J. Bradford DeLong's Blog, page 2321

Training the Human Element

It's clear that I will never find the iPad more than an amusing toy until I actually write things on it. And it is clear that I will never write things on it until I get good at it. And it is clear I will never get good at it until I can touch-type on the virtual keyboard. And it is clear that I will never be able to touch-type until I get lots of practice.

A vicious circle.

Which I am going to try tobreak out of via exercises like this one...

American Income Volatiilty: Sprung, Brooks, and Rose

My reading of Stephen Rose is that the best way to report his finding is: "fully 60% of adults aged 34-59 in 2005, over the previous ten years, had at least one year in which their household's total income excluding capital gains would have supported material living standards for its members that, when adjusted for family size and composition, would have equalled or exceeded the material living standards of a family of four with household income greater than $100,000 in 2009."

From...

Obama Tries to Guide Israel onto a Road to Long-Run Survival

Gideon Rauchman watches the friend of Israel at his work: "if Israel does not take [the road Obama offers:] soon, the long-term survival of the Jewish state will be imperilled..."

Israel’s fear and loathing of Obama: I could not help thinking back to the early stages of the Northern Irish peace negotiations.... The Israelis’ furious reaction to the pressure they are under from the Obama administration is reminiscent of the British rage early in the Northern Irish peace process, when it...

Wingnut Harmonic Convergence: Hoover Institution Department (Or, Denouncing the Illiterate Brown People Is Best Done by Somebody Who Knows How to Spell "Dam" and "Roll")

Victor Davis Hanson:

The Remains of a California Day: By three, I drove up to the CSU Fresno Henry Madden Library to get a Greek edition of Procopius’s History of the Wars. (Procopius is the ancient sort of the DC insider blogger/pundit: he praised Justinian, sort of, in the History of the Wars, damned him as demonic in the Secret History, and eulogized him in the Buildings — all predicated on the degree to which Procopius felt that the emperor was well/sick, dead/alive...

DeLong Smackdown Watch: Goldman-Sachs and ABACUS

It's "Have a Cow," Robert...

Robert Waldmann:

Robert's Stochastic thoughts: Brad DeLong clears his throat. I throw a cow. He wrote

The win-win benefits of trading money for money--where are they? It turns out that they are there. There are, actually, four:

Trading money now for money later: people who want to save now and spend later can make win-win trades with people who want to spend now and save later.

Risk: people who are unusually averse...

Fun with More Impractical Flash-Based Internet Tools...

Two Things Worth Reading for April 26, 2010

Michael Snyder: Millennials Are The Brokest Generation Ever







Roger Ebert on "Good Night, and Good Luck"

Yes, the Current Government of Israel Is Deeply Corrupt, Why Do You Ask?

Philip Elmer-Dewitt:

http://www.wisdeo.com/articles/view_post/3036: The official explanation for seizing the devices at the airport never did make sense: On the face of it, Israel's decision Saturday night to allow iPads to be brought into the country was a straightforward reversal of a sensibly cautious import policy.... But... [no:] experts outside (or, for that matter, inside) Israel... [bought:] the explanation that the ministry was concerned that a device that used American Wi-Fi...

A Spring Dilemma

If I take enough allergy medicine to feel human, I am immensely sleepy.

If I take sufficiently litle allergy medicine to feel alert, I feel absolutely miserable.

What should I do?

April 28: Econ 210a: The Great Recession in Historical Perspective

April 28: Macroeconomics—Up to 2007:

Walter Bagehot (1873), Lombard Street http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/4359, entire.
Ben Bernanke (1983), "Nonmonetary Effects of the Financial Crisis in the Propagation of the Great Depression" American Economic Review 73, pp. 257-276, http://www.jstor.org/view/00028282/di950033/95p00602/0
John Hicks (1937), "Mr. Keynes and the 'Classics': A Suggested Interpretation", Econometrica http://web.econ.unito.it/bagliano/macro3/hicks_econ37.pdf
John B. Taylor...