| Fed says inflation main worry but cites risks
Still, most economists think the Fed's next move is more likely to be a rate reduction than an increase. A Reuters poll of 21 top bond firms that deal directly with the central bank in the markets found 13 believed the Fed's next move would be to lower borrowing costs. After edging ahead at just a 0.6 per cent annual rate in the first three months of the year, the US economy grew at a solid 3.4 per cent pace in the second quarter. Now, however, growth seems to be slowing again and some economists think the Fed's nod to downside economic risks could mark the first shift in a softening of inflation concerns. 'This admission of risks to growth is a full baby step toward an equal risk position,' said Brian Fabbri, managing director of economic research at BNP Paribas in New York.
UAE team to begin training camp today
UAE coach Bruno Metsu has selected 21 players for the matches against Iraq and Kuwait. Meanwhile, the UAE Football Association technical committee has sought to close the disciplinary issue against the national team players who allegedly went out of the training camp on the night before their friendly against AC Milan on January 8. Mohammad Bin Dokhan, the head of the FA technical committee, said in a press conference the team will play very important matches in the coming days and the players need to concentrate on that. .
Viewing all entries for: December 2007
CAN real consumption inequality decline even as income inequality increases? The Economics Focus piece in the current edition of the newspaper argues that it can and has. Paul Krugman's emphatic rejoinder on his New York Times blog fails entirely to join this issue, despite his table-thumping rhetoric. What Mr Krugman does do is to gesture toward nominal consumption inequality numbers that he prefers over those offered by Dirk Krueger and Fabrizio Perri, professors of economics at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Minnesota respectively, who he seems to think are guilty of "the misuse of the Consumer Expenditure Survey." But this is, as Mr Krugman recognises, "a narrow technical issue." More importantly, it is mostly beside the point of the piece he is criticising, which is this: But consumption numbers, too, conceal as much as they illuminate.
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