The figure below shows a series of forecasts by the Federal Reserve for real GDP growth in 2015, with the first forecast made in March 2013 and the last one made a few days ago. Each bar shows the central range of the forecasts by Fed economists, with the average forecast as a dot in… Read more
Archive for the ‘Deficits, Debt and Taxes’ Category
Optimal fiscal policy
I testified in the House Budget Committee this AM and have many excellent war stories to share. But no time to do so now. Until then, please read my testimony, to which I devoted some thought. Roughly speaking, the position of the majority R’s is that you should always balance the budget for…I just sat… Read more
Check it out, OTE’ers: The Reconnection Agenda is upon us!
Read the intro to my new book, The Reconnection Agenda: Reuniting Growth and Prosperity, over at the WaPo PostEverything. Or better yet, download the whole damn book at let me know what you think. You can buy a hard copy–you know, with paper pages, here. [Here’s the cover, which I think is great, by Anthony… Read more
The Fed lowered its long-term unemployment rate…and a salient point re the R’s budgets
Details at PostEverything. Everyone’s wound up about precisely when liftoff will occur (when the Fed will first raise interest rates after about six years at about zero) but I think the big story is that the Fed lowered their “natural rate,” the unemployment rate consistent with stable inflation. It’s a confusing time for Fed macromanagement… Read more
Read this now: a trenchant oped by Greek finance minister Varoufakis
To me it reads like the correct dosage of mind and heart and as such comes across as both a rational and heartfelt approach to the least harmful/most potentially helpful way forward in resolving the debt/fiscal crisis. I guess some clever austerian could argue that the claim “I’m not using game theory” would fit quite neatly… Read more