depression

The following is an excerpt of an article written exactly twenty years ago on 8 October 1992 by the late Wynne Godley, a British economist, who predicted disaster for Europe’s planned single currency. This is the single most cogent and…

I have had a lot of other things on my plate and haven't been able to write as regularly as I would like. But I am going to try to increase the volume of posts by putting out more quick hits like this one that capture my macro view without…

I am still deciding what this week's weekly post will be on. Clearly, I need to write a bit more substantively about QE3 than I have so far. And I have two media appearances from last week to use to update you on my viewpoint. The broad…

Last week, in framing the Greek elections, I reminded you that irrespective of who won the elections in Greece on Sunday, it was clear that Greece would be unable to hit their deficit targets. This is why the German government is already…

The chart below via Reuters' Scott Barber is what an economic depression looks like. It covers Greek bank deposits from 1998 to present.

In 1921, the US, a creditor nation, was fighting boom time inflation and turned to 'austerity' to defeat it. Europe on the other hand was seeing a debt-laden deflationary episode after the Great War. This episode has historical lessons for…

Spain has become the new Greece. Actually, in many respects Spain is now worse than Greece. The Spanish unemployment rate is already so high and unlike Athens, Madrid has made no headway in reducing its public debt levels (whereas the…

"The chart also shows that the current economic situation is much weaker in several euro-area periphery countries. The recession in Greece has yet to end, and real GDP is now more than 17 percent below its prior peak. While a recovery…

"The anger that prompted Christoulas to take his own life in Syntagma Square in view of the Greek parliament is shared by much of the middle-class and low-income Greeks who have carried a disproportionate burden of the stringent tax…

Shiller says the shift toward renting and city living could mean “that we will never in our lifetime see a rebound in these prices in the suburbs." Watch the video.