Macroeconomics and econometrics are tools for recognizing patterns in data and interpreting them in ways that distinguish cause from coincidence. What attracted me to macroeconomics were its noble goals of identifying the causes of economic depressions and of understanding how government policies can promote prosperity. In graduate school, I learned that modern macroeconomics required more math...

Credit spreads are large, volatile and countercyclical, and recent empirical work suggests that risk premia, not expected credit losses, are responsible for these features. Building on the idea that corporate debt, while fairly safe in ordinary recessions, is exposed to economic depressions, this paper embeds a trade-off theory of capital structure into a real business cycle model with a small,...

BACKGROUND Childhood and current economic difficulties are associated with physical health. However, evidence concerning the factors underlying these associations is sparse. This study examines the contribution of a range of social and behavioural factors to associations between economic difficulties and physical functioning. METHODS We used comparable data on middle-aged white-collar employe...

Thomas A. Rietz (1988) proposes that the possibility of rare disasters (such as economic depressions or wars) is a major determinant of asset risk premia. Robert J. Barro (2006) shows that, internationally, disasters have been sufficiently frequent and large enough to make the Rietz proposal viable, and they account for a high equity premium. The Rietz-Barro hypothesis is almost always formulat...

Ricardo after Sraffa In the preface of the Principles (1817), Ricardo states that the main problem of Political Economy concerns the distribution of income among the three classes of society: the capitalists, the workers and the landowners, who receive the profits, the wages and the rents, respectively. When rent is discarded, the trade-off between wages and profits becomes apparent. Nowadays, ...

Background and Objectives: Depression is the most common mood disorder, which may be experienced by most of the people during their life. Food insecurity may result in mental disorders such as anxiety and depression. The aim of this study was to assess depression status and its relation to household food insecurity in women living in Northwest of Iran. Materials and Methods: In this cross-sect...

BACKGROUND Obesity is highly correlated with the development of chronic diseases and has become a critical public health issue that must be countered by aggressive action. This study determined whether data from Google Trends could provide insight into trends in obesity-related search behaviors in Taiwan. OBJECTIVE Using Google Trends, we examined how changes in economic conditions-using busi...

background the aim of the study was to evaluate the depression levels in mothers of children with leukemia. materials and methods this single centred, cross-sectional study was conducted among mothers of children with leukemia at the hematology and oncology research center, baghaie-pour clinic in yazd city during february through december, 2013. the study sample included 58 mothers with 1-12 ye...