-- The House actually pinged two bills back to the Senate: one that conditions funding the government on defunding the health care law, and the other that exempts military pay from the shutdown. I suspect the Senate will unanimously approve the latter. The former will lead to the shutdown.

--...

In the Room for Debate feature over at the New York Times, Julila Isaacs makes an interesting linkage between lower child poverty rates and higher rates of income mobility. She points out, for example, that Scandinavian countries maintain both lower child poverty rates and more upward mobility. Correlation...

The Washington Post today published a profile of Florida Republican Rep. Steve Southerland, focusing on his attack on the SNAP -- formerly food stamps --program. It's a piece I found interesting, even inspiring at points; as I read it, I began to see the Congressman in a different...

*And, like my CBPP colleagues, I consider "prioritization" the same as default.

Annie Lowrey provides a clear anatomy of the two different types of fiscal dysfunction Congress is toying around with right now: gov't shutdown vs. default on the public debt. It's the fiscal version of...

I've spared my readers a blow-by-blow of the latest developments around cliffs, ceilings, CR's, shutdowns, etc., but as gridlock shifts into overdrive and the self-inflicting wound squad are sharpening their knives, here's my abbreviated take:

It's all about Boehner.

Too abbreviated? OK, I'll explain.

As I see it, the House...

Well, how about that? The Fed just surprised everyone and decided to hold off on the taper for now. I suspected they might, given the set of factors I mentioned this AM. From their statement-very much a "yes...but" kind of thing:

Some indicators of labor...

[The following are some initial impressions from the income, poverty, and health insurance data released by the Census Bureau this morning. NOTE: these data refer to 2012, so yearly differences, unless otherwise noted, are between 2011 and 2012. Also, visit www.offthechartsblog.org for CBPP's updates and analyses.]

The...

I'm surprised but not shocked. Damien Paletta and Kristina Peterson of the WSJ were the first I saw to report that the math for getting the president's alleged front-runner out of the Senate Banking Committee was getting awfully tough.

Though I found Larry to be a strong Keynesian...

In a little over a month, according to the U.S. Treasury, in order to pay bills they have already incurred, Congress needs to raise the government's borrowing authority by increasing the debt ceiling.

Since 1960, Congress has raised the limit 78 times, under both Republican and Democrat presidents...

...neither of which is original, but whadyagonnadoaboutit?

First, it's pretty well understood at this point that the tick down in unemployment last month, from 7.4% to 7.3% was a function of weakness not strength: the rate fell not because more folks got jobs but because more folks left the job...

It's now pretty well understood that of the two ways you can reduce unemployment, we got the bad one today. That is, the jobless rate can fall because more jobseekers land jobs -- good; or because they give up looking -- bad.

Today's tick down was of the latter type....

Beyond pointing out that I don't want either of them to mow my lawn, I've remained neutral in the debate over Yellen vs. Summers for Fed chair. I continue to think they're both fine choices and that the differences between what they bring to the job and how...

There's a ton of interesting analysis out in recent days on the quite explicit though often under-appreciated economic thrust of the March on Washington that took place half-a-century ago today.

I found economist Joe Stiglitz's discussion of Dr. King's influence on his work to be particularly resonant. As I pointed...

CNBC's John Harwood interviewed Treasury Secretary Jack Lew this morning and I thought Lew made an interesting point. He was giving the White House talking point that "we won't negotiate over the debt ceiling" and Harwood was like, OK, but you will negotiate over the budget... why is...

I'm just back from dual vacations, and I'm tempted to turn right back around.

As readers may have noticed, I've been on a spiritual vacation from writing about the upcoming fiscal madness, including a) the need to fund the government at the end of next month when the fiscal year...

Here's an engaging read from Sunday's New York Times on why economics doesn't qualify as a science, and, more fundamentally, asking what is it good for, anyway?

On the first point, you'd probably be hard pressed to find even many economists willing to defend our discipline as a...

For those focused on the upcoming budget debate, Greg Sargent raises an important point, one that's worthy of your attention. Put on your boots -- we're going deep into the fiscal muck on this one.

At the end of next month, the current patch that's paying for government...

"I wouldn't want Larry Summers to mow my yard."

That little gem was uttered Monday by Senator Pat Roberts (R-Kan) in what has to be a fight the White House really doesn't want to have right now. They've got two very strong candidates in Summers and Janet Yellen,...

Back when we used to argue about the Keynesian stimulus known as the Recovery Act, I posted charts like those you see here: very simple pictures showing that real GDP started growing shortly after the Act's implementation at the same time that job losses decelerated.

I'll be the...

I usually find economist Robert Shiller's commentaries resonant and insightful, but this one seemed more confusing than enlightening. The thrust of the piece is the concern that government activities to promote innovation can just as easily stifle it.

The piece introduces the notion of corporatism, from a new...