Let’s have a little fun. You get to be the President. Imagine it’s late fall 2009. Everything with the economy is working better than you had any reason to expect. Consumers are buying again but not going crazy. Geithner’s Plan worked beyond your wildest expectations. GDP has been positive in the third quarter and […]
Archive for March 24th, 2009
World Trade: Will It Bounce Back Quickly?
Here’s a good article from the Economist. It discusses the fall in world trade and touches on a issue for which I’ve come up with no firm conclusion. The author notes the rapid fall in world trade as well as the fact that the decline has affected so many countries. Sort of an equal opportunity downturn. […]
Reports Of British Deflation Miss The Mark Badly
Remember those reports (including a post on this blog) yesterday about the U.K. slipping into deflation today. Well forget about it. Didn’t happen. In fact, things surprisingly went the other way. Prices actually increased by 3.2% for February. Economists are scratching their heads trying to figure out what happened. Their best guess is that the sharply lower […]
Volcker Sounds Off
“We’re in a government-dependent financial system; I never thought I would live to see the day… We’ve got to fight to get away from that.” That is what Paul Volcker had to say today when asked about the state of the economy. He was appearing at a forum on the Future of Finance sponsored by […]
AIG Execs Coerced Into Forfeiting Bonuses
CNBC reports that the AIG bonuses were returned under duress. The network has received a copy of an email that was sent to the recipients of the bonuses. Here is what they have up: “Please be aware that we have received assurances from Attorney General Cuomo that no names will be released by his office […]
Why Treasury Doesn’t Want Goldman’s Money
In a perfect world one or more of the recipients of TARP money paying it back would be considered a good thing. We don’t live in a perfect world. In the New York Times, Andrew Ross Sorkin, notes that Goldman may well pay back the $10 billion it received but the Treasury might not want […]