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
First, the characterization of foodservice and restaurant workers as a career track is inaccurate. The median age of restaurant workers is 28.4 years, the second youngest sector of our economy (next to retail shoe stores at 24 years).
A “reduced-form” analysis, also often referred to as “non-structural” analysis, is the most common kind of econometric analysis performed by economists.
The problem of underfunded pension plans is complex. Some possible economic effects are as follows.
As noted, the Federal Reserve has significantly expanded its balance sheet from about $800 billion prior to the Financial Crisis, to roughly $4.5 trillion as of November, 2014.
Black Friday is mostly a marketing gimmick to stimulate shopping during an extended weekend of wide-spread idleness, and the weekend’s performance is not a reliable predictor of total holiday spending or the health of the economy.
Yes, economic theory traditionally has emphasized the role of the entry and exit of firms in dividing market surplus. In microeconomics, free entry and exit of firms is an important part of the assumption of free competition.
Would a sudden loss of the meat and dairy industry, and all the ripple effects, destroy the economy?
Agriculture and agriculture-related industries contributed $777.0 billion to the U.S. GDP in 2012, a 4.7% share. The value of U.S.
To my knowledge, a publically-accessible national listing of all the agricultural cooperatives and their branches does not exist.
As the layoffs suggest, a large part of agriculture, in this case the crop sector of agriculture, has seen a significant reduction in prices and incomes over the past two years.
Just to be clear, “the debt limit is the total amount of money that the United States government is authorized to borrow to meet its existing legal obligations, including Social Security and Medicare benefits, military salaries, interest on the...
Assume that you decide to buy a new cell phone. Are you going to buy iPhone or Xiaomi, some unknown brand? For a typical US consumer, you have about 40% chance to buy iPhone, but almost 0% chance to buy Xiaomi.
If central banks are to lend to the government, they would have to print money and that is potentially inflationary. Forward-thinking countries try to control such a temptation by legislating in advance that their central bank be independent.
Thank you for your question. Indeed, part of the expenditure in health expenditure and defense will count towards total GDP.
Money supply increases when the FED (say NY FED) buys T-bonds from other banks (say Wells Fargo) or non-bank public (say a household or a dealer) in a secondary market, NOT a primary market.
I will focus on the benefits of the Canal when it becomes operational, because a project of this magnitude is very likely to create numerous temporary jobs and plenty of opportunities for local companies in the construction sector during the...
Continue Reading AnswerYour question requires that I explain some of the background for Right-to-Work laws, and I took the liberty of adding a more general answer on the effect of Right-to-Work on the economic outcomes for firms and workers.
Let me try to answer your question by breaking it down.
“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)”.
At present, I am not aware of a widely accepted academic research in economics and finance that would provide a definitive explanation for the exact calendar timing of major financial market fluctuations in the United States for the time period...
Avian influenza has continued to spread, particularly in flocks of egg-laying hens. When a farm encounters a case of avian influenza, some birds die and others are euthanized.
How can we understand which country is more powerful when we know the rate between their currencies?
The rates don’t reflect relative power. For example, 1 UK pound equals about 1.56 USD. That does not at all mean that UK is more powerful. Similarly, a US dollar approximately exchange for 122 Japanese yen currently.
I think you don't want everyone to have access to the money-printing press or if you do, then let there be a fixed limit (say, they can print no more than a thousand "basics", the name of this currency).
First, a disclaimer. Whatever is written below is not actual investment advice; it is general economics discussion, a dinner table conversation, no more.
If the government destroys ivory this year, then there is less of it this year which may cause price of ivory to rise. That may dissuade some current potential buyers.
There are many assumptions underlying your question. To begin with, we have to ask, why are people currently unemployed?
Let me try to remove some of the confusion. Imagine the only good in the economy is corn and corn costs $1 a pound, and imagine you and all others earn $100 a month.