Author Archives: John Taylor
A New Chart Cast on the Bad News Recovery
As many have observed the employment report for August released today was disappointing news, but it really is a continuation of a steady stream of bad employment news that has been the story of this recovery since its beginning. The … Continue reading
Posted in Slow Recovery
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Strong Push Back at Jackson Hole
In his Jackson Hole speech, Ben Bernanke argued that quantitative easing (in particular Large Scale Asset Purchases, or LSAPs) has had large macroeconomic effects, saying that “a study using the Board’s FRB/US model of the economy found that, as of … Continue reading
Posted in Monetary Policy
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Government Policies and the Delayed Economic Recovery
A year ago, when the economic recovery had already been delayed two years, Lee Ohanain and I got the idea for a book on the role policy in the delay. To make the idea operational we invited people who were working on … Continue reading
Posted in Slow Recovery
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Which Simple Rule for Monetary Policy?
The discussion of “Simple Rules for Monetary Policy” at last week’s FOMC meeting is a promising sign of a desire by some to return to a more rules-based policy. As described in the FOMC minutes, the discussion was about many of … Continue reading
Posted in Monetary Policy
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Democracy is Not a Spectator Sport, Even for Economists
It’s good news that economic issues are now getting more attention in the presidential campaign. More than 400 economists have signed a statement on the differences between the Romney economic program and the Obama program—the numbers are growing each day—and … Continue reading
Posted in Teaching Economics
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Paul Krugman is Wrong
Paul Krugman took time off from his vacation last Friday to take a shot at a paper by Kevin Hassett, Glenn Hubbard, Greg Mankiw and John Taylor on the growth and employment impacts of Governor Romney’s economic program in comparison … Continue reading
Posted in Regulatory Policy
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It’s Still a Recovery in Name Only–A Real Tragedy
I have been regularly charting the path of real GDP and employment during the recovery from the recession as new data are released. From the start it was clear that the recovery was very weak. By its second anniversary the … Continue reading
Posted in Slow Recovery
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Still Learning from Milton Friedman
We can still learn much from Milton Friedman, who was born 100 years ago today. Here I focus on his role in the macroeconomic debates of the 1960s and 1970s, because they are so similar to the debates raging again … Continue reading
Posted in Monetary Policy
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Benefits of More Fed “Action” Do Not Exceed Costs
Both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal ran front page stories yesterday reporting that the Fed is yet again about to take action. “Fragile Economy Said to Push Fed to Weigh Action” said the Times. “Fed Moves Closer to … Continue reading
Posted in Monetary Policy
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One of the Most Important Lessons of Modern Macroeconomics
I completely agree with John Cochrane when he writes in his review of my book First Principles that the “preference for rules is one of the most important lessons of modern macroeconomics” and that it is still the major point of … Continue reading
Posted in Monetary Policy
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Economics One 