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Medicare for 64-Year-Olds Is a Step Toward Medicare for AllDean Baker
Truthout, April 8, 2019
Dean Baker / April 08, 2019
Article Artículo
The "Independent" Fed Isn't Quite What It Is Cracked Up to BeCEPR / April 06, 2019
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Predicting the Next Recession and Other Things to Do with Your TimeThe people who completely missed the housing bubble, the collapse of which sank the economy in 2008 and gave us the Great Recession, are again busy telling us about the next recession on the way. The latest item that they want us to be very worried about is an inversion of the yield curve. There has been an inversion of the yield curve before nearly every prior recession and we have never had an inversion of the yield curve without seeing a recession in the next two years.
If you have no idea what an inversion of the yield curve is, that probably means you’re a normal person with better things to do with your time. But for economists, and especially those who monitor financial markets closely, this can be a big deal.
An inverted yield curve refers to the relationship between shorter- and longer-term interest rates. Typically, a longer-term interest rate, say the interest rate you would get on a 30-year bond, is higher than what you would get from lending short-term, like buying a three-month Treasury bill.
The logic is that if you are locking up your money for a longer period of time, you have to be compensated with a higher interest rate. Therefore, it is generally true that as you get to longer durations, say a one-year bond compared to three-month bond, the interest rate rises. This relationship between interest rates and the duration of the loan is what is known as the “yield curve.”
We get an inverted yield curve when this pattern of higher interest rates associated with longer-term lending does not hold, as was at least briefly the case last week. For example, on Wednesday, March 27th, the interest rate on a three-month Treasury bill was 2.43 percent. The interest rate on a ten-year Treasury bond was just 2.38 percent, 0.05 percentage points lower. That meant that we had an inverted yield curve.
CEPR / April 05, 2019
Article Artículo
The Growth of Weekly Hours in Key Sectors is WeakKevin Cashman / April 05, 2019
Jobs Byte Artículo
Economy Adds 196,000 Jobs in March; Some Signs of Slowing Wage GrowthApril 5, 2019 (Jobs Byte)
Dean Baker / April 05, 2019
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Global Civil Society Urges WTO Members to Abandon Digital Trade TalksDeborah James / April 03, 2019
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Deflation Is Not Preventing Consumers from Buying Items in JapanCEPR / April 03, 2019
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Buttigieg Says Flooding in the Midwest Is Not Big Deal, Just a Small Fraction of Year's RainfallCEPR / April 02, 2019
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Why is Populism on the Rise and What do Populists Want?Dean Baker
The International Economy, Winter 2019
Dean Baker / April 02, 2019
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Latin America and the Caribbean
NAFTA in the Time of AMLORebecca Watts / April 02, 2019
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Facebook Will Only Get "Flummoxed" in India if It Has Inadequate StaffingCEPR / April 02, 2019
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As US Economy Weakens, Economists Struggle to Predict Next RecessionDean Baker
Truthout, April 1, 2019
Dean Baker / April 01, 2019
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Who Will Get Poor from Uber, Lyft, and Other "Unicorns" that Go Public?CEPR / March 29, 2019
Article Artículo
Labor Market Policy Research Reports, March 2019CEPR regularly publishes a curated collection of original research from academic institutions and nonprofits on the state of the US labor market. The compilation is part of our ongoing effort to promote informed debate on the most important economic and social issues that affect people's lives.
The Brookings Institution
Advancing Opportunity in California’s Inland Empire
California’s Inland Empire has seen exceptional growth over the years due in large part to its affordability and close proximity to the Pacific Ocean. However, a series of busts and booms within trade and technology coupled with the Great Recession threatened to diminish the growth of the region and left many of the workers behind. This report finds ways to advance jobs opportunities in the area. The authors found the Inland Empire must increase competitiveness and diversity in “opportunity industries”— industries that contain good and promising jobs.
CEPR and / March 29, 2019
Article Artículo
Putting Numbers in Context: A Winnable Battle Our Side Doesn’t Want to FightPolls consistently show that the public hugely overestimates the share of the budget that goes to items like SNAP (food stamps), Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF), and foreign aid. People will typically give answers in the range of 20 to 30 percent of the budget for these categories of spending. In reality, the shares are 1.5 percent for SNAP, 0.4 percent for TANF, and 0.4 percent for foreign aid.
I would argue that this matters, since the public’s willingness to support a program depends in part on how much they think we are spending on it. This is for two reasons, the first is simply that people are only willing to pay a limited amount in taxes to help the poor here and abroad. If they already think they are spending a lot for this purpose, they will be reluctant to spend more.
The other reason is that people will reasonably be concerned about the efficiency of the programs. If all our tax dollars are going to help poor people, and yet we still have so many people in poverty, then our anti-poverty programs must not be very efficient. If that is the case, added additional dollars probably will not do much to help the poor. Nor will modest cuts do much to harm them.
All of this seems pretty straightforward and not really debatable, yet when it comes to educating the public on the true size of these programs, interest is very close to zero. That is hard to understand, especially when the route to a better-educated public is pretty easy to see.
The most obvious reason that people grossly overestimate the amount of spending on these programs is that their budgets are always discussed as billions of dollars. No one knows how much billions of dollars are, except that it means lots of money.
Discussing budget numbers in millions, billions, and trillions is incredibly irresponsible reporting. It is the job of the media to be informing their audience. Writing that food stamps cost $70 billion a year, or that TANF costs $20 billion, is not informing readers. It is just putting down numbers, equivalent to a mindless fraternity ritual, that serves no informational purpose.
CEPR / March 28, 2019
report informe
Private Equity PillageEileen Appelbaum and Rosemary Batt / March 27, 2019
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Trump’s Budget Would Deny Food to 400,000 Children and Pregnant PeopleDean Baker
Truthout, March 25, 2019
Dean Baker / March 25, 2019
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Fred Hiatt Trashes the Left: Suppose a Billionaire Paid People to Trash the CenterCEPR / March 25, 2019