Tuesday Assorted Links - 03/31/20

1. Once in a Lifetime - Ben Hunt, Epsilon Theory

   What do I mean by sociopathy and division?

   I mean the way our political and economic leaders beat the narrative drum about how this virus prefers to kill the old rather than the young, as if that matters for our policy choices, as if older Americans are lesser Americans, as if we should think of them differently – with less empathy – than Americans who are more like “us”.

2. Why We Sleep — a tale of institutional failure - Andrew Gelman
   That latest tale of research malfeasance in the very popular "pop science" bestseller Why We Sleep. The author Matthew Walker seems to have very egregiously omitted data to support his hypotheses.

3. The Corona Crisis vs. The Great Depression - Ben Carlson
   Sober-minded compare/contrast between now and the Great Depression. Some dynamics are similar, others are very different (a well-functioning Fed, social programs, Keynesianism).

4. A Vision of Post-Pandemic New York - Tyler Cowen, Bloomberg

5. Fiscal Policy during a Pandemic - Miguel Faria e Castro, St Louis Fed

   I find that UI benefits are the most effective tool to stabilize income for borrowers, who are the hardest hit, while savers favor unconditional transfers. Liquidity assistance programs are effective if the policy objective is to stabilize employment in the affected sector.

6. Lockdowns and GDP Is there a tradeoff? - Andrew G. Atkeson

   If we lock everyone down, we save lives, but we lose economic output. But what if we go back to work now? We will lose lives, but will we gain economic output?

7. Two COVID-19 initiatives - Alex Danco