Antonio Fatas

The United States is no longer providing any financial support for Ukraine according to Kiel's tracker - and has not been for a few months now (although I do wonder how one counts the intelligence support).

Europe is footing the bill alone.

Jason also said that "Scott Bessent is a credible, mainstream pick for Treasury Secretary". I do not deny the credentials of some of these names but when someone accepts a position in this administration you know how credible and mainstream they are NOT

What does this remind me of...October 1999 Kevin Hassett's Dow 36,000 that argued that stock market was a bargain and it should more than triple in value

European defence governance and financing. Because Europe cannot be blackmailed any longer. If not now then when? @voxeu.org @cepr.org @kiel.institute cepr.org/voxeu/column...

You know you are in a bubble when financial advisors “hedge” their opinion by saying do not sell but hedge against the risk of a crash.

Simple point to be made to Trump by Europeans. His proposed deal with Putin is as threatening to the rest of Europe as it is humiliating for Ukraine. Rejecting it is not "siding" with Kyiv, but unavoidable to safeguard security of every European democracy......

www.theguardian.com/world/live/2...

Exactly, demand for what and at what price. AI is real and likely to have positive benefits on growth, earnings... but what matters for the bubble debate is whether current valuations are justified.

The fact that Bitcoin's price has gone down despite very favorable regulatory views from the US administration proves the obvious point: valuations of assets without fundamentals can be very subjective

Very reassuring... (from the US peace plan). Source: www.ft.com/content/79ee...

TEN MONTHS IN:

The national debt is higher.

The trade deficit is wider.

The inflation rate has worsened.

The unemployment rate is up.

Trump flattery will get you nowhere Fawning after the US president is not only humiliating — it doesn’t work

Only leverage works with Trump.

on.ft.com/4oSjE0g

Brilliant chart from paper being presented at IMF 13th Statistical Forum by Robert Zymek (IMF Research Department), "Bilateral Trade in Services: Insights from a New Database," showing how the trade networks differ between goods and services according to the new data. www.imf.org/en/news/semi...

Trump’s Global Tariffs Curtailed Trade, Data Shows

Wrong headline. Since Trump's victory and therefore anticipation that tariffs were coming, average trade balance -90 billion USD. In the previous two years -72 billion USD. Looking at one month makes no sense.

www.nytimes.com/2025/11/19/u...

How far apart is Miran from Taylor? #EconSky
econbrowser.com/archives/202...

For folks (and journalists) who want to search the Oversight Committee email texts, I made a database for searching the 20k text files:

splendorous-chaja-f79791.netlify.app

Long expansions can create inefficiencies and complacency but the evidence on hysteresis suggests that recessions do not increase aggregate growth, quite the contrary.

New @cepr.org book on digital finance. A must read for current debates on CBDC, stablecoins, regulation, etc... And it is free to download.

cepr.org/voxeu/column...

Average hours worked in Denmark from 1872 to 1925. The dashed line represents the collective bargaining reform. We observe country-level average working hours between 1872 and 1911, but with gaps. We calculate the 1914–1925 values from occupation-level data. Hours are interpolated where data is missing: several intervals between 1872 and 1911, and between 1914 and 1919. In recent years, calls for shorter working weeks have re-emerged in Europe and elsewhere. This column examines how Denmark’s 1919 shift to the eight-hour workday affected labour market outcomes such as hourly wages, weekly earnings, and employment. Weekly earnings fell in provincial towns but less so in Copenhagen, where union membership was higher and hourly wages rose partly to offset shorter hours. Employment increased everywhere, especially among unskilled and female workers. Decentralised wage bargaining appears to have allowed for partial wage compensation and employment expansion.

8-hour workday led to + employment in Denmark, especially among unskilled & female workers. Earnings fell in provincial towns but less in Copenhagen, where union membership was higher & wages rose to offset shorter hours.
M Fredagsvik Gunnesmo, C Worm Hansen
cepr.org/voxeu/column...
#EconSky

Chart showing activities of overseas Japanese affiliates by region. Data source: METI, the Basic Survey on Oversea Business Activities Studies examining the effects of free trade agreements on the activities of multinational enterprises have tended to focus on trade between home countries and their FTA partner countries. This column examines the effects of free trade agreements on local sales and exports to third countries by overseas affiliates of Japanese manufacturing multinationals. While the effects on local sales are ambiguous, regional trade agreements have positive effects on exports to other countries, suggesting that that Japanese multinationals have optimised their cross-border supply chain networks by utilising various forms of free trade agreements.

A Kato & H Nishiyama find regional trade agreements have positive effects on exports to other countries from overseas Japanese manufacturing multinationals, suggesting that they have optimised their cross-border supply chain networks through free trade agreements.
cepr.org/voxeu/column...
#EconSky

The figure illustrates how inflation expectations shifted after the 2022 inflation surge, together with their 90-95% confidence intervals. In both inflation targeting and non-inflation-targeting countries, expectations for the year ahead increased by roughly one percentage point, while longer-term expectations remained stable, indicating that credibility held up across regimes. See Imam and Poghosyan (2025) for details of the empirical analysis. The 2022 global inflation surge tested inflation-targeting frameworks under severe supply shocks. This column shows that, despite earlier and sharper tightening, inflation targeting central banks did not achieve systematically better outcomes than their non-targeting peers. Instead, credibility and timely action mattered more than institutional labels. As supply shocks driven by geopolitics, climate change, and the energy transition become more frequent, inflation targeting frameworks will need to adapt and evolve to remain effective in this new environment.

Patrick Imam and Tigran Poghosyan show that despite earlier and sharper tightening, inflation targeting central banks did not achieve systematically better outcomes than their non-targeting peers during the 2022 global inflation surge.
cepr.org/voxeu/column...
#EconSky

What the Dutch elections mean for the Netherlands and for Europe Armida van Rij and Sander Tordoir decipher what the election results mean for The Netherlands and Europe more broadly.

From CER: What the Dutch elections mean for the Netherlands and for Europe. www.cer.eu/insights/wha...

This figure shows the median and interquartile range for the response of people in each country to the question "What do you think the current level of government debt is in percent of your country's Gross Domestic Product (GDP)?" Voters fear debt, but they do not understand it. Using data across 13 countries, this column shows that most people dramatically misjudge debt levels and lose trust in their governments with every budget cut. A smaller group of wealthier and more experienced voters demonstrates a stronger grasp of fiscal realities. Yet all groups share a common concern: that debt stabilisation efforts will disproportionately penalise them. These findings reveal how misinformation and memory shape the politics of debt – and why fixing fiscal policy may first require fixing public perception.

Francesco Bianchi, Era Dabla-Norris, & Salma Khalid show that most people dramatically misjudge debt levels and lose trust in their governments with every budget cut. They also believe that debt stabilisation efforts will disproportionately penalise them.
cepr.org/voxeu/column...
#EconSky

Graph showing the effect of conflict on GDP Wars leave deep and lasting scars on economies. Using data for 115 conflicts across 145 countries over the past 75 years, this column documents large and persistent declines in output, investment, and trade following the onset of war, with no evidence of recovery even a decade later. Government revenues collapse while spending remains stable, forcing reliance on inflationary finance and short-term debt. The findings show that the true cost of war extends far beyond the battlefield, reshaping fiscal and monetary stability for years to come.

Efraim Benmelech & Joao Monteiro use data for 115 conflicts over the past 75 years and document large and persistent declines in output, investment, and trade following the onset of war, with no evidence of recovery even a decade later.
cepr.org/voxeu/column...
#EconSky

Graph showing average medical residents’ score in Catalonia vs rest of Spain. The points represent yearly mean residuals from an individual-level regression of score on province and specialty-year fixed effects, disaggregated by region. Lines represent the linear fit to the scatterplots, separately estimated before and after the shock. Given the growing prevalence of political and social polarisation, understanding its effects on society is of paramount importance. This column discusses the effects of an increase in political polarisation on a region’s capacity to attract human capital. The evidence shows how an increase in polarisation results in lower attraction of human capital, especially for individuals with higher human capital scores.

David Martinez-Miera & Carlos Sunyer examine how an increase in political polarisation impacts a region's capacity to attract human capital. They leverage Spain's centralised system of medical resident placements and the 2017 Catalonia referendum as a case study.
cepr.org/voxeu/column...
#EconSky

Panel (a) displays the employment share of data-intensive occupations in each commuting zone in 2022. Panel (b) shows the total CO2 emissions in each commuting zone for the same year. Darker colours represent higher levels of adoption of data-intensive occupations or emissions over the sample period. Red triangles indicate the presence of a data centre site. AI and other data-intensive technologies may help optimise energy use, but the technologies themselves are power hungry. This column explores how the diffusion of AI affected emissions in the US between 2002 and 2022 and finds that local AI growth raises emissions by boosting economic activity and energy use. It also leads to power generation becoming more carbon-intensive as plants shift from renewable to non-renewable sources. The ‘green’ promise of AI will remain elusive as long as the electricity sector itself does not rapidly decarbonise.

A Bonfiglioli, R Crinò, M Filomena, & G Gancia find that local #AI growth raises emissions by boosting economic activity and energy use. It also leads to power generation becoming more carbon-intensive as plants shifts from renewable to non-renewable sources.
cepr.org/voxeu/column...
#EconSky

FBI fires top official amid Kash Patel’s outrage over reports of agency jet use Patel reportedly became furious after stories revealed he flew to visit girlfriend and fired official who oversees fleet A top FBI official with 27 years standing has reportedly been fired by the bureau after its director, Kash Patel, became enraged by press stories revealing he had used a government jet to travel to see his girlfriend sing the national anthem at a wrestling match. Steven Palmer, who had worked at the bureau since 1998, was fired as head of the FBI’s critical incident response group which is responsible for handling major security threats as well as overseeing the agency’s fleet of jets. He was the third head of the unit to be dismissed since Patel became the second Trump administration’s FBI director in February. Continue reading...

FBI fires top official amid Kash Patel’s outrage over reports of agency jet use

Economics Literature Search Full-text search across 15,000+ papers from top economics journals and NBER working papers. Track how empirical methods have evolved over time.

Dropping a beta version of this page while everyone is up and processing baseball!

This tool lets you search the full text of papers from the American Economic Review, American Economic Journal series, and over 30,000 NBER working papers.

paulgp.com/econlit-pipe...

11 states w/negative GDP growth, 10 states w/negative employment #EconSky
econbrowser.com/archives/202...

Bipartisan group of big-name economists (including Bernanke, Yellen, Nobel laureates Acemoglu & Johnson, etc) in amicus brief urge SCOTUS to throw out Trump's reciprocal tariffs.

www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/24...