I gave an updated talk on this topic for the Better Policy Project yesterday. Slides available at
this link, video link below.
Author Archives: James_Hamilton
Why did U.S. real GDP fall?
The Bureau of Economic Analysis announced today that seasonally adjusted U.S. real GDP fell at a 1.4% annual rate in the first quarter. What does this portend?
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What can I do to help Ukraine?
I asked this question to my friend and prominent academic economist Yuriy Gorodnichenko. Here were his answers for three of the places to which he’s been making financial contributions:
Sanctions, energy prices, and the world economy
Oil sanctions and recession
After a wild ride up to $130 a barrel, the price of oil has come back down to its level from before Russia invaded Ukraine. Russian oil may be finding buyers despite the sanctions, and U.S. production continues to recover. But the situation remains very uncertain, and a big disruption in the quantity of Russian oil that reaches world refineries is a very significant possibility. In my previous post, I examined the causes of the run-up in the price of oil that had already occurred before the invasion and discussed the implications for U.S. inflation. Today I comment on the possible implications of further supply disruptions for U.S. real GDP.
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Oil prices and inflation
The price of oil has doubled from its value a year ago and could increase much more if there are significant reductions in the quantity of Russian oil that reaches world refineries. This is the first in a series of two posts on what these events could mean for the U.S. economy. Today I focus on the implications for inflation, and in a follow-up post I will discuss implications for real GDP.
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GDP almost back to potential
The Bureau of Economic Analysis announced today that seasonally adjusted U.S. real GDP grew at a 6.9% annual rate in the fourth quarter, more than twice the average growth rate the U.S. has seen since World War II.
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GDP growth: is this as good as it gets?
The Bureau of Economic Analysis announced today that seasonally adjusted U.S. real GDP grew at a 2% annual rate in the third quarter, slightly below the average growth rate of 2.25% that we saw during the previous economic expansion.
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Video tour of Mars
From NASA.
The economic recovery continues
The Bureau of Economic Analysis announced today that seasonally adjusted U.S. real GDP grew at a 6.5% annual rate in the second quarter. That’s well above the 3.1% average growth that the U.S. experienced over 1947-2019. Kudos to Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta economist Patrick Higgins, whose nowcast of 6.4% that Menzie highlighted yesterday anticipated today’s release on the nose.
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