It is amazing no one has thought of this before. Seven years after the GFC began, we’ve still got up to 25 million people who want jobs but cannot find them. Of course that’s far more than the official unemployment numbers—which don’t count anyone who worked just an hour or so, or who gave up … Read more
By Olivier Blanchard The dynamics that were emerging at the time of the October 2013 World Economic Outlook are becoming more visible. Put simply, the recovery is strengthening. In our recent World Economic Outlook, we forecast world growth to be 3.6 percent this year and 3.9 percent next year, up from 3.0 percent last year. In advanced economies, we forecast … Read more
There is still time to register for our upcoming Post Keynesian conference at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Unfortunately, the program is full so we cannot accept paper proposals. However, there is still space for participants.The registration is cheap, and includes all dinners and special events, some of which are listed below. For more information … Read more
JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, BP, Chevron, WalMart, and billionaires Charles and David Koch are launching a multi-million dollar TV ad buy Tuesday blasting President Obama over the national debt. Actually, I don’t know who’s behind the ad, because there’s no way to know. And that’s a big problem. The front group for the ad … Read more
France appears to have taken its public relations strategy for dealing with $8.9 billion fine against BNP Paribas from an old saying among lawyers: “If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have neither on your side, pound the … Read more
By Alejandro Werner The prospects for global growth have brightened in recent months, led by a stronger recovery in the advanced economies. Yet in Latin America and the Caribbean, growth will probably continue to slow, although some countries will do better than others. We analyze the challenges facing the region in our latest Regional Economic Outlook and discuss … Read more
Imagine Fed Governor Rip van Winkle started his nap at the beginning of 2007 and just woke up to find that inflation is close to the Fed’s objective and the unemployment rate is at its 30-year average. You could forgive him for expecting the federal funds rate to be close to its long-run norm of … Read more
By Chris Dalby: While Germany is breaking world records for the amount of sustainable energy it uses every year, German energy customers are breaking European records for the amount they pay in monthly bills. Surprisingly, they don’t seem to mind. In the first half of 2014, Germany drew 28 percent of its power generation from renewable energy … Read more
The surprisingly strong rebound in second-quarter GDP growth will suffer a substantial bout of deceleration in the third quarter, according to the Capital Spectator’s median econometric nowcast. The US economy is projected to increase 2.5% (real seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the July-through-September period, down from the 4.0% rate reported by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) … Read more
In December 2003, Willem Buiter demonstrated that creating new fiat money does not create a liability for the issuer: see ‘Helicopter Money: Irredeemable Fiat Money and the Liquidity Trap’, NBER Working Paper 10163. Buiter has recently taken his analysis further (see: ‘What more can central banks do to stimulate the economy’, Citi, Economics, 9 May … Read more