Category Stephen Gordon
Difficulty with comments
There's been a recent surge in the number of comments taken hostage by our spam filter. If you don't see your comment within a short period of time, please send an e-mail to either me or the post's author, or post a short comment to the effect that a previous comment doesn't seem to have […]
Real wages during the recession
I've seen a few stories about recent trends in wages, and too many of them seem to be trying to make a big deal out of movements that – when in put in context – are really too small to say much of anything. [Updated in an almost-certainly futile attempt to combat confirmation bias.]
On ‘first-order’ and ‘top-end’ inequality, and why the distinction is important
The debate about income inequality seems to be happening at two levels, which I'm going to label "first-order" and "top-end" inequality. First-order inequality is visible in standard measures such the gini coefficient, and shows up as an increase in the gap between average and median incomes. Top-end inequality refers to the share of income that […]
No, we really don’t want to reduce inequality
A few weeks ago, Mike Moffatt wrote an op-ed that ran in the Ottawa Citizen and several other PostMedia papers to the effect that there simply isn't the will on the part of 99% of the population to do much about inequality: if there were, there'd be more popular support for the sort of tax-and-redistribution […]
“Just one more dying quail a week, and you’re in Yankee Stadium”
The incomes earned by elite athletes are often cited as examples in arguments to the effect that high incomes aren't a problem that need solving. If large numbers of people are willing – eager, even – to give small sums of money to watch Wilt Chamberlain play basketball, then on what grounds would anyone begrudge […]
Miles Corak has a blog. Subscribe now
Miles Corak, a labour economist formerly of Statistics Canada, currently at the University of Ottawa, has started a blog. He's off to a great start; go read what he's written, and then go back for more. I know I will.
Teaching bleg: Online sources for the story of the global economic crises?
I'm teaching an advanced macro course this term, and I've decided that someone who is receiving an undergraduate degree in economics should be conversant in current events. After six years of blogging, I've seen lots of material. Too much, in fact; I scarcely know where to start. Can anyone point me to some online summaries I […]
Canada’s redistribution policy: take from the rich, give to the … median?
Much of the public debate on income inequality focuses on what is happening with market incomes. But most people generally accept that a certain level of inequality in market incomes is inevitable, and indeed necessary in order to provide the sort of incentives that generate economic growth. What really matters is inequality of income net […]
A preliminary estimate for Canadian 2011Q3 GDP growth
The August 2011 GDP numbers are out, so it's time for my quarterly attempt to provide an estimate for quarterly GDP growth a month before Statistics Canada releases its first estimates – the most recent exercise is here. This is done by using simple linear regression model of monthly GDP growth on monthly LFS data […]
The Bank of Canada revises down its forecast
Not much to add to what's been said elsewhere, except that I've updated my series of graphs documenting the evolution of the Bank of Canada's forecasts.
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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