Macroeconomic Measurement

November 18, 2011

Health Insurance Dilemmas

Assume for a moment that you are slim, love broccoli and run 4 miles each day. Should your health insurance premium be lower than the amount […]

November 17, 2011

Ben Franklin’s Turkey

The bald eagle is our national bird but, according to Ben Franklin, the turkey should have been. In a letter to his daughter, he explains why. […]

November 14, 2011

European Ties

How to picture the US/European economic partnership? You could think of Skippy Peanut Butter. Owned by Unilever, a multinational based in the UK and the Netherlands, […]

November 9, 2011

“Tweakers”

Referring to Steve Jobs, most of us think of innovation and entrepreneurship. Like Thomas Friedman in “(Steve) Jobs, Jobs, Jobs, Jobs,” we imagine business starters and […]

November 8, 2011

The Future of Oil

When will we run out of oil? A room full of pistachios might have the answer. In the first several pages of The Invisible Heart: An […]

November 5, 2011

Leaving the Euro

Would you like to win 250,000 British pounds? Predicting that a nation’s euro zone exit would be catastrophic unless properly managed, a UK businessman has sponsored […]

October 29, 2011

The Seven Billionth Baby

On October 12, 1999, according to the United Nations, the 6 billionth person (approximately) in the world was born. At the time, the UN projected the […]

October 28, 2011

Euro Deal Primer

To understand euro zone bailout plans, just think BBB. Bonds, Banks, Bailout The Bonds: If you own Greek debt, then you would be asked to accept […]

October 26, 2011

Innovation and Jobs

Just say, “More productivity, R & D and economies of scale,” and you are talking about large firms. New Yorker financial columnist James Surowiecki reminds us […]

October 25, 2011

Greece and Argentina

Nobody wants Greece to become Argentina. It all began with what scholars Rogoff and Reinhart called the lending boom of the 1990s. Enjoying the influx of […]