Matt Nolan

Analytical bias and “recession fatigue”

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Everywhere I look I am being told that the RBNZ must slash rates into heavily stimulatory territory.  There are calls for tax cuts, infrastructure spending, further unemployment relief.  There are calls that commodity prices will collapse – but the price we pay for things won’t.  Pretty much anything that could be wrong, we’re are being told is wrong.

It is easy to get caught up in this.  All the negative news and statements that the Bank MUST cut between 150-200 basis points makes me feel like “maybe they should”.  Ultimately, you start to feel that they know things you don’t.  This type of analyst is a “fast follower”.

Now pulling back from all this talk, as an analyst I may try to be “objective”.  I may try to forget about these things, and take special notice of the “good things.  Wholesale funding pressures are falling, petrol prices have collapsed, income growth is still strong, and the labour market is still in tight territory.  A little bit of a slowdown is not a bad thing if it helps to clean up the economy.  However, this view is just as wrapped up in subjective feelings – in this case I have heavily devalued the actual evidence of difficulties in the economy, and the fact that a drastic slowdown is never completely in the data till well after the event.  Analysts that suffer in this way are facing “recession fatigue”.

Analysts must try to remember that this inherent biases exist – as by doing so they can help themselves make more objective, and more useful, statements about what is going on in the economy.  Noticing your ideological blindspot will help you to be a better analyst – so don’t hide from it, face it!  If only I knew how 😛

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jamesz

James Bond: anti-trust crusader!?

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I saw the new Bond flick, ‘Quantum of Solace’, over the weekend and I was amazed at how progressive it is. No longer does our alpha-male hero wreak destruction upon villains with moon bases, bent on world domination. His latest homicidal rampage is to prevent a new terror: oligopoly pricing. Read more

goonix

Buy low, sell high

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With the official cash rate set to fall even further later this week, shares become relatively appealing when compared with other financial instruments, such as bonds and term deposits.

The old adage of ‘buy low, sell high’ seems fitting, given the battering shares the world over have taken in the past while. The NZX and Dow Jones industrial averages, for example, are both down around a quarter from their respective values six months ago.

But just when is the market ‘low’?

I don’t know! If I did, I’m sure I’d be a lot wealthier than I am. However, I thought it would be useful to write a blog entry to stimulate discussion and debate on what TVHE readers are picking for the sharemarket:

  1. Is now a good time to buy?
  2. What industries/companies would you consider investing it?
  3. What factors are influencing your decisions to invest, or not?

I look forward to hearing our readers’ views on the current state of the sharemarket.

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Matt Nolan

Was the money supply not behind the Great Depression?

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Over at Paul Krugman’s blog he discusses the idea that monetary authorities could have prevented the Great Depression and how that relates to now (ht Economist’s View). Specifically he states that recent events imply that “the thesis of the Monetary History (Friedman’s book) has just taken a hit”.

I am not sure I agree with Krugman’s argument here. He states that the Fed controls the money stock. Given that the money stock grew through the late part of the Depression, and given the money stock has increased meteorically now he states that we can’t “blame” the Fed for either slowdown.

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Matt Nolan

What to do?

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It appears someone has created a site that copies our entire posts.

I have tried emailing the guy – but I didn’t get any response. What do you guys think we should do?

Update: So we have agreed it is a spam blog, and we should put a copyright on our site and posts.  Interestingly, when I looked up the site on Technorati I noted that the Standard links to “invest on credit” as well as us (both under “other blogs”) – random!  They would have linked because of the “quality” New Zealand content methinks 😉

Matt Nolan

Real income, poverty, and a tiered CPI

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According to a recent book by Christian Broda and David E. Weinstein (Prices, Poverty, and Inequality: Why Americans are Better Off Than You Think) (ht Marginal Revolution) growth in income inequality was less pronounced in the US because of changes to the quality and cost of goods that “poor” people purchased.

This indicates to me that a tiered consumer price index could be a useful thing.  Currently the household economic survey (HES) provides an annual tiered income measure (where we see the average income of different income deciles).  However, this nominal measure is not particularly useful if the change in prices experienced by different groups are very diverse.

As a result, a similarly tiered CPI measure (so a CPI for each income decile) would actually give us a much better way to figure out change in “real income” and thereby a fairer measure of the distribution of real income – which is something we care about.

Surely the HES has a measure of purchases by different income groups.  As the CPI is broken down into different products it should be possible to take these weights and come up with a loose set of indicies that represent the price inflation faced by different income declines shouldn’t it?