Monthly Archives: August 2010
The Fed should buy pro-cyclical assets, not bonds
Suppose you believe that the US economy needs increased Aggregate Demand, and needs looser monetary policy to accomplish that, and needs asset purchases by the Fed to accomplish that. (I believe those things, but am not going to argue them here). What sort of assets should the Fed buy? I want to divide all assets […]
Sectoral shifts and the Canadian recession
Last December, I wrote a post on the effects of the recession on various sectors of the Canadian economy. The main results were: The service sector was barely affected; most of the losses were in the goods sector. Within the goods sector, manufacturing took the brunt of the job losses. Of course, the losses in […]
Marginal Tax Rate Structure Matters for Wage Inequality
Have you ever had a conversation that completely changed your thinking on a subject? My thinking on inequality and taxes was radically altered about 10 years ago when my office mate and I were studying for an exam in Robin Boadway's PhD course in Public Finance, and we got to discussing tax rate structure. During […]
Taylor = Wicksell + Fisher + Friedman
Note to all genuine historians of economic thought: yes, I know. There's real history, then there's Whig history, and then there's this blog post.
Federal Taxation of Labour Income in Canada is Regressive (in Terms of Marginal Rates)
Or at least, it is for some ranges of income. Don't believe me that marginal tax rates are regressive? Follow me:
Some reasons not to take an undergraduate degree in economics
In a recent post, Nick Rowe speculated that the President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis made basic macro mistakes in part because he has an undergraduate degree in math. Yet a person wanting to make a career as an academic economist (or a president of a federal reserve bank) should not choose economics […]
The bond “bubble”, and why we should be worried about it
In one important sense, there is a "bubble" in US government bonds, and we should be worried about it.
Lithium in the Water Supply and Our Preferences
Big Think on one of my favourite topics – changes in behaviour caused by mineral levels in the body: Communities with higher than average amounts of lithium in their drinking water had significantly lower suicide rates than communities with lower levels. Regions of Texas with lower lithium concentrations had an average suicide rate of 14.2 […]
What standard monetary theory says about the relation between nominal interest rates and inflation
This is what I understand "standard" monetary theory to say about the relation between inflation and nominal interest rates.
Why “everyone” should be forced to take Intro Economics
The reason is not what you are expecting. It's because maybe if he had been forced to take Intro Economics, the 12th President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, who holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Chicago, who is a specialist in money and macro, who has a CV that creams […]
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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