Peter's Blog

Optimism Alone Can’t Fix the Economy

Many economists and businesses look to survey data to judge the state of the economy. These data can provide interesting insight and will certainly sway markets, but whether they can actually capture real economic phenomena is up for debate.

That Which Cannot be Taught

While the upcoming election has people discussing policy, and economic policy in particular, we rarely ask the question of whether we need economic policy in general. I’m being facetious here, however, the reach of economic policy that we employ and are attempting to enact in the future must be questioned. Rather than questioning any specific […]

Haywire Trading Platforms Sabotaged “Black Monday” Retail Dip Buyers

With Monday’s global market sell-off triggered by a panic in Japan, investors logged into their stock trading platforms to buy (or sell) the dip through institutions like Charles Schwab, Fidelity, TD Ameritrade, Vanguard, E-Trade, and Wells Fargo to buy the dip. But whether these retail traders were planning on panic selling or scooping up discounted […]

Inflation “Cooled” in June, So Why is Consumer Confidence Still Tanking?

The recent CPI report showed that inflation is, according to official data, cooling down — so why are consumers more worried for the future than they’ve been in months? If prices are coming down, shouldn’t that fuel higher confidence and a greater collective sense of economic well-being? One simple answer is that the official data […]