John Tepper Marlin is Principal of CityEconomist and
Publisher of Boissevain Books. From April 2009 to
May 2011 he was working as Senior Economist at the
Joint Economic Committee in Washington, DC. In the
fall semester of 2011-12 he is teaching economics to
MPA students at Pace University. He has also been
teaching a course on CSR to MBA and MPA students as
Adjunct Professor at NYU's Stern School of Business.
From 1992 to 2006 he was Chief Economist in the
Office of the New York City Comptroller.
A graduate of Harvard (A.B. cum laude), Oxford (BA,
MA) and George Washington (Ph.D. in economics)
Universities, his first full-time job was as a
financial economist in Washington, D.C. with the
Federal Reserve Board, the Small Business
Administration and Federal Deposit Insurance
Corporation. For 20 years he served as President and
CEO of the Council on Municipal Performance and JTM
Reports.
His writing includes serving as principal writer of
Harvard's Let’s Go Guide to Europe, which
became a best-selling series. He founded and was
editor of the first two issues of the Journal of
Financial Education. His books include The
Book of American City Rankings, Cities of
Opportunity, Building a Peace Economy and
Contracting Municipal Services.
His 2008 case study of Topkapi Iplik, a textile
plant in Turkey is one of a group of three in a
CIPE-SAI report on implementing workplace standards
. His article on the “No Dirty Gold Campaign,”
appears in the second volume of the
Journal of Economists for Peace and Security,
June 2006. The New York Times has published
four of his op eds, and others have appeared in
Newsday and The Asian Wall Street Journal.
He has received awards for an article with Jurgen
Brauer on estimating a peace gross world product
(2011), for an article with Janine Berg and Farid
Heydarpour on optimal tax mix (2002), and for a
paper for the NYC Comptroller;s Office on estimating
the economic impact of 9/11 (2001).
I'm reading about the arrest in London of Kweku
Adoboli of the Swiss investment bank UBS. I'm at the
Randolph Hotel in Oxford, overlooking Balliol
College. I'm here for the Oxford University Reunion
Weekend -- 49 years since I matriculated.
It seems
that Mr. Adoboli, the young UBS trader, made...
1 Comments| Posted
August 29, 2011 | 07:14 PM
(EST)
A day after Hurricane Irene was downgraded to a
tropical storm,
38 fatalities have been reported. Each of these
deaths represents a great loss for their survivors.
Fatalities are also a guide to the economic impact
of the disaster.
3 Comments| Posted
August 26, 2011 | 10:34 AM
(EST)
The country is stuck in a liquidity paralysis. The
Tea Party's debt exorcisers are pushing their case
too hard at the wrong time. President Obama
continues to have a big challenge to get the country
moving again.
Yet there may be hope at the state and local
level. The...
When the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 and the
Soviet Union disintegrated, many of us looked
forward to a Peace Dividend, a reduction in military
spending that would allow more U.S. Government
spending on public needs like health care or
education, or tax cuts, or a combination.
As the Democratic administration wrestles with huge
U.S. economic problems, officials can take comfort
in the fact that they have an easy act to follow.
The numbers are in, and under Bush 43 only four U.S.
states beat the average long-term growth rate. The
four "winner" states that did better...
At
dinner this week I had a chance to quiz Georg Kell
about the UN's Global Compact. Georg is Executive
Director of the UN Global Compact. What is his
mission? He told...
Public concern is fully warranted over the high and
rising 8.1 percent unemployment rate reported for
February. In fact, the true pain is closer to double
what is reported. The Bureau of Labor Statistics
routinely provides the data to report the higher
rate. The standard unemployment rate averaged 5.8
percent...
The U.S. financial meltdown has created a worldwide
crisis. Ironically, worldwide scared money is still
flowing into U.S. Treasury obligations as a safe
haven. This permits more U.S. borrowing, but by
drying up credit overseas creates financial crises
in other countries.
The U.S. economy lost 651,000 more jobs (nonfarm
payroll) in February, says the BLS, for a cumulative
loss of 2.6 million in the past four months. The
unemployment rate rose from 7.6 to 8.1 percent.
These numbers were anticipated by the stock market
to some extent yesterday. The market is...
If you thought the inflation dragon was has been
reliably slain (or at least temporarily exiled) by
the St. George of reduced demand, consider that the
record increase in unit labor costs in the fourth
quarter of 2008 was revised up.
Dennis Blair, Obama's director of national
intelligence, told the Senate Intelligence Committee
on Friday that based on reports from the nation's 16
intelligence agencies, the global recession is now
the country's
top security concern.
Unrest overseas, he says, would be a threat worse
than terrorism. He said:
Today is both the 200th birthday of Abraham
Lincoln and the 100th birthday of the NAACP.
When the NAACP was founded in 1909, the number
of faithful Lincoln Republicans was dwindling,
but John E. Milholland was one, an
Irish-American and a Presbyterian> He became the
NAACP's first Treasurer and...
My San Francisco friend Michael Phillips advised me
today by email that he is telling his colleagues to
worry less about big powerful multinationals and
more about despots of rogue states.
...
Four of HuffPost's staffers were on offer at
Manhattan's 92nd Street Y February 5. This panel
discussion is billed as giving the lowdown on "How
they choose the stories that make the news" and
"their insights into blogging, including what blogs
they link to and why, what content gets blogs...
President Obama is committed to creating five
million new green jobs via subsidizing energy
alternatives and conservation with an estimated $100
billion of the stimulus bill. The same kind of
commitment is occurring at the New York State and
City levels. On January 26 New York's Governor David
Paterson
BBC News is running a
medical care story today
that has implications for U.S. medical care.
Residents who are put on a shorter 48 hour/week
limit, in accordance with European Union
regulations, made 33 percent fewer medical errors
than those...
Thank you if you contacted BBC about allowing the
U.S. Health Care show produced by Panorama to be
downloadable in the United States. It worked. Just
received this message from BBC Panorama:
Dear John, Thank you for your email. Due to high
demand, we have now made the programme
available...
As the Congress considers a stimulus package, let
the new job numbers be heard throughout the Capitol,
as reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics this
morning. Unemployment rates in December were higher
for every state and the District of Columbia,
whether measured in comparison with November or with
the...
My sister Brigid Marlin lives in the UK and a few
days ago was watching a BBC program on health care
in the United States. Brigid is not a public affairs
junkie so I was interested when she sent me an email
reporting that the program was a shocking
portrayal...
SEPTEMBER 2011 Sept. 16 - UBS Hit Shows Risk of Casino Investment Banks
Sept. 14 - Creating U.S. Jobs - Six Avenues.
Sept. 14 - The Jobs Impact of a High Top Tax Rate.
Sept. 7 - Ed Koch Urges Easier Rules for Families Devastated by Real Estate Deflation..
AUGUST 2011 Aug 31 - Krugman was one of few who predicted the U.S. liquidity trap. Now Europe is liquidity-obsessed.
Aug 31 - Irene a Top Catastrophe? Deaths Not in Top 100. Costs Not in Top 10 Hurricanes.
Aug 29 - Cost of Hurricane Irene in Lives and Property Losses.
Aug. 28 - Was Bloomberg right to evacuate? Yes. Aug 26 - NYC Leads in Tech and Green Incubators.
Aug. 8 - The S&P Downgrade Ruckus.
Aug. 7 - Counterfeit Goods in NYC and LA.
Aug 3 - Debate on Mayor's Plan to Boost NYC Tech. JULY 2011 July 20 - For Green Jobs, Cut Subsidies for Fossil Fuels.
July 15 - Proposals for Meeting the August 2 Deadline for Raising the Debt Ceiling.
July 7 - Municipal Bond Rigging - SEC Actions.
SEPTEMBER 2011
Sept. 16. UBS Hit Shows
Risks of Casino Investment Banks. (HuffPost.)It seems that Mr. Adoboli, the young UBS trader,
made a $2 billion mistake. Using his super-duper Delta One trading system, he
bought Swiss francs as a hedge when he meant to sell them. Before he realized
his mistake, if we can believe this, the market ran away with his bet. Swiss
francs fell in value and UBS took the hit for a couple billion. This exceeds
Nick Leeson's $1.3 billion loss, which brought down Barings in 1995. It ranks
third after Jerome Kerviel's $6 billion loss at Société Générale in 2008 and...
More.Sept. 14. Creating U.S. Jobs - Six Avenues. (Blogspot.) Six ways to create jobs in the United States, starting with the least promising.
More.
Sept. 14. The Jobs Impact of a High Top Tax Rate. (Blogspot.) Jobs grew faster during years with the highest top tax rates. The middle class spends more of what it keeps. And the average working American has a greater sense of being in a fair society.
More.
Sept. 7. Former Mayor Ed Koch Makes a Couple of Good Points. (Blogspot.) Mayor Koch argues for a fairer treatment of individuals still suffering from real estate deflation. More.
AUGUST 2011
August 31. Krugman and the Liquidity Trap. (Blogspot.) On December 18, 2008, I reported on a speech by Laurence Meyer.
[H]e said that after the December 16, 2008 Federal Open Market Committee statement, the FOMC could go on vacation "for two years". [It's now nearly three years and we are still at the zero bound. No mention of the liquidity trap in the 12th Edition of Baumol and Blinder.] Paul Krugman is one of the few people who predicted the danger of the Japanese-style liquidity trap infecting the United States. Now the obsession for liquidity seems to have captured Europe. More.
August 31. Does Hurricane Irene Rank among Top Ten All-Time U.S. Catastrophes? (Blogspot). No. Fatalities are at 42, which is a terrible loss of life, but the 100th-ranked U.S. catastrophe (epidemics excluded) is approximately 100 fatalities. Irene does not make the top 100. On the basis of cost, the wide-ranging Irene hurricane is estimated to cost $7 billion to $10 billion [according to the NY Times]. But this does not place Irene in the top ten U.S. hurricanes, inflation-adjusted, as reported officially by the National Hurricane Center.More.
August 29. Measuring Irene's Damage. (HuffPost). A day after Hurricane Irene was downgraded to a tropical storm,
38 fatalities have been reported. Each of these deaths represents a great loss for their surviving families. Fatalities are also a guide to the economic impact of the disaster.More.
August 28, 2011. Mayor Bloomberg’s Evacuation - Panicky, Politic or Prudent?
(Blogspot)More.
August 26. NYC Leads with Incubators for Green and Tech Startups.
(HuffPost). The nation's economy is stuck in a liquidity freeze. The Tea Party's debt exorcisers are pushing their case too hard at the wrong time. President Obama continues to have a big challenge to get the country moving again. Yet there may be hope at the state and local level, where officials - Mayor Bloomberg, City Council President Quinn, Rep. Maloney - are seeking ways to get entrepreneurs together with the right knowledge basis and support. New York City is doing this for tech and green startups.More.
August 8. The S&P Ruckus and the Real Policy Challenge.
(Blogspot).
More.
August 7. Counterfeit Goods - New York City and Los Angeles.
(Blogspot). More.
August 3. Mayor Bloomberg's Tech Center Competition. Online debate has been started by the New York Times on Mayor Bloomberg's competition to bring major university resources to New York City to encourage tech innovation. The general response is favorable. Comment: Stanford, Cornell and NYU appear to be making substantial efforts to respond to the Mayor's challenge. Stanford, at the heart of Silicon Valley, will be hard to beat, since it meets the import standard and also has the track record dating back to the Hewlett Packard startup. Many of the recommendations of the 1999 report by the NYC Comptroller on the software/IT industry are still not implemented and remain valid. Click here for a summary of the report and a link to download the full report at What's in it for Stanford? New York has been gaining ground relative to Boston and the Bay Area. California's economy is suffering from its deep involvement in the creation and spread of the mortgage debt crisis. New York is a hedge, a growth opportunity and a service to the economic future of the United States.
JULY 2011
July 20. For Green Jobs, Cut Fossil-Fuel Subsidies. (Blogspot.)More.
July 18. Debt Ceiling Countdown. (Blogspot). Michael D. Shear, online (in the Saturday, July 16 NY Times), provides a “cheat sheet” on the various proposals for meeting the August 2 deadline for raising the debt ceiling. Comment: Not mentioned is the fact that Both Moody’s and S&P have threatened to lower their triple-A ratings on long-term U.S. debt if the deadline is not met, with S&P going further and expressing hawkish views about the terms of any compromise.More.
July 7. How Anti-Regulatory Are GOP Rank-and-File? An outraged Republican friend sent me a link from Jesse's Café Américain, commenting on SEC and other actions announced on July 7. The related SEC actions, from their announcements, are summarized below. My GOP friend was distressed at the inadequacy of the penalties. Polls of areas that include many Wall Street workers show them favorably disposed toward more SEC oversight. This is interesting to me because many Republican leaders are vociferously anti-regulation. They clearly don't speak for everyone in the ranks.More.
Site reopened July 11, 2011.
The CityEconomist website was opened in 2006. It provides resources and comments on U.S. and regional financial and economic developments until March 2009, starting again in July 2011. John Tepper Marlin, Principal of CityEconomist, was serving as Senior Economist at the Joint Economic Committee in Washington, DC from April 2009 to May 2011.
Channel 34 of the Time/Warner & Channel 83 of the
RCN
Cable Television Systems in Manhattan, New York.
The Program can now be viewed on the
internet at time of cable casting at: WWW.MNN.ORG NOTE: You
must adjust viewing to reflect NYC time & click on "WATCH MNN 1" at site
