The Economist recently reported on the Iron Law of Convergence in the US economy. Economists have observed the tendency of poor areas to catch up with rich areas in the US throughout much of US history. In recent decades convergence has slowed and in recent years there has been signs of divergence in recent years. For example:
Last week reports surfaced that Trump was “impressed” by his interview with Dr. John Taylor to fill the role of Fed Chairman. The markets at PredictIt.org, however, aren’t buying it.
As he has for most of October, Jerome Powell, himself a current Fed governor, is seen as a heavy favorite to replace Janet Yellen next year.
Just in case you were wondering, everybody who’s anybody agrees that Janet Yellen’s done a great job as Fed Chair.
The editorial board of USAToday, for example opined yesterday:
There is no reason not to reappoint Yellen, the first woman to hold the post. She is a capable and well-respected chairman who gained valuable experience as a Fed governor during the 2008 financial crisis. As chairman, she has ably begun the process of unwinding the policies that kept the economy from sinking too far into the abyss.
[This is the 2013 F.A.Hayek Memorial Lecture presented at the Austrian Economics Research Conference, March 22, 2013.]
This week President Trump revealed his final five candidates for Federal Reserve chair. Disappointingly, but not surprisingly, all five have strong ties to the financial and political establishment. The leading candidates are former Federal Reserve governor and Morgan Stanley banker Kevin Warsh and current Fed governor, former investment banker, Carlyle Group partner, and George H.W. Bush administration official Jerome Powell. Gary Cohn, current director of the president’s National Economic Council and former president of Goldman Sachs, is also on Trump’s list.
Introduction by Patrick Newman
Murray Rothbard was a scholar of enormous erudition with many diverse research interests. He wrote about economic theory, economic history, history of economic thought, pure history, philosophy, political science, and popular culture.
In order to make the data “talk,” economists utilize a range of statistical methods that vary from highly complex models to a simple display of historical data. It is generally held that by means of statistical correlations one can organize historical data into a useful body of information, which in turn can serve as the basis for assessments of the state of the economy. It is held that through the application of statistical methods on historical data, one can extract the facts of reality regarding the state of the economy.
[Editor’s note: The Mises Institute presents the “voluntaryist constitution” as a thought experiment, and is not presented here as an ideological or political ideal.]
A World in Disarray: American Foreign Policy and the Crisis of the Old Order
by Richard Haass
Penguin Press, 2017
