Economic Policy

The Federal Reserve’s crusade against the ghost of inflation has driven unemployment much higher than the official numbers suggest. It’s not technology that’s keeping down wages — it’s the policy of America’s politically insulated central bank.

Continuing the debate from “The Speed Limit,” by Alan S. Blinder, and “Why We Can Grow Faster,” by Barry Bluestone and Bennett Harrison (September-October 1997).

It would be nice if the Dodgers returned to Brooklyn and if the economy grew faster than 2.3 percent. But neither of these things is in the offing.

Champions of the U.S. economic system say that Europe’s generous social protections cause high unemployment. But it’s the global economy that’s driving up joblessness in Europe–just as it increases income inequality in the United States.

The great bull market of the 1990s has generated euphoria in millions of inexperienced investors and laid the groundwork for privatization of Social Security. But extensive poll data suggest that investor expectations are grossly unrealistic.

When two economists showed that a higher minimum wage would have little adverse effect on jobs, did the fast food industry try to spike the data and poison their reputations?