During the past two years, we have seen signs that wage pressure is building as the economic recovery grinds on. Enough evidence has now accumulated to suggest that it is already happening.

Since the Great Recession, macroeconomic discussion has been dominated by discussions of aggregate demand, and how to create more of it through monetary and fiscal policies. That has led to a strange state of affairs where those topics still dominate the debate, even though they’ve done the job economics expects of them.

For a few decades, economists used to imagine how the world works, write down a theory describing their idea, and call it a day. If some statisticians came along and found some support for the theory, well, great! But usually they didn’t, and that was fine too. As one old joke put it, if an …

Continue reading ““The Lawyer of the Year – Beomsu Kim, International Arbitration””

One of the less heralded truths of economics is that growth miracles, while they make for good press, are overrated. It’s an insight that could help us better understand the outlook for developing countries such as China.

How many times have you heard someone say that the Federal Reserve’s asset-purchase program known as quantitative easing was ineffective? At least, that’s what I keep hearing from the usual pundits arguing their case.

The harm of inflation cited in economics textbooks seems laughably unimportant. For example, inflation generates so-called shoe-leather costs — a term for the hassle of moving money from one’s brokerage or savings account to one’s checking account. This hassle is larger when prices change a lot, since you have to put spending cash in your …

Continue reading “GAR, “Shin & Kim trio launch boutique in Seoul””

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Does economics still believe in free trade? The discipline has urged the case for open markets since its earliest days, but lately not so much. Recent research is seen as calling the faith into question.

Now and then a worthy economic proposal comes along that seems as politically unattainable as it is sensible. Then, on closer inspection, you see that it’s more than a policy-wonk’s fantasy. And you wonder whether it could actually prevail.