The Economists' Voice

The Cost of Job Loss in the Great Recession: How Bad Has it Been?

Henry S. Farber — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 13:05:16 PST

Job losers in the Great Recession have had substantially more difficulty finding employment than in earlier recessions, according to Henry Farber of Princeton. Roughly fifty percent of those who lost jobs between 2007 and 2009 remained without work in 2010 and and even those full-time job losers who did find jobs are more likely to be part time than in past recessions.

Why Systemic Risk Considerations Affect the Market for Long-Term Care Insurance

Robin L. Lumsdaine — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 13:07:32 PDT

New capital requirements and regulations, aimed at controlling systemic risk in the financial sector, could have the unfortunate, unintended consequence of discouraging insurers from offering long-term care insurance, according to Robin Lumsdaine of American University.

What's an $800 Billion Stimulus Worth?

Burton A. Abrams — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 15:40:58 PDT

What's an $800 billion stimulus worth? Negative $475 billion, according to Burton A. Abrams of the University of Delaware.

Comment on DeLong: Why is Economics in Crisis?

Lonnie K. Stevans — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 16:13:27 PDT

Why is economics in crisis? Just look at the curriculum or the obscure articles we publish, says Lonnie Stevans of Hofstra University.

Comment on Hoerger: Early Pilots of Medicare Auctions Bring No Solace to Auction Experts

Peter Cramton et al. — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 15:57:11 PDT

Peter Cramton and Brett Katzman stick to their guns: Medicare auctions remain fatally flawed and must be fixed. They argue that contrary to Hoerger's comment, no comfort can be drawn from the fact that the market was able to withstand price reductions in early pilots.

Comment on Cramton and Katzman: Medicare Competitive Bidding Lowered Expenditures

Thomas J. Hoerger — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 15:37:32 PDT

In contrast to Cramton and Katzman’s assertion that Medicare encountered serious problems with its pilot competitive bidding program, Thomas Hoerger of RTI International cites his early evaluations that suggested strikingly positive results.

The Net Fiscal Expenditure Stimulus in the US, 2008-9: Less than What You Might Think, and Less than the Fiscal Stimuli of Most OECD Countries

Joshua Aizenman et al. — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 17:24:58 PDT

Understanding how the economy reacted to fiscal stimulus in the aftermath of the deepest recession of the last fifty years is essential. Joshua Aizenman of the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Gurnain Kaur Pasricha of the Santa Cruz Institute for International Economics and the Bank of Canada show that aggregate fiscal expenditure stimulus in the United States, properly adjusted for the declining fiscal expenditure of the fifty states, was close to zero in 2009. Furthermore, the USA is ranked at the bottom third in terms of the rate of expansion of the consolidated government consumption and investment of the 28 OECD countries they studied recently.

Comment on Cragg and Stiglitz: Invest in Intangible Assets

Kenan Patrick Jarboe — Wed, 18 May 2011 14:32:29 PDT

To move beyond 'old economy' stimulus policies such as accelerated depreciation, we need to focus on ways to provide incentives for investment in intangible assets, such as worker training, according to Kenan Jarboe of Athena Alliance.

The IMF’s Switch in Time

Joseph E. Stiglitz — Thu, 12 May 2011 13:53:26 PDT

So much for the Washington Consensus. The IMF has finally begun to come around and has realized that unfettered markets can create dangerous instability and inequality, according to Joseph Stiglitz of Columbia University.

Economics in Crisis

J. Bradford DeLong — Thu, 05 May 2011 14:15:50 PDT

Have economists forgotten what they once knew about financial markets, macroeconomics and their interactions? Brad DeLong of UC Berkeley certainly thinks so and interprets Larry Summers as saying the same.

Should the Government Invest, or Try to Spur Private Investment?

Michael Cragg et al. — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 12:43:56 PDT

The U.S. economy clearly needs stimulation, but the Obama administration’s plan for accelerated depreciation is an ‘old economy’ approach to stimulating aggregate investment and unlikely to ease the Great Recession, according to Michael Cragg of Brattle Group and Joseph Stiglitz of Columbia University. The authors suggest alternative policies consisting of carefully designed carrots and sticks.

Tracking the Sputnik Economy

Edward B. Barbier — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 10:59:06 PDT

In his 2011 State of the Union address, President Obama stressed investment in infrastructure, education and clean energy in the U.S. economy to "win the future." Edward Barbier of the University of Wyoming argues that to track the progress of such an investment strategy will require replacing GDP per capita as the main economic indicator with a Net Domestic Product (NDP) measure that is "adjusted" for real depreciation or appreciation in the reproducible, human and natural capital stock.

The Path to Universal Broadband: Why We Should Grant Low-Income Subsidies and Use Experiments and Auctions to Determine the Specifics

Gregory L. Rosston et al. — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 16:11:40 PDT

Gregory Rosston of Stanford University and Scott Wallsten of the Technology Policy Institute argue that the switch from voice to broadband services provides a rare opportunity to reform universal service programs. Rossten and Wallsten offer an alternative design to deliver services in an efficient and politically-palatable manner.

Comment on Song: Mortgage Interest Deduction

Richard K. Gordon — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 16:07:48 PDT

A proper income tax base should allow a deduction for mortgage interest expense, according to Richard Gordon of Case Western Reserve University.

Comment on DeLong: The Pain Has a Purpose, Namely, Higher Profits

Barbara R. Bergmann — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 09:39:39 PDT

Barbara Bergmann of the University of Maryland and American University provides a political economy hypothesis to explain Brad Delong's mystery: The pain has a purpose, namely, higher profits.

Comment on Kamstra: Reasons for Developing Countries to Be Thrilled about Trills

Hammad A. Siddiqi — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 16:37:40 PST

Shiller’s trills might prevent the flight of capital from developing to developed countries, according to Hammad Siddiqi of Lahore University of Management Sciences, who suggests they could be used to realign the objectives of developing nations and international lending agencies such the World Bank and the IMF.

Pain without Purpose

J. Bradford DeLong — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 14:58:43 PST

J. Bradford DeLong, of UC Berkeley, is baffled by the presidents and prime ministers in the North Atlantic. Why, he wonders, do the powers that be insist on inflicting further economic misery?

Why Official Bailouts Tend Not To Work: An Example Motivated by Greece 2010

Christophe P. Chamley et al. — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 16:18:50 PST

Christophe Chamley of Boston University and Brian Pinto of the World Bank use recent events in Greece to illustrate that official bailouts tend not to work when countries have fundamental fiscal (‘insolvency’) problems and construct a two-period numerical example to explain why this should not come as a surprise.

Comment on Pauly: The Constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act—Comparisons with the Home Mortgage Deduction

Edward Song — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 12:40:45 PST

No one calls the home mortgage deduction an "individual mandate" to buy a home, so why should Obama's "mandate" to obtain health care under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) be unconstitutional, asks Edward Song of The Song Law PC.

Deflation Dread Disorder “The CPI is Falling!”

Edward E. Leamer — Mon, 07 Feb 2011 14:00:59 PST

We’re suffering an epidemic of deflation dread disorder, according to Edward Leamer of UCLA who takes on the New York Times and leading talking heads. Leamer's contention is that deflation is not so bad and maybe not coming.