Notes:

Latest blog posts from Style Guide

Nobel Pool Update
One of organizers of the a href="http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2008/10/nobel-prize-pool.html"Nobel Prize pool/a provides this update on the betting:br /span style="font-family:arial;"blockquotepspan style="font-family:arial;"Robert Barro has emerged in the Harvard Nobel Pool with 16.2% of all... Read more...
Published 3 hours ago

Jefferson had the Louisiana Purchase
A student alerts me to this story:br /span style="font-family:arial;"blockquotepstrongspan style="font-family:arial;"a href="http://uk.reuters.com/article/reutersEdge/idUKLNE49906S20081010"Iceland for sale on eBay/a/span/strong/ppspan style="font-family:arial;"LONDON (Reuters) - Great scenery and... Read more...
Published 7 hours ago

Recession or Depression?
A student asks,br /span style="font-family:arial;"blockquotespan style="font-family:arial;"What makes a recession officially turn into a depression?/span/blockquote/spanThere is no official designation of depression. The NBER business cycle dating committee, of which I was once a member, picks... Read more...
Published 18 hours ago

Never say never
a href="http://voanews.com/english/2008-10-08-voa44.cfm"The VOA reports/a:br /span style="font-family:arial;"blockquotespan style="font-family:arial;"Blanchard and his IMF colleagues say there is strongspan style="color:#cc0000;"no chance/span/strong of a repeat of the global depression of the... Read more...
Published a day ago

More Commentary on the Financial Mess
ollia href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/08/AR2008100802931.html"Laurence Kotlikoff and Perry Mehrling/a/lilia href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122351051370717359.html"Vernon Smith/a/lilia... Read more...
Published a day ago

How to Recapitalize the Financial System
There is broad agreement among economists that what the financial system needs right now is not only an injection of liquidity but also a recapitalization. The essence of the current financial crisis is that many firms bet that housing prices would not fall; the prices fell nonetheless; and now... Read more...
Published 2 days ago

Lessons from the Past
a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122342618776613613.html"UCLA econ prof Lee Ohanian/a:br /span style="font-family:arial;"blockquotepspan style="font-family:arial;"There are many historical precedents of bad policies following crises. The worst case was after the stock-market crash in... Read more...
Published 3 days ago

Explaining the Financial Crisis
Sort of.br /br /object width="400" height="324"param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/_o4IcNbfPMAhl=enfs=1"/paramparam name="allowFullScreen" value="true"/paramembed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/_o4IcNbfPMAhl=enfs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true"... Read more...
Published 3 days ago

Fed 101
For teachers of basic economics: a href="http://www.federalreserveeducation.org/fed101/index.htm?CFID=1211065amp;CFTOKEN=31357651"a good resource about the Federal Reserve/a. Read more...
Published 3 days ago

Nobel Odds
a href="http://www.pinnaclesports.com/lines.aspx?type=contestcategoryamp;contesttype1=nobel%20prizeamp;contesttype2=2008%20nobel%20prize%20in%20economics"PinnacleSports/a gives the current odds on some possible winners of the Nobel Prize in economics. Among the economists they have listed, Martin... Read more...
Published 3 days ago

A Few Good Reads
ollia href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122333901560909871.html"Andrew Biggs and Kent Smetters/a discuss tax fairness./lilia href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122152292213639569.html"David Cutler et al./a and a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122333750424809705.html"David Gratzer/a... Read more...
Published 4 days ago

Do you take models (too) seriously?
a href="http://www.growthcommissionblog.org/content/fundamentalists-versus-realists"The very wise Paul Romer suggests that the key divide among economists today is between fundamentalists and realists/a.br /br /span style="font-family:arial;"blockquotepspan style="font-family:arial;"The financial... Read more...
Published 4 days ago