Showing posts with label Macro Demystified. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 7, 2018
What is inflation? Let Wala’a explain in less than 2 minutes!
What is inflation? Let Wala’a explain in less than 2 minutes!
Posted by at 12:49 PM
Labels: Macro Demystified
Monday, January 15, 2018
From a new IMF working paper by Jihad Dagher:
“This paper reviews some of the most infamous financial crisis in history and brings several patterns that are rarely discussed in the literature, at least not in a historical and cross- sectional approach. It shows that in most cases regulation has been pro-cyclical, effectively weakening during the boom and strengthening during the bust. Regulators do not operate in a vacuum, and this paper shows how, in most cases, political interventions have helped fuel the boom in similar ways across time and countries. The political repercussions of crises, partly due to changes in the public’s perception about the role of the government, are usually very significant. They help explain the reversal of policies and the regulatory backlash.
The interplay between politics and financial policy, described in this paper, has not received sufficient attention. The focus of the literature, which has been mostly cast in technical terms, is to find the optimal level of regulation that regulators should be enforc- ing. Will new regulations and their enforcement survive the test of time? History offers a relatively pessimistic answer to this question. It offers plenty of examples where regulatory failures can be attributed to political failures. Strengthened regulations and supervision are, in essence, tools given to regulators to use as long as the political climate allows them to. To what extent can regulators be insulated from changes in politicians’ (and voters’) philosophy toward regulation? What changes need to be made at the institutional level? This is an important question left for future research. Acknowledging the fact that politics can be the undoing of macro-prudential policy would be a step in the right direction.”
From a new IMF working paper by Jihad Dagher:
“This paper reviews some of the most infamous financial crisis in history and brings several patterns that are rarely discussed in the literature, at least not in a historical and cross- sectional approach. It shows that in most cases regulation has been pro-cyclical, effectively weakening during the boom and strengthening during the bust. Regulators do not operate in a vacuum, and this paper shows how,
Posted by at 2:35 PM
Labels: Macro Demystified
Thursday, January 11, 2018
From a blog by Duncan Green: “Stefan gave us a tour of the ‘Big Ideals, Big Egos and Big Thinkers in development’. Here they are, points for recognizing them.” Continue reading the wonderful summary here.
From a blog by Duncan Green: “Stefan gave us a tour of the ‘Big Ideals, Big Egos and Big Thinkers in development’. Here they are, points for recognizing them.” Continue reading the wonderful summary here.
Posted by at 10:24 AM
Labels: Inclusive Growth, Macro Demystified
Monday, December 25, 2017
My work with Davide Furceri, and Jonathan D. Ostry on The aggregate and disttributional effects of financial globalization: evidence from macro and sectoral data makes into the list of the research that shaped our world in 2017–put together by Dan Kopf of Quartz.
The aggregate and disttributional effects of financial globalization: evidence from macro and sectoral data (pdf) by Davide Furceri, Prakash Loungani and Jonathan D. Ostry
Main finding: Foreign finance has led to more inequality.
Nominating economist: Dani Rodrik, Harvard University
Specialization: Globalization and economic development
Why? “In brief, opening up to foreign finance (“financial globalization”) produces limited gains to aggregate output while generating significant increases in income inequality (a higher share of top incomes, a lower labor share, etc.). This paper’s conclusions are significant as the authors are researchers at the International Monetary Fund, which aggressively pushed for financial globalization until recently.”
My work with Davide Furceri, and Jonathan D. Ostry on The aggregate and disttributional effects of financial globalization: evidence from macro and sectoral data makes into the list of the research that shaped our world in 2017–put together by Dan Kopf of Quartz.
The aggregate and disttributional effects of financial globalization: evidence from macro and sectoral data (pdf) by Davide Furceri, Prakash Loungani and Jonathan D.
Posted by at 2:48 PM
Labels: Macro Demystified
From Dani Rodrik’s weblog:
Ten commandments for economists
1. Economics is a collection of models; cherish their diversity.
2. It’s a model, not the model.
3. Make your model simple enough to isolate specific causes and how they work, but not so simple that it leaves out key interactions among causes.
4. Unrealistic assumptions are OK; unrealistic critical assumptions are not OK.
5. The world is (almost) always second-best.
6. To map a model to the real world you need explicit empirical diagnostics, which is more craft than science.
7. Do not confuse agreement among economists for certainty about how the world works.
8. It’s OK to say “I don’t know” when asked about the economy or policy.
9. Efficiency is not everything.
10. Substituting your values for the public’s is an abuse of your expertise.
Ten commandments for non-economists
1. Economics is a collection of models with no predetermined conclusions; reject any arguments otherwise.
2. Do not criticize an economist’s model because of its assumptions; ask how the results would change if certain problematic assumptions were more realistic.
3. Analysis requires simplicity; beware of incoherence that passes itself off as complexity.
4. Do not let math scare you; economists use math not because they are smart, but because they are not smart enough.
5. When an economist makes a recommendation, ask what makes him/her sure the underlying model applies to the case at hand.
6. When an economist uses the term “economic welfare,” ask what s/he means by it.
7. Beware that an economist may speak differently in public than in the seminar room.
8. Economists don’t (all) worship markets, but they know better how they work than you do.
9. If you think all economists think alike, attend one of their seminars.
10. If you think economists are especially rude to non-economists, attend one of their seminars.
From Dani Rodrik’s weblog:
Ten commandments for economists
1. Economics is a collection of models; cherish their diversity.
2. It’s a model, not the model.
3. Make your model simple enough to isolate specific causes and how they work, but not so simple that it leaves out key interactions among causes.
4. Unrealistic assumptions are OK; unrealistic critical assumptions are not OK.
Posted by at 2:35 PM
Labels: Macro Demystified
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