Robert Solow

Solow condemns the welfare reforms recently passed by Congress and President Clinton for confronting welfare recipients with an unworkable choice - finding work in the current labor market or losing benefits. He argues that the only practical and fair way to move recipients to work is, in contrast, through an ambitious plan to guarantee that every able-bodied citizen has access to a job. Solow contends that the demand implicit in the 1996 Welfare Reform Act for welfare recipients to find work in the existing labor market has two crucial flaws. Solow concludes that it is legitimate to want welfare recipients to work, but not to want them to live at a miserable standard or to benefit at the expense of the working poor, especially since children are often the first to suffer. Instead, he writes, we should create new demand for unskilled labor through public-service employment and incentives to the private sector - in effect, fair "workfare." Throughout, Solow places debate over welfare reform in the context of a struggle to balance competing social values, in particular self-reliance and altruism.

Alfred Marshall, the founder of modern economics, once described economics as 'the study of mankind in the ordinary business of earning a living'. In Economics for the Curious, 12 Nobel Laureates show that 'the ordinary business of earning a living' covers a wide range of activities, as they take readers on an engaging tour of some of the everyday issues that can be explored using basic economic principles. Written in the plainest possible language, Nobel Laureates including Paul R. Krugman, Eric S. Maskin, Finn E. Kydland and Vernon L. Smith confront some of the key issues challenging society today - challenges that claim attnetion in any phase of the business cycle. The range of topics include how economic tools can be used to rebuild nations in the aftermath of a war; financing retirement as longevity increases; the sustainable use of natural resources; and what governments should really be doing to boost the economy. Economics for the Curious is an accessible but informative display of the kinds of questions economics can illuminate. It will appeal to anyone who has an interest in economics and the world around them, and we hope it will encourage further interest and study in the topic from readers everywhere. -- from dust jacket.

On December 14 and 15, 1992, just over one month before he was to take the Oath of Office, President Bill Clinton was joined by Vice-President Al Gore, major cabinet appointees and 329 of the nation's top economists, corporate executives, labor leaders and others for an incisive and comprehensive discussion of the problems facing the U.S. economy and the rough choices that lay ahead for his incoming administration. The array of speakers at the Little Rock Economic Conference, in the words of a New York Times editorial, provided government, business and the American public with "a valuable national conversation" and demonstrated that President Clinton, who "displayed a remarkable grasp of big themes and small details ... [was] up to the task" of making the important economic decisions.

This is the first in a series of annual reports on European economic developments by an international panel of distinguished economists, writing accessibly. Competitive Disinflation addresses one of the main areas of debate concerning economic developments in Europe: the extent to which the budgetary policy of national governments is competitive rather than cooperative. The discussion focuses on three particular cases, French macroeconomic policy since 1987, the reunification of Germany, and constraints imposed on national governments budgetary powers by membership of the EMU. This is a book about the radical alteration of the environment in which economic policy is formulated, with an analysis of options for action and a consideration of factors limiting the effectiveness of that action. It will be a stimulating read for all those, including students, who have an interest in macroeconomic policy issues in the context of European pressures.

"Global crises are very rare events. After the Great Depression and the Great Stagflation, new macroeconomic paradigms associated with a new policy regime emerged. This book addresses how some macroeconomic ideas have failed and examines which theories researchers should preserve and develop. It questions how the field of economics -- still reeling from the global financial crisis initiated in the summer of 2007 -- will respond" -Back cover.

"The relationship between structural reform and macroeconomic policy underlies the widespread perception that the large European economies have underperformed in the recent past in comparison both with their own standards and with the contemporaneous performance of the United States. Nobel Laureate Robert M. Solow introduces the book by observing that, within European financial and governmental institutions and among European economists, the most common response is a call for structural reforms, primarily deregulation of the labour market, to make it more like a spot market for a perishable commodity, with the implicit presumption that essentially nothing else is needed. This book takes a more inclusive view and provides analyses that might be useful in a more coordinated and simultaneous approach on all three fronts - labour and product markets, and also the demand side."--BOOK JACKET

This book by a Nobel laureate in economics begins with a brief exposition of Kenneth J. Arrow's classic paper "The Economic Implications of Learning by Doing" (1962). It shows how Arrow's idea fits into the modern theory of economic growth, and uses it as a springboard for a critical consideration of spectacular recent developments that have made growth theory a dynamic topic today. The author then develops a new theory that combines learning by doing (identifying it with the concept of "continuous improvement") with a separate process of discrete "innovations." Learning by doing leads to a fairly smooth reduction in labor required per unit of output, tied to the rate of gross investment in new capital equipment. Innovations arrive at random; when one of them happens, the labor requirement takes a jump downward. This new model, simple as it is, does not lend itself to self-contained solution. The author accordingly presents the results of a series of computer simulations that exhibit the variety of paths the new model economy can follow, showing, among other things, that early good luck can have a persistent effect. The book concludes with some general reflections on policies for economic growth, drawn not from any one modeling exercise but from general experience with a variety of growth models.