EconoMonitor

Does Obama Have A Platinum Coin Up His Sleeve?

February 6, 2025January 4, 2013 by L. Randall Wray

Forget gold. Buy platinum. The platinum coin idea is on a roll—I’ve heard it has climbed into the top five of Twitter Trending (whatever that is). It was the frontpage of HuffPost: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/03/debt-ceiling-coin_n_2404653.html; Paul Krugman wrote about it http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/02/debt-in-a-time-of-zero/?smid=tw-NytimesKrugman&seid=auto ; Josh Barro picked it up http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-01-03/why-we-must-go-off-the-platinum-coin-cliff.html; and Joe Weisenthal featured it: http://www.businessinsider.com/3-huge-myths-about-the-plan-to-save-the-economy-with-a-trillion-dollar-platinum-coin-2013-1. But the best … Read more

The Not-So-Simple Economics of Right-to-Work Laws

February 7, 2025January 3, 2013 by Ed Dolan

There was much hand wringing and an equal amount of triumphant cheering last month, when Michigan became the twenty-fourth state to adopt a right to work (RTW) law. It joined Indiana, which went RTW last February, as only the second major industrial state with such a policy. Much of the commentary portrayed the spread of … Read more

Why Does Brad DeLong Worry About Paying For Tax Cuts?

February 7, 2025January 2, 2013 by L. Randall Wray

Presumably Brad DeLong is happy that Congress did not push the economy over the cliff with the self-destruct austerity package it had designed to hold the country hostage. All that was simply to give Democrats the cover they needed to slash Social Security and other safety net programs. But Brad worries about the long-run effects … Read more

The Budget Deal: What We Have Left Undone

February 7, 2025January 1, 2013 by Ed Dolan

Making fiscal policy is never going to be easy, but it would be easier if we broke the process down into a logical sequence of steps. Here are those steps, as I see them: Decide how large a government we want in terms of government purchases and transfer payments. Any such number will necessarily have … Read more

Understanding the Central Bank of Turkey: Targeting Volatility, not Inflation

February 7, 2025December 31, 2012 by Emre Deliveli

I started the year at Hurriyet Daily News (HDN) with a column on Turkish monetary policy, and out of the 63 columns I wrote this year, 18 were directly on monetary policy. Therefore, is only appropriate I end the year with a column on Turkish monetary policy. During his presentation of the bank’s 2013 Monetary … Read more

Mission: Impossible – Christmas Turkey

January 30, 2025December 24, 2012 by Emre Deliveli

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) released its Article IV consultation report for Turkey late Dec. 21. These documents are scrutinized by Turkish policymakers before publication. However, reading between the lines can still reveal a lot about where the Fund and the government differ on economic policy. Here’s the intro. to my latest Hurriyet Daily News … Read more

TROLL FRIDAY: AMERICA, LOCKED AND LOADED

February 6, 2025December 21, 2012 by L. Randall Wray

OK, it is Troll Friday and I’ve still got no Trolls stepping up to the challenge. Indeed, once I challenged them to go beyond their personal attacks, they all just crawled back into their little Troll Holes and curled up into little Troll Balls. No matter. I’m the Troll today. The public outcry over the … Read more

Does Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Harbor Green Illusions about Solar Power?

February 7, 2025December 17, 2012 by Ed Dolan

Ozzie Zehner’s book Green Illusions calls our attention to the sometimes exaggerated claims that are made for alternative energy. Zehner sees these unrealistic ideas as widely shared in the mainstream environmental community. He maintains that they lead to the illusion that if we only muster the will to invest more in solar panels, windmills, and … Read more

The German Erosion

February 7, 2025December 14, 2012 by Dan Steinbock

Dilemmas of the Last Triple-A Eurozone Economies Until recently, the Eurozone crisis was cushioned by the strong performance of the German economy. But those days are fading. During the past four years, The UK has suffered a double dip. France is flirting with recession. Italy’s EUR 2 trillion debt forced a technocratic regime to take … Read more

More News From the Financial Front: We’re Not Out of the Woods Yet

February 7, 2025December 12, 2012 by L. Randall Wray

Here’s a quick round-up of recent financial news. You cannot make this stuff up. 1. Yes, Crime Still Pays. What happens if you help Mexican drug lords launder $7 Billion of drug profits through US bank branches, and you finance purchases for international terrorists committed to attacks on America, and you have processed $60 Trillion … Read more