Global Investors Are Telling Donald Trump His Deficits and National…
Washington is unnerved these days about budget deficits and the national debt. Deficit angst comes along periodically, often as a pretext for cutting social spending. This time, however, there’s genuine cause for alarm. Outsized deficits are par for the course when the economy is in recession or reeling from a shock like the pandemic or the financial collapse; most of… Continue reading
Globalization 2.0 and the Rise of the Rest
International economic conferences like the one I attended in Rio a few weeks ago can be a little tedious, when experts debate their latest econometric models. Yet, I sat up and listened very intently when an IMF official remarked, almost as an aside, that the world’s emerging economies would account for 48 percent of global GDP this year. That means…Continue reading
The Cost of Playing Games with the Full Faith and…
I spent last week in Rio attending a meeting of the IMF’s advisory board for the Western Hemisphere — and returned this week to Washington for the latest round of threats and charges over raising the U.S. debt limit. The contrast was, at once, disturbing and farcical. At the IMF meeting, former finance ministers, prime ministers and other ex-economic policy…Continue reading
Running on Empty: The Economics and Politics of Gasoline Prices
Mother Nature is intervening again in U.S. energy markets. Just as falling oil prices are puncturing upward pressures on gasoline prices, prospects of serious flooding in areas of the Gulf states where refineries are concentrated has sent gas future prices soaring again. With the economy sputtering a bit again, it’s not welcome news for the President, or for the rest…Continue reading
Cutting Long-Term Deficits Alone Won’t Fix the Economy
Washington is mesmerized these days with the two parties’ various stratagems to turn the deficit debate to their own advantage.  But all this political maneuvering may carry a big cost for Americans, as it sidelines any serious action on our larger, more immediate economic problems. The U.S. expansion is in some danger today, but not from the deficit projections for…Continue reading
President Obama Wins the First Round with Paul Ryan
Yesterday’s presidential address on fiscal policy was a very striking scene. The venue was a small auditorium at George Washington University. Invitations went out just two days earlier; and with so little notice, GWU students made up more than half of the audience. Former Democratic economic policy officials — myself and perhaps 10 others — directors of Democratic-allied policy shops,…Continue reading
Why Big Banks Want Americans to Pay More for Everything
Once again, the nation’s big banks are working hard to have their own way with some of the most consequential issues before Congress. Tucked into the small print of Paul Ryan’s budget plan for 2012 and beyond are provisions to roll back the key regulatory steps taken to make another financial meltdown less likely, especially higher capital requirements tied to…Continue reading
Forget about Spending and Get Serious about the Economy
Washington today, especially the Congress, has a textbook case of cognitive dissonance. A confluence of black swan developments may well threaten the American and global recoveries. There’s the civil war in Libya and unrest across much of the Middle East that could disrupt world energy supplies, the natural catastrophes in Japan may upend the world’s third largest economy, and several…Continue reading
The Aftershocks for the U.S. Economy from the Disaster in…
As the damage to Japan and its economy from the recent natural disasters deepens, we can begin to see serious potential aftershocks for our own economy. In certain respects, the United States relies on our broad and intricate financial and trading relationships with Japan. China has surpassed Japan as the world’s largest buyer of U.S. Treasury securities. But Japan remains…Continue reading