The London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) is an index (actually, there are 150 indexes covering 10 currencies and 15 maturities from 1 day to 1 year) that is reported daily by the British Bankers Association (BBA).  LIBOR settings are established each day as the result of a survey of a panel of large international banks. … Read more

A common refrain about economic policy and performance in the United States over the past thirty years is that inequality is rising and the middle class is disappearing.  The implication of the latter claim is that people are falling out of the middle class into the lower income class.  Of course, if you define “middle… Read more

The Labor Department’s Jobs report came out this morning at an 80,000 job increase for June, an 84,000 gain for the private sector and a 4,000 loss for the public sector. We had forecast a 60,000 increase overall and a 70,000 increase for the private sector. The Unemployment rate remained unchanged at 8.2 percent, the… Read more

Joe Mihalic is a recent graduate from the Harvard Business School (HBS) who managed to pay off $91,000 in student debt in seven months.  He is currently enjoying his fifteen minutes of fame because he documented the details of his journey in a blog.  His story is one of determination and commitment to a goal. … Read more

The Federal Reserve puts out two publications that address the level, change and composition of household net worth.  The most widely known is the Household Balance Sheet table in the quarterly Flow of Funds (FOF) report.  This report is released about two months after the end of a quarter.  The FOF for the first quarter… Read more

Tyler Cowen is a creative economist.  Here, he proposes a novel approach to Europe.  The key paragraph: Just to make the comparison biting, what if we postponed the costly benefits part of ACA for a year (it may be struck down anyway) and send $200 billion directly to Spain and its banks?  Is more money… Read more

The Obama Administration has seized upon a recent article in MarketWatch by Rex Nutting (here) that purports to show that federal spending growth under President Obama is the lowest of any Administration since Dwight D. Eisenhower.  Press Secretary Carney and the President have glommed onto this story with abandon, arguing that the President is, by… Read more

A major event in the financial markets last month was the initial public offering of FaceBook (ticker symbol FB).  Despite the subsequent decline in price, the financial press reported that this IPO “instantly” created many new millionaires and billionaires.  By doing so, the IPO has worsened economic inequality in the U.S.  This is because inequality… Read more

President Obama tells us that the highest return investment you can make is in your own (or your children’s) education.  The aggregate statistics appear to bear this out with college graduates earning about 50% more than high school graduates.  Even after taking into the direct cost of four years of higher education along with the… Read more

After the market close last Thursday, JP Morgan Chase (JPM) announced that it had incurred a large loss in a “hedge” position.  The loss is rumored to be approximately $2.3 billion.  If it was truly a hedge position then there presumably is a gain on the item being hedged.  I did not see any mention… Read more