Central Banks Pushing on Strings Again
More proof that central banks have lost the plot.
Read more...Category Archives: The dismal science
The Strange Fate of Economists’ Interest in Collective Decision-Making
How economists studied collective decision-making after World War II, faced many impossibilities, and lost interest after solving them.
Read more...Austria: A Case Study of How Offshoring Lowered Growth
Austria illustrates that over time, offshoring reduces the skill levels of domestic workers and even organizations.
Read more...Bill Black: Thomas Friedman Wants A “Center-Left” Democratic Party Based on Austrian Economic Myths
Thomas Friedman has managed to outdo himself on the downside.
Read more...Economists Mystified that Negative Interest Rates Aren’t Leading Consumers to Run Out and Spend
It been remarkable to witness the casual way in which central banks have plunged into negative interest rate terrain, based on questionable models. Now that this experiment isn’t working out so well, the response comes troubling close to, “Well, they work in theory, so we just need to do more or wait longer to see […]
Read more...How CEOs Get Paid for Luck
Lackluster growth is everywhere….except in CEOs’ pay packets. Wonder why?
Read more...Emergy (with an “m”) and Environmental Accounting for Maine’s Landfill
Policy implementing the Maine Solid Waste hierarchy should be justified using emergy as the unit of account, and not dollars.
Read more...Why the Crisis in Italy is Not Over
The structural roots of Italy’s economic problems.
Read more...Lousy Experts: Looking Back at the Ex Ante Estimates of the Costs of Brexit
An economist contends that economists do not bear much responsibility for the Brexit vote.
Read more...Shaky State of North-South Relations
North-South, or developed-emerging economy dealings, are becoming more contentious.
Read more...Financialization and its Discontents
Untangling the credit versus money focus in the critiques of financialization.
Read more...Brexit Realism: Maybe Voters Were Not Dumb
By David Miles, Imperial College Business School. Originally published as a chapter in the VoxEU ebook, Brexit Beckons: Thinking ahead by leading economists, available to download free of charge To some, the Brexit referendum was a failure by economists to persuade UK voters that leaving the EU would entail major economic costs. This column argues […]
Read more...How ‘Competitiveness’ Became One of the Great Unquestioned Virtues of Contemporary Culture
How political authority has legitimated and promoted the questionable goal of competitiveness.
Read more...Do “Unconventional” Monetary Policies Work?
A skeptical look at unconventional monetary policies: quantitative easing, ZIRP, and negative interest rates.
Read more...Back in Work, Still Out of Pocket: Labor Market Recovery Since the Great Recession
The labour market recovery in OECD countries has been steady but slow since the Great Recession. More worrying is the fate of wage growth over the same period. This column assesses the implications of stagnation in the labour market for growth, wages, and inequality. It finds that structural weaknesses in labour market performance have become more visible as markets recover from the Great Recession. The policy response must include macroeconomic policies aimed at strengthening investment, and structural policies to support growth while nudging workers towards higher-skilled jobs.
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