Dean Baker's Blog, page 274

Solid Common Sense from Catherine Rampell on Uber

Catherine Rampell's column on Uber is well worth reading. The basic point is very simple and should be obvious. There are good reasons for regulating cabs. They should have proper insurance, meet safety standards (both car and driver), and should also be limited in number. (Cabs create congestion and pollute.)

Whatever regulations are established should apply across the board. Uber doesn't get an exemption because it is run by incredibly rich twenty somethings.  

Is Educating Matt Yglesias a Full-Time Job?

Sorry, I usually find Matt's stuff interesting, but I couldn't resist the cheap shot. Anyhow, Matt seems to have gotten himself stuck in the mud of a silly debate between Obama haters and Obama apologists.

The haters are saying that all the jobs created under the Obama administration are part-time jobs -- pointing out that full-time employment is still below the pre-recession peak. Meanwhile the apologists are pointing out that most of the jobs created under Obama have been full-time jobs. Wi...

Washington Post Comes Out for Protectionist Trade Deals

In prior decades trade deals were largely about reducing tariffs and quotas that obstructed trade between countries. Due to the impact of these past deals, these barriers are now quite low or non-existent.

That is why the trade deals currently being negotiated by the Obama administration, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Pact (TTIP), are not really about reducing trade barriers. These deals are about locking in place a corporate friendly structur...

Are Public Pensions Taking Excessive Risks?

Andrew Biggs had a column in the Wall Street Journal last week complaining that public pension funds were taking excessive risk by having 70 percent to 80 percent of their holdings in risky assets, such as stocks and various alternative investment vehicles. In a few cases, holdings of risky assets apparently cross 80 percent. Biggs argues that this is far too high and that underfunded pension plans are now taking big gambles in the hope of closing their funding gap.

Bigg's basic argument stem...

TPP & TTIP Are Not Your Grandfather's Trade Agreements

The NYT had an article which discussed the potential political implications of a better than expected economic picture. At one point the article comments:

"The White House’s push for fast-track trade negotiating powers — and eventually for a major Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact — could be eased by growing confidence in the economy and the nation’s ability to compete internationally."

This comment is essentially a non sequitur. The major pacts up for negotiation, the Trans-Pacific Partne...

TPP and TTIP Are Not Your Grandfather's Trade Agreements

The NYT had an article which discussed the potential political implications of a better than expected economic picture. At one point the article comments:

"The White House’s push for fast-track trade negotiating powers — and eventually for a major Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact — could be eased by growing confidence in the economy and the nation’s ability to compete internationally."

This comment is essentially a non sequitur. The major pacts up for negotiation, the Trans-Pacific Partne...

More on the Continuing Weakness of the Labor Market

The November jobs numbers were unambiguously good news. The economy is moving in the right direction and at a faster pace than we had seen in years. But we have to realize how far the labor market has to go before it makes up the ground lost in the recession.

The simplest and best measure is the employment to population ratio (EPOP), which gives the percentage of the adult population which is employed. This stood at 59.2 percent in November (unchanged from October). This is 1.0 percentage poi...

Economics for Economic Reporters Lesson 34,721: Monthly Wage Data Are Erratic

Okay boys and girls, today we learn about the erratic pattern of wage data. Ideally the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) would tell us exactly how much hourly wages rose each month. Unfortunately, BLS doesn't have that ability. It has a very good survey of establishments that gives a reasonably close estimates of current hourly and weekly wages, but these numbers are not exact. And, since each month's wage estimate includes a component of error, the changes from one month can contain a very l...

It's Not a Free Trade Deal and Michael Froman Wants to Take Food Choices Away from Individuals

It looks like individual choice is not supposed to get in the way of corporate profits in the world of Michael Froman and U.S. trade policy. In a Washington Post article on the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Pact (TTIP), U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman is quoted as saying:

"We’re not trying to force anybody to eat anything ... we do feel like the decision as to what is safe should be made by science."

While it is not entirely clear what Froman means by this comment, most people...

Marketplace Radio Tells Us the National Debt is a Really Big Number

I have complained at length about news stories that give us really big numbers with no context, which they should know are absolutely meaningless to almost all their listeners. Marketplace Radio did exactly this early in the week when it told listeners in a short segment:

"Here's a big number: $18 trillion. 

"That's the national debt of the United States of America. Yesterday, we surpassed the $18 trillion mark for the first time.

"Partisan and or political inferences will not be ent...