Steven Davis here. Kevin Murphy and I are launching a new podcast called “Economics, Applied.” We are professors at the University of Chicago and Senior Fellows at the Hoover Institution. Our podcast aims to bring evidence and economic thinking to major policy issues. We interview guests who have first-hand experience in the policy arena and we discuss the issues with leading scholars. In some episodes Kevin and I just sit back and take stock of our conversations with guests and draw lessons. Please tune in!
Articles
An interesting brouhaha has broken out in France, lately famous for reinvigorating the idea of wealth taxes: The French government should default on (“annul” “cancel” — the left is great at euphemisms) its debt held by the European Central Banks. Voilá. Disparu. Without any financial or economic cost!
August 24, 2026
Articles
The U.S. unemployment rate has trended down for decades. Estimates after removing business cycle fluctuations show that the trend rate fell from 7.8% in 1976 to 4.8% in 2024.
August 24, 2026
Articles
Money, power and security are intimately connected. For extended periods, the world’s financial center has been concentrated in one country, one city, one currency, providing in effect a code of conduct, whose most effective modern variants have been the nineteenth-century gold standard (1873–1914), the Bretton Woods system (1945–1971), and the international system around the so-called Washington Consensus (1980–2008). Each of these orders eventually frayed, and alternatives needed to be constructed. Concentration around a financial center yields powerful network advantages, but the historical record warns against treating any such arrangement as permanent. The emergence of rival centers has repeatedly been associated with heightened conflict, war, and destruction.
August 24, 2026
