Econbrowser

The housing meltdown: Why did it happen in the US?

Some Observations on the Ongoing Crisis: Causes and Opportunity Cost Again

There's a lot of commentary -- more comprehensive and up to date than I can provide -- on the crisis and the attempts to resolve the logjam in the financial markets.[0], [1] But I stilll have a...

Implications of Repricing of Dollar Denominated Assets

In the wake of global financial events, a couple of articles have caught my attention in terms of implications for the dollar. First was this Reuters account of a People's Daily editorial, suggesting...

Scott Irwin takes down Michael Masters

Econbrowser is pleased to host another contribution from Scott Irwin, who holds the Laurence J. Norton Chair of Agricultural Marketing at the University of Illinois. Today Scott offers a critique of...

Back to the Real Side of the Economy: Recession Watch

Only on a day like today does an over 1 percent decrease in industrial output move to third page. But this item (and this hilarious article h/t Economists View) reminded me to update the indicators...

Effects of Hurricane Ike on oil and gas markets

As Hurricane Ike took over the Gulf of Mexico, I watched with unusual interest, since I had been scheduled to fly through Houston to give a lecture in Baton Rouge on Friday. We had to cancel that...

Recessions and Output Gaps, Updated

In "Redefining Recession", The Economist discusses some of the difficulties in interpreting the "R" word. Since the article juxtaposed output gaps against the conventional NBER definition, I thought...

Trade Deficit Reduction via Changes in Exports, Imports or Prices

Today's July trade release was a little bit of a surprise, due to oil [0]; Haver covers the numbers. Calculated Risk discussed the release, and actually took the outcome as a fairly positive,...

We're #2?

Or so says Palgrave Econolog's rankings of popular economics blogs (hat tip: Newmark's Door).

Taylor Rules, Synchronized Recession and the Potential for Competitive Depreciation

In yesterday's FT, "All in this together" assessed the possibility of a roughly synchronized downturn in the world's major economies, with the United States, ironically enough, suffering the smallest...