Mia over at PragmaticMom.com has posted a great analysis of basic monetary economics over at her blog. I encourage you all to read it. Here’s an excerpt:
This is the key question of why the United States (and therefore Rosie) can’t just print endless amounts of money. This questions shifts from a question of Government…
After my post on The Truth About Austerity and hearing some great feedback from Peter in the comments, I deemed it necessary to dedicate a post to explaining the basics of public finance. We at Hans try to make basic economics accessible to all readers, so I will aim to keep it simple and limit…
Would a 3rd Round of Fed Quantitative Easing be a charm?
Matthew O’Brien, writing last week for The Atlantic, certainly feels it would be. Those who share his sentiments were disappointed when Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke in his hearing before Congress stated “monetary policy is not a panacea”, which many have interpreted as a sign…
Sometimes economists make analogies to make policies coherent. I find this by line particularly appetizing, imagining Bernanke as a soufflé chef trying to keep his light dessert fluffy. According to Menzie Chinn and Jeffry Frieden, the solution is just to whip in a little inflation to keep that soufflé/economy healthy.
The basic idea they convey…
To piggyback on nfreiling’s post, Krugman’s article makes several oversights which only muddy his analysis. First, he relies on the mainstream definition of inflation—a rise in prices. However, a more accurate definition for inflation would be “an increase in the supply of money”—something that has happened at a historically unprecedented rate if the following chart…
Leave it to Paul Krugman to try and invalidate Austrian economic theory with a measly 3-year inflation figure:
“Austrians…were sure about what would happen as a result: There would be devastating inflation. One popular Austrian commentator who advised (Ron) Paul, Peter Schiff, even warned…of the possibility of Zimbabwe-style hyperinflation in the near future.
“So here…
