Around the Traps 9/1/15

It is time again for Around the Traps.
As you can see people are writing quite a bit quite early in the New Year.
Although Umpiring on Saturday I do have the time so updating will occur.

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• Mumble on how_tony_can_survive , qld_election_notes
• Kevin Bonham on queensland-beautiful-one-day-lineball-the-next
• The Kouk on joe-hockey-and-emergency-interest-rates
• John Quiggin on myefo
• Todd Winther on queenslands-early-election-hinges-on-a-test-of-newmans-strength
• Patt McConnell on years-on-asic-still-grappling-with-swap-rate-fixing-scandal 
• Peter Martin on geoblocks-how-netflix-apple-adobe-take-us-for-a-ride

Northern America

• Menzie Chinn on minimum-wage-increases-in-the-wake-of-ww-ii , an-economic-warning
• Robert Waldeman on the-same-percentage-of-us-adults-have-a-favorable-view-of-the-aca-as-say-it-does-not-establish-death-panels, gdp-growth-and-federal-revenues-and-expenditures-during-the-current-recovery
• Edward Lambert on new-variables-for-the-effective-demand-equation-part-4 , praying-for-time-in-the-business-cycle
• Mark Thoma on frbsf-economic-letter-why-is-wage-growth-so-slow , policy-uncertainty , borrowers-forgo-billions-through-failure-to-refinance-mortgages
• Sandwichman on dynamic-scouring
• Menzie Chinn on the-dollars-recent-rise-in-perspective
• Tim Taylor on when-will-federal-reserve-raise-interest-rates Thanks Mark
• Macroblog on gauging-inflation-expectations-with-surveys-part-1-the-perspective-of-firms  ( 3 authors)
• Brad De Long on 1920-1921-relevant-worth-much-attention , the-early-impact-of-the-affordable-care-act-comment
• Livio De Matteo on saving-ontario , comparing-manufacturing-employment-growth-canada-and-the-usa
• Noah Smith on economics-stars-swing-left
• Simon Wren-Lewis on sachs-and-age-of-diminished-expectations see also Robert Waldeman and then Kruggers
• Judy Soloman on court-case-shouldnt-scare-off-marketplace-enrollees Thanks Brad
• David Andolfatto on brad-delong-on-employment-to-population
• Mark Thoma gives us Tim Duy on fed-watch-volatile-week-ahead-of-employment-report , fed-watch-wage-growth-or-lack-of-continues-to-surprise
• Calculated Risk onemployment-report-comments-first-come-the-jobs , demographics-unemployment-rate-and-inflation , public-and-private-sector-payroll-jobs-under-various-presidents

Europe

• Kruggers on europes-trap , about-that-french-time-bomb , panic-fast-and-slow , deflation-as-betrayal
• Simon Wren-Lewis on who-is-lying-about-uk-budget-plans-obr , if-clegg-had-become-chancellor
• Antonio Fatas on and-this-is-how-greece-might-leave-euro  Thanks Noah sort of
• Daniel Little on what-is-a-european  Thanks Mark
• Cecchetti and Schoenholtz on the-ecbs-not-so-sweet-16th  Thanks Mark
• Chris Dillow on hyperbole-in-politics
• Dani Rodrik on grek-elections-democracy-political-trilemma-and-all-that Thanks Mark
• Gregory Connor on macroprudential-regulation-policy-dynamics-and-constraints
• Colm McCarthy on the-ecbs-policy-target
• Lord Keynes on more-evidence-on-profit-squeeze-of-1873-96 , neoclassical-and-quantity-theory-explanations -of-the-1873/96-deflation
• Brad De Long on charlie-hebdo-and-juan-cole-why-al-qaeda-attacked-satirists-in-paris
• Rosa Freedman on we-are-all-charlie-hebdo-and-this-is-an-attack-on-our-rights
• Bill Derodie on charlie-hebdo-offends-and-we-must-defend-its-right-to-do-so
• Ezra Klein on charlie-hebdo-cartoons  Thanks Brad

Asia

• Dan Crawford on tales-of-globalization-russia-and-china
• Noah Smith on japans-fertility-rate-is-rising-and-you-all-missed-it , lion-dog-panda-dog-blaze-of-amateur-sociology

Wonk

• Larry Summers on Let this be the year we put a proper price on carbon  Thanks Mark
• Simon Wren Lewis on the-war-with-banks-has-to-be-fought-on-two-fronts , austerity-and-economic-hyperbole , heterodox-laziness-or-worse , faith-based-macroeconomics
• Chris Dillow on who-bears-risk , endogenous-preferences , deflation , heterodox-economics-the-left
• Tony Yates on higher-inflation-target-is-preventative-not-a-cure Thanks Mark
• Dani Rodrik on the-fundamental-lessons-about-emerging-economies-that-economists-have-refused-to-learn Thanks Brad
• Kruggers on not-invented-here-macroeconomics , thinking-about-international-bond-yields , orthodoxy-heterodoxy-and-ideology , where-are-the-friedmans-of-yesteryear
• Jeremie' Cohen-Setton on permanent-qe-and-helicopter-money Thanks Mark
• Brad De Long on yes-past-four-years-powerful-evidence-keynesian-view-happens-zero-lower-bound-ask
• Menzie Chinn on guest-contribution-terms-of-trade-shocks-competitiveness-and-stability-the-role-of-foreign-asset-management
• Ian Kelly on on_economic_forecasting Thanks Mark
• Mark the Ballot on polling-accuracy

General

• Brad De Long on mo-hard-power-soft-power-muscovy-strategy-and-my-once-again-failure-to-understand-niall-ferguson
• Andrew Topf on did the Saudis and the US collude in dropping oil prices
• Tim Harford on why-more-and-more-means-less
• Chris Dillow on freedoms-supporters

Climate

• Andreas Ortmann on the facts on climate change science and how to assert them  Thanks Mark the Graph
• James Whitmore on 2014-was-australias-third-hottest-year-on-record-says-bureau-of-meteorology
• Brad De Long on 2014-hottest-year-record-globally-far-reports-japan-meteorological-agency
• Hotwhopper on the-relevance-of-climate-models
• Brave New Climate on climate-heating-for-2014-in-australia
• Stoat on anthropogenic-influence-on-recent-circulation-driven-antarctic-sea-ice-changes
• Chris Mooney on 2014-may-set-a-new-temperature-record-so-can-we-please-stop-claiming-global-warming-has-stopped Thanks Brad
• Tim Taylor on environmental-protection-and-productivity Thanks Mark
• John Quiiggin on only-a-mug-punter-would-bet-on-carbon-storage-over-renewables

Andrew Gelman (Mainly Stats)

• relaxed-plagiarism-standards-way-keep-tuition-dollars-flowing-foreign-students
• statistics-diary
• life-paths-accomplishments-mathematically-precocious-males-females-four-decades-later
• planning-class-semester-thinking-aloud-move-toward-active-learning
• completely-reasonable-sounding-statement-strongly-disagree
• wow-much-impressive-anything-frank-flynn-ever

Genial Dave Giles
nuttin,obviously on holidays

• ardl-modelling-in-eviews-9

Dianne Coyle (Quirky + Book Reviews)

• the-non-existent-shark , economics-for-the-curious , guest-post-on-the-changing-state-of-economics , impossibility-elections , the-top-1%
• Noah Smith on sci-jacking

Vox wonk

• capital-flows-emerging-markets-and-global-financial-cycle
• how-good-are-out-sample-forecasting-tests
• multinational-firms-and-transfer-pricing-new-evidence
• tax-inversion-remains-huge
• multinational-firms-and-transfer-pricing-new-evidence
• bank-england-fails-its-transparency-test
• little-help-my-bank-japanese-smes-export-decision
• global-crisis-and-global-renminbi
• policy-impact-key-player-targeting
• democracy-and-threat-revolution-new-evidence
• preferential-trading-agreements-helping-economic-reform-developing-countries
• global-supply-chains-and-transmission-shocks

The Asian Cup

Tomorrow the Asian cup starts.

Given it is being played in Australia we are now one of the favourites.
I am not sure I agree with this.
We lost all three games in the World cup.
Whilst we played some good football in the first two games our defence was dreadful more so in the last game against Spain.
We had chances to win our first two games but couldn't.

We rely way too much on Tim Cahill who cannot possibly play in the next World cup. We do not have a playmaker and seem to have little plan on what to do because of that.

WE do have three very quick forwards although one wasn't picked. I would have relied on them and had Cahill playing in the most attacking midfield position which made him the player he is not as a forward.

I hope I am wrong. I hope we p[lay good football  pleasing to the eye and we score goals which we have found hard to do.

Here's hoping!

State Politics

Interesting happenings in State politics.

Campbell Newman the Queensland premier has called an early election for January 31.
The latest polls are not good for the LNP. but beware with optional preferential voting these polls become problematic. See the inestimable Kevin Bonham. John Quiggin thinks Newman's tactics are flawed.  Mumble's thought are in tune with my own. He writes again today

I can see the LNP winning but with a vastly reduced majority. The only way this could be averted is if people thought there could be an actual change of Government. I very much doubt if this occurs.
Todd Winther weighs in.

See Antony Green's site if you are interested.


In NSW Mumble was correct and I was wrong. Headoffice backed Luke Foley from the left wing. The last time they did this was when they installed Nathan Rees and didn't that go well!

The Liberals/National deserve to get back in but with a vastly reduced majority. This will occur when my cricket team plays in their final!

My trip to Jindabyne

My family went to Jindabine just after Christmas.

We drove past Lake George which is a lake no more. I remember driving to Canberra and the lake would be lapping up near the road. What gives?

My wife was driving and wanted to drive through Canberra. I drove for the first half of the trip. What was most interesting was the amount of space ready for leasing now. Lots of empty buildings in Canberra if this is any judge.

The area is quite depressing. Lots of smooth large rocks , light brown to white grass and plenty of dead trees. It makes for a dead boring trip either going there or going home.

The one good point was the nights. although the sun was quite hot during the day the nights were cold and you needed a duna. It made for great sleeping.

Woolworths in Jindabine seem to have higher prices than elsewhere. The locals I talked to believe this is due to the trip to Cooma takes a long time where Woolworths competes with Coles and hence lower prices.

We are into fresh fruit and vegetables. Naturally Jindbine has a lower quality than Eastwood.

Woolworths was packed and again the locals told me they get a lot of people coming down there at Christmas time. There did seem to be a lot of bike riders around.

It has a decent cinema where I watched the Hobbit with my two sons at 8.30 on a Tuesday night. It was  less than half full.

One can read a lot. I am not a fan of bushwalks more so given how ugly the area was. It is interesting when the grass is green how much better the landscape looks.

Why does diesel cost more in Sydney than Canberra or even Goulburn?

Coming up

I am plagiarising Andrew Gelman  on this for this month whilst in holiday mood.

I am going to be writing about:

• holidays down at Jindabine. whatever happened to Lake George?
• Cricket ( Both on the OZ V India test Series and some other topics such as were the 1948 side really unbeatable
• Football Asian cup is about to start in town. How will my beloved socceroos ( sorry worldgamearoos) go and how are they playing 
• Book Reviews. I have read and are reading some fascinating books. Steve from Brisbane will be delighted to know most German soldiers who died from the cold in Russia during WW2 died because their anus was frozen whilst attempting to do an Edgar Britt!
• Movie Reviews. I saw The Hobbit with my two boys and enjoyed it and am going to see the Imitation Game     ( Both Barkely Rosser and Genial Dave Giles have something to say about it).
• an accidental meeting with Fred Gruen and his wife ( but no sons) in Mittagong a long time ago.

plus the usual stuff.

Tommy Bolin

I'm baack from holidays.

I regret to say I had not heard of Tommy Bolin until he joined Deep Purple.

I then bought an album of his and was won over. ( Back then you could listen to the album in the shop before buying it.)

This is my favourite song of his.
Post Toastee live.

Unfortunately he is now dead.

Around the Traps new Year Edition 2/1/15

Had some time so here is a smallish version of Around the Traps.

If I get the time and are allowed by the wife I will try to get more articles


Aussie,Aussie,Aussie

• Kevin Bonham on 2014-site-review
• Mumble on the_abbott_drag
• Don Arthur on contraception-and-the-underclass-debate-from-keith-joseph-to-gary-johns
• Andrew Norton on release-of-the-1988-hecs-cabinet-documents
• The Kouk on rba-cut-reduce-the-number-of-board-meetings
• Greg Jericho on a-depressing-year-of-downs-and-ups-six-changes-to-the-australian-economy
• David Singer on remembering Australia's first jihadist attack on 1 January 1915 

Northern America

• David Cay Johnston on obama-economic-stimuluspoliciesstockmarket Thanks Mark
• Kruggers on keynesians-and-the-volcker-disinflation , the-obama-bounce
• Calculated risk on question-1-for-2015-how-much-will-the-economy-grow ( has links from 2-10)
• David Glasner on is-john-cochrane-really-an-irving-fisherian ,krugman-on-the-volcker-disinflation
• Lord Keynes on rothbard-on-recovery-from-us-recession
• Menzie Chinn on the-year-in-review-even-more-fantastical-pseudo-economics , addendum-to-more-fantastical-pseudo-economics , i-think-i-know-why-some-folks-thought-1946-was-one-of-the-best-years-of-our-lives
• Robert Waldeman on senate-torture-report-executive-summary

Europe

• Roger Farmer on the-greek-dance-with-debt Thanks Mark
• Simon Wren-Lewis on the-eurozone-scandal , how-good-has-uk-recovery-been
• Kruggers on britains-success-story
• Jonathon Portes on halving-deficit
• Chris Dillow on blair-the-ideologue

Asia
nuttin

Wonk

• David Beckworth on tinkering-on-margins  Thanks Mark
• Progrowth liberal on indirect-and-incorrect-tests-of-ricardian-eqivalence-and-supply-side-economics
• Richard Green on the-limits-of-knowledge-in-economics-4 Thanks Mark
• Noah Smith on heres-what-economics-gets-right
• Simon Wren-Lewis on on-stupidity-of-demand-deficient
• Nick Rowe on the-third-best-case-for-fiscal-policy-and-moral-hazard-for-central-banks , temporary-increases-in-g-at-the-zlb-in-an-nk-model
• Chris Dillow on in-praise-of-complexity-economics
• James Hamilton on supply-demand-and-the-price-of-oil
• Roger Farmer on secular-stagnation-neo-paleo-keynesian Thanks Mark
• Tony Yates on john-cochrane-ken-rogoff-cash-bans-and-the-zero-bound  , escaping-the-zero-bound-ngdp-plt-vs-raising-the-inflation-target , the-silliness-of-ngdp-targeting-again Thanks Mark
• Edward Lambert on new-variable-for-effective-demand-limit-part-2 , new-variable-for-effective-demand-limit-part-3
• Brad De Long on afternoon-must-read-dylan-matthews-greg-mankiws-worst-argument-piketty-yet
• Simon Wren-Lewis on in-defence-of-ngdp-targets
• Growth economics on populations-not-nations-dictate-development

General

• Chris Dillow on the-diversity-paradox
• Barkley Rosser on spoiler-alert-correcting-imitation-game I am going to see this
• Lorenzo on dont-mention-the-inconvenient

Climate

• John Quiggin on catalyst-teaches-the-controversy
• Science of Doom on natural-variability-and-chaos-seven-attribution-fingerprints-or-shadows
• hotwhopper on know-your-data-ocean-acidification-again
• Brave New Climate on current-world-energy-demand-ethical-world-energy-demand-depleted-uranium-and-the-centuries-to-come

Andrew Gelman ( Mainly Stats)

• statistical-methods-pocket-tools
• just-confidence-drive-act-engraved-inner-criteria-guide-action
• closest-collaborator-cant-talk
• a-new-year-puzzle-from-macartan
• think-2015-can-principles-statistical-quality-control-applied-statistics-education
• stethoscope-weapon-mass-distraction
• continue-teach-use-hypothesis-testing
• Kaiser Fung on proxy-unmasking

Genial Dave Giles ( Econometrics)

• econometrics-in-post-cowles-era
• the-multivariate-median
• econometricians-debt-to-alan-turing
• new-year-reading-list

Dianne Coyle (Quirky + Book Reviews)

• my-brilliant-holiday-reading , most-popular-posts-of-2014 , books-to-look-forward-to-in-2015 , which-economists-should-be-more-influential
• Frances Wooley on why-does-toronto-have-better-outdoor-ice-than-ottawa , the-economics-of-stuff
• Eddie Oczowski on what-drives-our-wine-choice-taste-or-the-price-tag
• Leon Neyfakh on how-elevator-transformed-america  Thanks Brad

Vox wonk

on holidays

• asking-people-which-aspects-wellbeing-matter-most
• education-and-constitutional-rights-international-comparative-study
• new-evidence-portfolio-balance-effect-qe