The Central Bank of Nigeria recently announced changes to the way the country’s foreign exchange market will work. Foreign currencies can now be bought and sold at rates determined by the market – not by the central bank. This signals the intention of the Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration to allow market forces to determine the […]
Americans are returning to the labor force at a quickening rate – do they just really need the work?
The U.S. economy surprised analysts by adding 467,000 jobs in January, overcoming omicron concerns and continuing a long streak of gains, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Feb. 4, 2022. Yet at the same time, the unemployment rate ticked up a notch, from 3.9% to 4%. Confused? Shouldn’t a large increase in jobs drive […]
Tinubu inherits Nigeria’s high debt – an economist analyses what this means for the country’s future
As the 16th president of Nigeria, Bola Ahmed Tinubu inherits an economy that is grappling with inflation, chronic unemployment, extreme poverty, crumbling infrastructure and insecurity. Nigeria’s debt profile stands out among these problems like a sore thumb. The country’s external debt stock – what it owes non-residents – was US$41.69 billion in 2022. Multilateral lenders […]
Jobs are up! Wages are up! So why am I as an economist so gloomy?
In any other time, the jobs news that came down on Dec. 2, 2022, would be reason for cheer. The U.S. added 263,000 nonfarm jobs in November, leaving the unemployment rate at a low 3.7%. Moreover, wages are up – with average hourly pay jumping 5.1% compared with a year earlier. So why am I […]
In fractious debate, GOP candidates find common ground on cause of inflation woes and need for school choice
It was a night in which even “the great communicator” himself may have struggled to be heard. At the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California on Sept. 27, 2023, seven Republican candidates looking to become the leading challenger to the absent GOP front-runner Donald Trump interrupted, cross-talked and bickered – often to the exasperation of […]
The Federal Reserve and the art of navigating a soft landing … when economic data sends mixed signals
With inflation easing and the U.S. economy cooling, is the Federal Reserve done raising interest rates? After all, gently bringing down the trajectory of prices without crashing the economy was the central bank’s objective when it began jacking up rates over a year ago. Gross domestic product, the broadest measure of an economy’s output, expanded […]
Inflation report is a mixed bag – an economist explains why some items are rising faster than others
Economists worried about soaring inflation got some good news to start the year: The rate of inflation has eased. The first report card of 2023 on consumer prices, released on Jan. 12, showed that the overall cost of goods and services decelerated to an annual pace of 6.5% in December, the slowest in over a […]
Why stagflation is an economic nightmare – and may already be here
The economy is cooling while inflation remains elevated. And that is raising alarm bells among economists who worry it means “stagflation” is on the way. But what is stagflation exactly? We asked Veronika Dolar, an economist at SUNY Old Westbury and a visiting professor at Stony Brook University, to explain what it is, what causes […]
6 ways Canadians can prepare for the upcoming recession
Although it certainly feels like it, and many people believe it, we are not in a recession yet. While a recession is defined as two successive quarters of negative GDP growth, it is essentially a period where economic growth falls significantly and unemployment rates rise. Given the lack of a precise definition, there is not […]
Federal Reserve just hiked interest rates for the 7th time this year – so why are mortgage rates coming down?
The Federal Reserve raised interest rates by half a percentage point on Dec. 14, 2022, to a range of 4.25 to 4.5%, the seventh increase this year. So far in 2022, the Fed has lifted its benchmark short-term rate, which influences most other borrowing costs in the economy, by 4.25 percentage points from a low […]