Author Archive

Paulson Flips Again On Whether He Needs the Remaining $350 Billion In TARP

Now I didn’t specify in the title of this post whether it means Paulson wants the money or not; do you remember? I know it’s a tough question since I think Paulson has literally flipped twice in the past two weeks. But as of right now, Paulson claims he doesn’t need to tap into the […]

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Mankiw Wants a Nobel Too So Starts Writing Like Krugman

Look at his latest blog post calling for the Fed to explicitly abandon price stability (HT2EPJ). In his words: [E]ven if the Fed cannot reduce nominal interest rates, it can reduce real interest rates by committing to a modest amount of inflation. Some would view this as a radical change in monetary policy. In some […]

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Old School Video Explains the Joys of Inflation

This 10-minute video (HT2LRC) could be a documentary on That Which Is Seen.

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Fed Slashes and Promises to Make It Stick: Let’s See if Krugman Is Right

The Fed cut the target today down to “0 to 0.25%” and “made an explicit commitment to keeping official interest rates near rock bottom for an extended period.” This is exactly what Paul Krugman has recommended. So let’s see if it works. My point here is that for every period where the standard “cut rates […]

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Hayek Tells Bill Buckley That Even Keynes Was Afraid of the Keynesians

Last month Bob Roddis caused a stir when he made available the audio recording of Hayek’s 1975 “Meet the Press” appearance. Well Roddis has done it again. He has provided me with this recording (mp3) of Hayek on Bill Buckley’s Firing Line. Buckley asks Hayek about the popularity of Keynesianism, if (as Hayek claimed) it […]

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What Was Madoff’s Exit Strategy?

Econophile asks some good questions: Ponzi schemes are fascinating. Why would anyone do one unless they have a plane to Rio waiting on the runway? They know that they have to get off the train at some point and then it’s all over. Why did Bernie Madoff do it? $50 billion is real money. Aside […]

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Dan Mitchell Blows Up Keynesianism

Yeah yeah, this video (HT2 Pete Boettke) from Dan Mitchell is a bit elementary, but it’s not his fault that our society is enthralled by a ridiculous idea. Incidentally, the defender of Keynesianism would argue that Hoover and FDR didn’t do it right; they shouldn’t have raised taxes, just spending. And with Japan, the response […]

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More Problems in Paulson’s Explanation of the Lehman Collapse

Robert Wenzel at EPJ explains the latest twist in the Lehman story: Even though Paulson & Co. first said they didn’t have legal authority to help Lehman, and then said they never once considered putting taxpayer money at risk for the company, it turns out the Fed lent a Lehman subsidiary $87 billion after Lehman […]

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