Ask an Economist
Welcome to Ask an Economist, a public service of the Department of Economics at Iowa State University, designed to answer your economic questions.
Our talented faculty and alumni can answer questions on a variety of economic topics to help you make more informed choices about your day-to-day decisions--or to just add a more reasoned voice when talk of the economy comes up around the dinner table.
Questions & Answers
There are several issues here. First, the US central bank, the Fed, is an independent monetary authority and does what it thinks best to keep inflation and unemployment low. They cannot be "asked" to print more money or change interest rates.
This is a great question. Currently interest (but not principal) on student loans is deductible within certain limits.
Partner A secures a loan for startup through a business (business 1) he owns 90% of. Partner A will have significant input in business decisions but little to do with day to day operations.
Hello, and thank you for sending us a question! The GDP growth rate is measured relative to last year’s GDP.
To a certain extent, the quoted sentence is tautological.
As an accounting identity, from the GNP accounts, the Balance of Trade (positive is a surplus) = (Savings – Investment) + (Taxes – Government Spending)
To explore the relationship between the Peoria live hog price, Interior Missouri live hog price, National negotiated prior day purchase base price, National negotiated slaughter base price, CME lean hog futures price, and farrow to finish profit...