Free Republic

Economists across the political spectrum predicted that President Donald Trump’s trade negotiations would end in disaster. Now that his August 1 deadline has passed without the sky falling — and with multiple advantageous deals completed — it’s time to seriously reevaluate the flawed arguments the experts made against his strategy. Many, it turns out, made basic errors in economic reasoning. On the left, Nobel laureate and Columbia professor Joseph Stiglitz declared in January that Trump’s policy was “very bad for America and for the world,” while University of Michigan economist Justin Wolfers called it “impressively destructive.” On the right, prominent...

In November 2023, the warning came, as clear as an omen. A political upstart was seeking office and, if elected, his policies were likely to cause “devastation” in his own country and “severely reduce policy space in the long run.” The threat was a chainsaw-wielding disciple of Austrian economics from Argentina who embraced laissez-faire economics. The predictions of doom came not from Old Testament prophets, but 108 economists who signed a public letter saying his anachronistic ideas had long ago been discredited. “As economists from around the world who are supportive of broad-based economic development in Argentina, we are especially...

Establishment economists are threatening President-elect Donald Trump with a new round of inflation if he restores Americans’ civil right to a secure national border. But the free market will manage the inflation threat by hiring Americans in place of deported migrants, and by investing in productivity-raising machinery, responded EJ Antoni, an economist at the Heritage Foundation. “I see no reason why the adjustment would not happen almost immediately,” he told Breitbart News.

This headline article from the New York Post caught our attention because it has the familiar ring of “51 former intelligence heads” in the 2020 election. Previously, the stacking of experts to create disinformation was used to hide the truth within the Hunter Biden laptop, which was evidence of Joe Biden’s pay-to-play schemes. Now, the “experts” are stacked to claim Joe Biden’s economic policy is better than Donald Trump’s. I will ignore the article’s Freudian optic of the economist speaking at the globalist WEF event, and instead focus on the facts. We have an actual track record of President Trump’s...

The Fed and economists are encouraged because CPI is down to 3.3% from a high of nearly 9% in 2022. Despite the Fed’s “significant progress” in lowering inflation, most citizens are outraged and confused by economists’ relatively rosy inflation observations. Most citizens believe inflation is still rampant.The Fed and economists are correct in that inflation is now tame. At the same time, citizens dissatisfied with high prices have solid grounds on which to base their disapproval.Let’s better understand how such contradictory beliefs can both be factual. Furthermore, in the process, we can help Jerome Powell understand why economic sentiment is...

Sixteen Nobel Prize-winning economists signed a joint letter Tuesday warning of what they see as economic risks if former President Donald Trump were to serve a second term, including reheated inflation. “While each of us has different views on the particulars of various economic policies, we all agree that Joe Biden’s economic agenda is vastly superior to Donald Trump’s,” the economists wrote. Axios was first to report the letter. “There is rightly a worry that Donald Trump will reignite this inflation, with his fiscally irresponsible budgets,” wrote the group of politically progressive academics...

During an interview with CBS’s “The Takeout” podcast released on Friday, Biden Senior Adviser Gene Sperling stated that while some economists question whether the White House’s narrative on shrinkflation is accurate, “I think Joe Biden feels like he knows what side he’s on.” And “one thing Joe Biden has learned a bit, is it’s not sometimes just listening to the real conservative economists, but just following his gut instinct” like he did with the American Rescue Plan. Sperling said, [relevant remarks begin around 23:35] “He’s not happy, whether you call it price gouging or greed, he’s just not afraid to...

Homebuyers willing to brave today’s high mortgage rates might at least be delighted to find that they have plenty of homes to consider. In the latest monthly housing report from Realtor.com®, the overall number of homes for sale in May marks seven months of growth. “The biggest eye-catcher for me is the fact that inventory is rising sharply,” says Realtor.com senior economist Ralph McLaughlin. “There are 35.2% more homes on the market than this time last year, an incredible trend in the direction of normality.” “While the housing market is still in the seller’s territory, it is expected to shift...

The President’s economic agenda, the “Build Back Better” package being debated in Congress, would provide vital public investments in the nation’s physical and human infrastructure, as well as in our tattered safety net. These investments are long overdue—they were needed before the COVID-19 pandemic, and their necessity has been highlighted by the virus and the economic shock that came with it. Some, however, have invoked fears of inflation as a reason to not undertake these investments. This view is short-sighted. These are importantly supply side measures, increasing the ability of more Americans to participate productively in the economy, helping to...

The outlook of Americans on the economy has turned increasingly pessimistic, mirroring the view of economists who see less growth next year. Back in January, when asked by pollsters for the Economist/YouGov survey whether they thought the economy was getting better or worse, half of Americans chose worse. Around 18 percent said they thought it was getting better. Twenty-four percent said it was staying the same. Nine percent said they weren’t sure. In the most recent Economist/YouGov poll the share saying the economy was getting rose was 54 percent. The share saying it was getting better was 17 percent. The...

Economists no longer expect inflation to come down as rapidly as they forecast earlier this year. The median expected rate of inflation moved up to 4.2 percent in 2023, higher than the forecast of 3.9 percent the survey predicted in February, the National Association for Business Economics survey found. That is more than twice the Fed’s target inflation rate of two percent. The Fed raised its interest rate target rapidly last year in an effort to bring down inflation.

Expert panel deciding how much black Californians are owed include a professor who believes black Americans are owed $14 trillion Others on the panel have said that economics is inherently racist and the plight of Native Americans are 'irrelevant' to payouts The panel has calculated how much they believe black Californians are owed for racial injustices in the state A Reparations Task Force will now make its final report to the State Legislature at the end of June The five economists who will determine just how much the state will pay black Californians for historic injustices include a professor who...

On Thursday’s broadcast of NBC’s “MTP Now,” Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI) defended President Joe Biden’s student loan program and said she’s “really tired of these armchair economists who love to take the shots and get attention, but aren’t really working hard to try to solve some of our nation’s problems.” Host Kristen Welker asked, “I would be remiss if I didn’t ask you about the other big news today, which is the President’s announcement on student loans. He’s extending the pause. He’s giving relief of $10,000 to those who make less than $125,000. Some economists, though, are warning that it...

Renmin University professor Jin Canrong has Washington’s attention. The senior director for China at the US National Security Council, Rush Doshi, cited him two dozen times in a new book entitled “The Long Game: China’s Grand Strategy to Displace American Order.” Professor Jin’s warning on Friday at the “Observer” (guancha.cn) website that US inflation might lead to the bankruptcy of the US government will be read carefully in Washington – especially because Jin claims that China can help America out of its economic problems. “The United States is in a state of mental transition,” the Chinese academic averred, citing the...

May’s jobs numbers released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics Friday shocked economists, who expected something starkly different from the 2.5 million payrolls added and lower 13.3% unemployment rate. Economists estimated that the country would lose 7.5 million jobs. The unemployment rate was expected to hit 19%. In notes circulating following the release, dumbfounded economists struggled to get their jaws off the ground. “In one line: Rather startling,” wrote Pantheon’s Ian Shepherdson. “The biggest payroll surprise in history, by a gigantic margin.” ING’s chief international economist James Knightley called the report "simply astonishing." “Somehow the US jobs market has come...

Pray for an Easter Miracle.The CDC has overblown the coronavirus pandemic EVERY STEP of the way since January when Dr. Fauci said Americans should not be worried about the coronavirus.The experts told the American public the masks did not work.Now the experts want everyone to wear a mask when you go outside your home.The Navy hospital ship USNS Comfort docked in in New York City on Monday, March 30, 2020. The ship was expected to bolster a besieged New York City health care system by treating non-coronavirus patients while hospitals treat people with COVID-19.But after three days in the harbor only three patients had been transferred to the...

A growing share of U.S. business economists think a recession is unlikely before 2021. In a report on Monday, 38% of economists surveyed by the National Association for Business Economics said they believe a slowing economy will tip into recession in 2020. That's down from 42% in a survey taken in February. Only 2% of those polled expect a recession to begin this year, while roughly a third of respondents foresee one hitting in 2021. One reason fewer economists expect a recession next year—the Federal Reserve's move last month to dial back interest rates for the first time since 2008....

Supply side economics works, and if one can keep the government out of the way, all boats will truly rise on the rising tide As much as I am eager to celebrate the American economy coming back into the land of the living, I am also cautious about getting into the Conga line until I can look at some of the internal numbers associated with those who are striving to achieve the American dream. What is not often discussed by the pinheads on TV is that the level of participation in the labor force is perhaps as important as the...

Democrats declare that Obama is responsible for the current economic growth we are witnessing. Republicans counter that President Trump’s pro-business actions over the last year are to credit for the current economic climate. We hear the arguments from both sides of the aisle as to why their man and their party was to credit for the continued prolonged economic expansion including steady job growth and record high stock market prices. Fortunately for President Trump, the professionals agree with his argument that he is most responsible for the recent economic gains. According to a Wall Street Journal poll asking 68 business,...

I first read Thomas Sowell in college -- no thanks to my college. At the majority of America's institutions of "higher learning," reading Thomas Sowell was a subversive act in the early 1990s when I was a student. It remains so today. Why? Because the prolific libertarian economist's vast body of work is a clarion rejection of all the liberal intelligentsia hold dear. Among the left's most corrosive ideas is the concept of perpetual and permanent racial victimhood, which social engineers pretend to rectify through federally mandated, taxpayer-subsidized preferential policies. Sowell's groundbreaking academic analyses of these programs in the...