The intra-Eurozone current account deficits have frequently been mentioned as one of the causes of the current malaise in the euro area. Krugman (2012(1)) has stated that the current crisis is “a balance of payments problem, in which capital flooded south after the creation of the euro, leading to overvaluation in southern Europe”. Dadush and … Read more
By Nick Cunningham: As Russian President Vladimir Putin tries to maintain its grip over Eastern Europe with its vast web of natural gas pipelines, one small European country gained a bit of leverage over Russia. Lithuania announced on May 8 that it has successfully pressured Russian gas giant Gazprom into lowering its price for natural … Read more
Russia’s annexation of Crimea has totally upended Kiev’s plans for Black Sea and Sea of Azov offshore oil and natural gas production. Before the peninsula’s March 16 independence referendum, followed two days later by Russian annexation, Ukraine’s state-owned Chornomornaftogaz (“Chernomorneftegaz” in Russian) owned 17 hydrocarbon fields, including 11 natural gas fields, four gas condensate fields, and two … Read more
Something that I have thinking about for a few weeks – and was reminded of reading Ryan Avent this morning – is the series of pieces at FT alphaville regarding the outflow of cash from China. See here and here and here. The thinking had been that the renminbi was a one-way bet as China … Read more
A New Analysis of Employment in the Era of Secular Stagnation and Global Oversupply U.S. Jobs in 2014―A New Conundrum Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics and author’s re-indexation. Aggregate payroll growth in 2014 has been concentrated in low wage sectors and, for reasons discussed in this report, is not transmitting effectively to consumption growth … Read more
The Eurozone countries and Japan are now falling back into recession/depression and deflation, and their public debt levels are grossly excessive, and still rising. The deepening economic crisis in these two large economic blocks could have serious implications for other G-20 countries, as aggregate demand is already weak globally. Nonetheless, based on the advice of … Read more
Hello Again after another absence from blogging. I return thanks to my beloved Hurriyet Daily News (HDN), as I explain below. But I will try to stick to blogging regularly this time around. Below is what was supposed to my HDN column for today. However, when you buy the paper today or when you go … Read more
The world economy faces huge infrastructure financing needs that are not being matched on the supply side. Emerging market economies, in particular, have had to deal with international long-term private debt financing options that are less supportive of infrastructure finance. While unconventional monetary policies in advanced countries in the aftermath of the global financial crisis … Read more
Several years into the most serious structural crisis of modern history, it is apparent that there are still a number of flaws, in both the current national and global economic system, that need to be addressed if the West is to resume stable and meaningful economic growth. We have already stressed and analysed various aspects … Read more
The Fed has declared an official end to quantitative easing. It is a logical time to ask, did QE work? Danielle Kurtzleben gives the honest answer in a recent post on Vox: “It’s very, very hard to know.” Still, we do know three things that QE did not do. These are worth pointing out, especially … Read more