Economics

Archive for Economics

Dave Smith Interviews Bob

I was just on Dave Smith’s podcast “Part of the Problem.” We talked econ and politics, and had some laughs. Plus near the beginning, I did my dial-up modem sound effect. Note, I think Dave only has episodes available for free for a short window, so if you want to listen to this, grab it […]

Two Points of Pushback Against My Buddies, re: GOP Tax Plan

(1) Suppose someone argued, “I don’t think it’s right for Donald Trump to be talking trash to North Korea. He is just setting the US up for a big war that might involve nuclear weapons. In terms of foreign policy, he’s writing checks that the American public doesn’t want to cash. It would be much […]

Krugman Claims “No Evidence” That Regulation Deters Investment

I beg to differ. My latest at IER.

JCT Estimate on Tax Plan

[EDIT: I dug up my own post; mystery solved. I explain at the end.] John Cochrane links to the new JCT estimate on the distributional consequences of the tax package. Here’s Cochrane: Bottom line: No change. Income categories are paying almost exactly the same share of federal taxes as before. Millionaires actually pay a tiny […]

There’s Nothing More Complicated Than First Principles

I am not kidding, it is ridiculously hard to express basic economic principles to non-economists. I always felt much more comfortable teaching upper level econ courses to majors. Case in point: In my latest EconLib, when writing the initial draft, I actually had pangs of doubt that my discussion was so elementary, people would wonder […]

Does a Worker Help the Rest of Society?

In the past on this blog, I’ve complained when Krugman argued that if you believe workers get paid their marginal product, then you can’t also argue that entrepreneurs help the rest of society. In the current EconLib article, I try to clearly explain at least two major problems with that approach. However, it’s not a […]

Sincere Question on Tax Reform

I have seen several good economists praising the increase in the standard deduction in the tax package. Now to be clear, even though these are free-market guys, they are *not* simply arguing from the position of, “This reduces theft.” (Indeed, at least two of them are scandalized that employers can still deduct health insurance premiums […]

More on Unemployment Duration

Earlier I had posted a graph showing the *mean* duration of unemployment spells, and I used it to buttress my claims that something was screwy with the labor market. But in the comments Kevin Erdmann seemed to be disagreeing with me when he wrote: I think most of this is due to the extreme extended […]