As expected, today’s jobs data showed a slowing labor market. Payrolls expanded by 115,000 in April, less than hoped or expected. Upward revisions to February and March added another 53,000 jobs, however, so the overall payroll picture is better than the headline. The unemployment rate ticked down to 8.1%, the labor force participation rate slipped to 63.6%, [...]
Archive for the ‘Economy’ Category
Jobs Report – The Soft Side of Mediocre
Posted in Data, Economy, Macroeconomics, tagged jobs, Macroeconomics, unemployment on May 4, 2012 | 4 Comments »
The U.S. Economy is Uncertain, Fragile, and … Growing
Posted in Economy, Macroeconomics, tagged Economy, Haiku, Uncertainty on February 1, 2012 | 8 Comments »
Over at the Kauffman Foundation, Tim Kane has released his latest quarterly survey of economic bloggers. Here’s the usual word cloud reflecting the adjectives (up to five per respondent) that we econobloggers offered up to describe the U.S. economy: That’s much better than last quarter, when you needed a magnifying glass to find any optimistic [...]
Getting Better But a Long Way to Go
Posted in Data, Economy, Macroeconomics, tagged jobs, unemployment on January 7, 2012 | 1 Comment »
Friday’s jobs data confirmed that labor markets are getting better, but slowly. Payrolls expanded by 200,000, the unemployment rate fell again to 8.5%, weekly hours ticked up from 34.3 to 34.4, and hourly earnings rose by 0.2%. Of course, there is still a long, long way to go. Unemployment and underemployment both remain very high, but [...]
The Twelve Days of Christmas for Our Weak Economy
Posted in Economy, tagged Humor on December 22, 2011 | 2 Comments »
With apologies to Christmas carol purists, my latest Christian Science Monitor column offers up the twelve days of Christmas for our weak economy. I am no Jeff Foxworthy, so please forgive the poetic license and imprecise scanning. Oh, and kudos to my editor for letting me keep in the reference to Festivus. As the folks [...]
The Most Important Economic Chart of the Year
Posted in Budget, Economy, Finance, International, tagged Europe, Graphics, Interest Rates on December 21, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Ezra Klein surveyed 18 economists for their charts of the year. Here’s my candidate, courtesy of Spiegel Online: This chart illustrates the end of euro complacency. Investors once acted as though the euro eliminated not just currency risk but sovereign credit risk. All nations–from Greece to Germany–could borrow at the same low rates. No longer. [...]
A Great Introduction to Economic Inequality
Posted in Economy, Taxes, tagged Income, Inequality on December 14, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Over at the Browser, Sophie Roell interviews MIT economist Daron Acemoglu on the economics of inequality. In the course of discussing five books on the topic (one of which is actually a research paper), Acemoglu hits many of the high points — technology, skills, and education; the increase in income at the tippy-top of the [...]
The U.S. Economy is Weak, Uncertain, and Fragile
Posted in Economy, Energy, tagged Economy, Macroeconomics on October 31, 2011 | 5 Comments »
At least according to the latest Kauffman survey of economics bloggers by Tim Kane. Here’s the word cloud of responses when the bloggers (including me) were asked for up to five adjectives to describe the U.S. economy in Q4 2011: Comparing this to the last survey in July, the good news is that “vulnerable” has gotten smaller. The [...]
Is Our Luck Running Out on Oil Supplies?
Posted in Economy, Energy, Macroeconomics, tagged Energy, Macroeconomics, Oil on October 23, 2011 | 4 Comments »
In an excellent new paper, Jim Hamilton asks whether the “phenomenal increase in global crude oil production over the last century and a half” reflects technological progress or good fortune in finding new reserves. The two aren’t completely distinct, of course. Better technology helps find more resources. But the heart of the question remains: have we been [...]
Unemployment, Small Business, Quantitative Easing, and More
Posted in Economy, International, Macroeconomics, tagged Federal Reserve, Macroeconomics, Monetary Policy, Small Business, Sweden, unemployment on September 15, 2011 | 1 Comment »
The Fed’s quantitative easing programs did indeed lower interest rates, but more so for Treasuries and mortgage-backed securities than for other kinds of debt. Small businesses are overrated as job creators. Extended unemployment insurance does increase unemployment rates, but not that much. Those are just a few of the findings from papers presented today at [...]
Regulatory Uncertainty and Our Weak Economy
Posted in Economy, Regulation, tagged Economy, Regulation, Uncertainty on September 8, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Over at the Economist’s Free Exchange blog, Grep Ip offers an excellent, balanced analysis of regulatory uncertainty and our weak economy. Here’s a short excerpt: How much of our economic malaise can be blamed on regulatory uncertainty? Conservatives argue that a wave of Obama administration regulations and the threat of more to come are the [...]
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