The shocking onslaught of the Russian military into the Ukraine, and Kiev (or Kyiv) in particular, prompts thoughts of what relationship has obtained, over the long run of history, between Russia and Ukraine. Some of the topics associated with this historical matter can be difficult...
I spent all weekend thinking about Bob Mundell. I had just gotten the hard copy of my own book released several weeks ago, and I was reading it, beginning with the dedication: To Bob Mundell. Robert A. Mundell, the 1999 Nobel Prizewinner in economics and...
Robert A. Mundell, the 1999 Nobel Prizewinner in economics and in an easy argument the greatest economist of the last several generations, died April 4 in his beloved Italy at the age of 88....
On the death of legendary public servant George P. Shultz several days ago, the New Republic ran an extraordinary piece of historical reflection, Bruce Bartlett’s “George Shultz, the Godfather of the Discredited Laffer Curve.” Bartlett’s piece uses Shultz’s death as the merest of pretexts for its...
Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker all but advocated a price rule for monetary policy beginning in the latter half of 1982. He despaired of the major options to a price-rule, namely quantity and interest-rate targeting, and urged that instead, the exchange value of the dollar...
Currency boards have attracted increasing interest in recent years—and months—because signs of another international monetary crisis are beginning to gather. The prevailing monetary system does not comport with the actual monetary order of the world. Currency boards can, on all important criteria, close the currently...
In February 2009, President Barack Obama issued his first budget, a budget that resulted in a federal deficit of $1.3 trillion. The title of the budget, “A New Era of Responsibility,” had partners in rhetorical exorbitance in its subheadings: “Inheriting a Legacy of Misplaced Priorities,”...
Monday, November 28th, 2011 Over the past several years of this Great Recession, the audacity of the Federal Reserve has been something to behold. In the face of recession and a financial sector in shock, the Fed has taken interest rates essentially to zero, added so...
