Archive - Brad DeLong's Grasping Reality

Pre-Lecture Notes: Immigration :: American Economic History

I am now officially behind! For the first time this semester, I have to give a lecture & I did not have a rough draft of it in hand before the semester…

23 hrs ago •

PROJECT SYNDICATE: Bond Vigilantes! Or Is It "Bond Vigilantes?'?

Normal countries, countries with “exorbitant privilege”, and the threat of the loss of same. For even for those those with “exorbitant privilege” cannot…

Mar 7 •

Brief Comments on the Economic & Political-Economic State of the Trump

I did a short interview with the BBC. Cleaned-up transcript. And my talking points. None of which I got to use...

Mar 6 •

DRAFT: Night Thoughts on Dictatorial Court & Courtier Politics...

With the exoteric subject of the post being the rise of Deng Xiaoping to paramountcy in China in the late 1970s at the head of a coalition of PLA FFA…

Mar 6 •

I Did an Interview with "Capital" Magazine in Türkiye...

Two big lessons, I think: (1) Expect to be surprised by what happens to your economy and to your rate of economic growth. (2) Recognize that “orthodox…

Mar 2 •

DRAFT: I Get to Talk About the 2nd Industrial Revolution in American Economic History on Monday!

Behind the paywall because I am not yet fully happy with it. Lecture: Innovation, Immigration, & Industry: The 2nd Industrial-Revolution Era Making of…

Mar 1 •

Anchoring Your Thoughts Against the Blizzard of Trumpist Lies Is Very Important for You!

Proper mental hygiene is essential if you are to be a useful part of humanity-as-an-anthology-intelligence over the next four years. Start now…

Mar 1 •

February 2025

"Inflection Point", Hosted by Dylan Riley & Brad DeLong

Yes, another podcast, as if the world needed more… We are going to try to soft-relaunch "Inflection Point" next week, with our first guest being the…

Feb 28 •

American Economic History: American Exceptionalism Calculations

2025-02-26 We Econ 113: Some quick-and-dirty back-of-the-envelope Python-calculated numbers on the "Great Traverse" that was the long-run knock-on…

Feb 26 •

Desperate & Semi-Despairing Night Thoughts About Ukraine

Can you negotiate a peace with sooooo many liars in the room? Is there an unstable path to Ukraine’s future?

Feb 25 •

What are We For?

The false populism of the current administration is already a source of growing conflict. Which only raises the question: now what?

Published on Jared’s Substack • Feb 23

Slides for Tomorrow's (2025-02-24 Mo) "American Exceptionalism" American Economic History Lecture

Why isn't the United States of America one Giant Australia (or New Zealand)? Why the u.s. didn’t stay a land of farmers & miners. How infrastructure…

Feb 23 •

First Principles of Fiscal Policy, with Some of Their Practical Applications

My Godley-Tobin Lecture at the Eastern Economic Association. It has turned out to be a full-throated defense of Federal Reserve monetary policy in the…

Feb 22 •

HOISTED FROM THE ARCHIVES: Again, This Year, I Lament I Have No Opportunity to Give My "How to Think Like an Economist" Lecture

It seems to me that this is important stuff—that people really should know it before they begin studying economics, because it would make studying…

Feb 20 •

American Economic History Midterm This Friday!

Here are my slides for the pre-midterm review class... These are the things I want to have handy today, both to talk about the format and the types of…

Feb 20 •

Blame the Right-Wing Noise Machine, Not the Facts on the Ground, for Voters' Dismay About the Economy

No, our economic statistics were not painting us an unusually rosy picture last fall. Yes, the state of the American economy is very disappointing. But…

Feb 16 •

Gini Coefficients...

Yes, 0 is complete equality and 1 is complete inequality; but, in between, what do they mean, really?

Feb 16 •

Brad DeLong's Grasping Reality—The SubStack

WELCOME TO BRAD DELONG’S GRASPING REALITY: My attempt to make my readers—and myself—smarter, while keeping all of you out there in SubStackLand…

Feb 15 •

HOISTED FROM THE ARCHIVES FROM 1998: Robber Barons

“Industrial Statesmen”, Robber Barons, & billionaires: wealth, power, & the politics of fortune from railroads to Silicon Valley—how the rules of…

Feb 15 •

Time to Revisit: How Does This Assessment Look Fourteen Months Later?

I need to update my assessment I made 14 months ago about "Team Transitory" vis-à-vis "Team Persistent" on US early-2020s inflation. I need to update it…

Feb 10 •

PROJECT SYNDICATE: Trump's Smoke & Mirrors

An awful lot of Trump is performative kayfabe focused on gaining attention—and doing horrible things to a few people. And an awful lot is disastrous…

Feb 9 •

REVIEW: Small People Dealing with Looming Fascism Novel Watch

I do love Jo Walton's "Small Change" trilogy. & I do find it, once again, a very suitable read for our times. Save for the not-unhappy ending part...

Feb 8 •

PROJECT SYNDICATE DRAFT: Chaos-Monkey Trade Policy

Welcome to the chaos monkey house. The Trump II administration will have policies, and they will almost surely have very destructive impacts on America…

Feb 7 •

Yes: This Is Worth Signing: Economists Who Are Neither Bought Nor Crazy Oppose Broad-Based Tariffs

Broad-based tariffs are really not a good idea at all. As I was writing in email earlier this morning in response to “economists are much better at…

Feb 6 •

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