indicate the Fed's policy is actually working:The recent surge in long-term Treasury yields has led many to...

Nick Rowe Schools Arnold Kling in M... Review topics and articles of economics: Nick Rowe replies to Arnold Kling's rant against the monetary disequilibria view of recessions: What makes a recession a recession, and something more than a bad ...

The Conservative Case for Stabilzi...Scott Sumner explains why conservatives should be in favor of a nominal income targeting rule.

QE2 and Rising Yields... More folks are now considering the possibility that the rise in long-term interest rates may be a sign of economic recovery. For example, see Ryan Avent, Paul...

Monetary Policy and the Pre-Crisis ... Review topics and articles of economics: Many observers have made the case that monetary policy was too loose in the early-to-mid 2000s and, as a result, helped fuel the credit and housing boom. Some observers,...

A 100 Trillion Dollar Zimbabwe Bill... Previously on this blog I have looked at the extent of hyperinflation in Zimbabwe and as well as recent progress (i.e. the defacto dollarization of the economy) the...

Student Managed Investment Fund... Review topics and articles of economics: One of the events I enjoy attending here at Texas State University is the semester-end presentation by our student managed investment fund (SMIF). This fund...

Asking the Wrong Question... Randall W. Forsyth dreams he is doing the 60 Minutes interview with Ben Bernanke and comes up with this exchange:Bernanke: "What we're doing is lowering interest rates...

What if the PIGS Had Never Adopted ... Review topics and articles of economics: What if the PIGS had never adopted the Euro? How would they now be handling the current economic Eurozone crisis? Would there even be a Eurozone crisis? These are...

Why We Need an Explicit Nominal Tar... Review topics and articles of economics: So we learn from the 60 minutes interview with Ben Bernanke that if necessary there will be a QE3:Scott Pelley: Do you anticipate a scenario in which you would commit to...

A Must Read on Monetary Economics... Review topics and articles of economics: The book that played a pivotal role in shaping my understanding of monetary economics is now available online at no cost: Less Than Zero by George Selgin. Among other...
A Good Time at the SEA Annual Meeti... Review topics and articles of economics: Earlier this week I attended the Southern Economic Association annual meetings in San Antonio, Texas. Among other things, I was part of a session at the meetings whose...

Too Much Focus on Interest Rates... Though much needed, QE2 it is far from perfect. One problem with QE2 is that it is being marketed as a monetary stimulus program that works by lowering long-term...

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