Category fun
Animal Spirits?
I suppose it is a little early for news stories that characterize the dog days of summer but a recent CBC item on Prairie Dogs certainly caught my attention. Prairie dogs are social animals that live in cooperative groups and apparently they have relatively sophisticated language. According to the story, via their chirps they are […]
On the percentage of Canada covered by water (totally off topic)
Sorry. This is about maths and stats, with a possible application to physical geography. Nothing to do with economics (well, it might have an application to business cycles, but I'm not ready to go there yet). Maybe the geographers have already figured this one out long ago (I couldn't find it on Google, but I […]
Macroeconomics when all goods are non-rival
Sometimes it's good to build really weird models. Because bits of the real world are a bit weird, even if the whole world isn't as totally weird as the model, and taking an extreme case can help us understand the effect of those weird bits. Plus it's fun. I'm going to assume that all produced […]
Economics of the Apocalypse
Well December 21st is almost upon us and with it the end of the Mayan calendar cycle and the anticipated arrival of the end of the world or the end of the world as we know it. Well, what do the economic indicators tell us about how this fundamental shift may be accounted for by […]
Darwin = Malthus + Sebright? Diffusion of technical change.
Just throwing out some random ideas, on subjects I know little or nothing about, that are only vaguely related, hoping someone better than me might pick some up and run with them properly. Read at your own risk.
Bond Villains as Fiscal Stimulus
I’ve known my friend Harold since high school and over the years both of us have given a lot of thought to the problems of the Northern Ontario economy while watching much of its traditional economic base in resource extraction and processing slowly disappear. Harold has spent a good many years in the economic development […]
Dumb econometrics questions/bleg on forecast probabilities
I'm bad at econometrics. I've got a couple of simple questions, that ought to have a simple answer. Noah Smith's post (HT Mark Thoma) reminded me of it. There are probably other students at the back of the econometrics class who don't know the answer either, so I'm going to ask for all of us.
Liquidity, bubbles/ponzis/chain letters, and money
I might as well join in the fun. Along with Steve Williamson, Noah Smith, Karl Smith, Paul Krugman, David Glasner, and Steve again. [Update: and Brad DeLong and JP Koning. And David Andolfatto.] Some assets are more liquid than others (they have lower transactions costs of buying and selling). More liquid assets will have a […]
An Economic Salute to US Presidents!
Well tonight is the next US Presidential debate and what better way to help set the stage than an economic retrospective on American Presidents and their relative performance when it comes to economic growth. I went onto Eh.Net and have obtained real per capita US GDP in 2005 constant dollars for the period 1790 to […]
Rat choice theory
The magnificent edifice of modern microeconomics is built on a simple model of human behaviour: rational choice theory. The rational person has goals; things she wants and values. She makes choices; she acts to achieve her goals. Saints can be rational, and so can sinners. What matters is having preferences and making choices, whatever those choices […]
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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