wages

Sanctions because of the Crimean crisis have had less economic impact than private portfolio preference shifts. However, as Ukraine moves into the EU sphere, further actions against Ukraine could be more far-reaching. China has moved…

I had four big topics in today’s links: Japan, China, Ukraine and Spain. I want to concentrate here on the two Asian countries over the European ones. The wage issue in Japan is an important one because it informs the policy choices in the…

While the credit expansion/savings reduction needs to continue to grow to support GDP growth, the credit expansion/savings reduction doesn’t need to ‘spike up’ proactively as it does when the fiscal tightening is proactive.

My contention has been that the first two arrows of Abenomics gave the Japanese economy a short window to bring the Japanese labour market back to full employment, re-ignite wage gains, and institute structural reforms. In my view, Abe has…

Since October I have been saying that the US growth was probably going to decline for the remainder of this business cycle. In contrast, I have believed Europe would recover ever since data last June confirmed a broad based phase shift…

Today’s ADP employment report came out with a figure of 139,000 jobs added to the US economy in February. This number is low and comes with downward revisions to past numbers. The ADP data are the last big numbers we will see except weekly…

Japan’s deflation problem is overdetermined – there are multiple causes at work, any one of which could account for the observed phenomenon. Those who have been following the debate can simply choose their favourite – balance sheet…

Themes for today Emerging market political risk is now front and center. US data suggests consumption growth is vulnerable to poor wage trends. The European periphery banks are benefitting from lower sovereign yields. The potential…

Marshall Auerback was on CNBC yesterday afternoon talking to Kelly Evans and Steve Liesman on Closing Bell. And his read on the US economy is like mine, 1.5-2.0% underlying growth. He thinks the weak Q1 numbers are not just weather-related.…

"Most of the CPI effects of the Bank of Japan’s efforts to depreciate the yen remain confined to a relative price shock to food and energy that crowds out spending power elsewhere in the economy on future second-round effects in the absence…