The three lives of Japanese military pesos

The three lives of Japanese military pesos

| backing theory of money, cash, Gresham's Law, inflation, Japan, quantity theory of money, unit of account

1942 Japanese Invasion Philippines Peso with a JAPWANCAP Stamp In his reply to Mike Sproul, Kurt Schuler brings up the question of the dete...

Was coin debasement always bad?

Was coin debasement always bad?

| coins, Gresham's Law, inflation, seigniorage, sticky prices, unit of account

Dante's 8th level of hell, which housed counterfeiters, among others. Illustration by Doré In this post I'll argue that debasement w...

Ghost Money: Chile's Unidad de Fomento

Ghost Money: Chile's Unidad de Fomento

| compensated dollar, deflation, ghost money, inflation, Irving Fisher, medium of exchange, money illusion, Robert Shiller, unit of account, zero lower bound

Santiago skyline This post continues on the topic of the separation of the medium-of-exchange function of money from the unit-of-account fu...

Give Bernanke a long enough lever and a fulcrum on which to place it, and he'll move NGDP

Give Bernanke a long enough lever and a fulcrum on which to place it, and he'll move NGDP

| inflation, market monetarism, Mike Sproul, Miles Kimball, Nick Rowe, open market operations, Paul Krugman, quantitative easing, Scott Sumner, zero lower bound

I'm running into a lot of central bank doubt lately. Mike Sax and Unlearning Economics , for instance, both question the ability of the...

Market monetarists and "buying up everything"

Market monetarists and "buying up everything"

| fundamental value, inflation, market monetarism, medium of exchange, open market operations, stock market and equities

Market monetarists have a reductio ad absurdum that they like to throw in the face of anyone who doubts the ability of central banks to crea...

Transporting the macroblogosphere back to 1809: Usury Laws and the 5% upper bound

Transporting the macroblogosphere back to 1809: Usury Laws and the 5% upper bound

| Bank of England, forward guidance, Henry Thornton, history of thought, inflation, Miles Kimball, Nick Rowe, nominal interest rates, Paul Krugman, real interest rate, usury, zero lower bound

The zero-lower bound is the well-known 0% floor that a note-issuing bank hits whenever it attempts to reduce the interest rate it offers on ...