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BlogHas There Been a Fiscal Shock in the United States Recently?
I used a figure like the one above in a talk that I gave at the Eastern Economic Association 39th Annual Conference last month on the topic “Heterodox Shocks.” (The diagram above incorporates data released at the end of last month.) Total government spending in the US, shown in red, continues to fall as a [...] -
Working Paper No. 766Heterodox Shocks
Should shocks be part of our macro-modeling tool kit—for example, as a way of modeling discontinuities in fiscal policy or big moves in the financial markets? What are shocks, and how can we best put them to use? In heterodox macroeconomics, shocks tend to come in two broad types, with some exceptions for hybrid cases. […] -
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Why Is the Federal Reserve Talking about “Tapering”?
Ryan Avent wonders why, with unemployment too high and inflation too low — even by the Federal Reserve’s own previously articulated standards — there is so much talk of “tapering” coming from members of the Open Market Committee (talk of slowly drawing down the Fed’s asset purchases). Avent mentions the possibility that considerations other than [...] -
Federal Reserve Bank President Narayana Kocherlakota speaking at the 22nd Annual Minsky Conference in New York.
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UK Debate and the Facts Moving in Opposite Directions
Today in the Guardian, Philip Pilkington notices the British Labour party potentially inching away from their scaled-down proposal for a “job guarantee,” an idea fleshed out by Hyman Minsky: Minsky’s theories of financial instability suggested that capitalist economies were prone to serious downturns in which huge amounts of the labour force would find themselves unemployed. [...] -
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More London Whale Postmortem
The US Senate investigation of JPMorgan Chase’s Chief Investment Office (CIO), and more specifically of the operations of its Synthetic Credit Portfolio (SCP) unit — otherwise known as the “London Whale” trades — concluded with the release of their full report in March. The report alleges that the CIO operated without a clear mandate and [...] -
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QE vs the Recovery Act: How Does Our Approach to Stimulus Affect Inequality?
Annie Lowrey recently renewed the ongoing discussion over whether the Federal Reserve’s attempts at reviving the economy through quantitative easing (QE) are exacerbating inequality. The abbreviated version of the argument is that QE operates mainly through boosting asset prices, leading to gains in stocks and housing that largely benefit those at the top. If that’s [...] -
One-Pager No. 38Financial Reform and the London Whale
The recent report by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations on the operations of JPMorgan Chase’s Synthetic Credit Portfolio unit—aka the London Whale—has brought renewed attention to the risks of proprietary trading for insured banks, and provides depth to the larger risks inherent in the financial system after Dodd-Frank. -
One-Pager No. 38
Χρηματοοικονομική μεταρρύθμιση και η «φάλαινα του Σίτι»
Η πρόσφατη έκθεση της μόνιμης υποεπιτροπής της αμερικανικής Γερουσίας για τις έρευνες σχετικά με τις δραστηριότητες της μονάδας Συνθετικού Χαρτοφυλακίου Πιστοδοτήσεων της JPMorgan Chase, που είναι επίσης γνωστή ως η «φάλαινα του Σίτι του Λονδίνου», έστρεψε εκ νέου την προσοχή στους κινδύνους των χρηματιστηριακών πράξεων/αγοραπωλησιών για ίδιο λογαριασμό (proprietary trading) από ασφαλισμένες τράπεζες και αποκαλύπτει […] -
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What Is “Time Poverty” and Why Should You Care?
This is how we came up with the official poverty line for the United States, back in the early 1960s: essentially, we put together a very basic diet, figured out the monetary value, and multiplied by three. If a family has less income than that number, adjusted for inflation, they’re poor. There are numerous problems [...] -
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Minsky Abroad
Announcing two upcoming conferences, organized as part of the Levy Institute’s international research agenda and in conjunction with the Ford Foundation Project on Financial Instability, which draws on Hyman Minsky’s extensive work on financial governance, the structure of financial systems to ensure stability, and the role of government in achieving a growing and equitable economy: [...] -
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New Frontiers in Financial Wrongdoing and Instability
Benjamin Lawsky is the very first Superintendent of the New York Department of Financial Services (DFS), a regulatory body created in 2011 through the merger of the New York State Banking and Insurance Departments. Lawsky spoke recently at the Levy Institute’s annual Minsky conference and he began with an appropriately Minskyan tune: There is a [...]