Econoblogging
Maggie Fiskow reviews Winterspeak:
Over the past few months, I followed a very interesting blog by an economist who goes by the pen name, "Winterspeak." The blog focused on "Thoughts on Human Interaction Over the Next 25 Years." In this blog, as stated in the very first post, Winterspeak wanted to focus on specifically those interactions between each other, between nations, and between digital information. Winterspeak is the same author of the blog, "Bleakonomy." However, as the author just goes by a pen name, we cannot find much information about the author or his/her credentials.
Winterspeak updated the blog very frequently, almost daily. This blog was first started in September 2000. There are not many readers of Winterspeak's blog, as there have only been 2,633 profile views in almost nine years. However, as more time goes on, this number has grown. The number has grown by a large number of people from when I first started following the blog.
From reading many of Winterspeak's posts, many of them have a very conservative tone and a republican spin on them. For example, a posting dated February 21 was titled "Obama: 'I will worsen the recession in the US by decreasing the deficit.' " In this posting, Winterspeak claimed he/she saw the end of the Obama administration--just one day after Obama was sworn into office! Just a week later, Winterspeak titled a posting "Obama: 'I will deceitfully give your money to bankers.' " Furthermore, the following is an excerpt from a post on March 2. "If you want to see how deeply adrift the Obama administration is, check out this interview of Tim Geithner, who will go down as the worst Treasury Secretary of all time (you're off the hook, Paulson!). He honestly wants to return housing to bubble prices. Oh, and Obama will depress the economy further by reducing aggregate demand some more." These kinds of pessimistic attitudes towards Obama and his administration are frequently found throughout the blog.
Winterspeak sometimes had some humorous postings, as well, such as his/her post (or link, rather) comparing Kevin Murphy, an Economics Professor at the University of Chicago, and Chuck Norris. Winterspeak was very honest with its posts, such as the post in early March, titled "It's all so complicated." Winterspeak acknowledged that he/she was confused.
As a side note, as we just finished up a discussion in class regarding globalization, Winterspeak's first-ever post was about globalization. Winterspeak is pro-globalization. He/she stated his/her agreement with economists in that "globalization helps poor nations become richer." Winterspeak also believes that globalization is not "irreversible."
Winterspeak often posted links to other economists' blogs or writings. Conservative economists, or people with a conservative economic view would find this blog interesting to follow.
Lauren Miller reviews Greg Manikw's Blog:
Greg Mankiw is an economics professor at Harvard University; his respected profession certainly demonstrates his high credentials. Mankiw's blog, subtitled "Random Observations for Students of Economics", addresses a student audience, and he uses his blog site to specifically keep in touch with current and former students. Directly under his picture located on the top right side of the blog page, Mankiw provides additional information about himself with a link to his Harvard website, as well as links to his favorite textbooks and old columns. As an introductory economics professor, Mankiw clearly values student learning and wants to enhance student understanding of economics with his online blog. Of course, anyone interested in learning more about economics would find his page informative.
Mankiw's blog layout is organized and user-friendly. Each post is arranged in chronological order, the most recent at the top of the page. A sidebar also includes columns with timeless posts, advice for students, principles of economics, and archives of his blog. Although not incredibly fancy or artistic, the blog is easy to read and navigate.
With a new post everyday, Mankiw keeps his readers up-to-date on current economic information and interesting news stories. Some days, Mankiw even includes several new blog posts. His posts vary each day, some posts including a video message, many with links to relevant articles, and still others with cartoons or related photos. He even includes the link to his own article published in the New York Times. The topic of each blog constantly changes, providing students with a diverse knowledge base of economic opinion and reports.
Often, Mankiw uses outside information and blurbs from other economists to make a point or direct students to specific economic readings. His wide array of knowledgeable sources increases the credibility of his blog.
Mankiw frequently discusses and posts different opinions and facts regarding fiscal stimulus and monetary policy. With the incoming administration of president-elect, Barack Obama, Mankiw includes much about Obama's new policies for government spending and tax decisions. He appears quite skeptical of Obama's proposed increased government spending.
Overall, Greg Mankiw's blog, though certainly not addressing every sort of economic news, provides a strong opinion base about the economy and students can learn a lot from his site.
Jess Ramos reviews Marginal Revolution:
Marginal Revolution is a blog on economics kept by two economics professors at
Cowen and Tabarrok blog often, with around 3-4 posts per day. Though the posts are small, they are substantive. Generally, the posts include a short excerpt of a paper or article with a link to the full material. Some posts are a short list of links recommended by Cowen.
However, Cowen and Tabarrok aren't the only ones who find that pithy article interesting. Marginal Revolution is one of the most popular economics blogs, second only to Paul Krugman's blog, according to the Econolog, a website that aggregates economist blogs. The blog receives an average of 23,518 visits per day and since the installation of the site meter, Marginal Revolution has had over 20 million total visits.
Marginal Revolution remains in touch with the current events in the economy, with posts on bank nationalization, Treasury jobs, and bailouts. The blog focuses mostly on macroeconomic issues from different angles especially through Cowen's themed posts. In his "Markets in Everything," Cowen blogs about offbeat markets around the world, such as economic disaster tours in
Overall, Marginal Revolution was a clear, informative, offbeat and fun blog to read.
Combined with the posting frequency and the content, the blog made economics not quite as technical or daunting but rather more simple and accessible. For me, it made the dismal science a little bit less dismal, by connecting economics to daily life and unlikely places. Through its content-rich short posts, Marginal Revolution accomplishes its slogan: "smaller steps toward a much better world."
Hank Nathan reviews Knowledge Problem:
Lynne Kiesling and Michael Giberson's blog entitled, "Knowledge Problem," addresses the world of economics from an energy and environmental perspective. While the blog does include general economic topics, the primary focus is energy technology and its environmental ramifications. The website provides in depth commentary on these fields and promotes more efficient energy technology.
Lynne Kiesling is a Senior Lecturer in the department of economics at
Michael Giberson is an instructor and research associate with the Center for Energy Commerce in the Rawls College of Business at
This blog isn't for everyone; the topic is fairly specialized and is more suited to a niche audience. People who are particularly fascinated by energy evolution and the corresponding impact on the environment would find this site quite useful and entertaining. The insight provided about technology is intriguing and makes the reader think about the endless possibilities and all of the potential advancements. However, if someone is simply looking for a blog on the economy in general, this is not the best website.
One of the major positives of this blog is the frequency with which it is updated. Some blogs become stale because of the lack of consistent writing, but this site does not fall into that category. There is a new post virtually every day and, often times, they are lengthy entries and not just brief posts that are pointless (which is something often associated with blogging). The information provided is typically rich and well thought out. Conversely, some people may see this as a drawback because some posts are newspaper article length and readers might prefer a quick read.
Overall though, Lynne Kiesling and Michael Giberson's blog called "Knowledge Problem" offers compelling insight into the often overshadowed economic field of energy and the environment.
Jacob Geiger reviews Economist's View
Mark Thoma is a well-known economics professor at the
Thoma's blog, "Economist's View," is updated several times a day during the work week and a few times during the weekend. The blog is an excellent econoblogging aggregator, as Thoma often posts excerpts from newspaper columns, news stories and even other economics blogs. If you're trying to take in as many different opinions and want to know what economists are considering the "news of the day" (and what the economists think about that news), Thoma's blog is an excellent place to start. On many posts, Thoma simply write a brief introduction of what an author has written and then posts excerpts from the column. Sometime's he'll intersperse his own thoughts throughout the column. Other times, he'll add a short conclusion and discuss why he agrees or disagrees with what the author has outlined. Thoma also posts an extensive list of "links of the day" early each morning, giving readers and excellent jumping off point for their morning reading. His links include articles from major news and business publications, op-ed columns from major economists (almost all of Paul Krugman's columns are discussed or linked) and links to other economics blogs. Furthermore, Thoma has compiled an extensive list of other economic blogs and has a nice sidebar where past posts are broken down into various sections.
When Thoma writes longer posts instead of commenting on other articles, he usually takes a moderate to liberal point of view. These longer posts usually occur 3-5 times a week, and in them he has outlined his support for the Congressional stimulus plan that was passed last month. Like other economists, however, he has expressed concern that the plan may not be large or extensive enough and that Obama may not have enough political support to ask Congress for more money if the first attempt to stimulate the economy and fix the nation's banks isn't successful. Thoma has also taken a stand against complaints from Republican politicians and pundits that Obama is trying to destroy capitalism and use the economic crisis to impose a socialist style of government. He called such claims ridiculous and strongly argued that Obama was only forced to take such dramatic actions because of the failings and shortcomings of the Republican administration that preceded him. Like many commentators in recent days, he has attacked Larry Kudrow and other conservatives at CNBC, arguing that their cheerleading helped swell the stock and housing bubble to ever larger heights.
Despite his forays into politics, Thoma's blog is a valuable asset to readers of all political persuasions. Above all, he seems to be a realist, acknowledging that while he considers heavy government spending essential to the economy's short-term health, there will be significant long-term challenges as the government grapples with the rapidly growing federal debt.
Leann Gerlach reviews Bleakonomy
Bleakonomy is a collaborative website dedicated to news, musings, humor, and spirituality about the world economy and its travails and exploitations. Created in December 2008 by Dr. Daniel Summers, the blogger site allows professors, poets, priests, doctors, economists, and students to voice their opinions about political, economic, and religious matters in a public forum. The most prominent "bleakonomists" are Devin Maclachlan (the reverend webmaster), Izza Hussin (a University professor with a PhD in political science), and Calvin Sanborn (a rector of an Episcopal parish in Maine). Since its creation, just four months ago, the website has witnessed more than 9,715 visits from readers around the world. On average, there are 63 hits per day and more than 400 hits each week. Readers tune in daily to read more than 5 new posts from the bleakonomy collective. Seventy -three blog entries were posted in December 2008 and 130 have already been uploaded this year.
The collective website serves as a vehicle for social networking where readers and authors alike can voice their opinions about public issues. Bleakonomists create a dialogue with readers by leaving room for feedback under each entry. If a controversial topic is of particular interest to the public, it is not uncommon to see more than twenty comments below the headline that discuss the issue in further depth. This aspect of the website is particularly exemplary - as it challenges authors to defend their positions and forces them to update entries frequently as information becomes more widely available. Bleakonomy excels at creating debates between unrelated groups of people concerning issues that affect individuals every day.
Because a variety of topics are discussed on Bleakonomy, it is important that the website be clearly organized and easy to follow. The webmaster has done an excellent job at standardizing each entry and categorizing important topics according to their subject. The entries are very well-written - illustrating the intellect of each blogger and his command of the material at hand. Snippets from videos, website links, and quotes from politicians and other public figures are often used to stimulate conversation and hammer home important points. Bleakonomists frequently cite other blogs and/or headline news organizations as sources of information and inspiration for their entries - namely The Slate, Politico, The Daily Dish, Washington Daily, New York Times, and The New Republic. These references are often entertaining and humorous and are generally posted in tandem with major headlines and anticipated events. The blog, therefore, is up-to-date and compelling to read.
While the variety of topics discussed can be considered an asset to the website, it also hinders the blog's readability. The wide range of entries is disjointed and lacks a central focus. Additionally, although there are a multitude of prominent bleakonomists, the website is strongly Anti-Republican, Anti-Conservative, and Anti-Bush. While many blogs are strongly opinionated, a blog of this nature would benefit from authors with dissenting opinions. As Bleakonomy is a website that prides itself in reacting quickly to new headlines, it generally fails to anticipate future news and is unsuccessful at localizing important issues. There is very little focus on the economy as it affects individuals and a heavy emphasis on the political nature of economic issues.
Overall, I would recommend Bleakonomy to nerdy individuals, like myself, who are interested in debating public policy and discussing the headlines in further depth. Bleakonomy's bloggers have discussed a myriad of topics from Stem Cell Research, gay marriage, and abortion rights to Oscar predictions, movie reviews, and Michael Steele bashing. The website does not lack interesting material that often challenges the popular opinion and stimulates my intellectual curiosity.
Alicia Budich reviews EconLog:
Econlog is a blog sponsored by the Library of Economics and Liberty. The Library of Economics and Liberty is an online site (econlib.org) sponsored by Liberty Fund, Inc. Liberty Fund (libertyfund.org) is a private foundation created to encourage the ideal of a society, one that is free and full of responsible people. To do this, the Fund hosts international conferences each year, publishes books, and supports the LOE. The LOE is a comprehensive site which culls articles, podcasts, online books, encyclopedias, and guides together along with its Econlog Blog to educate and inform people about economic issues, especially in their relation to liberty (theoretically, a well-performing free market economy is most conducive to free society).
The blog is authored by Arnold Kling, Bryan Caplan, and David Henderson. Kling's credentials include a Ph.D. in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, six years as an economist on the staff at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, eight years at Freddie Mac - in the late eighties and early nineties, mind you. Caplan received his Ph.D. from Princeton, and since then has spent his time studying and writing about libertarianism, free-market capitalism, and anarchism. While not writing for EconLog and a number of reputable economic publications, he teaches at George Mason University. Henderson is not only a blogger for EconLog, but he also is the features editor for the LOE. He is also a Research Fellow with the Hoover Institution, and served as the Senior Economist for Health Policy and Energy Policy under President Ronald Reagan.
Each of the three post almost daily, and some days they post two or three times. They blog about everything ranging from the EconLog book club (http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2009/01/econlog_book_cl_1.html) to their recent appearances on network news. The categories they post in include Austrain Economics, Economics and Culture, Economics book suggestions, and the Economics of Health Care, Crime, and Education (Their backgrounds really come out in these postings). I read Caplan's postings more frequently than the others because they tend to be easier to digest but still give me plenty of information. Kling tends to link me to articles (oftentimes good ones), without really telling me why. Many of the works readers are directed to are pretty dense, and a summary or "guide" tot them would be helpful, but you don't always get one on this blog. Sometimes, you're lucky even to get more than a sentence about why you should click the link (most of the time, the links really are worth clicking).
The biggest weakness is that this blog assumes all readers are more economics savvy than the average bear, and have a lot of time to spend online. There are a lot of references to economic history (fabled and recent), that I don't get because I simply wasn't alive when it happened. Or they use some catch phrases to reference an event that I also don't get because I've never been around "Banana Republic Economics." Sometimes they even dip into the jargon world: "Vertical LM is not Vertical AS." The blog's other weakness is that it is incredibly boring visually. There are no pictures, no visual links. It is just a very standard blog layout. Some pictures, or even just visual links, would be more inviting than the standard "blue" link amidst grey writing.
Mike White reviews Grasping Reality with Both Hands:
Berkeley professor Brad DeLong's blog, Grasping Reality with Both Hands, offers an intellegent yet overall generic experience to the reader. Though essentially yet another "professor-blogs-about-his-once-industry-with-skepticism-and-underlying-jealousy" read, DeLong offers a few shining moments which explain why Nobel laureate Paul Samuelson describes him as "most influential". DeLong is an economist whose resume includes the NBER and the San Francisco Federal Reserve branch, and currently he teachers at California-Berkeley's Political Economy program. His past teaching credentials include Boston University, Harvard and Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Apt reading for reporting on the economy, DeLong's work focuses on stock market fluctuations and the "evolution of the stock market in the U.S. and internationally," however the blog itself covers everything you'd expect from a sassy econoblogging professor, from nutty .jpegs to posts entitled "The Pro-Life Movement: Children of Sluts Must Die" which, of course, relates indirectly to the economy. DeLong updates frequently, often multiple times a day, with everything from tony jokes to full on dissertations on market behavior, to critiques of his fellow economists' blogs. DeLong revels in an ongoing feud with Economist writer and fellow market analyst Luigi Zingales. The reading is funny when the jokes don't go over my head, and interesting when the economics don't go over my head, but often one or both happen in a single post.
The major strength of the blog is certainly its breadth of coverage and frequent updates. A passion for economics and global news seems to keep DeLong up at night, bringing forth an almost tiresome onslaught of posts that only the truly devoted could possibly keep up with. From youtube addresses from Barack Obama to the giant artistic renderings of rats (something about Giant Rats of Sumatra, again, one of the jokes which escaped me) DeLong gives his readers a veritable playground of stimulating links, interesting analogies, and critiques of every subject from Journalism to the Amazon Kindle to hundred-page-long theses on economic and political thought. While his critiques never fail to find holes in the argument, many times the source material itself is so thick or time consuming that it seems inappropriate for a blog.
Unfortunately for DeLong, much of the good economics gets bogged down in the generic, freakonomics-esque cultural commentary and nit-picky "gotcha" moments exposing misquotes and faulty logic from the likes of the New York Times and Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, who DeLong seems to have a particular grudge against. The commentary is all enlightening, but at a point it just gets redundant. Yes, Mr. DeLong, we realize that politicians pander to their constituencies. The level of intelligence needed to get through most of DeLong's more lengthy and pertinent posts is immediately insulted a day later with gems such as "Republicans: Worse Than You Think!"
Perhaps my favorite aspect of DeLong's blog, and certainly the most unique, is the he-said she-said gossip trails between warring economists. DeLong tracks feuds between two ideologies, such as Clive Crook and Paul Krugman, and gives thankfully sparse commentary on the excerpts, leaving the viewer to cast their own opinion. This is fun, sometimes catty, and always informative. I learned of several viewpoints I never would have thought about, not from DeLong himself, but from his expert juxtaposition of two arguments. Unfailingly, DeLong will enter his non-partisan two cents on which concept makes more "intellectually honest" points, as he calls them, and usually it's difficult disagreeing with him. In summation, DeLong is effective but scattered, intelligent but painfully striving to be hip, and just culturally relevant enough for the average college-educated web surfer to stay engaged. If you can't find anything more focused, or if you're a person of many erudite interests who likes others to know you have many erudite interests, Delong's blog may be for you.
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