EconAir

OK, who do you fear more, big government or big business?   Historically, Americans saw a relatively small government with regulatory powers as a check on monopoly and big business.  But the rise of big government because of the Great Depression, World War II, the Cold War, and the Great Society changed that.  Americans had a choice.  There was a general consensus that we had to spend a lot of money for national and international security during the Cold War.  But the expansion of the social welfare state and environmental regulations changed attitudes towards the federal government.  The two largest programs of the social welfare state, Social Security and Medicare, have been financed by very large tax increases. These tax increases are somewhat offset by federal income tax cuts.   Since the 1980s, there has been a well-financed campaign to roll back the regulation of big business, espe...

You go around to farmers with cows. You buy all the cows and pay the farmers a small fee to milk the cows and sell the milk. You pay for the cows with ass(et)-backed securities called MBSs (Milked Bovine Securities) that you tell investors are udderly safe. But some of the cows don't give enough milk (cow flow problem) or give no milk at all. You take some of the asset-backed securities, say they're backed by the subprime cows, and use them as collateral to sell another set of securities called CMOs (Cow Milk Obligations). Then you buy CDSs (Cow Dried-up Swaps) from AIG (Angus Insurance Company) to insure the CMOs when the cows stopped giving milk. If you work it right, you collect more on the CDSs than you pay out to retire the CMOs. The money you get from selling the dead cows go to pay the CLOs (cow leather obligations). You could also sell CDOs (cow dung obligations) that depend on how much cow dung is produced. This is a typical Wall Street product - turning sh...

A basic assumption in economics and business finance is that individuals are rational in the sense that they compare the cost and benefits of a decision. Generally, this means comparing the cost of investing or consuming today to the expected benefits in the future. Cost is usually the price of the product or investment; expected benefits are harder to figure. The rule is simple; if the expected benefits are greater than the cost, buy it. If not, don’t. Even if the cost is spread out into the future – a car paid for with a cash down payment and a car loan – it is relatively easy in theory to discount future costs along with expected benefits back to “present value” (today’s dollars) and do the comparison. One question that economics and finance doesn’t ask is: Does how you make a purchase or investment affect the buying decision? Does it matter if you pay cash or use a credit card? Theoretically, the answer is no. But recent neuroscience research indicates that the answer...

INTRODUCTION This post and the next is on the topic of economic development and its contribution to economic growth.   Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution more than 200 years ago, this is the central economic dynamic.    The following are factors that led to American economic development, many in place  before the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.   The United States, more than any other country, was positioned to take advantage of the new technology and ideas that were the basis of the Industrial Revolution.   The following is an outline of those factors.   For the full story of the early decades of America's Industrial Revolution, see Engines of Change and some of the excellent histories written about America after the Revolution. FACTORS IN AMERICAN ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND GROWTH The usual narrative centers on the inventors and entrepreneurs who developed and commercialized new production and tran...

Nicola Tesla There has been a debate in economics on whether innovation is exogenous (outside the economy) or endogenous (inside the economy).   This is another one of those dichotomies that obscures explanations of economic processes. This is a stylized narrative of the path of economic innovation, the dynamics of the modern, industrial economic system.   The resulting economic structure is mostly oligopoly, the domination of markets by large corporations. Innovation begins with public knowledge, often scientific or mathematical discoveries that sometimes do not seem to have any practical value.   Imaginary numbers, general equations of electromagnetism, the Second Law of Thermodynamics, Brownian motion, E=mc**2, the structure of DNA, the conductivity of solids, quantum superposition, etc.   Some  scientists and inventors begin to see possible applications of this scientific knowledge.   In the 20 th century, they are often funded by ...

“The age is running mad after innovation.” Samuel Johnson In the Beginning Why study economic theory and analysis, read economic history, and make economic forecasts? The short answer is because of the Industrial Revolution and the attempt to understand its dynamics and structure. Economics is an attempt to understand the material world we live in, the environment created by the Industrial Revolution. THE BEGINNING OF THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION The Industrial Revolution began in England in the late 1700s. It then spread to America  and western European countries. This post will summarize its origins in England and describe the early decades of the Industrial Revolution in America. The Industrial Revolution was a radical break in history. But in England, many of the preconditions were already in place, as can be seen by the history of the Wedgwood company. The revolutionary generation that first adopted steam engines saw t...

The Rocket - Famous Steam Locomotive England , more than any country, started the Industrial Revolution in the late 1700s.   And for over 150 years, England continued to discover new products and technologies.   Yet England eventually fell behind the United States and Germany in industrial technology, commercial innovation, production efficiency, and economic growth.   What happened? The seeds of England ’s relative economic decline were there right at the beginning. Producing cotton cloth was England's first big industry.  But m illwrights, mechanics with specialized knowledge of how to build wool and cotton mills and their machinery, felt frustrated because they seldom became part owners and couldn’t find financing to start their own mills.   Some illegally emigrated to the United States and France .   Much of the early American textile mill technology was due to English immigrants and English technology.   The first cotton spin...