Previously published on December 16, 2016 in the California Economic Forecast publication. United States housing sales have been climbing since the recession, but are still relatively low. This is particularly true once the home sales are adjusted for population. Household formation has shown some signs of life lately, especially since early 2015. New home starts… Read more

Previously published on December 16, 2016 in the California Economic Forecast publication. The United Sates economy continues to grow at less than its potential. The 12-month moving average of job creation has been falling steadily since February 2015. In seven of the last eight quarters, investment growth has been negative or near zero. Productivity declined… Read more

The Financial Analyst Journal (FAJ) is a terrific publication put out by the CFA Institute.  This group also sponsors the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation.  In a recent issue (September/October 2016), a panel of leading financial experts (Professors Andrew Lo, Robert Merton, Stephen Ross, and Jeremy Siegal) discuss the future of finance and how it… Read more

Ray Kurzweil is a brilliant inventor and author and is currently Chief Scientist at Google.  He is known for many things, but perhaps most notably for the idea of the “Singularity.”  This is a time in the fairly near future, according to him anyway, when processing power of computers will have developed to the point… Read more

In 1693, as related by economist Moshe Milevsky in his book King William’s Tontine, King William of England (actually a Dutchman and formerly William of Orange) sold to investors an interesting financial product.  Each buyer was a member of a pool of buyers that immediately received a “dividend” on their investment of 10% per year. … Read more

Previously Published in CERF’s September 2016 California Economic Forecast: It’s time for another presidential election.  Each candidate is promising new initiatives that will bring prosperity to Americans.  So, we’re forecasting vigorous economic growth?  No. Our forecast is pretty much the same as it’s been for years, anemic economic growth as far as we can see.… Read more

Let’s think about the structure of the perfect retirement investment vehicle.  The perfect vehicle would have annual payouts that exceed what could be achieved by buying bonds or other asset classes.  The perfect vehicle would hedge against so-called “longevity risk” which is the risk of outliving your money.  The perfect vehicle would have annual payments… Read more

William Goetzmann has written a masterful book (Money Changes Everything) on the role of finance in world history.  The basic message is that financial development has played an enormous role in the advancement of civilization.  This is in spite of various financial debacles that have come along periodically.  Goetzmann suggests that there are four major… Read more

Previously published on August 26, 2016 on newgeography.com Most discussions of our slow economic growth includes a seemingly compulsory demand for increased public capital spending, so-called infrastructure spending or simply “roads and bridges.”  Both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton promise increased public capital spending on their websites.   Larry Summers made perhaps the best case for… Read more

Interest rates are historically low and so is the return on savings.  People commonly talk about low interest rates being an inducement to increase spending and reduce saving.  In fact, this is one of the “transmission mechanisms” by which expansionary monetary policy is presumed to stimulate the economy.  In economic theory, consumption spending is modeled… Read more