In a January 6 commentary, economist Daniel Gros of the Centre for European Policy Studies argued that Japan’s slow economic growth over the last decade is largely due to slow growth of its labor force, rather than lower productivity.
On January 4, the International Monetary Fund published a working paper showing that demand by emerging economies is of growing importance in commodity price fluctuations.
In a January 3 commentary, Harvard economist Ken Rogoff defended floating exchange rates.
Also on January 3, the Peterson Institute published a study on how to get countries with persistent trade surpluses to increase domestic consumption, allow their exchange rates to rise, and take other actions that would reduce surpluses and thus redress international imbalances.
In a December 27 commentary, Tax Analysts economist Martin Sullivan reported that Japan has just decided to cut its corporate income tax rate from 39.5 percent to 35 percent.
In a December 23 commentary, University of Chicago economist Luigi Zingales warned that Europeans were making their debt problems worse by mimicking some of the abuses that created the financial crisis. In particular, sovereign debts are being repackaged just as mortgage debts were so as to create new debts with higher credit ratings.
Also on December 23, the Institute for the Study of Labor published a working paper which estimated the size of the underground economy in Quebec, Canada, at 5.6 percent of GDP in 2002, costing the government $3.3 billion in revenue.
On December 21, economist Edwin Truman of the Peterson Institute published a study recommending a strengthening of the International Monetary Fund’s surveillance authority.
I last posted items on this topic on December 22.
Bruce Bartlett is an American historian and columnist who focuses on the intersection between politics and economics. He blogs daily and writes a weekly column at The Fiscal Times. Bartlett has written for Forbes Magazine and Creators Syndicate, and his work is informed by many years in government, including as a senior policy analyst in the Reagan White House. He is the author of seven books including the New York Times best-seller, Imposter: How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy (Doubleday, 2006).
