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A website forum in which senior fellows of the Peterson Institute for International Economics discuss and debate their responses to global economic and financial developments as they occur each day and offer insights that others might overlook.
One of the bigger questions in this recession, which has been marked by the steepest increase in unemployment of any downturn since World War II,1 has to do with the impact on immigration. Theoretically, we would expect an influx from south of the border as the recession hits Mexico and other [...]
The administration’s top thinkers on banking regard themselves as avoiding “irreversible errors,” meaning precipitate moves on banking. They argue that “wait and see” may work out and, if it doesn’t, they can always take more dramatic action later (e.g., of the variety advanced by Thomas Hoenig of the Kansas [...]
The road show for the guardians of the international economy moves this weekend from London, site of the G-20 summit earlier this month, to Washington, site of the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, and the world’s finance ministers and central bankers. We can hope that these leaders will translate [...]
In January, we calculated the likely impact of the global economic crisis by comparing the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) growth forecast for the crisis years with the average growth in the precrisis period of 2005–07. Given the release of new growth forecasts, we update our exercise here, but focus on the forecast for 2009. Three [...]
If asked to offer parental career advice to teenagers on the Horn of Africa, most economists would probably recommend becoming a pirate. As a profession, piracy enjoys numerous standard economic advantages:
Low Barriers to Entry: education and certification prerequisites limited to rudimentary seamanship, no need for student loans or entrance exams. Initial [...]