Economics

I have a post on my other blog, Outrun Change, that discusses the reshoring trend.  More companies are bringing their manufacturing back to the U.S. because of changing economics of offshoring.   One challenge in reshoring is improving the skills of American workers so they can use the latest technology.

Reshoring – huge opportunity if we want it and a skill-set challenge we can overcome

After reading some comments in Russell Roberts’ book, The Price of Everything, I realized that I have a lot of servants hard at work in my home.  I have a huge number of servants working in my business.

See a partial list of servants who are hard at work at my other blog, Outrun Change:  I Have Dozens of Servants in My Home and Business.

…

I have lots of servants helping in my home and businessRead More »

(cross-post from my other blog, Nonprofit Update)

While out for a walk yesterday morning, I noticed construction at the strip shopping center near my home. Wood frame in just about done.

New construction?  In this economy?  That isn’t supposed to be happening, right?

…

Is it possible we are not heading into a double dip recession?Read More »

The team at Econstories.tv have made the Fear the Boom and Bust and Fight of the Century available on MP3. For free. If you enjoyed the video, you might enjoy the mp3.

The videos of the rap songs are also available for download. For free.

You can get them on the right side of their home page, linked above.

Have a post, Inflation watch, up on my other blog. April numbers are continuing at the increased level that started in late 2010. See my post for graphs.

(duplicate of post from Nonprofit Update)

The great economists Hayek and Keynes continue their rap encounters. This time they go to a congressional hearing and wind up in a boxing ring.

Check out Fight of the Century at EconStories.

Some of my favorite lines:

…

Rappin’ economists, round 2. Yes, rapping. Yes, round 2.Read More »

(cross-posted from www.ulvog.wordpress.com)

Amity Shlaes, in her current Forbes column, Economics by Cartoon, points out that the cartoon Quantitative Easing Explained and the rap debate between Keynes and Hayek have received 3.5 million and 1.7 million hits on YouTube, respectively.  I’ve mentioned these videos here and here.  (Just checked – the QE cartoon is up to 4.0 million visits.)

Over 5.7 million hits on YouTube video explanations of what is going on?  Why?

…

Why are cartoons such a popular explanation of economics right now?Read More »

Cross post from www.ulvog.wordpress.com

Incredible visualization of 200 years of economic development and improvements in health around the world.  A professor creates an entertaining visual of how health and wealth has increased in 200 countries over 2 centuries.  Does it all in under 5 minutes.  In 1810 all countries of the world were poor and sick.  The industrial revolution started many countries up the health and wealth climb.  World War I and the influenza epidemic knocked everyone back.  The great depression moved many countries back in wealth but not in health.  After WWII, lots of countries really took off.  There are big disparities in 2009, but the improvements everywhere from 1810 to 2009 are mind-boggling.  Few countries are left in the poor and sick area.  Most people live in the middle of wealth scale and most of the people on the planet are at the upper end of the health scale.

The million dollar question?  What drives the improvement?  Watch it twice to see if you think that economic development is the driver for all of it.  Compare what you know about when countries started adopting the capitalist, industrial approach to their economy.

Lessons?  Take your pick.  War is bad for everyone.  Epidemics are really bad.  Economic growth helps everyone.  More economic growth would close the gap between top and bottom.

Biggest factor I see in the video?  Economic growth from capitalism means a country can afford better infrastructure and disease prevention meaning everyone is healthier.  If we can keep from killing ourselves from another world war and keep from killing the economic engine that got us here, the future is brighter than today!

Hat tip Exurban League

One semester of econ in 6 entertaining minutes.  A few cute quips from the video in very loose paraphrase:

The Fed is engaged in quantitative easing because they believe there is danger of deflation.  But aren’t food prices higher than a year ago? Yes. …

Great video explaining one perspective on why QE2 is a lousy ideaRead More »

Quantitative Easin’ is a new song in easy listening style that explains what the Fed is planning for the very near future.  Fun explanation.  Watch out for the depressing graphs though.

The singer, Curtis Threadneedle, is on facebook here.

Update: Fed announced the QE2 will be for $600,000,000,000 spread in $75B purchases per month of longer-term treasuries. Typo in title of this post corrected.

As news reports indicate the Fed plans a half trillion dollar quantitative easing, it is a good time to revisit the Hayek and Keynes debate.  If you would like a rap explanation, check this out: “Fear the Boom and Bust”. Yes, Hayek presented in rap. …

Rapping Economists debate how to improve the economy? Rapping? On economics?Read More »

The people who make the official call for the start and end point of recessions, which is the National Bureau of Economic Research, announced on September 20 that the recession officially hit bottom in June 2009.  We need to look at what that actually means.  The bottom point of the economic cycle is considered the end of a recession.  The Bureau calculated the low point, or the trough, was in June last year.  Since then the economy has been recovering, although slowly. …

The recession officially ended in June 2009Read More »

If you are so interested, lots of economic data is available from the federal government on-line.  Two items of interest to me are unemployment data and GDP changes.  Those are fairly major pieces of the economic picture.

Unemployment data:  Alternative measures of labor utilization – table A-15 from the Bureau of Labor Statistics

Of particular interest are U-3 and U-6. The most quoted information is the U-3 measure, which is a calculation of unemployed people as percent of the civilian labor force.  This is the official number you hear about. The broader data is the U-6 measure. That is based on the total number unemployed plus people only able to work part-time, plus people who want to work but have dropped out of the market.  Or at least that is my casual interpretation of the data.

Changes in GDP:  Percent change from preceding period in real Gross Domestic Product – table 1.1.1 from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. 

There are several frequently requested tables from the BEA.

http://www.bea.gov/national/nipaweb/SelectTable.asp?Popular=Y