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1681 publications found

  • Working Paper No. 670 May 18, 2011

    The Product Space

    Jesus Felipe, and Arnelyn Abdon
    Abstract

    In this paper we look at the economic development of Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) in the context of structural transformation. We use Hidalgo et al.’s (2007) concept of product space to show the evolution of the region’s productive structure, and discuss the opportunities for growth and diversification. The majority of SSA countries are trapped in the export of unsophisticated, […]

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  • One-Pager No. 9 May 17, 2011

    Did Problems with SSDI Cause the Output-Jobs Disconnect?

    Abstract

    The slow recovery of the job market after the recessions of 2001 and 2007–09 has fostered concerns that the link between output growth and job creation has been severed. Between 2000 and 2010, the employment rate for males plunged from 71.9 to 63.7 percent—a decline that can be accounted for almost entirely by a fall […]

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  • Working Paper No. 669 May 17, 2011

    Race, Power, and the Subprime/Foreclosure Crisis

    Gary A. Dymski, Jesus Hernandez, and Lisa Mohanty
    Abstract

    Economists’ principal explanations of the subprime crisis differ from those developed by noneconomists in that the latter see it as rooted in the US legacy of racial/ethnic inequality, and especially in racial residential segregation, whereas the former ignore race. This paper traces this disjuncture to two sources. What is missing in the social science view […]

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  • Policy Notes No. 4 May 12, 2011

    Was Keynes’s Monetary Policy, à Outrance in the Treatise, a Forerunnner of ZIRP and QE? Did He Change His Mind in the General Theory?

    Jan Kregel
    Abstract

    At the end of 1930, as the 1929 US stock market crash was starting to have an impact on the real economy in the form of falling commodity prices, falling output, and rising unemployment, John Maynard Keynes, in the concluding chapters of his Treatise on Money, launched a challenge to monetary authorities to take “deliberate […]

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  • Policy Notes No. 4 May 12, 2011

    Μια ανάλυση της εξέλιξης των απόψεων του Κέινς για τη νομισματική πολιτική—από τη «Πραγματεία για το Χρήμα» στη «Γενική Θεωρία»

    Jan Kregel
    Abstract

    Προς το τέλος του 1930, καθώς το κραχ του Χρηματιστηρίου της Νέας Υόρκης το 1929 είχε αρχίσει να έχει αντίκτυπο στην πραγματική οικονομία των ΗΠΑ πτώση στις τιμές των εμπορευμάτων, μείωση της παραγωγής και αύξηση της ανεργίας ο Τζον Μέιναρντ Κέινς, στα τελευταία κεφάλαια του βιβλίου του «Η Πραγματεία για το Χρήμα» προκαλούσε τις νομισματικές […]

    Download Σημειωματα Πολιτικής 2011/4 PDF (1.30 MB)
  • Policy Notes No. 3 May 12, 2011

    A Modest Proposal for Overcoming the Euro Crisis

    Yanis Varoufakis, and Stuart Holland
    Abstract

    This “Modest Proposal” by authors Varoufakis and Holland outlines a three-pronged, comprehensive solution to the eurozone crisis that simultaneously addresses the three main dimensions of the current crisis in the eurozone (sovereign debt, banking, and underinvestment), restructures both a share of sovereign debt and that of banks, and does not involve a fiscal transfer of […]

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  • Policy Notes No. 2 May 04, 2011

    Is the Federal Debt Unsustainable?

    James K. Galbraith
    Abstract

    By general agreement, the federal budget is on an “unsustainable path.” Try typing the phrase into Google News: 19 of the first 20 hits refer to the federal debt. But what does this actually mean? One suspects that some who use the phrase are guided by vague fears, or even that they don’t quite know […]

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  • Working Paper No. 668 May 02, 2011

    The Freedom Budget at 45

    Mathew Forstater
    Abstract

    Forty-five years ago, the A. Philip Randolph Institute issued “The Freedom Budget,” in which a program for economic transformation was proposed that included a job guarantee for everyone ready and willing to work, a guaranteed income for those unable to work or those who should not be working, and a living wage to lift the […]

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  • Working Paper No. 667 April 20, 2011

    The Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being, Great Britain, 1995 and 2005

    Edward N. Wolff, Ajit Zacharias, Thomas Masterson, and Selçuk Eren
    Abstract

    We construct estimates of the Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being for Great Britain for the years 1995 and 2005. We also produce estimates of the official British measures HBAI (from the Department for Work and Pensions annual report titled “Households below Average Income”) and ROI (from the Office of National Statistics Redistribution of Income […]

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  • Working Paper No. 666 April 20, 2011

    Hegemonic Currencies during the Crisis

    David Fields, and Matías Vernengo
    Abstract

    This paper suggests that the dollar is not threatened as the hegemonic international currency, and that most analysts are incapable of understanding the resilience of the dollar, not only because they ignore the theories of monetary hegemonic stability or what, more recently, has been termed the geography of money; but also as a result of […]

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  • Research Project Report April 12, 2011

    Minsky on the Reregulation and Restructuring of the Financial System

    Abstract

    This monograph is part of the Institute’s ongoing research program on Financial Instability and the Reregulation of Financial Institutions and Markets, funded by the Ford Foundation. This program’s purpose is to investigate the causes and development of the recent financial crisis from the point of view of the late financial economist and Levy Distinguished Scholar […]

    Download Research Project Report, April 12, 2011 PDF (3.24 MB)
  • Public Policy Brief No. 118 April 11, 2011

    Will the Recovery Continue?

    Dimitri B. Papadimitriou
    Abstract

    In this brief, Research Scholar Greg Hannsgen and President Dimitri B. Papadimitriou focus on the risks and possibilities ahead for the US economy. Using a Keynesian approach and drawing from the commentary of other observers, they analyze publicly available data in order to assess the strength and durability of the expansion that probably began in […]

    Download Public Policy Brief No. 118, 2011 PDF (1.40 MB)
  • Public Policy Brief No. 117 April 05, 2011

    It’s Time to Rein In the Fed

    L. Randall Wray, and Scott Fullwiler
    Abstract

    Scott Fullwiler and Senior Scholar L. Randall Wray review the roles of the Federal Reserve and the Treasury in the context of quantitative easing, and find that the financial crisis has highlighted the limited oversight of Congress and the limited transparency of the Fed. And since a Fed promise is ultimately a Treasury promise that […]

    Download Public Policy Brief No. 117, 2011 PDF (1.19 MB)
  • Working Paper No. 665 April 04, 2011

    Causes of Financial Instability

    Dirk Bezemer
    Abstract

    Given the economy’s complex behavior and sudden transitions as evidenced in the 2007–08 crisis, agent-based models are widely considered a promising alternative to current macroeconomic practice dominated by DSGE models. Their failure is commonly interpreted as a failure to incorporate heterogeneous interacting agents. This paper explains that complex behavior and sudden transitions also arise from […]

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  • Working Paper No. 664 March 31, 2011

    Can Portugal Escape Stagnation without Opting Out from the Eurozone?

    Alfonso Palacio-Vera, and Pedro Leao
    Abstract

    The creation of the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) has not brought significant gains to the Portuguese economy in terms of real convergence with wealthier eurozone countries. We analyze the causes of the underperformance of the Portuguese economy in the last decade, discuss its growth prospects within the EMU, and make two proposals for urgent […]

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  • Working Paper No. 663 March 29, 2011

    Quality of Match for Statistical Matches Used in the 1995 and 2005 LIMEW Estimates for Great Britain

    Thomas Masterson
    Abstract

    The quality of match of four statistical matches used in the LIMEW estimates for Great Britain for 1995 and 2005 is described. The first match combines the fifth (1995) wave of the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) with the 1995–96 Family Resources Survey (FRS). The second match combines the 1995 time-use module of the Office […]

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  • Working Paper No. 662 March 28, 2011

    The Financial Crisis Viewed from the Perspective of the “Social Costs” Theory

    L. Randall Wray
    Abstract

    This paper examines the causes and consequences of the current global financial crisis. It largely relies on the work of Hyman Minsky, although analyses by John Kenneth Galbraith and Thorstein Veblen of the causes of the 1930s collapse are used to show similarities between the two crises. K.W. Kapp’s “social costs” theory is contrasted with […]

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  • Working Paper No. 661 March 26, 2011

    Minsky’s Money Manager Capitalism and the Global Financial Crisis

    L. Randall Wray
    Abstract

    The world’s worst economic crisis since the 1930s is now well into its third year. All sorts of explanations have been proffered for the causes of the crisis, from lax regulation and oversight to excessive global liquidity. Unfortunately, these narratives do not take into account the systemic nature of the global crisis. This is why […]

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  • Working Paper No. 660 March 21, 2011

    Financial Markets

    Jörg Bibow
    Abstract

    This paper provides a brief exposition of financial markets in Post Keynesian economics. Inspired by John Maynard Keynes’s path-breaking insights into the role of liquidity and finance in “monetary production economies,” Post Keynesian economics offers a refreshing alternative to mainstream (mis)conceptions in this area. We highlight the importance of liquidity—as provided by the financial system—to […]

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  • Working Paper No. 659 March 16, 2011

    Minsky Crisis

    L. Randall Wray
    Abstract

    Stability is destabilizing. These three words concisely capture the insight that underlies Hyman Minsky’s analysis of the economy’s transformation over the entire postwar period. The basic thesis is that the dynamic forces of a capitalist economy are explosive and must be contained by institutional ceilings and floors. However, to the extent that these constraints achieve […]

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  • Working Paper No. 658 March 15, 2011

    Keynes after 75 Years

    L. Randall Wray
    Abstract

    In this paper I first provide an overview of alternative approaches to money, contrasting the orthodox approach, in which money is neutral, at least in the long run; and the Marx-Veblen-Keynes approach, or the monetary theory of production. I then focus in more detail on two main categories: the orthodox approach that views money as […]

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  • Working Paper No. 657 March 12, 2011

    What Does Norway Get Out Of Its Oil Fund, if Not More Strategic Infrastructure Investment?

    Michael Hudson
    Abstract

    For the past generation Norway has supplied Europe and other regions with oil, taking payment in euros or dollars. It then sends nearly all this foreign exchange abroad, sequestering its oil-export receipts—which are in foreign currency—in the “oil fund,” to invest mainly in European and US stocks and bonds. The fund now exceeds $500 billion, […]

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  • Strategic Analysis March 10, 2011

    Jobless Recovery Is No Recovery: Prospects for the US Economy

    Dimitri B. Papadimitriou, and Gennaro Zezza
    Abstract

    The US economy grew reasonably fast during the last quarter of 2010, and the general expectation is that satisfactory growth will continue in 2011–12. The expansion may, indeed, continue into 2013. But with large deficits in both the government and foreign sectors, satisfactory growth in the medium term cannot be achieved without a major, sustained […]

    Download Strategic Analysis, March 2011 PDF (2.96 MB)
  • Working Paper No. 656 March 05, 2011

    Money in Finance

    L. Randall Wray
    Abstract

    This paper begins by defining, and distinguishing between, money and finance, and addresses alternative ways of financing spending. We next examine the role played by financial institutions (e.g., banks) in the provision of finance. The role of government as both regulator of private institutions and provider of finance is also discussed, and related topics such […]

    Download Working Paper No. 656 PDF (169.85 KB)

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Blithewood
Bard College
Annandale-on-Hudson, NY 12504-5000
845-758-7700
The Levy Economics Institute of Bard College, founded in 1986 through the generous support of Bard College trustee Leon Levy, is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, public policy research organization. The Levy Institute is independent of any political or other affiliation, and encourages diversity of opinion in the examination of economic policy issues while striving to transform ideological arguments into informed debate.