Bull Market

Wall Street opposed the anti-LGBT #HB2. Will they oppose bigotry in the White House?

Dangerous Bill to Deregulate Private Equity Could Enable New Fraud

Whatever happened to deficit bias?

Deficit bias: The tendency of governments to allow deficit and public debt levels to increase. Irish Fiscal Council Glossary.

Yesterday I wrote that the UK would be better advised to launch a conventional fiscal stimulus than to rely on…

UK helicopter money: a solution in search of a problem

Talk of UK helicopter money is whirring up again. I can’t really see why.

Sure, there’s a case — in extremis — for a central bank to create money and either buy and cancel government debt (effectively financing…

The best-paid hedge fund managers made $13 billion last year

That’s enough to end family homelessness in America

Globalisation is fraying. Look under the Elephant Trunk

Globalisation is fraying. Of course in some ways it looks to be in rude health — flows of people across borders continue to rise and the internet is driving ever higher flows of information. But some of the core beliefs that many…

The IMF, the neoliberal agenda and the world we’ve built

The IMF is questioning elements of the “neoliberal agenda”. As a headline that’s big news and the article that appeared on the Fund’s website yesterday evening is well worth taking the time to read.

House Subcommittee Considers Bill to Shred the SEC’s Tires

The many problems with the Investment Advisers Modernization Act

Is Doha driving oil prices higher?

Is the oil output freeze meeting in Doha the reason behind the jump up in crude prices? Is the market pricing a deal? Or is there an alternate thesis.

On Sunday April 17th, over a dozen key oil producers, OPEC members and non-members, will…

Labour Bargaining Power and the Luddite Fear

Technological change is as old as history.

In fact, in the broadest of sweeps, the economic history of mankind is a story of technological change, rising productivity and rising living standards.

Advocates and Lawmakers Press for Relief to Groups of Students Victimized by Predatory Practices

Fed-worrying

Three weeks I wrote that:

Right now, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if a year that began with a deflation/growth scare ended with an inflation scare.

Now, predicting the “return of inflation” is something of a trope of post-2009 economic commentary and…

Deregulation: Bad for Cheeseburgers, Bad for Financial Markets

Senator Warren Presses For Debt Cancellation NOW for Defrauded Students

Panics, Crises, the Fed & the Labour Share

Once upon a time it was common to refer to financial market catastrophes as panics rather than the more modern terminology crises. So the panics of 1873, 1893 and 1907 gradually gave way to the crises of Asian crisis of 1997/98, the all-consuming crisis…

How does capital respond to a labour shortage?

An article in the Wall Street Journal last week got me thinking again about of the bigger medium term questions in macroeconomics. Namely, what should we be worrying about more: not enough workers or not enough jobs?

Global Output Gaps & Inflation

The global economy looks a bit more ropey than it did a few weeks ago. Or at least is does if you’re taking your cues from equity and commodity markets, which have chosen to mark my return to the financial services industry with the worst start the year in decades.

2016 — The Year of “Never Closer Union”

The problems of Euroland haven’t exactly gone away, but after the climax, denoument and…

Goodhart-Nangle, Demographic Destiny & Varieties of Capitalism

The single most interesting macroeconomic idea to come out financial markets types this year is what it’s being called Goodhart-Nangle hypothesis (after former Bank of England chief economists Charles Goodhart (who’s…

Mark Zuckerberg’s $45 Billion Loophole

Facebook’s founder just invented the Keeping Pledge

Sector balances, macroprudential policy and the UK economy

A week ago the Office for Budget Responsibility published its Economic and Fiscal Outlook alongside the Autumn Statement. And for a change most the reaction and analysis focused on the fiscal forecast rather than its economic…

New Heights of Preposterousness

60% of Ted Cruz‘s tax cut goes to the top 1%

Bernie Sanders Wants to Spend $18 Trillion: So What?

The shortest Greece post ever

It has been suggested to me, somewhat forcibly, that ten thousand words about a bailout package from five years ago that’s long since been superseded, was a bit too much. I disagree, of course — picking over old case studies is how you learn in business school, and it’s a good…