Ask an Economist

Hello, I'm a 42 year old woman from Los Angeles CA. Due to personal reasons I left the state for about 10 years. Now that I'm back, I noticed that things have changed a lot! For example: when I was a young adult, I used to work as a waitress. I remember that most of my co-workers were about the same age and most of us were attending Junior College. However, now I'm 42 years old, I noticed a completely new group of people. Most are mature, in their mid 30s to mid 40s. A lot of them made careers out of working as servers. How does it affect the economy to have more people pursue careers in minimum wage jobs?

Using the worst case scenario (Illinois), what are the economic implications of underfunded pension plans?

Why are economists and retailers surprised at the 11 percent lower Black Friday sales given the slight rise in the economy? Seems like just because gas is a bit less expensive and overall unemployment, people have still taken a financial hit that cannot be recovered in bank accounts simply by saving a few dollars at the gas pump. Is there an economic theory behind this surprise? I know I save more than most people but the outcome doesn't surprise me. Thanks for any thoughts and for this service!

I have a vegan friend who believes that the meat and dairy industry and all its affiliates and infrastructure could be phased out of the United States economy without causing it to collapse. In one year. I vehemently disagree. I found a statistic from 2009 by the meat industry saying they essentially make up 5% of the economy. I understand that if we include the dairy industry and all industries that exploit animals, it would be much higher, but let's stick with 5%. Would a sudden loss of 5% of the total US economy, with all those people being left jobless, all those companies going under, and all the ripple effects (Who needs a grill anymore?) (Where did fast food go?) destroy the economy? This is also assuming the animals would be harvested one last time; so there wouldn't be any costs concerning the animals themselves.

In light of the recent layoffs at John Deere and its suppliers, how does the agriculture sector rate compared to the rest of the economy that seems to be rebounding? How long can we expect sluggish commodity prices?

A recent Economist article www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21639587-beware-heavily-traded-stocks-drop-pops reports on an academic paper that seems to offer a mechanical rule for beating the stock market by a substantial margin. Is this a disproof of the efficient market hypothesis or is there some trick?

When health care spending (or military spending or education) is tallied as a "percentage of GDP," doesn't that GDP figure include that same health spending? If you remove all that double-dipping, what would those percentages look like?

What is your opinion on the potential impact of the proposed Nicaragua Canal, a trade route that would connect the Pacific Ocean to the Caribbean via Lake Nicaragua, on the Nicaragua economy?

I would like to ask you a basic question of not understanding quantitative easing. I understand the mechanics but I don't understand why this is considered pumping in "fresh" money, since the FED is just buying up Bonds that were purchased before. They are NOT just giving away absolutely free to BANKS. I know it's wordy but the below elaboration details my confusion. Hope you can help. Thank you!

In quantitative easing, the process of US Fed Bank buying bonds from Banks in order to increase money supply is pretty straight forward but no one seems to be able to explain my particular question or I guess confusion. I even posted on the US Fed open market website but they just gave me the typical answer I already knew.

Again, I'm aware that the FED can pretty much "print money" out of thin air and "inject" it into system but when I look closer at the details of what is happening, I still have trouble describing the process of injecting "fresh" money into an economic system because it looks as though they are limited by putting back the money that was spent to buy the bonds in the first place by banks.

So, to elaborate what I'm trying to say is that if you have a situation of the FED just giving away cash or call it a credit on their ledger for various banks out of the blue. Now that is exactly what I would call injecting fresh money because the banks didn't have to do anything or exchange anything in order to receive that money, just like if I were walking down the street and a complete stranger just came up to me and handed me cash. Now that scenario is what I would understand as injecting fresh money on top of a system.

But what is really happening is that under open market operation for quantitative easing, the US FED is buying up all the bonds that banks are holding at a given moment. Those bonds were purchased at an earlier time by various banks by giving money to the FED or other government agencies, so it looks at best to be putting all the money back into a system in which those monies were extracted from the system before, therefore it's not a "fresh" injection of new money. So it's just putting equal money back into system that was taken out at earlier time? Isn't it?

In other words, let's just say for simplicity that all US Banks spent $1 Trillion to buy bonds 5 years ago (so 5 years ago, $1 Trillion was taken out of an economic system) And now, 5 years later the FED is buying up those bonds from the banks(putting $1 Trillion back into system) The net effect is no new fresh money.

Put it another way, if you add up all the bonds that banks are holding, let's say it comes to $1 Trillion, the FED even though they want to inject $2 Trillion into system over time, they can not do that because all the bonds that are out there doesn't equal $2Trillion; they can only purchase back up to $1Trillion. So the saying, the FED can "print" money as much as they want into a system is not possible, at least in this example of how they do it now in the real world.

I'm sorry for such wordiness but you won't believe how much misdirected answers I get even from professionals. I'm really hoping you can shed some light on my confusion.

With all the killing of poultry by bird flu and euthanizing that will this do to the retail poultry prices?

Hi.. I am a writer. I am from India.. I need some help on a story I am writing based on economics.. India is a poor as well as a wealthy country. Therefore, it seems to me that money has a dual purpose - Basic Survival and Human Ambition. The poor I see are busting their asses off just to reach basic survival, while the rich are making millions by the strength of their ambition, intelligence, and passion.. I have always heard the argument that printing money to get rid of poverty will in turn lead to inflation thus in turn leading to even bigger poverty. But one day, I had a different idea... What if, anyone is allowed access to print money.. Every money that is printed can only be accepted by government bodies providing basic necessities like food, basic clothing, water, and modest shelter. These government bodies can later exchange that money for anything they want. But the initial printer cannot exchange the first printed money for anything but only for basic public services. All the money in the market will therefore come from a government source providing one of basic services to people. If people want to then improve, meaning if they want to go to a fancy restaurant rather than a public mess,, they will have to earn that money.. Therefore earning money will be associated with human ambition and passion while money itself will be associated with public basic needs.. With survival out of question,, all people can focus on doing a personal business, taking better jobs, etc. in order to improve their lifestyle; economy will bloom... What I need to know, is, for the sake for my story,, what things can go wrong in this model?? Why is this kind of a system practically impossible because I assume if it was possible it would have been already there.. What are the flaws of this model?? Why does this sound too good to be practical?? I thank you for your time and your patience.. I hope to hear from you soon..