THE TEACHING ECONOMIST - William A. McEachern 
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Issue 36, Spring 2009
William A. McEachern, Editor
Online Resources
This recession is evolving so fast that summaries of events, research, and even timely accounts such as PBS Frontline 's "Inside the Meltdown" ( http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meltdown/view/ ) can become quickly dated. The timeliest sources are those blogs and online sites that focus on the downturn. Here are a dozen sites in alphabetical order that could be useful to you and your students. Criteria for selection include attention to the current economy, frequent postings, links to timely resources, a range of perspectives, and free access.
- The Baseline Scenario at http://baselinescenario.com/ addresses the question "What happened to the global economy and what can we do about it?" The lead contributor is Simon Johnson , a professor at MIT and former chief economist at the IMF. For an interview with Simon, go to http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/02132009/watch.html .
- Bloomberg on the Economy at http://www.bloomberg.com/tvradio/podcast/ontheeconomy.html . Offers podcast interviews of "the best minds in economics" including Michael Porter, James Galbraith, and Nouriel Roubini.
- Dani Rodrik's Blog at http://rodrik.typepad.com/dani_rodriks_weblog/ . The Harvard professor focuses on international political economy. A sample: "Don't fret about the future of capitalism, which after all has an almost unlimited capacity to reinvent itself."
- Econbrowser: Analysis of Current Economic Conditions and Policies at http://www.econbrowser.com/ written by James Hamilton, UC-San Diego, and Menzie Chinn, U. of Wisconsin-Madison.
- The Economist at http://www.economist.com/research/articlesBySubject/display.cfm?id=348918 . This site collects the magazine's economics articles for the week. No subscription required.
- The Economics Roundtable at http://www.rtable.net/index/rt/economics/recent/ hosted by William Parke, UNC-Chapel Hill. It's a metablog that draws on more than 130 economics blogs for daily postings.
- Financial Crisis and Recession at http://woodwardhall.wordpress.com/ by Robert Hall of Stanford and Susan Woodward of Sand Hill Econometrics. A husband-wife team of economists, Hall chairs the NBER business-cycle dating committee, and Woodward was chief economist at HUD and at the SEC.
- Global Economic Crisis at http://community.cengage.com/GECResource/blogs/gec_blog/default.aspx . Launched by Cengage Learning in January 2009, this blog offers a variety of online resources with timely commentary, data, videos, and podcasts.
- Grasping Reality with Both Hands at http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/ . Brad DeLong of Berkeley created one of the first go-to blogs by an economist. He has been doing this well for a long time.
- Greg Mankiw's Blog at http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/ . The Harvard professor, textbook author, and former CEA head under Bush offers thoughts, policy ideas, and links.
- The Marginal Revolution at http://www.marginalrevolution.com/ . Tyler Cowens and Alex Tabarrok of George Mason University aim to take "small steps to a much better world."
- Vox's Global Crisis Debate at http://www.voxeu.org/ is generating ideas for April's G20 Summit in London . The debate is organized around five topics: development, macro, regulation, institutional reform, and open markets. Each topic is moderated by an expert, such as Luigi Zingales, who covers regulation.
Acknowledgments: For helpful comments on a draft of this issue, I thank John Carey, Sarah Greber, Dennis Heffley, Stephen Sacks, Charles Martie, Stephen Miller, and Susan Smart.