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This paper tracks the development of sectoral saving and borrowing in the US economy over the past 50 years.

Revised text of a presentation at the Conference on Microfoundations for Modern Macroeconomics, Columbia University, November 2010. I would like to thank Amar Bhidé, Roman Frydman, and Andy Haldane for helpful comments, and the Institute for New Economic Thinking for research support.

John Kay’s thought-provoking essay The Map is Not the Territory: An Essay on the State of Economics argues that economists have been led astray by excessive reliance on formal models derived from assumptions that bear too little similarity to the world we live in.

A poem seems to be an almost perfect metaphor for the modern corporate world.

The University of Chicago is well-known for as the place where a famous group of economists, including Milton Friedman, Georges Stigler, Gary Becker, among others, developed a method for analyzing economic facts based on Marshallian price theory, a vision of the evolution of macroeconomic aggregates called monetarism, and an approach to individual liberties and the role of the state known as (neo)liberalism.

In a show of good faith between two rising economic powers, China and Brazil have agreed to a bilateral currency swap.

While German economic policy makers continue to cling to neoclassical economic approaches, an increasing number of prominent economic figures are starting to accept the failure of orthodox theories to address the current crisis and are expressing the need to rethink fundamental economic concepts.

What is the purpose of America’s universities today?

I always think of Adam Smith when I hear the term ‘division of labour’ - but I’m being cured of this by reading a bit more about Britains late 18th century in Jenny Uglow’s The Lunar Men.

One country poses an existential threat to Europe – and it is not Greece, Italy or Spain.

World Bank President Robert Zoellick is growing frustrated with the lack of urgency on the part of Europe’s leaders in responding to the financial crisis in the euro zone.

At the heart of the Eurocrisis lies a vicious circle where once there was a virtuous one.

Leijonhufvud has questioned the flawed fundamentals of economics. And he has explored the spread of contagion in undermining the web of contracts that are the basis for capitalism.

After the recent election brought a center-right coalition to power, what’s next in the Greek crisis? Are we finally in the clear? Not so fast, Greek economist Yanis Varoufakis says. Varoufakis explains the real outcome we can except after Greek voters’ “contradictory verdict,” where 55% voted for anti-bailout parties yet a pro-bailout government resulted due to the nature of Greece’s electoral system.

Have you ever heard the old adage about the danger of allowing foxes to guard the henhouse? Apparently the New York Fed hasn’t.