I’ve talked about this on the radio for the last few weeks already, and talked to national media about this too. I thought I would just briefly mention here some of the items people should be looking at with these budget revisions. Here is a link to the announced revisions to the document.
I’ll be teaching bank regulation to the upper-level undergrads and forecasting to the undergrads and grad students this term. This got me thinking about risk. Risk is a huge issue for these subjects, obviously.
I changed the look of the website a bit, but the content will remain the same. I remain convinced North Dakota is a fascinating subject for economic research. In particular the population dynamics with the economy in the state are fascinating and an important subject for my continued research. I’ll continue to post about these ideas as I can, as well as general economic trends and aspects that are important. I will also post about my bank regulation and forecasting classes for this term.
In an epic display of the more things change, the more they stay the same Paul Ryan is unhappy with the process of fiscal policy under his own leadership. I will wait to comment on the legislation more fully when the votes are in (what the end passing coalition looks like may be the most interesting part of this). With this policy we essentially put in place tax cuts and spending increases, so something for both parties to celebrate or at least sell as a victory. Of course it is fiscally irresponsible and leads me to the generic comment I want to make: fiscal policy is not working. As much as people (in and out of government) want to take aim at the Fed, their policy decisions can be justified as following a defined approach to policy and the world.
Continue reading Reaffirming the Impotence of the Fiscal Policy Process
In what may be the most telegraphed monetary policy move in history the Federal Reserve raised rates today by 0.25% (here is an article). The great wailing and gnashing of teeth predicted by all the Chicken Littles seems not to have come to pass though. I have been saying this on JT’s show for the better part of a year now: If the economy is so fragile that a 0.25% increase in rates is a threat to economic growth than we have bigger issues.