The steep drop in the U.S. personal saving rate over the last decade has fueled speculation that Americans are spending recklessly. But alternative measures of personal saving show that households are actually setting aside a larger share of their resources than the official figures suggest. In...

Economists have not been altogether successful in their efforts to forecast “core” inflation—an inflation measure that typically excludes volatile food and energy prices. One possible explanation is that the models used to make these forecasts fail to distinguish the forces influencing...

Recent years have seen a sharp rise in the number of negative equity homeowners--those who owe more on their mortgages than their houses are worth. These homeowners are included in the official homeownership rate computed by the Census Bureau, but the savings they must amass to retain their home...

Economists have long studied the relationship between resource utilization and inflation. Theory suggests that when firms use labor and capital very intensively, production costs tend to rise and firms have more scope to pass those cost increases along in the form of higher product prices. In...

Recent years have seen a sharp rise in the number of negative equity homeowners - those who owe more on their mortgages than their houses are worth. These homeowners are included in the official homeownership rate computed by the Census Bureau, but the savings they must amass to retain their...

When economic activity slows down, labor markets may undergo extensive structural change-the permanent reallocation of workers across industries. Job losses can be heavy, and creating new jobs and retraining displaced workers to fill them can take time. A high degree of restructuring may help to...

The current recovery has seen steady growth in output but no corresponding rise in employment. A look at layoff trends and industry job gains and losses in 2001-03 suggests that structural change - the permanent relocation of workers from some industries to others - may help explain the stalled...

Each month, the government releases two estimates of U.S. employment growth - one based on a survey of firms, the other on a survey of households. Since 1994, these measures have diverged sharply. Evidence suggests that the household survey's estimate has risen more slowly because it undercounts...

Expectations about future inflation are generally thought to play an important role in households’ decisions about spending and saving. They are also of great interest to central bankers, who take them into account when determining policy or assessing the effectiveness of communications with...

Expectations about future inflation are generally thought to play an important role in households' decisions about spending and saving. They are also of great interest to central bankers, who take them into account when determining policy or assessing the effectiveness of communications with the...