Steven Kopits argues about the relevance of market imperfections, to wit:
What the hell do you teach your students, Menzie? “Well, you know, here’s the theory, but let’s not get carried away with it in real life.”? Why would anyone want to be an economist when the bulk of your views seem to revolve around exceptions to the rule, about presumptions that you are smarter than the market or that markets don’t work?
New information coming out on Friday, employment in a week and a half. For now:
Figure 1: Nonfarm payroll employment (dark blue), Bloomberg consensus for January as of 1/26 (blue square), industrial production (red), personal income excluding transfers in Ch.2012$ (green), manufacturing and trade sales in Ch.2012$ (black), and monthly GDP in Ch.2012$ (pink), all log normalized to 2020M02=0. Source: BLS, Federal Reserve, BEA, via FRED, IHS Markit (nee Macroeconomic Advisers) (1/4/2021 release), NBER, and author’s calculations.
Farm income rose – but income from selling farm products fell. Were it not for direct farm support, income would’ve fallen.
With the Washington Monument in the background, President-elect Joe Biden with his wife Jill Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris with her husband Doug Emhoff listen as Yolanda Adams sings “Hallelujah” during a COVID-19 memorial, with lights placed around the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, Tuesday, Jan. 19, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
Source: NPR
An Econbrowser reader, defending the use of the term “China virus” instead of the Covid-19 term, writes:
I remember once seeing a book on a used bookstore shelf in Washington DC (Second Story Books?) years ago entitled “Great Public Policy Disasters” or something like that. Over this year, I’ve been thinking that one could write an entire book series entitled “Great Public Policy Disasters of 2020” . With that in mind, here’s the year in review:
By Jeffrey Frankel, December 24, 2020.
Key indicators tracked by NBER Business Cycle Dating Committee (BCDC) show mixed behavior; income (ex-transfers) declines. So too does consumption.
The stock market booms while GDP staggers along. Why?
