NYT: Nelson Freire, Piano Virtuoso of Warmth and Finesse, Dies at 77.

 https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/04/arts/music/nelson-freire-dead.html?searchResultPosition=1

NYT Paul Krugman - Coming Next: The Greater Recession.

 https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/06/opinion/coronavirus-us-recession.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

'Todo ser humano é frágil quando se defronta com a morte', diz Bob Dylan em entrevista sobre novo disco.

https://oglobo.globo.com/cultura/todo-ser-humano-fragil-quando-se-defronta-com-morte-diz-bob-dylan-em-entrevista-sobre-novo-disco-24478619

NYT - Paul Krugman: On the Economics of Not Dying.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/28/opinion/coronavirus-economy-death.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

NYT: It’s the End of the World Economy as We Know It.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/16/upshot/world-economy-restructuring-coronavirus.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

NYT: The Global Coronavirus Crisis Is Poised to Get Much, Much Worse.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/13/opinion/coronavirus-cases.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

Paul Krugman: Cronies, cranks and the coronavirus - April 14, 2020 - NYT.

By Paul Krugman Opinion Columnist

Trying to predict Trump administration actions really is like Kremlinology, updated for the age of social media. There’s clearly no formal policy process; Donald Trump acts on impulse and intuition, often shaped either by whoever he last met or what he last saw on Fox News, making no use of the vast expertise he could call on if he were willing to listen. Those of us on the outside, and from all accounts, even many people within the administration try to infer what’s coming next from tweets and statements by people presumed to be in favor at the moment.

So what does Trumplinology suggest right now? That Trump really, really wants to end the economy’s lockdown very soon. Early Monday Trump tweeted out an assertion that he has the power to overrule state governors who have imposed lockdown orders — which suggests that we may have a constitutional crisis brewing, because as far as anybody knows he has no such power. Meanwhile, in an interview with The New York Times, Peter Navarro, Trump’s trade czar, argued that a weak economy might kill more people than the virus.

The thing is, as far as I can tell epidemiologists are united in the belief that it’s far too soon to be considering any relaxation of social distancing. The lockdowns across America do seem to have flattened the curve, allowing us to avoid — just — completely overwhelming the health care system. New cases may have peaked. But you don’t want to let up until you’re in a position to do so without giving the pandemic a second wave. And we’re nowhere close to that point.

So where’s this coming from? I’ve seen some people portray it as a conflict between epidemiologists and economists, but that’s all wrong. Serious economists know what they don’t know — they recognize and respect experts from other disciplines. A survey of economists found almost unanimous support for “tolerating a very large contraction in economic activity until the spread of infections has dropped significantly.”

No, this push to reopen is coming not from economists but from cranks and cronies. That is, it’s coming on one side from people who may describe themselves as economists but whom the professionals consider cranks — people like Navarro or Stephen Moore, who Trump tried unsuccessfully to appoint to the Federal Reserve Board. And on the other, it’s coming from business types with close ties to Trump who suffer from billionaire’s disease — the tendency to assume that just because you’re rich you’re also smarter than anyone else, even in areas like epidemiology (or, dare I say it, macroeconomics) that require a great deal of technical expertise.

And Trump, of course, who was planning to run on the strength of the economy, desperately wants to wish the coronavirus away.

The reality is that we shouldn’t consider opening the economy until we have both reduced infections dramatically and vastly increased testing, so we can crack down quickly on any potential re-emergence.

Paul Krugman: And now for something completely different.

By Paul Krugman Opinion Columnist Many people, predictably, have reacted to the Covid-19 pandemic by insisting that it makes the case for whatever policies they were advocating before. Conservatives who believe in the magical power of tax cuts insist that we should respond to a pandemic by, you guessed it, cutting taxes. Anti-immigrant groups insist that it shows that we must stop immigration. Bernie Sanders supporters insist that for some reason it means that Democrats should turn away from Joe Biden. Advocates of a universal basic income insist that it shows why we need U.B.I. So it’s kind of impressive, amid this orgy of confirmation bias, to find many mainstream economists — and, with a slight delay, the Democratic leadership in Congress — acknowledging that coronavirus economics really is different, that it calls for policies that are different from the usual recession-fighting playbook. For the record: even if you believe that cutting taxes would greatly increase Americans’ incentive to work hard (which you shouldn’t), tax cuts aren’t the answer when millions of workers are necessarily idle because of a lockdown meant to limit viral infection. And the coronavirus slump actually makes the case against universal basic income, even though part of that $2 trillion not-a-stimulus bill did involve sending everyone a check. What’s happening now is that a large number of American workers — maybe as many as one in four — have lost their income because of social distancing. These workers have bills to pay; they need replacement income close to what they were making before. The rest of the work force doesn’t need anything comparable. And if you just send everyone a check, it will be either grossly inadequate for the newly unemployed, impossibly expensive, or both. Universal income, independent of circumstances, won’t do the job. So what should our economic policy be? Over the past week or so mainstream economists have largely converged on the view that we should focus not on economic stimulus — we want part of the economy shut down for the time being — but on disaster relief for those losing their incomes. What’s striking is that this is the answer coming even from Keynesian economists like Larry Summers, Olivier Blanchard, and yours truly, who generally favor fiscal stimulus in the form of spending to fight slumps, and have been urging the U.S. to take advantage of low interest rates to do a lot more public investment. You might have expected this gang of nerds to use the current slump as an excuse to pursue their (our) favorite policy. But hard thinking about the nature of the current crisis says that infrastructure spending, however desirable it may be, doesn’t address the immediate issues. Enhanced unemployment benefits and aid to small businesses do get at the heart of the current problem. So that’s what serious economists are recommending, and Democrats in Congress have mostly come around to the same view. Making your policy recommendations contingent on what’s actually happening in the world may not sound like a terribly hard test of intellectual integrity. But given the political world we live in, I’m actually impressed and gratified to see so many economists rising to the challenge. Mathematical models of the economy may seem abstruse, but they help clarify our thoughts. Here’s the state of the art on pandemic economics modeling. My informal take on the issue, done before I saw that lovely model (which, FYI, has a definite Krugman 1998 feel.) But unemployment insurance is creaking under the strain; in New Jersey it relies on programs nobody knows how to write anymore. Economists overwhelmingly support the lockdown.

Nobel Prize 2011.

American Economists Share Nobel Prize - NYT

The Nobel prize in economic science was awarded Monday to Thomas J. Sargent at New York University and Christopher A. Sims at Princeton University for their research looking at the cause-and-effect relationship between economic policy and the broader economy.

The Nobel laureates Christopher A. Sims, left, a professor at Princeton University, and Thomas J. Sargent, a professor at New York University.

Their work uses statistical analysis to disentangle the question of whether a policy change that happened in the past affected the economy or whether it was made in anticipation of events that policymakers thought would happen later. This research has also helped economists better understand how people’s expectations for policy affect the economy.

Dr. Sims said Monday that his research was relevant for helping countries decide how to respond to the economic stagnation and decimated budgets left by the financial crisis.

“The methods that I’ve used and that Tom has developed are central for finding our way out of this mess,” he said. But asked for specific policy conclusions of his research, he responded, “If I had a simple answer, I would have been spreading it around the world.”

Dr. Sims, 68, who is president-elect of the American Economic Association, has primarily looked at temporary policy changes, such as a surprise in government finances or a change in the interest rate. For example, his methods have been used to determine whether a central bank’s decision to raise the interest rate affected inflation or whether bank officials raised the interest rate precisely because they expected that inflation change later on.

The prize committee at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said in a statement that his research has tried to develop a systemic way for distinguishing between unexpected shocks to the economy, such as a change in oil prices or government finances, and expected changes.

His methodology, developed in the 1970s, has been tremendously influential in subsequent decades among all flavors of economists. It helped lend credence to New Keynesianism, the theory that says that the economy can go into recession because there is not enough demand, and has been the basis of important papers by Ben S. Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, and Olivier Blanchard, the chief economist at the International Monetary Fund.

Dr. Sargent, 68, on the other hand, has focused on longer-term structural changes in the economy, such as setting a new inflation target. His research has analyzed historical data to better understand how these types of policy changes affect the economy over time. He has also conducted experiments in a sort of laboratory setting to examine how new policies might affect the economy.

The two economists were awarded for work that they did independently of each other but that the prize committee said was complementary. Both were expected to speak at Princeton later on Monday.

“Today, the methods developed by Sargent and Sims are essential tools in macroeconomic analysis,” the citation said.

The Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel is not one of the original Nobel prizes. It was created in 1968 and is awarded annually “according to the same principles as for the Nobel Prizes,” first begun in 1901.

STEVE JOBS: 1955 - 2011

Steven P. Jobs, the visionary co-founder and former chief executive of Apple, has died at 56.

Apple said in a press release that it was “deeply saddened” to announced that Mr. Jobs had passed away on Wednesday.

“Steve’s brilliance, passion and energy were the source of countless innovations that enrich and improve all of our lives,” the company said. “The world is immeasurably better because of Steve.

Mr. Jobs stepped down from the chief executive role in late August, saying he could no longer fulfill his duties, and became chairman. He underwent surgery for pancreatic cancer in 2004, and received a liver transplant in 2009.

Rarely has a major company and industry been so dominated by a single individual, and so successful. His influence went far beyond the iconic personal computers that were Apple’s principal product for its first 20 years. In the last decade, Apple has redefined the music business through the iPod, the cellphone business through the iPhone and the entertainment and media world through the iPad. Again and again, Mr. Jobs gambled that he knew what the customer would want, and again and again he was right.

The early years of Apple long ago passed into legend: the two young hippie-ish founders, Mr. Jobs and Steve Wozniak; the introduction of the first Macintosh computer in 1984, which stretched the boundaries of what these devices could do; Mr. Jobs’s abrupt exit the next year in a power struggle. But it was his return to Apple in 1996 that started a winning streak that raised the company from the near dead to its current position. This summer, Apple briefly exceeded Exxon Mobil as the most valuable United States company.

When a Nobel Prize Isn’t Enough

Até laureados com o NOBEL tem seus momentos de tristeza e desilusão com o ser humano. Neste artigo no The New York Times de June 5, 2011, o NOBEL PETER DIAMOND se queixa de seus colegas por não ratificarem seu nome como um dos integrantes do FED. Imaginem o que acontece conosco, simples mortais...

By PETER A. DIAMOND is a professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Last October, I won the Nobel Prize in economics for my work on unemployment and the labor market. But I am unqualified to serve on the board of the Federal Reserve — at least according to the Republican senators who have blocked my nomination. How can this be?

The easy answer is to point to shortcomings in our confirmation process and to partisan polarization in Washington. The more troubling answer, though, points to a fundamental misunderstanding: a failure to recognize that analysis of unemployment is crucial to conducting monetary policy.

In April 2010, President Obama nominated me to be one of the seven governors of the Fed. He renominated me in September, and again in January, after Senate Republicans blocked a floor vote on my confirmation. When the Senate Banking Committee took up my nomination in July and again in November, three Republican senators voted for me each time. But the third time around, the Republicans on the committee voted in lockstep against my appointment, making it extremely unlikely that the opposition to a full Senate vote can be overcome. It is time for me to withdraw, as I plan to inform the White House.

The leading opponent to my appointment, Richard C. Shelby of Alabama, the ranking Republican on the committee, has questioned the relevance of my expertise. “Does Dr. Diamond have any experience in conducting monetary policy? No,” he said in March. “His academic work has been on pensions and labor market theory.”

But understanding the labor market — and the process by which workers and jobs come together and separate — is critical to devising an effective monetary policy. The financial crisis has led to continuing high unemployment. The Fed has to properly assess the nature of that unemployment to be able to lower it as much as possible while avoiding inflation. If much of the unemployment is related to the business cycle — caused by a lack of adequate demand — the Fed can act to reduce it without touching off inflation. If instead the unemployment is primarily structural — caused by mismatches between the skills that companies need and the skills that workers have — aggressive Fed action to reduce it could be misguided.

In my Nobel acceptance speech in December, I discussed in detail the patterns of hiring in the American economy, and concluded that structural unemployment and issues of mismatch were not important in the slow recovery we have been experiencing, and thus not a reason to stop an accommodative monetary policy — a policy of keeping short-term interest rates exceptionally low and buying Treasury securities to keep long-term rates down. Analysis of the labor market is in fact central to monetary policy.

Senator Shelby also questioned my qualifications, asking: “Does Dr. Diamond have any experience in crisis management? No.” In addition to setting monetary policy in light of a proper understanding of unemployment, the Fed is responsible for avoiding banking crises, not just trying to mop up afterward.

Among the issues being debated now is how much we should increase capital requirements for banks. Selecting the proper size of the increase requires a balance between reducing the risk of a future crisis and ensuring the effective functioning of financial firms in ordinary times. My experience analyzing the properties of capital markets and how economic risks are and should be shared is directly relevant for designing policies to reduce the risk of future banking crises.

Instead of going to the Fed, however, I will go about my congenial professional existence as a professor at M.I.T., where I have taught and researched since 1966, and I will take advantage of some of the many opportunities that come to a Nobel laureate. So don’t worry about me.

But we should all worry about how distorted the confirmation process has become, and how little understanding of monetary policy there is among some of those responsible for its Congressional oversight. We need to preserve the independence of the Fed from efforts to politicize monetary policy and to limit the Fed’s ability to regulate financial firms.

Concern about the (seemingly low) current risk of future inflation should not erase concern about the large costs of continuing high unemployment. Concern about the distant risk of a genuine inability to handle our national debt should not erase concern about the risk to the economy from too much short-run fiscal tightening.

To the public, the Washington debate is often about more versus less — in both spending and regulation. There is too little public awareness of the real consequences of some of these decisions. In reality, we need more spending on some programs and less spending on others, and we need more good regulations and fewer bad ones.

Analytical expertise is needed to accomplish this, to make government more effective and efficient. Skilled analytical thinking should not be drowned out by mistaken, ideologically driven views that more is always better or less is always better. I had hoped to bring some of my own expertise and experience to the Fed. Now I hope someone else can.

SERÁ QUE ELE TEM RAZÃO?

Enquanto isso, na América o Nobel Paul Krugman continua sua crítica ao trabalho do Ben Bernanke, o atual presidente do Federal Reserve – Fed. Em dois recentes artigos ele comenta:

• The lights are going out all over America — literally. Colorado Springs has made headlines with its desperate attempt to save money by turning off a third of its streetlights, but similar things are either happening or being contemplated across the nation, from Philadelphia to Fresno.
• And while the Fed sits there in its self-inflicted paralysis, millions of Americans are losing their jobs, their homes and their hopes for the future.

OBAMA EM CRISE!

É uma pena que depois de tanta ESPERANÇA, hoje ELE precise de tanto apoio...Direto do NYT.