Category Archives: Financial Crisis

Where will the new capital come from?

Writing in Thursday’s Financial Times, Pimco chief executive and chief investment officer Mohamed El-Erian argues that Europe’s first order of business should be to recapitalize its banks. It is hard to argue with this prescription.  With the finances of Greece, … Continue reading

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Send in the technocrats!

Winston Churchill said that democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried. The financial crisis has tested Churchill’s assertion. In Greece, the austerity measures imposed on the country by the EU and … Continue reading

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Alan Meltzer’s straw “Keynesian”

Remember when “liberal” became the insult of choice among Republicans? Apparently, “Keynesian” has now taken on that status for Republican economists.  Never mind that Keynesian is ill-defined (old Keynesian?  new Keynesian?  the Keynesian part of the neoclassical synthesis?)–making Keynesian a … Continue reading

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Prize (for a) failure

British clothing retailer Simon Wolfson (known to his friends in the House of Lords as Baron Wolfson of Aspley Guise) announced several days ago the establishment of the Wolfson Economics Prize (read the press release here).   The prize, worth … Continue reading

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The long run and short run of it

When you teach economics, you spend a fair amount of time dwelling on the distinctions between the short run and the long run. If a firm is not making a profit but is meeting its short-run costs (e.g., wages, utilities), … Continue reading

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Gary Becker and the law of the jungle

The sub-prime crisis and the ensuing economic slowdown have led many to question some widely held economic tenets, particularly the belief that unfettered markets inevitably lead to the best of all possible outcomes. Writing in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal, University … Continue reading

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WSJ op-ed board member: The unemployed prefer sitting on their duffs to working

Writing in today’s Wall Street Journal, WSJ op-ed board member Stephen Moore offers a variety of dubious–and at least one outrageous–opinion on the economy and eocnomic policy. (1) The economy would be in better shape today in the absence of … Continue reading

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Don’t blame the messenger

In case you have been asleep for the last couple of days, the sovereign debt rating of the United States was downgraded on Friday has been downgraded by the Standard and Poor’s (S&P) from AAA to AA+. This has not … Continue reading

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All hail Ronald Reagan

Apparently, the editors of the Wall Street Journal have a rule about the number of op-eds each week that praise Ronald Reagan.  I haven’t figured out the exact count yet, but Robert Barro’s piece in Monday’s Journal gets the paper … Continue reading

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How bad does Edward Lazear need it to be?

Writing in Friday’s Wall Street Journal, Stanford professor Edward Lazear argues that the real danger to the American worker is too much government–in other words: too many taxes and too much spending. Prof. Lazear writes: During the debt-ceiling debate, President … Continue reading

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