CARMA chameleon

Dani Rodrik's Blog brings to my attention a new website called CARMA (CARbon Monitoring for Action) with data on the carbon emissions of over 50,000 powerplants worldwide. The site has nifty color-coded maps (like my dream, red, gold and green).

Our friendly neighborhood power plant, Duke Energy's plant in North Bend (the one you drive by on the way to the Cincinnati Airport via I-275) emits 7.5 million tons of carbon dioxide per year, 2123 pounds per megawatt hour, earning a red dot.

The Fed Promises to Share its Feelings

The Fed announced today that it would publish more detailed forecasts more often. Chairman Bernanke explained the rationale for increasing the Fed's openness:

[A] considerable amount of evidence indicates that central bank transparency increases the effectiveness of monetary policy and enhances economic and financial performance in several ways. First, improving the public's understanding of the central bank's objectives and policy strategies reduces economic and financial uncertainty and thereby allows businesses and households to make more-informed decisions. Second, if practitioners in financial markets gain a better understanding of how policy is likely to respond to incoming information, asset prices and bond yields will tend to respond to economic data in ways that further the central bank's policy objectives. For example, if market participants understand that arriving information about the economy increases the likelihood of certain policy actions, then market interest rates will tend to move in a way that reinforces the expected actions, effectively supporting the goals of the central bank. Third, clarity about the central bank's policy objectives and strategy may help anchor the public's long-term inflation expectations, which can substantially improve the efficacy of policy and the overall functioning of the economy. Finally, open discussion of the central bank's analyses and forecasts invites valuable input and feedback from the public.

As Bernanke explained in the speech, there has been a considerable evolution toward greater central bank transparency - it was only in 1994 that the Fed only began publicly announcing changes in the Fed Funds target. Real Time Economics had reaction from several academic economists, who interpreted this as a move in the direction of inflation targeting. Bernanke was careful to say otherwise:

As you may know, I have been an advocate of the monetary policy strategy known as inflation targeting, used in many countries around the world. Inflation targeting is characterized by two features: an explicit numerical target or target range for inflation and a high degree of transparency about forecasts and policy plans. The steps being taken by the Federal Reserve, I must emphasize, are intended only to improve our communication with the public; the conduct of policy itself will not change...

...some aspects of inflation targeting may be less well suited to the Federal Reserve's mandate and policy practice. In particular, although inflation-targeting central banks certainly pay attention to economic growth and employment, their formal accountability is often largely couched only in terms of a price-stability objective.... As I have emphasized today, the Federal Reserve is legally accountable to the Congress for two objectives, maximum employment and price stability, on an equal footing. My colleagues and I strongly support the dual mandate and the equal weighting of objectives that it implies. Of course, as I have discussed, the Federal Reserve's influence over these objectives differs importantly in the long run: Monetary policy determines the long-run inflation rate, whereas the factors that influence the sustainable rates of growth and employment in the long run are largely outside the central bank's control. Still, over time, monetary policy must strive to foster rates of growth and employment close to their long-run sustainable rates. The Federal Reserve must thus be accountable for the effects of its policies on the real economy as well as on inflation. The enhanced projections that I have described today will provide additional information pertinent to both halves of the Federal Reserve's mandate.

Reagan Was Worse

In Vanity Fair, Joe Stiglitz makes the argument that, in terms of economic policy, George W. Bush is the worst president ever. In an essay titled "The Economic Consequences of Mr. Bush,"* he begins:

When we look back someday at the catastrophe that was the Bush administration, we will think of many things: the tragedy of the Iraq war, the shame of Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib, the erosion of civil liberties. The damage done to the American economy does not make front-page headlines every day, but the repercussions will be felt beyond the lifetime of anyone reading this page.

I can hear an irritated counterthrust already. The president has not driven the United States into a recession during his almost seven years in office. Unemployment stands at a respectable 4.6 percent. Well, fine. But the other side of the ledger groans with distress: a tax code that has become hideously biased in favor of the rich; a national debt that will probably have grown 70 percent by the time this president leaves Washington....

Up to now, the conventional wisdom has been that Herbert Hoover, whose policies aggravated the Great Depression, is the odds-on claimant for the mantle “worst president” when it comes to stewardship of the American economy. Once Franklin Roosevelt assumed office and reversed Hoover’s policies, the country began to recover. The economic effects of Bush’s presidency are more insidious than those of Hoover, harder to reverse, and likely to be longer-lasting. There is no threat of America’s being displaced from its position as the world’s richest economy. But our grandchildren will still be living with, and struggling with, the economic consequences of Mr. Bush.

Stiglitz makes a number of strong critiques Bush's stewardship (or lack thereof), but his historical comparison neglects a much more consequential Presidency, that of Ronald Reagan. There are some definite parallels between the two administrations - fiscal policies centered around "supply side" tax cuts which primarily benefited people with high incomes, a deteriorating fiscal situation (i.e. growing deficits) and low priority on traditional government functions (e.g. investment in infrastructure and research).

The parallels should not be taken too far - Reagan inherited an economy reeling from the "stagflation" of the 1970's, with a federal reserve determined to put an end to inflation, notwithstanding the "short run" consequences (arguably the Reagan fiscal policies forced the Volcker Fed to slam the monetary brakes even harder, worsening the recession). When Bush took office, unemployment and inflation were low, and the federal budget was in a rare state of surplus. Because of the differing circumstances, and because much is beyond the influence of the President, it would indeed be unfair to compare the two on a cyclical measures like unemployment (though it should be noted that the 1982 recession was much, much worse than 2001 - the unemployment rate reached 10.8% in 1982).

Although macro data miss many important nuances, here are some data on 3 issues raised in Stiglitz's critique: (i) tax code bias, (ii) the deficit and investment and (iii) fiscal priorities:

Distribution of the Tax Burden: From the CBO's data on effective federal tax rates, here are the effective tax rates on the highest-income 1%, from 1979 through 2004 (the last year available):

Although the Bush years have seen a dip in the tax burden on the richest, its much smaller than the plunge in the early 1980's (partly reversed by the tax reform act of 1986). Another way to look at the distribution of the tax burden is the ratio of the effective tax rate on the top 1% divided by the effective rate faced by the middle 20% of the income distribution:

Here again, the Reagan administration is where the big shift occurs. In 2000-03, while the richest received far larger tax cuts in terms of the dollar amount, the percentage change was actually bigger for middle-class households, so, by this measure, the relative burden on the rich actually rose.

The Federal Deficit and Investment: Relative to the size of GDP, the federal deficits of the 1980's were much bigger than those of recent years. According to the CBO's historical budget data, the federal deficit peaked at 6% of GDP in 1983 during the Reagan administration, and at 3.4% of GDP in 2004 (to be fair, there was a 2.7% deficit already in 1980, and a surplus of 2.4% in 2000, so the Bush administration saw a bigger swing in the fiscal position). One reason to worry about the deficit is if the indebtedness of the federal government is exploding relative to the size of the economy:

While the Bush administration has reversed the positive trend of the Clinton years, relative to GDP our federal debt has basically leveled off, but it has not resumed the explosive path of the 1980s (I should note this is publicly-held debt, and does not include the debt owed to the social security trust fund).

Another reason to fret about the deficit is that it may be bad for investment ("crowding out"), leading to a smaller capital stock and lower output in the long run. According to the BEA, here's nonresidential fixed investment as a % of GDP (1979-2006):

The Reagan and Bush eras have both seen sharp decreases in investment - the Bush-era decrease is sharper, but there are signs of a bit of a recovery already, while the Reagan trend only reversed after the Clinton administration took office (and raised taxes).

Fiscal Priorities: Several of Stiglitz's points relate to neglect of domestic priorities, like education, research and infrastructure. These all fall under the heading "domestic discretionary outlays" in the federal budget numbers. Lots of other things also show up in this category, so this is a very blunt measure, and doesn't tell us anything about how well the money is being spent. Nonetheless, the data are indicative a sharp fall in the early 1980's, with only modest changes since:

Although the Reagan administration did not really reduce the size of government, it did induce a significant reallocation, spending a larger share on the military and interest payments, and less on discretionary programs.

Ok, "worse" is very much a normative term, and whether and to what extent one views these shifts negatively is a matter subjective judgment. But the facts indicate that, compared to the Bush administration, the Reagan era saw bigger changes in the distribution of the tax burden, the growth rate of the national debt and in federal spending priorities.

*The title of his article is an allusion to Keynes, who penned "The Economic Consequences of Mr. Churchill," in criticism of the British government's decision to return the pound to its pre-WWI value of $4.86 (Churchill was Chancellor of the Exchequer, which is British for "finance minister"). Keynes was referencing his own famous critique of the Versailles treaty ending WWI, "The Economic Consequences of the Peace."

PS Stiglitz's article came to my attention via the invaluable Economist's View.

Update: Marginal Revolution's Tyler Cowen sees some inconsistencies in Stiglitz's argument.

Neoclassical Trade Theory and Globalization Backlash

The same standard neoclassical trade theory that underlies many economists' arguments about the gains from trade also implies that those gains will be distributed unevenly. In the Guardian, Jared Bernstein and Josh Bivens write:

Last February, before the flurry of news stories about unsafe imports, a New York Times/CBS poll [PDF] found that 51% of respondents agreed the US had "lost more than it gained from globalisation." Further, while trade is not supposed to create political problems for Republicans, a recent Wall Street Journal poll of Republican supporters found that that 59% agreed that "foreign trade has been bad for the US".

These results are clearly alarming to many in the elite policymaking class, for whom protectionism seems to be the first-order threat to the American economy.

These poll results, however, should not surprise anyone who understands the economics of trade. Chapter one of the trade textbook was essentially written by David Ricardo, and it does indeed teach that trade, on the basis of comparative advantage, typically boosts a nation's average income. This genuinely powerful insight explains why, even if we're more productive than a potential trading partner, or they're able to produce with much lower wage costs, trade will raise national income in both countries.

Sadly, both for American workers and the quality of the trade debate, the textbook has other chapters. One of them explains the Stolper-Samuelson Theorem (SST), which points out that when the US exports insurance services and aircraft while importing apparel and electronics, we are implicitly selling capital - physical and human - for labour. This exchange bids up capital's price (profits and high-end salaries) and bids down wages for the broad working and middle-class, leading to rising inequality and downward wage pressure for many Americans.

Note that this is not just a story about laid-off factory workers, who obviously suffer the toughest losses. Rather, all workers in the US economy who resemble import-displaced workers in terms of education, skills, and credentials are affected. Landscapers won't lose their jobs to imports, but their wages are lowered through competition with those import-displaced factory workers.

To be sure, the theory is clear that there are gains from trade - but there is also a change in relative factor prices (i.e. the returns to capital and wages of different types of labor). So while total income rises, this does not necessarily mean that the income of the median worker rises.

Dani Rodrik makes an interesting point about the selective use of neoclassical theory in arguments about trade policy:

The workhorse model of international trade (the 2x2 Heckscher-Ohlin model) has very stark implications for the effect of trade with poor, labor-abundant countries. Low-skilled workers in rich countries (read the U.S.) must end up as losers--not in relative terms, but in absolute terms. Moreover, the larger the overall gains from trade, the bigger must this adverse distributional effect be. In that world, it is inconsistent to claim there are large gains from globalization while downplaying the distributional impacts. Which is why many economists teach the model in their classrooms, but shift to other, more complicated models when they engage in the public debate about the effect of trade on wages.

Brad DeLong adds two useful points to the discussion:

For competition to be head-to-head, the two countries have to be making very similar goods with similar production processes. Hand-spinners in Pakistan don't compete with labor here in the United States but with the capital embodied in our large automated spinning mills.

That is, the neoclassical "no factor intensity reversals" assumption is violated. Also,

What trade does to our distribution of income can be undone by normal domestic redistributionist policies. The right way to deal with the issue is to (a) maximize the third world's ability to take advantage of our demand to spur its own growth, and (b) use domestic redistribution here to compensate for any adverse distributional impact.

In general, as elegant as it is, the neoclassical theory has not worked well when tested against the data (e.g. Trefler, "The Case of the Missing Trade and Other Mysteries," Am. Econ. Rev., 1995). Therefore we need to be cautious when using it to make the case for the gains from trade, or to raise distributional concerns.

Hairshirt Economics

With the bad news from the housing market, stock market and oil prices, and mixed signals from the labor market, there's some concern that a recession may be in the offing (or, given the "recognition lag," perhaps already underway...). Washington Post columnist Robert Samuelson makes a case that a recession may actually be a good thing:

Recessions also have often-overlooked benefits. They dampen inflation. In weak markets, companies can't easily raise prices or workers' wages. Similarly, recessions punish reckless financial speculation and poor corporate investments. Bad bets don't pay off. These disciplining effects contribute to the economy's long-term strength, but it seems coldhearted to say so because the initial impact is hurtful.

The Economist made a similar argument in August:

The economic and social costs of recession are painful: unemployment, lower wages and profits, and bankruptcy. These cannot be dismissed lightly. But there are also some purported benefits. Some economists believe that recessions are a necessary feature of economic growth. Joseph Schumpeter argued that recessions are a process of creative destruction in which inefficient firms are weeded out. Only by allowing the “winds of creative destruction” to blow freely could capital be released from dying firms to new industries. Some evidence from cross-country studies suggests that economies with higher output volatility tend to have slightly faster productivity growth. Japan's zero interest rates allowed “zombie” companies to survive in the 1990s. This depressed Japan's productivity growth, and the excess capacity undercut the profits of other firms.

Another “benefit” of a recession is that it purges the excesses of the previous boom, leaving the economy in a healthier state. The Fed's massive easing after the dotcom bubble burst delayed this cleansing process and simply replaced one bubble with another, leaving America's imbalances (inadequate saving, excessive debt and a huge current-account deficit) in place. A recession now would reduce America's trade gap as consumers would at last be forced to trim their spending. Delaying the correction of past excesses by pumping in more money and encouraging more borrowing is likely to make the eventual correction more painful. The policy dilemma facing the Fed may not be a choice of recession or no recession. It may be a choice between a mild recession now and a nastier one later.

Keynes recognized the potential for "excesses" in boom times. In chapter 22 of the General Theory he wrote:

It may, of course, be the case - indeed it is likely to be - that the illusions of the boom cause particular types of capital-assets to be produced in such excessive abundance that some part of the output is, on any criterion, a waste of resources; - which sometimes happens, we may add, even when there is no boom. It leads, that is to say, to misdirected investment. But over and above this it is an essential characteristic of the boom that investments which will in fact yield, say, 2 per cent. in conditions of full employment are made in the expectation of a yield of; say, 6 per cent., and are valued accordingly. When the disillusion comes, this expectation is replaced by a contrary "error of pessimism", with the result that the investments, which would in fact yield 2 per cent. in conditions of full employment, are expected to yield less than nothing; and the resulting collapse of new investment then leads to a state of unemployment in which the investments, which would have yielded 2 per cent. in conditions of full employment, in fact yield less than nothing. We reach a condition where there is a shortage of houses, but where nevertheless no one can afford to live in the houses that there are.

His prescription quite the opposite of letting the downturn "purge the rottenness out of the system," as Andrew Mellon, Hoover's Treasury Secretary put it. Keynes continues:

Thus the remedy for the boom is not a higher rate of interest but a lower rate of interest! For that may enable the so-called boom to last. The right remedy for the trade cycle is not to be found in abolishing booms and thus keeping us permanently in a semi-slump; but in abolishing slumps and thus keeping us permanently in a quasi-boom.

Matthew Yglesias found another relevant Keynes reference (and the first comment on his post has more on the parallel between Samuelson's argument and Mellon's view, which is also noted by Krugman).

Energy Deregulation's Hidden Virtue?

The electricity market was once highly regulated (e.g. prices set by government commissions) on the grounds that utilities are natural monopolies. In recent years, a number of states have de-regulated their energy markets.

The result? Higher prices. The NY Times reports:

Retail electricity prices have risen much more in states that adopted competitive pricing than in those that have retained traditional rates set by the government, new studies based on years of price reports show.

Of course, if there are negative externalities associated with electricity consumption - i.e. global warming-causing carbon emissions - higher prices are a good thing! The de-regulation acts like a stealth carbon tax (except no revenue for the government). Ahh... now I realize that all the politicians, "free market" types and energy lobbyists who pushed deregulation were engaged in a conspiracy to help the environment (no wonder Cheney kept those meetings secret!).

The Economist's Free Exchange blog makes a similar point here.

Dissed by Supermodel

You know your currency is in trouble when you see reports like this - Bloomberg reports:

Gisele Bundchen wants to remain the world's richest model and is insisting that she be paid in almost any currency but the U.S. dollar....

When Bundchen, 27, signed a contract in August to represent Pantene hair products for Cincinnati-based Procter & Gamble Co., she demanded payment in euros, according to Veja, Brazil's biggest weekly magazine. She'll also get euros for the deal she reached last October with Dolce & Gabbana SpA in Milan to promote the Italian designer's new fragrance, The One, Veja reported. Bundchen earned $33 million in the year through June, Forbes reported in July.

"Contracts starting now are more attractive in euros because we don't know what will happen to the dollar,'' Patricia Bundchen, the model's twin sister and manager in Brazil, said in a telephone interview in September from Sao Paulo.

A "hot money outflow," indeed.

Update: The story may not actually be true (hat tip to EconoSpeak)

Health Care Numbers

The US spends much more on health care than other high-income countries, and generally achieves outcomes that are, if anything, worse (e.g. lower life expectancy). Greg Mankiw looks on the bright side: in the NY Times, he argues that some of the facts cited by critics of the US system are misleading. Dean Baker and Mark Thoma were all over this one.

Update (11/6): Speaking of worse outcomes, The American Prospect's Ezra Klein offers "Ten Reasons Why American Health Care Is so Bad," from a recent comparative study (hat tip: Economist's View).

Update 2 (11/6): On his blog, Mankiw responds to some of the criticisms.

October Employment Report

On Friday, the BLS released its October "Employment Situation Summary." The report contains information from surveys of firms ("establishments") and households. Once again there is a disparity. According to the establishment survey, employment rose by 166,000 in October, but the household survey indicated a decline of 250,000. The household survey also reveals a decline in labor force participation, as 211,000 people are estimated to have left the labor force.

So, what's going on? Floyd Norris explains why the job gains in the establishment survey data may be a figment of the BLS's methodology. Econbrowser's James Hamilton cuts through the month-to-month noise by looking at the 12-month changes in both numbers, and says "all of this leaves me with the impression of an economy in which employment continues to grow, though not quickly enough to prevent the unemployment rate from rising." Dean Baker argues that the best indicator is the employment-population ratio (and notes that Bernanke has made the same argument):

One of the peculiarities of this cycle is that labor market weakness has expressed itself far more in declining labor force participation rather than measured unemployment. The difference is that the unemployed tell surveyors that they are looking for jobs, whereas to not be counted in the labor force people say that they are neither employed nor looking for work. It doesn't seem plausible that 1.4 million people have just decided that they no longer feel like having a job, so presumably their decision to drop out reflects labor market weakness.

While the employment report was mixed, at best, the BEA reported quite healthy real GDP growth. Their "advance estimate" (subject to revision) for the third quarter (July-September) was a 3.9% annual rate of growth, with gains in consumption, exports and government purchases more than offsetting the decrease in residential fixed investment resulting from the decline in the housing market.

How should a central bank respond to such contradictory signals? In the statement announcing the cut in the fed funds target rate (which came out on Wednesday, after the BEA report, but before the BLS report), the FOMC said:

The Committee judges that, after this action, the upside risks to inflation roughly balance the downside risks to growth. The Committee will continue to assess the effects of financial and other developments on economic prospects and will act as needed to foster price stability and sustainable economic growth.

Or, as the Magic 8-ball might say, "reply hazy, try again."

Intermediate Micro (Donkey Edition)

Late in Tuesday's Democratic presidential debate, Brian Williams gave some of the candidates a chance show off their intermediate microeconomics knowledge (or lack thereof).

We learn that Chris Dodd understands externalities (and what to do about them). From the transcript:

MR. WILLIAMS: ...Are you truly prepared to lead on a national scale the kind of sacrifice it would require where it intersects with the environment?

SEN. DODD: Well, I think you've got to -- I find it somewhat startling here that Ronald Reagan's former secretary of State and George Bush's first economic -- chief economic adviser are, frankly, more courageous and bold on energy policy than my fellow competitors here for this job, the presidency.

I've called for a corporate carbon tax. All of us share the same goals here of achieving energy independence, reducing our dependency on fossil fuels and the carbons they emit. But you're not going to achieve that unless you deal with price, quite frankly, here...

The advisor he refers to is Greg Mankiw, who advocates "Pigouvian" taxes.

The next question went to John Edwards, who must have missed the class on moral hazard (perhaps he had a bad hair day):

MR. WILLIAMS: Senator Edwards, should there be a bottomless well of federal dollars for people who knowingly live in areas of this country that are disaster prone to rebuild their homes if lost in a disaster?

MR. EDWARDS: Well, I think that when families are devastated -- and we've lived with this in North Carolina because we've been regularly hit by hurricanes, and I've spent an awful lot of time in New Orleans. When families are hit by natural disasters, I think it is for the national community to be there for them. I think that's our joint responsibility as a national community to be there for them.

I would have been very keen to learn Mike Gravel's views on resale price maintenance, but, alas, he was not invited. Its not the same without him.