Posts Tagged ‘Pierre Canac’
An Economic Explanation for Why Donald Trump Won the 2016 Presidential Election
By Dr. Pierre Canac – With real GDP growing at 3.2% during the third quarter of 2016 while unemployment was running at 4.6% in November and 178,000 jobs were created during the month, we could have expected that the voters would have returned the incumbent party to the White House. However, it did not happen.…
Read MorePuerto Rico: Is it America’s Greece? (Part II)
By Dr. Pierre Canac—This is the continuation of last week’s blog, and thus, it is advised to first read Part I if you haven’t done so. Remedies The ball is now in Congress’ court and the speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, indicated that he would push for a solution by March 2016. Commissioner Pierluisi…
Read MorePuerto Rico: Is it America’s Greece? (Part I)
By Dr. Pierre Canac—This is a two-part blog; the second part will appear next week. I usually write about international economics; however, this time I will let the reader decide whether this is what I am doing in this post. The Status of Puerto Rico Puerto Rico is a Commonwealth or a territory that belongs…
Read MoreCan There Be Too Much Finance?
By Dr. Pierre Canac –Finance certainly plays an indispensable and positive role in promoting economic growth and overall employment. However there is some evidence that the relationship between financial development and GDP growth is not linear, but instead has an inverse U-shape. As the size of the financial sector gets larger, at first GDP growth…
Read MoreDoes the U.S. Government Debt Fit in a Bucket?
By Dr. Pierre Canac —Nobody will disagree that $12.8tn is a large and potentially scary number! That is the U.S. Gross Federal Debt held by the public at the end of 2014. However, if you divide this number by the U.S. Gross Domestic Product which is $17.7tn, we get about 73%. Is this a large…
Read MoreIs it Time for Europe to Call in the Helicopter?
By Dr. Pierre Canac– “Let us suppose now that one day a helicopter flies over this community and drops an additional $1000 in bills from the sky, …. Let us suppose further that everyone is convinced that this is a unique event which will never be repeated,” (Friedman 1969, pp 4–5). In one of…
Read MoreGermany and Greece Need to Learn How to Tango Together
By Dr. Pierre Canac—Prior to the 2007-2008 financial crisis, cross-countries financial flows triggered global imbalances whereby some countries experienced large current account surpluses (and capital outflows) while others faced large current account deficits (and capital inflows). Current Account and Capital Flows A country with a large current account deficit by definition has a large excess…
Read MoreNegative Interest Rates: Unusual and a Difficult Phenomenon to Explain
With respect to interest rates, we live in a very interesting and indeed historical time. In some European countries, nominal interest rates are negative (while they are close to zero in the United States). A short while back this was thought to be impossible. Until it actually happened, it would have been difficult to imagine…
Read MoreWhere is the Inflation Monster Hiding?
For the past several years, there has been concern that higher inflation is just around the corner. It is a valid concern, given the damage that high inflation can wreak on an economy and the Fed’s expansion of the money supply. But caution should be exercised in attempting to preempt rising inflation since the facts…
Read MoreA Meeting of the Minds: Alexis de Tocqueville and Thomas Piketty
Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) is a French historian and political thinker who is best known in the United States for his book Democracy in America, which was published in 1835 following a trip to study the U.S prison system. Coming from Old Europe where wealth inequality was extremely large, he was impressed by the more…
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