Rekord: 33,2 Millionen Amerikaner bezogen im März Lebensmittelmarken

Im März bezogen 33,2 Millionen Amerikaner Lebensmittelmarken, eine Rekordzahl, die um 5,2 Millionen über der Zahl des Vorjahres liegt. Damit erhält etwa elf Prozent der Gesamtbevölkerung Lebensmittelmarken. Im März betrug der Wert der Marken im Durchschnitt 114 Dollar pro Person. Bereits im Februar hatte die «Los Angeles Times» berichtet, dass im Kreis Los Angeles 20 Prozent der Bevölkerung – 2,2 Millionen Menschen – auf öffentliche Unterstützung in Form von Lebensmittelmarken, Sozialfürsoge und sonstiger Beihilfen angewiesen ist.

Aus dem Tagesanzeiger, 5/6/09

The return of Bretton Woods Two? (or Bretton Woods 2.1?)

from RGE Monitor.

If you read the headlines earlier this week, you might well have concluded that the dollar’s days as the world’s leading reserve currency are numbered. Yu Yongding of China’s Academy of Social Sciences suggested that China should shift away from the dollar.* He isn’t alone. China’s population is no longer convinced that US Treasuries should be counted among the world’s safest asset.** Try feeding that into the Caballero, Farhi and Gourinchas model.***

Latvia’s currency crisis is a rerun of Argentina’s

Nouriel Roubini in der Financial Times.

After a recent failed public debt auction, the authorities in Latvia are desperately trying to prevent a depreciation of the currency, the lat. The country’s predicament is similar to the one that faced Argentina in 2000-01: a severe recession driven by global financial shocks, a sudden drying up of capital inflows and the need to reduce a large external deficit worsened by an unsustainable currency peg.As in Argentina, the International Monetary Fund initially went along – somewhat uncomfortably – with the authorities’ strong preference for not letting the currency depreciate, in spite of its significant overvaluation. But a real exchange rate depreciation is necessary to restore the country’s competitiveness; in its absence, a painful adjustment of relative prices can occur only via deflation and a fall in nominal wages that will take too long and exacerbate the recession.