J. Bradford DeLong's Blog, page 2205

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links for 2010-09-09

Calculated Risk: Double Digit Unemployment Rate early next year?

Calculated Risk: Double Digit Unemployment Rate early next year?: http://tinyurl.com/39dnp9s #worthreading





Complaining After the CIA Tortures You Is Illegal, Says Federal Court

David Waggamann: Complaining After the CIA Tortures You Is Illegal, Says Federal Court : http://tinyurl.com/273pt48 #worthreading





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Did Megan McArdle Really Graduate from a Business School?

She writes:

On Comparing Tax Cuts to Social Security: the only reason the [CBPP's two:] numbers [valuing the size of the upper-income tax cuts and the Social Security deficit:] looked even remotely the same size was that they were using a present value...

Did this person really graduate from a business school?

Either she needs her tuition back because they did not teach her what present value is for, or the business school needs to revoke her degree to get its reputation back...

CSPAN: The Macroeconomic Sitch

U.S. Economic Issues - C-SPAN Video Library: Bradford DeLong spoke about the economy and unemployment. He argued that original stimulus program was not large enough and another was needed to alleviate unemployment problem. He also responded to telephone calls and electronic communications.

36 minutes

What Is This "News" You Speak of?

Charles Homans:

I think that TV airtime is such a non-scarce commodity at this point that it doesn't really matter what you do. You can't dominate an atomized discourse--people predisposed to crackpotism will find it whether or not one more reasonable person is on TV. The only people who matter are the producers and executives who have the ability to deprive these stories of oxygen and don't.

It's times like this that I wish more news outlets behaved like Fox and Drudge. They...

In Which Daniel Mitchell Demonstrates the Difficulty of Having a Rational Conversation with Cato Institute Employees

Matthew Yglesias:

Matthew Yglesias » Communism is Bad, Policy is Discontinuous: Daniel Mitchell... post[s:] the... chart which he deems “a good illustration of the human cost of excessive government.” I think this mostly illustrates the difficulty of having a rational conversation with Cato Institute employees about economic policy in the developed world. Cuba is poor, but it’s much richer than Somalia. Is Somalia’s poor performance an illustration of the human costs of inadequate...

You Know There Is Structural Unemployment When the Unemployment Rate Is High and Yet Inflation Is Not Falling...

As Matthew Yglesias points out, there is no sign that we are there yet:

Matthew Yglesias » How To Tell When There’s Structural Unemployment: I feel like the entire Minneapolis Fed take on structural unemployment and “skill mismatch” is a giant exercise in obfuscation... there’s a very simple way to tell when additional monetary stimulus will no longer increase real output and that’s by looking at inflation.... If a bunch of counterfeiters show up in a country where there’s full...

Deficit Chickens

Duncan Black:

Eschaton:* That Nasty Deficit:* So the "centrist" Dems who are usually given lots of friendly ink over the endless kvetching about the deficit are going to prove, for the trillionth time, that they don't actually care about the deficit but instead only care about marginal tax rates for rich people. That won't stop reporters from writing about their "deficit concerns," though with any luck they'll all be chucked out of their jobs.

Commenting on Greg Sargent:

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Liveblogging World War II: September 9, 1940

World War II Day-By-Day:

Day 375 September 9, 1940: Battle of Britain Day 62. Göring believes the RAF is beaten due to their lack of resistance to the first daylight bombing of London on September 7 (in reality, RAF was confused by the new Luftwaffe tactic). Today, RAF is ready when a large raid crosses the Channel at 5 PM towards London. In addition to Keith Park’s No. 11 Group patrolling the approaches to London, Douglas Bader’s “big wing” (a formations of 3 squadrons from No. 12...

"Of Interest Only to Collectors of Narrative Contradiction"

Peter Stothard on Tony Blair:

A JOURNEY by Tony Blair reviewed by Peter Stothard - TLS: The other area that seemed a ripe source of stories was the one marked Iraq, especially the shrines to the genius of George W. Bush that the book’s limited pre-publicity had promised. The result here was more of a disappointment to those seeking new facts. But there are no new heights of hagiography either: when Bush is described as having been both “very smart” and of “immense simplicity in how he...