My Father is Darth Vader

I believe Alan is terribly wrong-headed about this topic.

Suppose some country had high tariffs that prevented many goods and services from being imported from abroad. Then a new President eliminated the tariffs. Alan would, I believe, applaud the policy move, despite job losses for some workers in previously protected industries.

But the rise in offshoring is much the same...more>>

Some Comments on "Freaks and Geeks"

In the April 2nd 2007 issue of the New Republic, Noam Scheiber has written a long piece titled "Freaks and Geeks"($$$). All academic economists should read this piece because it raises a host of issues concerning where academic economics is going...more>>

Frederic Mishkin: Inflation Dynamics

If you are interested in inflation dynamics and recent research suggesting that inflation dynamics have changed, this speech by Federal Reserve governor Frederic Mishkin looks at three important questions:

1. What is the available evidence on changes in inflation persistence in recent years?
2. What is the available evidence on changes in the slope of the Phillips curve?
3. What role do other variables play in the inflation process?...more>>

Trade and Full Employment

I hadn’t realized that Smith had said anything about full employment being a necessary condition for countries to benefit from trade. Come to think of it, I do not recollect Smith saying anything about employment being ‘full’, ‘partial’ or non-existent. Trade is about consumers, not producers, who may very well be producing domestic goods for local exchange and not goods for foreign trade...more>>

Should Marriage be Subsidized?

David Cameron, the leader of the Conservative Party, set off a considerable debate in Great Britain on marriage when he recently claimed "Families come in all shapes and sizes and they all need support [because]…married couples stay together longer. Therefore, there is a very strong case for supporting marriage [in the tax system]. Children do better if their mother and father are both there to bring them up"...more>>> and more>>>

Readings on (Mostly) Monetary Theory and Policy

A benefit of blogging is that you can harvest links for your classes as you look for things to blog about, and then post them as required or additional reading on a class blog or web page. In case anyone finds them useful, here are the additional readings and applications I've posted on the class blog for my Monetary Theory and Policy class so far this quarter (just short of 100 articles). I've been surprised at how many people in the class actually read these (I give short summaries of most of the articles posted as additional reading, so that probably helps encourage people to read more):...more>>