New Economic Perspectives

By William K. Black March 24, 2016     Bloomington, MN Representative Nancy Pelosi has just written the latest effort by a prominent Democrat to bash Republicans for the high crime of not being financially illiterate.  The Republicans are frequently financially illiterate on budget issues and they bash Democrats for the high crime of not being financially illiterate.  The leaders of both parties share the hypocrisy of bashing the rival party for supporting budgetary stimulus in...

Bill appears on the latest podcast from the Tax Justice Network discussing banking, regulations and the Bank Whistleblowers United 60 day plan. [embedded content] [Translate]

By Eric Tymoigne It may surprise you to know that the banking sector is one of the most regulated industries in the United States with a bank having to file regulatory documents with several agencies. These regulations determine how banks should and should not operate their business in terms of many aspects; from disclosure of information to potential customers, to means of determining creditworthiness of a potential client, to the amount of reserves to hold, to management issues, among...

By Eric Tymoigne The US financial system is extremely complicated and this series shades light only on some corners of that system by focusing on the banking sector. Here is a broad picture of the US financial system (some things have changed since the time I made this). Since the beginning of this M&B series, posts have emphasized the importance of balance sheet to get a solid understanding the mechanics at play in the financial sector. This post continues that trend. The balance...

This weekend: March 11th – 15th 2016, there are events taking place at the Village East Cinemas in New York including a book signing by Randy Wray on the 15th as well as screening of the movie. You can get all the details and list of guest appearances from Village East Cinema’s website here. Flyer for the book signing is after the jump. Why Minsky Matters Events [embedded content] [Translate]

By John F. Henry Levy Economics Institute On January 6, 1941, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivered his State of the Union Address to Congress. It was a perilous stage in world history, and Roosevelt used his annual address to urge U.S. entry into the war then raging. Against the isolationists in Congress (and in the general population), Roosevelt contended that the main objective of U.S. entry was to fight for the universal freedoms that all peoples of the world should possess....

By William K. Black March 3, 2016 The Bank Whistleblowers United’s third weekly lemons award is made jointly to the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) and Fannie Mae (with a dishonorable mention to the federal judiciary).  The award goes for these entities’ indifference and even hostility to whistleblowers.  On September 6, 2008, the FHFA placed Fannie and Freddie into conservatorship in conjunction with the largest public bailout in global history.  Fannie and Freddie failed in an orgy...

By Eric Tymoigne Given that the concept of leverage will be used often in the upcoming posts, this post spends some time explaining what leverage is and some of its impacts on the balance sheet of any economic unit. What is Leverage? Leverage is the ability to acquire assets in an amount that is larger than what one’s own capital allows to buy. Say that an economic unit has a net worth of $100, that it has no debt and that the counterparty is $100 in cash. The balance sheet looks like...

By William K. Black February 23, 2016     Bloomington, MN Secretary Hillary Clinton is asking Democratic voters to believe that she has experienced a “Road to Damascus” conversion from her roots as a leader of the “New Democrats” – the Wall Street wing of the Democratic Party.  When exactly this conversion occurred is never stated, but an interesting fact has emerged that demonstrates it did not occur during her service as the Secretary of State.  A Wall Street Journal story provides the...

William K. Black February 29, 2016     Brooklyn, N.Y. A blogger has trolled all heterodox economists as believers in the “occult.”  More precisely, he is upset about “econ people” (who are likely not economists) and who tweet him or post comments on his blog site.  The blogger further complains that these commenters say that they believe in heterodox economics and “new methodologies [that] are poised to topple mainstream economics.”  He then goes on to say:  “My typical response is to ask...