Author Archives: wciecon
Three meanings of “printing money causes inflation”
This is supposed to be a very simple post, mainly for non-economists. "Printing money causes inflation" can mean three different things. What I will say here should be obvious to economists, but I'm not sure if it is obvious to non-economists. And it makes me wonder if sometimes things get lost in translation. Maybe, just […]
How to destroy the “neoliberal consensus”
C'mon guys. If you are going to put forward a lefty conspiracy theory to explain why monetary policy is tighter than you (and I) think it should be, you at least need to get your story straight.
Why are lawyers against higher inflation?
An extremely quick Google search convinces me that lawyers are massively over-represented in the Canadian Parliament. I am quite sure that something similar is true in other countries too. Lawyers are far more powerful in setting government policy than are ordinary middle-class people like me. So if we want to understand why monetary policy is […]
Why the Roman Empire Really Fell
Research Memorandum From: Office of Historical Research Studies, Time Travel Division, Open University of the Inner Solar System, September 3, 2476 To: Board of Solar Regents, Open University of the Inner Solar System On the bi-millennium of the official fall of the Roman Empire as dated by the overthrow of Romulus, the last of the […]
It’s the Inflation Fallacy, duh!
Paul Krugman is wasting his time trying to figure out why the rich and powerful don't like inflation. There's a simple answer, that also explains why the non-rich and non-powerful don't like inflation either. And you don't need any fancy political economy to figure out the answer. If you want to know why non-economists don't […]
A simple question about Walras Law
Inspired by Free Radical's post, I think I have figured out a simpler and clearer way to say what I want to say about Walras' Law. Ask yourself the following question: Q. Assume an economy where there are (say) 7 markets. Suppose 6 of those markets are in equilibrium (with quantity demanded equal to quantity […]
Balancing the Premiers
Apparently, ten out of ten premiers (13 out of 13 if we count the territories) can agree that Canada is suffering from a “fiscal imbalance” between Ottawa and the provinces. At their annual meetings, which are wrapping up in Charlottetown today, the provincial premiers are arguing that since the Federal budget is moving into surplus […]
Tim Hortons
A lot of US econobloggers are talking about the Tim Hortons-Burger King merger. But all they seem to talk about is corporate tax rates. I think they are missing the big picture. The big picture is here: [I can't figure out how to embed that picture in Typepad. That's okay, I did – SG] To […]
Interest rates, asset prices, and the rich
Does anybody here remember 1982? When interest rates went very high, and so asset prices went very low. Just the opposite of today. What were people saying back then? 1. Were they saying: "Central banks are setting high interest rates and making asset prices low, which is bad for the rich, who own all the […]
The ECB cannot move last
I think this diagram helps us understand the Eurozone problem in simple game-theoretic terms:
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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