Monthly Archives: June 2012
How do the French control the size of the Sun? Hume vs Patinkin.
How do the French control the size of the Sun? How does the Fed control the size of the US economy? More importantly, how are those two questions related? [I'm still thinking about this, but have decided to post it anyway.] There is a metal rod in Paris that defines the length of the metre. […]
About WCI
As you can see, Stephen is revamping the WCI design. We're adding an 'about WCI' page. What I've drafted is below the fold. Comments welcome.
Competition matters, not ownership.
A Montréal-Toronto ticket on the Greyhound bus costs $30, advance fare. An Ottawa-Toronto ticket costs $49 (no advance fare is available). Since the Montréal-Toronto bus stops in Ottawa, savvy customers buy a Montréal-Toronto ticket, and just hop on the bus in Ottawa, saving themselves $20. Why does the bus ride from Montréal to Toronto cost […]
What were they thinking?
One of the best lines I heard at this year's CEA meetings was delivered by Chris Ragan, at a session on the Euro organized by Paul Jenkins.
Coming Soon to a University Near You…H-Index Rankings
Most of us are familiar with the metric known as the h-Index. Developed by Jorge Hirsch, the h-index is a measure that says that if you have an index of h, you have published h papers each of which has been cited at least h times.
The theft-proof bicycle helmet
I figured my bicycle helmet would never get stolen. Helmets, by offering protection in the event of an accident, appeal to those who are averse to risk, who worry about bad things happening. Thieves love risk, or are at least indifferent to it, as evidenced by the fact that they engage in risky behaviour like […]
An NGDPLP Target vs a higher Inflation Target as insurance against the ZLB
This is not a new point (Scott Sumner has made it before), but it needs repeating. The Zero Lower Bound is something we want to avoid. Here are two ways we can change monetary policy to reduce the risk of hitting the ZLB. Both work, but one comes at the cost of higher average inflation. […]
Artsie non-linearity, economics, and the concrete steppes
When economists say that something is "linear", rather than "non-linear", they normally mean it is a straight line, rather than curved. Y=a+bX is linear; Y=a+bX2 is non-linear. That is NOT what I am going to mean by "linear" in this post. Instead, I am going to use the words "linear" and "non-linear" in the way […]
Three (maybe four) main questions about money
What are the main questions in monetary economics? This post isn't really about the answers to those questions. It's about the questions themselves. This is how I think about dividing up monetary economics into a small number of main questions, and how those questions are related to each other. Others may want to divide it […]
Is the Health Care Cost Curve In Canada Finally Bending?
While public health care spending in Canada has been growing, what has not received a lot of attention is that after adjusting for inflation and population, growth rates of real per capita public health spending in Canada have actually been declining.
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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