Monthly Archives: December 2011
Low vs falling prices, and relative vs absolute prices, Intro Econ again
The discussion of Intro Economics in my last post got a bit esoteric at times. I want to bring us all back down to earth. This morning I got an email from a student who took my Intro Economics course last year. He works in retail, selling hi-tech goods. He asked me this question: hi-tech […]
Capital Formation in Canada: The Sequel
I decided to do a bit more work with my Canadian gross-fixed capital formation series for the period 1870 to 2010 to see if I could estimate a simple regression model that might explain its fluctuations. If everything can be explained by a few simple economic variables, then the downward trend in the ratio since […]
Why “great teacher” doesn’t get you on the short list
I'm spending today doing course outlines, meeting with students, and reading letters of reference.* Carleton is hiring this year. I'm on the labour/behavioural economics committee, which so far has received over 100 applications. A candidate's letters of reference are a key part of the package. Generally I skip to the end and read the last […]
God and Man at Harvard
60 years ago an undergraduate at an "Ivy League" US university didn't like the economics and politics that were being taught there. He didn't boycott classes. Instead he wrote a book about it. The full title of William F. Buckley's book is "God and Man at Yale: the Superstitions of 'Academic Feedom'". (I haven't read […]
Could periodontal competition make root canals more expensive?
On the right, the evil representative of the dental industry, seeking to maintain dentists' monopoly on the provision of all dental services. On the left, the noble entrepreneur, who only wishes to make the world a brighter place by providing safe, affordable teeth-whitening services. This image is taken from a video created by the libertarian […]
Blue sky money two – money and not banking
Banking is a subset of finance. Money and finance go together. Money and banking go even more together. But they don't have to go together. Maybe they didn't ought to go together. Finance is unstable. Banking is even more unstable than the rest of finance. A bank makes promises it knows it might not be […]
Canada’s Evolving Investment-Output Ratio
A phone discussion with a reporter this week on trends in Canadian investment and capital formation piqued my curiosity as to what the long-term trends in Canadian gross fixed capital formation have been. Apparently, despite the global financial crisis and associated economic uncertainty, business investment and capital formation is still relatively strong at the moment […]
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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