Author Archives: wciecon
The Bank of Canada raised interest rates today
The overnight rate was increased 25 basis points to 3.75%. Information on the Canadian and global economies received since the January Monetary Policy Report Update has been broadly in line with the Bank’s expectations, although the Canadian dollar has recently moved above the range that had been assumed in the Update. Real gross domestic product […]
The Bank of Canada will raise interest rates tomorrow
The Bank of Canada has increased its target for the overnight rate by 25 basis points four times in a row, from 2.50% to 3.50%, and if its January monetary policy report is anything to go by, it seems intent on continuing this trend. Output continues to hover around the Bank’s estimate of capacity, and […]
The anatomy of anti-economics
I recently had occasion to re-read Paul Krugman’s "Pop Internationalism", and this passage from ‘The illusion of conflict in international trade’ jumped out at me. His point of reference is international economics, but in my experience it also applies to other fields as well: As far as I can tell, the attitude of policy-minded intellectuals […]
Bad economics: weekly roundup
Tuesday’s announcement of the 2005Q4 GDP numbers provides the background for this week’s entries. First up is Jim Stanford’s column in Monday’s Globe and Mail, in which he notes that profits have been growing strongly, but Unfortunately, the investment response to this inflow has been uninspiring, to say the least. Corporate capital spending has grown […]
The revelation principle in action
At the University of Prince Edward Island, a history lecturer’s attempt to get his students to reveal their types in the first week goes awry: P.E.I. professor fired for no-show marking. A history professor who offered students a mark of 70 per cent if they opted out of his class has been fired by the […]
Federalism and the race to the bottom
Yesterday’s headline in the Globe and Mail provides a nice segue from my post on ethnic diversity and the Nordic model to how Canada’s federal structure could be a useful tool in generating the sort of public consensus that the Nordic model requires. Unfortunately for me, the source of the headline is somewhat problematic: Empower […]
Beware of the clever econometrician
Mahalanobis points us to a couple of interesting articles by Peter Kennedy on the nitty-gritty of applied econometrics. ‘Oh no! I got the wrong sign! What should I do?’ is a very nice summary of the data and modelling problems that can generate misleading estimates, and anyone who has had to deal with puzzling estimates […]
GDP is a flawed measure of economic welfare. So what?
The Economist indulges in a bit of hand-wringing about the exhaustively-documented weaknesses of using GDP to measure economic well-being: It’s high time that economists looked at more than just GDP: Economists spend much time discussing how to boost GDP growth. The OECD itself drew attention this week to the widening gap between America’s and Europe’s […]
Ethnic diversity and the Nordic model
There seems to be a consensus of opinion on the Nordic model around two points: It’s admirable. It can’t be exported to countries that aren’t as small and ethnically homogeneous as the Nordic countries. In a recent interview in the New Perspectives Quarterly (h/t to New Economist’s very helpful series on the Nordic model), Milton […]
Why do forecasters only report point estimates?
In a recent exchange, Jim Hamilton of Econbrowser and Kash at Angry Bear discuss the perils and pitfalls of economic forecasting. They agree on many things, most especially on the importance of maintaining a certain level of humility. The best summary is given by Jim Hamilton: "Don’t ask for too much of your forecast or […]
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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