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Business & Economics BLOG |
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How to Make Americans Economically Savvier?
By: Sebastian Wisniewski
12.28.2007
The U.S. housing market is in trouble partly thanks to the economic naivety of many Americans. Real estate buyers, including young first-time home owners, were lured by the low down payments (sometimes none at all) and low interest rates betting that market conditions won't change in an undesired way.
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The Fed's Role in the Housing Bubble
By: Robert P. Murphy
12.28.2007
In his 12/26 op ed for the Wall Street Journal, former Treasury Secretary John Snow blamed the “current situation” in our housing and credit markets on the “accumulation in recent years of large pools of excess savings around the globe.” Yet Snow’s theory doesn’t add up, and overlooks the role of Greenspan’s Federal Reserve in fostering the housing bubble.
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Economic growth relies on production, not just spending.
By: Robert P. Murphy
12.14.2007
Our financial press is always stuck in a Keynesian mindset, but the tendency is particularly pronounced during the Christmas season—here’s a typical article. The moral seems to be that if only consumers would go out and spend more money, the economy would grow, stores would hire more people, and workers would have more money to spend, thus completing the circle. Yet as with most Keynesian ideas, this view has things largely backwards.
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A Virtual Economy Case Study
By: Sebastian Wisniewski
12.4.2007
What if there was a way to live a life without meaningful consequences? What if individuals could participate in a virtual economy largely separate from the one surrounding us in the real world? What if policies could be applied to real people, but with laboratorial consequences? Second Life, an internet-based virtual world often compared to a computer game, and its derivatives may offer answers to those questions.
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