points-out

Huffington Post…

Earlier this week, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York published a blog post about the “mistake of 1937,” the premature fiscal and monetary pullback that aborted an ongoing economic recovery and prolonged the Great Depression. As Gauti Eggertsson, the post’s author (with whom I have done research) points out, economic conditions today — with output growing, some prices rising, but unemployment still very high — bear a strong resemblance to those in 1936-37. So are modern policy makers going to make the same mistake?

Read more:
Krugman: ‘Strong Chance’ U.S. Economy Will Worsen

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REIT Wrecks is a product of the mortgage maelstrom and the high yield investment opportunities it has created in REIT stocks & commercial real estate . The stylized phoenix in our logo betrays our bias. REIT investing, news and analysis. But that which still smokes remains … As Sternlicht points out, not all banks are able to hold on, and some owners are also being forced to sell, but the only real game in town when it comes to distressed assets is still FDIC loan sales …

See the rest here:
The State of Commercial Real Estate: Sternlicht and Zuckerman Have …

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Is It Time For Another WPA? Why Government-Created Jobs Aren’t The Answer

November 9, 2009

Putting aside the standard concern about central planning, there are some unintended consequences that could come with a modern WPA. This 1990 paper by Robert Margo points out that the long-term unemployed with Depression-era WPA jobs were more likely to be unskilled, and when economic conditions picked up, were less likely to get back into the private sector:

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Downturn Hits GE's CRE Unit | Distressed Marketplace

September 26, 2009

Newsweek has a quick article on GE’s commercial real estate unit. GE has historically been one of the most conservative players in commercial real estate . In fact, the article hits on this when it points out that 95% of GE’s mortgages …

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Economist: Why The Bailout Money Should Have Gone To Real People, Not Banks

September 20, 2009

Inside the beltway and among mainstream economists, Larry Summers has the reputation of being a genius. But Australian PhD economist Steve Keen points out a huge gap in the thinking of Summers — and all neoclassical economists.

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