Friedman, revisited (3)
share
digg
by
Economist.com | WASHINGTON, DC (6)
on
The Economist: Free exchange (0)
4 days, 19 hours
ago
permalink
Was he wrong about monetary policy? BACK in the summer, Free Exchange hosted a book club, in which we all read and discussed Captalism and Freedom. Included in this discussion was Mr Friedman's chapter on monetary policy, which recapitulated his views as expressed in his work A Monetary History of the United States (co-written with Anna Schwartz), and updated them to place primary blame for the depression on the Federal Reserve.Well, today Paul Krugman writes:A ...
-
mcs said:
On the impact of monetary policies in a depression.
Krugman: What to Do (1)
share
digg
by
Mark Thoma (11)
on
Economist's View (11)
5 days, 1 hour
ago
permalink
More from Paul Krugman. This is from the New York Review of Books (there's much more in the original): What to Do, by Paul Krugman, NY Review of Books: What the world needs right now is a rescue operation. The global credit system is in a state of paralysis, and a global slump is building momentum as I write this. Reform of the weaknesses that made this crisis possible is essential, but it can wait ...
Dueling monetary policies (1)
share
digg
on
The Economist: Free exchange (0)
5 days, 7 hours
ago
permalink
Different strategies in London and Frankfurt IF THE economy is sinking and inflation fading fast, should monetary policy respond quickly and aggressively, or is there any merit in cutting interest rates gradually? The Bank of England and the European Central Bank, who both have monetary policy meetings on 4 December, have different views. The BoE seems set to lop one percentage point off its benchmark rate, following the astonishing 1.5% reduction it made on 8 ...
Dollar falls, then firms, as Fed commits $800 billion more to ease credit crunch (1)
share
digg
by
Joseph Lazzaro (0)
on
BloggingStocks (2)
6 days, 9 hours
ago
permalink
Filed under: Federal Reserve, Recession, Financial CrisisThe dollar fell, then firmed, against most of the world's other major currencies Tuesday at mid-day, on word of yet another U.S. government intervention to ease the financial crisis. (For full currency data, click here.)Still, the more important theme, many economists and analysts agree, is how well the dollar has fared given the remarkable increase in debt by the United States and the supply of dollars globally. The dollar ...
Signs of Monetary Expansion (1)
share
digg
by
James Kwak (3)
on
The Baseline Scenario (3)
1 week
ago
permalink
There was a new theme buried in today’s announcements about purchasing $600 billion in mortgage-backed assets $200 billion in assets backed by other debt including student loans, credit cards, car loans, and small business loans. The New York Times story included these two paragraphs (emphasis added): The action by the Federal Reserve on buying mortgage-backed securities brings the full force of monetary policy to bear on the credit markets. Having already reduced the benchmark federal ...
Keynes' Open Letter to Roosevelt (3)
share
digg
by
Mark Thoma (11)
on
Economist's View (11)
1 week
ago
permalink
This is "An open letter to President Roosevelt" that appeared in the New York Times on December 31, 1933: Mr President: spend, spend, spend, Comment is Free: The following is an abridged text of an open letter [pdf] by John Maynard Keynes to the US president. Dear Mr President, You have made yourself the trustee for those in every country who seek to mend the evils of our condition by reasoned experiment within the framework ...
Will Deficit Spending in fact be Money-Financed? (1)
share
digg
by
Nick Rowe (0)
on
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative (3)
1 week, 1 day
ago
permalink
It's easy to say that money-financed increases in government spending should be used as a weapon of last resort, if the central bank runs out of ammunition as nominal interest rates fall to zero. But would government deficits in fact be money-financed?If the central bank targets the monetary base, the answer is trivial: if the bank wants to increase base money to pay for the deficit (printing money and giving it to the government to ...
Brown and TARP: Are they perpetuating the mess we're in? (1)
share
digg
by
Ajay Shah (0)
on
Ajay Shah's blog (0)
1 week, 1 day
ago
permalink
by Percy S. Mistry, in Financial Express, 25 and 26 November 2008.Applauded and replicated around the world for its decisiveness and firm action, the Brown Plan for financial system revival is proving to be seriously flawed in three major respects.First, Brown recapitalised the banking system before we established what the toxic assets residing in the system were worth. Despite a first expensive round of bank recapitalisation we still do not know how much more capital ...
Peter Schiff on the Collapse of the Dollar (1)
share
digg
by
Jordy (0)
on
Jordy Blog (0)
1 week, 3 days
ago
permalink
It’s End-the-Fed day today. I thought I’d commemorate it by posting a video featuring Peter Schiff (Ron Paul’s campaign finance advisor), who accurately predicted the sub-prime meltdown and the ensuing recession. Some great quotes (emphasis added): Our markets are going lower. This is not just a financial crisis; this is an economic collapse. Our entire phony economy is collapsing around us. There’s nothing the government can do to stop it; they should get out of ...
Is Zero a Lower Bound for Interest Rates?, by Arnold Kling (1)
share
digg
on
EconLog (5)
1 week, 5 days
ago
permalink
Suppose that the Federal Funds rate falls to zero. Does that mean that we are in the infamous liquidity trap, in which the Fed is powerless to use open market operations to affect the economy? I think not, and I'm pretty sure that only Paul Krugman or someone too awed by Krugman to think for himself would suggest otherwise. The Fed Funds rate competes with the rate on short-term Treasuries. The rate on short-term Treasuries ...
Crisis watch, 21 November (1)
share
digg
by
Ajay Shah (0)
on
Ajay Shah's blog (0)
1 week, 5 days
ago
permalink
TED spread 2.12 S&P 500 returns -6.71% VIX 80.86 Nikkei 225 (9:13 AM IST) -2.22% US Financials index -9.7% ICICI Bank ADR -9.72% Call rate on 20thth 6.2189% Currency futures (9:32 AM IST)50.51 I have an article in Financial Express today on the possibilities of enhanced infrastructure spending as a counter-cyclical device. While on this subject, read Ashutosh Kumar in FE today. An editorial on the rupee in Financial Express. C. B. Bhave on banning ...
Federal Open Market Committee Minutes - October 29, 2008 (1)
share
digg
by
Economic Indicator Reviewer (0)
on
EconoIndicators (0)
1 week, 6 days
ago
permalink
Federal Open Market Committee Minutes - Key Quotes Given the recent intensification and broadening of the global financial crisis, FOMC participants viewed the outlook for economic growth and employment as having worsened significantly since June. In the forecast prepared for the meeting, the staff lowered its projection for economic activity in the second half of 2008 as well as in 2009 and 2010. Technorati Tags: FOMC, Fed, Federal, Reserve, inflation The Manager of the System ...
Letting the air out (2)
share
digg
on
The Economist: Free exchange (0)
2 weeks
ago
permalink
The Fed will get (more) serious about deflation ALL the recent talk of the threat of deflation has now, more or less, become deflation. Asset prices, food and energy have all tumbled in recent months, and in October, the core index of American consumer prices actually fell. Treasury inflation-protected bonds see fairly significant deflation over the next couple of years, "Despite the fact that the Fed will never let it happen", editorialises Felix Salmon in ...
-
Sean said:
And, to stave off this evil threat of deflation, I'll print loads of money to hand over to my buddies in the banking industry, asking that they pretty please loan it out to you, with a bit of profit for them of course.
baby, it’s cold (1)
share
digg
by
cupcake (0)
on
cap to the hill (0)
2 weeks, 2 days
ago
permalink
winter is currently slapping us in the face. it’s here. and guess what! it’s cold. boo. and with the impending doom of frigid darkness, we’re seeing lots o’ hill kids searching for their 2008 cuddly buddy. a bed for one can be pretty chilly, but adding someone to the equation is not. think of all the special [...]
How do we stop it from happening again? (1)
share
digg
by
Stephen Gordon (3)
on
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative (3)
2 weeks, 4 days
ago
permalink
Nick Rowe passes this along: We failed. By “we” I mean economists. Sure, there’s a lot of blame to go round; a lot of people made bad decisions. But we didn’t know how to design a financial system which is robust enough to cope with people making bad decisions. If some people paid too much for their houses, and other people lent them too much money, the result should have been too many houses built, ...
"A Depression Buff's New Course of Study" (1)
share
digg
by
Mark Thoma (11)
on
Economist's View (11)
2 weeks, 5 days
ago
permalink
Can Bernanke meet the challenge?: A Depression Buff's New Course of Study, by Carlos Lozada, Washington Post: ...It seems somehow fitting to see Bernanke -- a top scholar on the economics of the 1930s -- at the helm of the Federal Reserve in yet another age of war and financial peril. Bernanke ... has devoted years of research to explaining how policy mistakes and financial panics transformed a 1929 recession into a worldwide calamity... If ...
What Not To Wear (1)
share
digg
by
DeanN (0)
on
Londonist (7)
3 weeks, 1 day
ago
permalink
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a man in possession of a hooded garment must be engaged in criminal activity. This is the precedent set by a judge who banned an Asbo youth from wearing a hoodie, a ruling which has been upheld by the High Court. Lawyers for Greenwich's Jerome Barnes argued that the judge could not order him to refrain from wearing a hoodie, on the grounds that such a move was ...
