https://ambrosini.us/Historical writing preserved from ambrosini.ushttps://ambrosini.us/writing/2012/01/help-wanted-incrementalist-systems-builder/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2012/01/help-wanted-incrementalist-systems-builder/a.k.a Toolsmith a.k.a. Geek To help forecast a hot CE product in one of the world's largest retailers (located in Seattle). Apply within .2012-01-11https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/10/dangling-epsilons/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/10/dangling-epsilons/Whenever I look at an estimation equation like this: from this paper , I wonder what's in that dangling epsilon term. In this equation we have Y's on the left hand side. And I think to myself, "what kinds of things pro2011-10-06https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/03/new-course-in-social-psychology/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/03/new-course-in-social-psychology/As I, fingers crossed, wind down my graduate work in economics, I am looking for new hobbies. I was thinking about getting back into baseball. I loved baseball when I was a kid and now, thanks to Moneyball and Baseball2011-03-10https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/03/the-most-subversive-sentence-ive-ever-written/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/03/the-most-subversive-sentence-ive-ever-written/In a paper on the "selection" of Mexican immigrants where we find that Mexican immigrants to the US are about the same as non-migrant Mexicans in terms of observable skills like education and age but, as it turns out, th2011-03-04https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/02/r-solving-a-small-system-of-equations-fast/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/02/r-solving-a-small-system-of-equations-fast/My google-fu failed me on this one, so for the next person googling "stupid fast library for solving a system of equations in R such that the trade off between speed and 'robustness' is way on the speed side", you're wel2011-02-20https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/02/inequality-granger-causes-growth/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/02/inequality-granger-causes-growth/So say Andrews, Jencks and Leigh. For what that's worth.2011-02-18https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/02/help-help-im-being-repressed/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/02/help-help-im-being-repressed/I'm watching the re-re-renewed debate about academic bias against conservatives with a little more skin in the game this time around. Two facts about me: for some strange reason I'm considered conservative by my academi2011-02-14https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/02/23andme-data-are-in/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/02/23andme-data-are-in/... and I'm boring. There's no traces of Indian in me (a now debunked family story ) and the white in me isn't that interesting either: This chart was produced using EURO-DNA-CALC (h/t Volokh ). I'm 1/4 Italian-Swiss (2011-02-01https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/02/does-the-welfare-state-screw-the-poor/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/02/does-the-welfare-state-screw-the-poor/Milton Friedman's complaints about rent control and the minimum wage are cliche. These programs hurt the people they're intended to help. Unintended negative consequences are the first things I look for when I think ab2011-02-01https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/01/this-post-is-intentionally-left-blank/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/01/this-post-is-intentionally-left-blank/... or is it? (PS - NBER has some good working papers out this week... stuff by Hall on the "Long Slump" and Chetty on micro/macro elasticities and then there's this look at poverty over the business cycle.)2011-01-31https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/01/the-govenator/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2011/01/the-govenator/I didn't vote for him, but Jerry Brown is... awesome! There's some sort of Nixon-going-to-China thing going on in California right now. Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="459" caption="Jerry Bro2011-01-12https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/11/labor-mobility/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/11/labor-mobility/If labor was perfectly mobile and suddenly there were massive dislocations requiring workers to relocate, you'd expect an uptick in the number of workers moving, right? A corollary is that if you do not see an up-tick i2010-11-18https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/11/a-link-for-everyone/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/11/a-link-for-everyone/I was at a practice job talk at a nearby university on Friday. As preface to my work ((I'll post on it as soon as I get my job applications sent)), I pointed out that workers change careers many times, 3 or 4 times, ove2010-11-08https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/10/william-wallace-watch-2/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/10/william-wallace-watch-2/Another Fed speech to throw in the William Wallace speech bucket. "They can take lives but they can never take our... history contingent monetary policy!!!" (h/t Sumner )2010-10-02https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/quit-picking-on-japan-part-ii/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/quit-picking-on-japan-part-ii/Will Wilkinson has been schooling the internets about division properly controlling for inflation when figuring real incomes, eliciting bored nods from those that have actually read Broda/Weinstein/Romalis (no links... t2010-09-30https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/foreclosure-deadweight/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/foreclosure-deadweight/Mike suggested for those interested in the foreclosure issue this paper . That paper says this paper estimates the deadweight costs of foreclosures. No it doesn't ((This is one of those cases where something is so blin2010-09-29https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/increase-inflation-and-combat-structural-issues/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/increase-inflation-and-combat-structural-issues/Inflation is below target. Increasing output and decreasing or stagnant inflation is an indication that inflation expectations are becoming unanchored. That's bad. Inflation should not spend too long, too far from its2010-09-27https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/question-for-those-that-want-to-stick-it-to-the-banks/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/question-for-those-that-want-to-stick-it-to-the-banks/Some seem to really dig plans for the housing market that stick to the banks. I'm down; I dig redistributional policy and we should encourage people to do what's best for them and their families (even if its bad for the2010-09-27https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/did-you-know/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/did-you-know/After Kockerlakota dared suggest there are substantial structural problems in the labor market (right wing scum!), the very next paragraph was: Given the structural problems in the labor market, I do not expect unemploym2010-09-25https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/question-2/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/question-2/All the heat on the issue of AD policy overshadowed and even delegitimized discussion of policy to deal with structural issues in the labor market. Suppose the latter policies were cheaper economically and politically. 2010-09-22https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/macro-model-mart/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/macro-model-mart/John Taylor links to the Macro Model Data Base . You are no longer allowed to critique macro for ignoring your pet "obvious" mechanism without having checked this list of models.2010-09-07https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/setting-expectations/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/09/setting-expectations/Evans and Honkapohja's work on learning in macro is important. Watch this to get a sense for what they're doing: But learning dynamics are not well understood empirically. Prof. Evans describes the dynamics under ada2010-09-01https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/08/quit-picking-on-japan/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/08/quit-picking-on-japan/Here's the per capita GDP for the G8 countries (relative to the USA): You can take two lessons from this chart. 1) Japan hasn't had bad monetary policy relative to, say, the continental European countries or 2) Mone2010-08-23https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/08/hints-about-the-stochastic-discount-factor/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/08/hints-about-the-stochastic-discount-factor/Its a great mystery (if you assume asset return volatility is all that matters) why investors don't hold more stocks. Sharar Pitaru at the neat new investment tool Plantly , says : Yes, in general our rationale might le2010-08-20https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/08/what-is-structural-unemployment/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/08/what-is-structural-unemployment/There seems to be a disconnect between how economists (and Fed economists in particular) use this term and how bloggers (and left bloggers in particular) use it. Some definitions: "The unemployment resulting from wage r2010-08-20https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/08/a-dsge-primer/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/08/a-dsge-primer/Here .2010-08-05https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/08/the-heartbeat-of-america/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/08/the-heartbeat-of-america/Here's all the Jolts data (minus job openings): These are not seasonally adjusted so that's why you get the inverted-U shape every year for the hiring and quits series and the inclined saw shape for firings. Still, you 2010-08-04https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/07/economists-as-political-slaves/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/07/economists-as-political-slaves/Delong : One of the embarrassing dirty little secrets of economics is that there is no such thing as economic theory properly so-called. There is simply no set of foundational bedrock principles on which one can base cal2010-07-23https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/07/who-are-the-long-term-unemployed/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/07/who-are-the-long-term-unemployed/A few weeks ago, Mike was asking me about the long term unemployed. I'm running some regressions using CPS data so I have the data he asked about just hanging out on my desktop. Public service: The unemployed during t2010-07-19https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/07/more-on-immigration/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/07/more-on-immigration/Ok. I can't wait anymore. Someday this paper (co-written with my advisor) will show up here . The paper reviews trends in immigration in California and summarizes the findings of one of Peri's working papers . In tha2010-07-13https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/07/wow-3/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/07/wow-3/Categorize this chart in the "must see the data to believe" bucket.2010-07-08https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/06/isnt-or-shouldnt/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/06/isnt-or-shouldnt/Sumner argues that if Krugman's claim is true that the Fed is too conservative, that they will do whatever to curb inflation, then fiscal policy won't work either. Fiscal policy moves the AD curve right, but the Fed will2010-06-04https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/immigrants-and-native-wages/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/immigrants-and-native-wages/I know I've had you riveted with the literature review in the last few posts about the effect of immigrants on native employment outcomes (i.e. wages and employment levels). I thought it was important, though, to point 2010-05-24https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/davis-santa-cruz/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/davis-santa-cruz/By revealed preference : Cameron Massoudi, who attends Irvine's Northwood High School, said he was upset to be placed on UC Davis' lengthy waiting list and decided last month to go with a solid acceptance from UC Santa C2010-05-22https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/the-total-effect-of-immigration-is-positive/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/the-total-effect-of-immigration-is-positive/Last time, I said that nobody really cares about the direct or partial effect of immigration on natives. This isn't strictly true. If immigration policy were changed to only allow immigrants of a particular skill-type 2010-05-18https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/george-borjas-and-the-national-approach/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/george-borjas-and-the-national-approach/It has taken me too long to introduce the hero of this story. Borjas has had a series of papers, books and editorials since the mid-80's that have each challenged the consensus economist's view on immigration in support2010-05-14https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/partial-derivatives-are-not-total-derivatives/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/partial-derivatives-are-not-total-derivatives/When Borjas says, "immigration lowers the wage of competing workers," he is only looking at the direct effect of immigrants on similarly skilled natives controlling for spillover effects. Immigrants affect natives in ot2010-05-14https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/a-little-better/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/a-little-better/Here's the cross-state plot of the effect of immigrants on native wages: This time you'll notice that I plotted the changes in the proportion of immigrants against the change in wages (these are changes from the 1990 to 2010-05-12https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/slam-dunk/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/slam-dunk/You'd think the question of whether there is an effect of immigration on native employment opportunities would be an open and shut case. Carefully comparing nations, states, cities and occupations using cross-sectional 2010-05-12https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/non-experimental-evidence/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/non-experimental-evidence/Angus Deaton recently said that all the attention that natural (and actual) experiments are getting is over blown. He claims experimental data has no special status in a hierarchy of evidence. I agree to the extent tha2010-05-11https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/even-more-zeros/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/even-more-zeros/There's more experimental-like evidence that immigrants have little or no negative effect on native employment opportunities, if you need it. In 1962, 900,000 pied-noirs repatriated to France after fleeing Algeria follo2010-05-10https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/d0-90--d1-80-d1-83-d1-81-d1-81-d0-ba-d0-b8-d1-85--d0-b5-d0-b2-d1-80-d0-b5-d0-b5-d0-b2--d0-bf-d1-80-d0-b8-d0-bd-d1-8f-d1-82-d1-8c--d0-bd-d0-b0-d1-88-d1-83--d1-80-d0-b0-d0-b1-d0-be-d1-82-d1-83/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/d0-90--d1-80-d1-83-d1-81-d1-81-d0-ba-d0-b8-d1-85--d0-b5-d0-b2-d1-80-d0-b5-d0-b5-d0-b2--d0-bf-d1-80-d0-b8-d0-bd-d1-8f-d1-82-d1-8c--d0-bd-d0-b0-d1-88-d1-83--d1-80-d0-b0-d0-b1-d0-be-d1-82-d1-83/Нет! ((Thanks Google Translate!)) An easy criticism of "experimental" data, like that from the Mariel boatlift , is it only applies to the particular situation under which the experiment was run. Immigrants may have2010-05-07https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/substitutability-as-default/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/substitutability-as-default/I'm jumping ahead of my own narrative, but why does it seem ingrained in people (including economists) that immigrants must be competing with native workers? Why is complementarity so much more unlikely in people's prio2010-05-07https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/immigrants-taking-our-jerbs/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/immigrants-taking-our-jerbs/I'm writing a "vulgarized" immigration paper (my Italian co-author's adjective). One thing we academics like to do is pick on the idea that immigrants take the jobs of native-born Americans. Watching Fox the last coupl2010-05-06https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/c2-bflos-cubanos-del-mariel-toman-nuestros-trabajos/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/c2-bflos-cubanos-del-mariel-toman-nuestros-trabajos/¡No! David Card's famous paper studied the impact of the sudden arrival of 120,000 refugees to Miami in 1980. He estimates that the total labor supply in Miami suddenly increased by 7% and the Cuban work force increas2010-05-06https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/june-6-1999/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/05/june-6-1999/A week after my graduation from college, I ordered: The Virgin Queen by Christopher Hibbert, Measuring Customer Satisfaction by Bob Hayes, Unidimensional Scaling by McIver and Stocks for the Long Run by Jeremy J. Siegel.2010-05-03https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/04/angus-maddison-rip/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/04/angus-maddison-rip/AC let me know that Angus Maddison has died . He's the guy with all the historical data. Some of it, they say, he made up. But at least we were able to include Angus Maddison fixed effects in our specifications. Now,2010-04-27https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/04/stated-preferences/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/04/stated-preferences/I just finished the first happiness tracking cycle and they 've sent me my Happiness Report. There's some unsurprising things like I'm happier on the weekends and when I'm doing stuff I want to do. The surprises: I'm h2010-04-19https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/04/a-story-that-never-gets-old-2/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/04/a-story-that-never-gets-old-2/Or does it?2010-04-13https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/04/the-computer-thinks-for-us/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/04/the-computer-thinks-for-us/Angus Deaton : Structural estimation is useful, not only for the estimates (whose credibility is often undercut by the panoply of supporting assumptions that are required to obtain them), but for understanding the empiri2010-04-12https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/04/pk-and-the-literature/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/04/pk-and-the-literature/I always laugh when Paul Krugman urges others to read the literature. He's a brilliant economist, but he's not exactly the goto guy for literature reviews... Today he says that Sumner and Avant should read the literatu2010-04-03https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/mike-ds-graph/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/mike-ds-graph/Mike D commented on this post: Let’s think about two axes here. On the x axis, put altruism (the weight my assessment of your utility has in my utility function) and on the y axis, put respect (if I assess your situati2010-03-12https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/genes-or-culture-or-both/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/genes-or-culture-or-both/An implication of Wilkinson's theory is that intergenerational mobility should decrease over time. Wilkinson claims intergenerational mobility has decreased. It hasn't (estimates from Lee and Salon 2009 ): The "intergen2010-03-10https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/truth-2/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/truth-2/esr speaks it: All data, including primary un-”corrected” datasets, must be available for auditing by third parties. All modeling code must be published. The assumptions made in data reduction and smoothing must be a2010-03-04https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/the-unemployed-arent-the-only-ones-seeking-jobs/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/the-unemployed-arent-the-only-ones-seeking-jobs/Work with me here. In normal times, say 2004 through 2007, suppose 10% of the working population are looking for jobs while still employed (do you know of a better estimate?). This means about 13 to 14 million employed2010-03-03https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/glen-whitman-isnt-feeling-the-love/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/glen-whitman-isnt-feeling-the-love/In his latest post , he worries that his excellent series critiquing Libertarian Paternalism (start here ) isn't getting many comments. If you've read a couple or all of these posts, leave a comment to let him know ho2010-03-02https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/england-since-like-ever/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/03/england-since-like-ever/Prof. Clark sits in the "what revolution?" camp among economic historians that try to date the industrial revolution. His data : Why does this matter? Well, if there was no revolution, only evolution, to modern industr2010-03-02https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/02/a-definition-of-paternalism/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/02/a-definition-of-paternalism/Just read Mankiw's new paper and this occurred to me: I'm definitely a jerk if I don't have other's outcomes in my utility function. I'm a paternalist if I have other people's consumption in my utility function, not th2010-02-26https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/02/another-earthquake/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/02/another-earthquake/This one's only 6.0. UPDATE: No injuries. No damage. No power outages. They're not even letting the kids out of school.2010-02-04https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/haitian-coffee/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/haitian-coffee/From an article about Haitian coffee (ht MR ): Atlantic Food Channel contributor Jerry Baldwin, co-founder of Starbucks and the company's first roaster and buyer, agrees. He now owns Peet's Coffee and Tea, and he says th2010-01-30https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/e3-81-b0-e3-81-8b-e3-81-a7-e3-81-99-e3-82-88/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/e3-81-b0-e3-81-8b-e3-81-a7-e3-81-99-e3-82-88/I was reading a very important article linked to by The Economist when I noticed the domain name was bakadesuyo. This is an expression the Real Scientist uses all the time, often in reference to things I've said or done2010-01-28https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/zero-rate-bound-rip/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/zero-rate-bound-rip/I'm filling this one under "William Wallace Watch" ( ref ). Is there a difference between level targeting and Taylor rules if there's no zero bound?2010-01-26https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/uc-davis-econ-in-the-news-28/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/uc-davis-econ-in-the-news-28/From a letter sent to NPR: I think you should interview Peter Lindert at UC-Davis. He's an economic historian (perhaps THE economic historian) that welfare state scholars look to. His book Growing Public: Social Spending2010-01-25https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/my-beef-with-scott-sumner-or-dude-youve-already-won-the-debate/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/my-beef-with-scott-sumner-or-dude-youve-already-won-the-debate/Pleasantries: brilliant blog . Anyone remotely interested in monetary policy, a.k.a. "the only remotely possible technocratic method to manage an economy", should read it. Ok. Prof. Sumner is absolutely right that the2010-01-25https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/negative-externalities-of-congress/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/negative-externalities-of-congress/So they're going to torpedo Bernanke's nomination because they need his blood to placate their base. Ms McArdle says : I see the political logic, but the economic logic is pretty poor. Bernanke didn't become Fed chair 2010-01-22https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/what-is-progress/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/what-is-progress/I'm a political newb, but even I can see why progressives would concern themselves with "stagnating" middle class wages rather than poverty (e.g. here ). Poor folks don't vote, but if you can convince the middle class (2010-01-15https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/great-moderation-rip/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/great-moderation-rip/Yuriy Gorodnichenko does some of the funnest research in macroeconomics. I've seen him talk about the Finnish Great Depression (subtitle: "From Russia with Love") and his test of some theories of informational rigidity 2010-01-15https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/catholic-relief-fund/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/catholic-relief-fund/... is where we donated. They had 300 staff in Haiti already and they have a large existing staff in the Dominican Republic. They can hit the ground running, so to speak. Also because a large majority of the populatio2010-01-14https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/william-wallace-watch/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/william-wallace-watch/From MarketWatch : [St. Louis Federal Reserve President James Bullard] said he would like the policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee "to adopt a state-contingent policy rule that would allow for the adjustment of a2010-01-11https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/japanese-unemployment/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/japanese-unemployment/In November, Japanese unemployment was at 5.2% . Many folks are comparing the Fed's action today to those of the Bank of Japan in the "lost decade" ( e.g. ). I can't quite peg down the comparison being made by Sumner, 2010-01-11https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/why-a-good-policy-stance-might-matter/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/why-a-good-policy-stance-might-matter/I haven't read John Taylor's newest working paper yet, but its about the Fed's start-stop policy stance under the ancien régime. The story he's riffing on in that paper is pretty standard. There was high and variable 2010-01-11https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/earthquake/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/earthquake/At 4:27 pm, a magnatude 6.5 earthquake hit about 27 miles due east west of my childhood home : Everyone in the family is accounted for and fine (it turns out half were out of town for a cheerleading contest). Broken gla2010-01-09https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/knittel-vs-the-internets/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/knittel-vs-the-internets/The numbers guy goes after Knittel's Woods study. I'm not sure Knittel and coauthor having had to take a mulligan should be seen as an embarrassment. BB ("before blogs"), to get the same feedback they got within hours,2010-01-07https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/amen-brother/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/amen-brother/Agent Contnjdida... AC says macro should be taught as a branch of computational economics. If I had made that connection two years ago I would have been on the job market this year.2010-01-04https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/phrasing-to-warm-sumners-heart/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2010/01/phrasing-to-warm-sumners-heart/Slide 1 shows the path, from the year 2000 to the present, of one key indicator of monetary policy, the target for the overnight federal funds rate set by the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC). --- Ben Bernanke2010-01-03https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/be-anonymous/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/be-anonymous/Back in the dark ages there was a debate about whether or not aspiring academics should blog pseudonymously before tenure. There was some speculation that Dan Drezner lost tenure at Chicago because of his blog and I rem2009-12-30https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/but-innovation-is-endogenous-too/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/but-innovation-is-endogenous-too/Risk aversion usually makes investments look less attractive. In the standard story, then, as risk aversion goes up, we would spend less money today to avert future catastrophes. Martin Weitzman argues, however, this re2009-12-29https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/what-is-a-catastrophe/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/what-is-a-catastrophe/In the previous post, I mentioned two types of catastrophe: cliff-diving and gradual. Suppose the first is a sudden major decrease in output. How much would returns to capital have to decline to get 1% average yearly r2009-12-29https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/tiger-woods-hurt-us-all/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/tiger-woods-hurt-us-all/That was the subject of an email from Prof. Knittle to the economics mail list regarding his new event study . The SF Examiner writes it up better than I can, but here's the key graph. Companies that had endorsed Woods 2009-12-28https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/the-constraint-that-shall-not-be-named/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/the-constraint-that-shall-not-be-named/The big problem with this system is that it doesn’t appeal to politicians who want to fiddle with everything in sight. --- Daniel Lakeland2009-12-28https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/woods-hurt-everyone-except-professors-doing-event-studies/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/woods-hurt-everyone-except-professors-doing-event-studies/Knittel on TV:2009-12-28https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/best-political-economy-indicator/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/best-political-economy-indicator/I don't think it's unemployment. The hire rate ?2009-12-22https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/prediction-no-william-wallace-speeches-from-ben/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/prediction-no-william-wallace-speeches-from-ben/In the next two years --- before the memory of this recession fades, but long enough from now that it doesn't risk unanchoring expectations --- Ben Bernanke will begin peppering his speeches and testimony before Congress2009-12-21https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/japan-data/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/japan-data/Japan bashing is popular. Looking at the data since QE started: Real per capita GDP has risen 1.4% a year and yet prices have been constant . I'm not sure why any one inflation target (positive or negative) is better t2009-12-18https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/i-must-be-crazy/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/i-must-be-crazy/Because the rest of the world seems crazy. Even Cowen and Sumner seem to think changing the inflation target right now would be a good idea. First, does the Fed have an inflation target and are expectations anchored, i2009-12-18https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/costs-of-discretion/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/costs-of-discretion/In the previous post, I argued upping the inflation target would have no impact on unemployment and it would risk unanchoring inflation expectations. If expectations became unanchored we would be trading off a permanent2009-12-18https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/the-positive-nature-of-normative-analysis/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/the-positive-nature-of-normative-analysis/When you first take a grad level economics class, it occurs to you the discipline appears to be "social physics". Where you thought the discipline was "a tool for understanding and social criticism and an instrument for2009-12-14https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/super-cool/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/super-cool/Data analysis!2009-12-13https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/dissertations-id-like-to-read/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/dissertations-id-like-to-read/Monetary policy and unemployment: welfare costs of lagged unemployment and optimal policy Time consistent fiscal policy: the case for an independent fiscal authority Banking crises cause monetary shocks: evidence from an2009-12-13https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/question/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/question/Why is it always assumed that "philosophy" or "pictures and talk" are substitutes for mathematical analysis? I mean, they're compliments right?2009-12-13https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/the-data-are-available-at-bls-gov-and-bea-gov/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/the-data-are-available-at-bls-gov-and-bea-gov/Right on the front page. The price level has been accelerating (increasing at faster rates) since last fall: and output is increasing: and unemployment is not increasing:2009-12-12https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/accelerating-output-and-prices-equals-additional-stimulus/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/accelerating-output-and-prices-equals-additional-stimulus/The Fed made a mistake last year. No doubt the Fed chairwoman 70 years from now will give a speech admitting fault for the "Great Recession". Fine. It does NOT follow from this that we need more aggregate demand stimu2009-12-11https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/a-model/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/a-model/Blanchard and Gali (2008) incorporate unemployment into the standard model. They have some interesting findings, but this one stuck out: This is the response of the unemployment rate over time to a 1% decrease in produc2009-12-05https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/stories/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/stories/The problem with academic macroeconomists is that they're terrible at telling stories. We say recessions are caused by real and nominal shocks and people snore. And monetary policy is too boring to be the best aggregat2009-12-04https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/models/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/models/The problem with most stories is that they're just words. With just words its easy to sound like you're making sense, that the one thing you said leads to the other. For example, Ryan Avant says we need more stimulus a2009-12-04https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/uc-davis-in-the-local-news/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/uc-davis-in-the-local-news/Stevens' research in the Las Vegas Sun . According to the article, Vegas has 4,000 homeless students in its public schools. Either Vegas is much bigger, younger and poorer than I had thought or this number is wrong.2009-12-02https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/the-cbo-says-moooo/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/the-cbo-says-moooo/I imagine this is how it worked for court alchemists. The CBO says that it has been ordered to give a prediction of the effect the ARRA and so it has . The Economists suggests this reverse crystal ball gazing is valid 2009-12-01https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/theyre-both-speaking-english-i-think/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/12/theyre-both-speaking-english-i-think/How is it possible that this person (and his commenters) and this person live on the same planet? A definition of economics is "the study of incentives"; an idea that's pretty well baked into my brain at this point. Th2009-12-01https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/11/cool-2/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/11/cool-2/Data!2009-11-29https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/11/cool-down-cool-down/https://ambrosini.us/writing/2009/11/cool-down-cool-down/Even if The Emails discredit all the "science" on tree-rings, there's still ice cores and bore hole data. And even if all paleoclimatology is BS, thermometer readings of temperatures show a sharp spike in the last coupl2009-11-25