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The Fed as Crime Fighter?

In an otherwise interesting post regarding Fed officials’ sympathy for banks to engage in “regulatory capital arbitrage,” Arnold Kling writes: The thinking [by Fed officials] was that the Basel capital accords required banks to hold too much capital for mortgages (this was probably true). Accordingly, the article [by a Fed official] takes a sympathetic view […]

Austrian Business Cycle Theory and the "Rational Expectations" Objection

The most typical objection to the ABCT from mainstream economists is that it apparently violates “rational expectations.” Loosely: Why don’t businesspeople learn to be careful when the Fed lowers interest rates? Here [pdf] is an excerpt of a paper I wrote while teaching at Hillsdale. It has all the Bayesian bells and whistles, and gives […]

Busting the Myth of Green Jobs

The tech guy at IER managed to isolate my 6-minute intro at the Heritage Foundation’s recent panel on “green jobs.” I don’t take a stand here on the science; I merely point out that government constraints on business won’t make them more profitable (as Obama et al. are claiming).

Star Trek: Get Me to Sickbay, I’m Gonna Puke

I’m sorry kids, I was not happy with the latest Star Trek, and I was a massive Trek geek in junior high / first portion of high school. (Don’t ask me how many dates I had.) I think the TNG episode where LaForge accidentally has the Holodeck create Moriarity with his slip of the tongue […]

How Much Inflation Is the Market Forecasting?

The strongest argument against those of us who are warning of potentially massive price inflation is that the bond market is apparently disagreeing with us. For example, yields on 5-year Treasurys (as of this writing) are about as low as they have been in the series’ history at FRED, which certainly doesn’t seem consistent with […]

John Taylor (of Rule fame): Proper Fed Target Is +0.5%, not -5.0%

You gotta love it. Is everyone still really confident that Ben Bernanke will suck all those reserves out of the system in the nick of time? Is it at all troublesome that Fed officials are using the “Taylor rule” to come up with a target interest rate of -5.0%, while Taylor himself thinks the proper […]

Stand-Up Economist Rips Macroeconomists

Now that I’ve gotten over my initial jealousy, this guy is pretty good. (HT2 Mark Thornton) If you get bored, fast forward to about 3:20 and listen to the hamster bit.

Benefits/Costs of Waxman-Markey

At MasterResource I summarize the latest goings-on in the climate wars. An excerpt: [S]ome of the most credentialed and respected supporters of cap & trade…agree with the numbers: Waxman-Markey would cost households $3,100 in higher prices per year (possibly offset through truly productive government spending and/or tax relief), in exchange for a world which warms […]