Macroeconomics

blog

COVID Learning Loss, Russian Trolls, Artificial Intelligence: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on helping students recover learning losses, fighting Russian trolls, racial disparity in unemployment benefits, the race for AI leadership, and more.

q&a

Balancing Public Health and Economic Effects of Physical Distancing: Q&A with Jonathan Welburn

Jonathan Welburn, an operations researcher at RAND, has spent years studying how economic shocks ripple outward like a contagion through the economy. He recently helped develop an online tool that policymakers can use to manage the health and economic effects of COVID-19 interventions.

blog

Australia's Fires, Artificial Intelligence, Fentanyl: RAND Weekly Recap

This weekly recap focuses on Australia's devastating fires, how artificial intelligence could manipulate the masses, the fentanyl crisis, and more.

commentary

The Early Bird Catches the Worm? Probably Not, Says Science on School Start Times

School start times are becoming a hotly debated topic across the United States. Starting middle and high schools at 8:30 a.m. would improve teen health, and the economic benefits of this shift would likely outweigh the costs.

Marco Hafner, Wendy M. Troxel @wendytroxel

commentary

If Teenagers Get More Sleep, California Could Gain Billions

Two key effects of better-rested teens are improved academic performance and reduced motor vehicle crashes. Delaying school start times to 8:30 a.m. could result in economic benefits that would be realized within a matter of years — $10 billion in California alone.

Wendy M. Troxel @wendytroxel, Marco Hafner

commentary

Where Keynes Went Wrong

Failure to consider the potentially adverse effect of government spending on the preexisting level of aggregate demand was and remains a disabling flaw in Keynesian theory—then and now, writes Charles Wolf, Jr.

Charles Wolf, Jr.

commentary

All Models Fail in Certain Situations

Perhaps fiscal and monetary policies have not been effective in the U.S. because the underlying problems may be structural. A key problem facing the technology-laden globalized U.S. economy is the gap between skills that employers demand and the unemployed have.

Krishna B. Kumar