Monthly Archives: July 2010

TV Fiscal Stimulus Debate Reveals Some Agreement

Posted on July 31, 2010 by John Taylor

PBS Newshour hosted a live TV debate between Mark Zandi and me yesterday on the question of whether government interventions helped or hurt the economy. The show highlighted a paper by Alan Blinder and Zandi about which I posted comments … Continue reading →

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More on the Blinder-Zandi Working Paper on the Crisis

Posted on July 29, 2010 by John Taylor

Yesterday the New York Times published an article about simulations of the effects of fiscal stimulus packages and financial interventions using an old Keynesian model. The simulations were reported in an unpublished working paper by Alan Blinder and Mark Zandi. … Continue reading →

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More Economists Voice Concerns about Deficit-Spending Proposals

Posted on July 21, 2010 by John Taylor

The number of economists arguing forcefully against efforts to use more deficit spending to stimulate the economy is increasing. Their arguments differ in important respects, ranging from empirical evidence that the stimulus programs thus far have done little to help … Continue reading →

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Government Policy and the Slowdown

Posted on July 20, 2010 by John Taylor

Is the economy slowing down and what has been the role of government? Recently EconTalk host Russ Roberts and I discussed these questions and our conversation was made available today as a podcast at the Library of Economics and Liberty. … Continue reading →

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New Data Show the Debt Problem Is Spending (not Taxes) and Obamacare Worsens the Problem

Posted on July 18, 2010 by John Taylor

Everyone now seems to agree that the exploding federal debt is a serious problem that must be addressed. But how? The following two charts provide some data to help answer that question. I put the charts together using budget data … Continue reading →

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A Chart for the Fourth of July

Posted on July 4, 2010 by John Taylor

Just before Americans started celebrating the July 4th weekend, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its annual Long Term Budget Outlook. The chart shows the CBO projection of the federal debt (as a percent of GDP) assuming that current law … Continue reading →

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Financial Reform with False Remedies and Errors of Omission

Posted on July 1, 2010 by John Taylor

A common criticism of the Dodd-Frank bill keeps coming up as more people wade through the several hundred sections, or at least summaries of them. This common criticism is that the bill contains many false remedies and errors of omission. … Continue reading →

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