General Economics

News                                                                                                                             
Market Watch | Fed's Dudley: Economic outlook still uncertain
Federal Reserve officials need three to four more months before they will be able to know if the economy can shrug off the drag from fiscal policy, said New York Fed President William Dudley on Wednesday.
Bloomberg | EU Urges Energy Market as U.S. Shale Gas Widens Price Gap
European Union leaders urged faster integration of the bloc’s power and natural-gas markets to lower energy prices as the U.S. shale-gas revolution widens the EU’s cost gap with its largest trading partner.
Market Watch | Bank of Japan ups economic outlook
The Bank of Japan raised its economic assessment at the end of its two-day meeting on Wednesday, while holding its policy unchanged.
CNBC | Mortgage Applications Tumble as Interest Rates Jump
Applications for home mortgages dropped for a second week in a row last week as a spike in interest rates stymied demand for refinancing, data from an industry group showed on Wednesday.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Forbes | It's The Taxes Hikes, Not The Spending Cuts, That Weigh On Growth
Although sequestration’s spending cuts grab headlines, the tax hikes are having greater fiscal effect. Unlike the much-mentioned March 1, sequester, the tax hikes began January 1, and are permanent. The disparate impacts and disproportional reaction have everything to do with Washington’s entitlement culture – that Washington feels entitled to tax and spend.
Fortune | This country needs another financial crisis
Almost a century ago Thomas Marshall, Woodrow Wilson's Vice President, got tired of listening to senators blather on about the nation's needs and uttered the words that made him immortal: "What this country needs is a good five-cent cigar." Today, with 24/7 blathering as our national political pastime, let me adapt Marshall's 1917 remark: What this country needs to get its act together is a good five-alarm financial crisis.
CNN Money | Even small business is bigger in Texas
As more entrepreneurs flock to the state, experts are pointing to a combination of growth-friendly conditions that have small businesses growing in, and messing with, Texas.
Heritage Foundation | Social Security Benefits and the Impact of the Chained CPI
The current debate over adopting a new measure of inflation has many beneficiaries worried that their benefits would be cut. To the contrary, their benefits would still rise under the new measure, and benefit increases would more accurately reflect changes in the cost of living.

Blogs                                                                                                                             
WSJ | Should U.S. Pay Workers to Delay Social Security?
Social Security already rewards workers for delayed retirement by increasing benefits with each passing year (and legislation in 1983 gradually raises the normal retirement age to 67 for people born after 1959). Four researchers looked into the idea of offering workers lump-sum payments to retire later. Their results suggest this approach could push more people to delay retirement without raising costs or cutting benefits.
Library of Economics | The Dirty Laundry of Instrumental Variables
Are instrumental variables (IV) estimates really superior to ordinary least squares (OLS)?  Most high-status empirical economists seem to think so.  Meta-analyses often treat IV as presumptively superior to OLS.  Yet when you ponder IV output, it's often simply bizarre.

Health Care

News                                                                                                                             
CNN Money | Medicare payment rates: $15,000 for one hospital, $26,000 for another
Get a hip replaced at Olympia Medical Center in Los Angeles, and Medicare will pay the small, doctor-owned hospital $15,585, or about 13% of what Olympia charged in the bills it submitted.

Blogs                                                                                                                             
Heritage Foundation | Big Hospitals’ Obamacare Deal Betrays Seniors and the Poor
During their closed-room dealings with the Obama Administration, the hospital industry’s lobbyists agreed to support Obamacare—provided that the law placed restrictions on physician-owned “specialty” hospitals, noted WSJ.

Monetary

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
CNN Money | Bank of Japan maintains policy, cheers Abenomics
Japan's central bank pledged Wednesday to maintain its ambitious quantitative easing program, saying that economic conditions in the country are improving.

Taxes

News                                                                                                                             
Politico | Tim Cook defends Apple tax policy
Apple CEO Tim Cook on Tuesday vigorously defended his company on Capitol Hill against charges that the tech company stashes billions of dollars overseas to lower its U.S. tax bill.
Politico | White House reveals new IRS details
The White House’s explanation of what it knew about the investigation into the IRS’s scrutiny of conservative political groups and how it planned for the eventual release of that information shifted once again Tuesday.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Real Clear Markets | Tax Individuals, Not Couples
Both advocates and opponents of same-sex marriage eagerly await the Supreme Court's decisions on two cases challenging the constitutionality of laws - one federal and one state - that deny recognition for same-sex marriage.

Blogs                                                                                                                             
CATO | Four Reasons to Applaud Apple’s Tax Planning
The Senate is holding a Kangaroo Court designed to smear Apple for not voluntarily coughing up more tax revenue than the company actually owes.

Employment

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Bloomberg | As Job Flow Slows, Americans Get Stuck in Place
Most Americans believe that the job market has grown more turbulent, with people changing employers ever more often. In reality, the opposite is happening.

Budget

News                                                                                                                             
Washington Times | Average credit card debt, late payments fall in 1Q
Americans got better about paying their credit-card debt on time in the first three months of the year, a period during which many borrowers use income tax returns to tackle their holiday season debt.
Washington Post | GOP moderates feud with conservatives over stall tactics on budget
Long-simmering divisions among Republicans burst into public view Tuesday evening, when GOP moderates challenged tea-party conservatives on the Senate floor over their refusal to proceed to formal negotiations with Democrats over the federal budget.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
WSJ | Austerity and Stimulus—Two Misfires
Why is it that in the United States the "stimulus" solution to the economy's ills has performed badly while in Europe the opposite approach, "austerity," has performed even worse?
WSJ | The Debt Problem Hasn't Vanished
President Obama has raised the national debt by nearly $6.2 trillion, the equivalent of $78,385 per family of four. It is true that projected deficits recently have been reduced.