Archived Publication Types

Union strength is capable of boosting wages for workers at the low end of the income scale. Even when differences in education and industry type are accounted for, workers in right-to-work states have a greater probability of earning close to the minimum wage than workers in states with relatively high union density. The decline of […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 57A, 1999 PDF (56.81 KB)

The causes for the instability that has marked the financial system over the past decade lie deep in the economic theory that urges easy and efficient substitution of one piece of paper for another, in the technology-driven tight articulation of receipts and payments, and in the growth of leverage that diminishes the creditworthiness of major […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 56A, 1999 PDF (28.94 KB)

In a Special Report, Distinguished Scholar Wynne Godley argues that the long expansion of the American economy has been propelled by forces that cannot be sustained into the medium term. These forces include a wholly exceptional rise in private expenditure relative to disposable income: at no time during the last 40 years has private expenditure […]

Download Volume 9, No. 4 PDF (351.17 KB)

Projections of an impending crisis in financing Social Security depend on unduly pessimistic assumptions about basic demographic and economic variables. Moreover, even if the assumptions are accepted, the projected gap between Social Security revenues and expenditures would not constitute a “crisis” and could be eliminated with relatively simple adjustments when it occurs. The real issue […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 55A, 1999 PDF (24.17 KB)

A new Public Policy Brief argues that the prediction of a coming crisis in Social Security is based on overly pessimistic assumptions about revenues and costs. Even if the prediction were to come to pass, the resulting financial shortfall could be resolved by relatively minor adjustments in the tax system at that time; cutting benefits […]

Download Volume 9, No. 3 PDF (384.42 KB)

Despite a long period of strong economic growth, more than 28 million working-age persons were categorized by the Bureau of Labor Statistics as out of the labor force in 1998. A small portion of this population will move into the labor force, but the majority will remain without work. This brief examines the demographics of […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 54A, 1999 PDF (104.34 KB)

Claims that the nation has reached full employment take for granted the need for a reserve pool of labor to maintain price stability and labor market flexibility. But are millions of jobless and underemployed workers the best we can do in these times of economic expansion? And what will happen when the inevitable downturn comes? […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 53A, 1999 PDF (51.47 KB)

Based on neoclassical theory, cutting budget deficits has come to be seen as a principal way to increase long-run growth, but the empirical evidence is ambiguous on the outcome of this macropolicy. A new model, the classical growth cycles (CGC) model, offers an alternative theoretical framework for analyzing the complex effects of fiscal policy. The […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 52A, 1999 PDF (56.48 KB)

In The Levy Report Interview, James K. Galbraith discusses his views on the state of the American economy and the economics profession, including the Federal Reserve’s focus on controlling inflation, monetary policy’s role in lowering unemployment, and the connection between unemployment and inequality in the wage structure. Contents: Ninth Annual Hyman P. Minsky Conference on […]

Download Volume 9, No. 2 PDF (517.52 KB)

The objective of the Ninth Annual Hyman P. Minsky Conference on Financial Structure was to determine the extent to which domestic and global economic events coincided with the types of instabilities Minsky describes, and to analyze his policy recommendations to alleviate instability and other economic problems. The conference was held April 21–23, 1999, at the […]

Download Conference Proceedings, April 21–23, 1999 PDF (639.12 KB)

The Levy Institute conducted a survey of small businesses to elicit information about their hiring and employment practices, especially the hiring of former welfare recipients; preferences regarding education, training, and other characteristics of potential employees; effects of increases in the minimum wage on employment decisions; and their responses to various forms of government wage and […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 51A, 1999 PDF (58.64 KB)

Central banks, national governments, and international organizations have resisted policies that would promote full employment because high employment and high capacity utilization are associated with structural rigidities that result in sluggish growth, inflationary pressures, and other undesirable consequences. What has been almost entirely overlooked is the way in which public sector activity can enhance flexibility […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 50A, 1999 PDF (55.19 KB)

Jeffrey G. Madrick talks with Levy Institute Vice Chairman Leon Levy about hedge funds’ influence over financial markets, and what went wrong with Long-Term Capital. Contents: Hedge Fund Mysteries: An Interview with Leon Levy by Jeffrey Madrick * New Working Paper topics include: Modern Money * Government Spending and Growth Cycles * The Minimum Wage […]

Download Volume 9, No. 1 PDF (341.33 KB)

This double issue of the Summary features the Ninth Annual Hyman P. Minsky Conference on Financial Structure, which underscored the renewed general interest in Minsky’s work as it applies to the global financial system.   Contents: Risk Reduction in the New Financial Architecture · Can Goldilocks Survive? · Workshop: Earnings Inequality, Technology, and Institutions · […]

Download Volume 8, No. 3 –4 PDF (428.10 KB)

In a new Policy Note summarized in this issue, Senior Scholar L. Randall Wray describes three threats to the current “Goldilocks” economy: global financial crisis, global deflation and excess demand, and a domestic surplus coupled with record private deficits. Contents: The Minimum Wage in Historical Perspective · Constructing Long and Dense Times-Series of Inequality Using […]

Download Volume 8, No. 2 PDF (96.94 KB)

New Working Papers summarized in this issue cover a broad range of topics, including the effects of the Clinton expansion on employment opportunities, the development of modern money from a Chartalist perspective, the federal budget surplus in the context of the coming economic slowdown, concepts of time in economic theory, and the effect of the […]

Download Volume 8, No. 1 PDF (272.33 KB)

HMO medicine sets up an inevitable conflict between the physicians’ traditional fiduciary role and the financial interests of the health plan and its physicians. Regulatory interventions, such as the formulation of rules regarding clinical practice, put government in a micromanagement role it cannot hope to perform well. Government instead should focus on building a regulatory […]

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The postwar system of corporate governance in Germany is being threatened by the failure of some industries to maintain their competitive position (with resulting significant job losses) and pressures for financial liquidity driven by those who have accumulated substantial financial holdings, institutions competing for control of those holdings, and those concerned about the funding of […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 49A, 1998 PDF (57.58 KB)

Despite the crisis in the Japanese financial sector, prolonged recession, and competitive challenges, Japan’s formidable productive system remains strong. Nevertheless, the system of corporate governance, which has pursued a strategy of retaining corporate revenues and reallocating labor resources and returns to labor in order to invest in productive capabilities, faces short-term pressures from a transformation […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 48A, 1998 PDF (57.77 KB)

HMO medicine sets up an inevitable conflict between the physicians’ traditional fiduciary role and the financial interests of the health plan and its physicians. Regulatory interventions, such as the formulation of rules regarding clinical practice, put government in a micromanagement role it cannot hope to perform well. Government instead should focus on building a regulatory […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 47A, 1998 PDF (57.14 KB)

The United States’ official poverty measure defines the poor in terms of a family’s actual, yearly cash income relative to an estimate of the income needed to sustain a minimally acceptable standard of living. An alternative definition, designed to reflect a family’s ability to achieve economic independence, would instead rest on its capacity for generating […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 46A, 1998 PDF (58.18 KB)

In this issue’s editorial, James K. Galbraith and George Purcell trace the chain of worldwide events that followed from the Federal Reserve’s failure to pursue interest rate cuts. Contents: Symposium: Employment Policies to Reduce Poverty * Wall Street Blues: An Interview with Leon Levy by Jeffrey Madrick * Editorial: The Butterfly Effect (James K. Galbraith […]

Download Volume 8, No. 4 PDF (614.65 KB)

During the recent robust expansion only 700,000 of the almost 12 million jobs created went to the half of the population that does not have at least some college education. Even though the number of officially unemployed fell to less than 4 million in the 25-and-over age group, there remain in that group over 26 […]

Download Public Policy Brief Highlights No. 45A, 1998 PDF (95.72 KB)

The purpose of this symposium, held September 24, 1998, at the Levy Institute’s research and conference center on the campus of Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, was to explore the causes and consequences of the persistence of poverty, and to examine policies that might rectify the inequitable distribution of the gains of economic success.

Download Proceedings, September 24, 1998 PDF (56.31 KB)