2006 News Releases

For immediate release:
January 12, 2006

Media contact:
James Hoard
Phone: (214) 922-5307
e-mail: james.hoard@dal.frb.org

Dallas Fed Introduces New Economic Publication

DALLAS—The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas today launched Economic Letter, a monthly publication, that will provide commentary on important trends and policy issues shaping the increasingly global economy. Articles will be written by Dallas Fed economists.

In the debut issue, Senior Vice President and Chief Economist W. Michael Cox and economist Jahyeong Koo analyze why Japan has found it difficult to break out of a long period of stagnation.

“Neither insufficient demand nor tight monetary policy fully explains why a once-thriving, highly competitive economy might fail to respond to either fiscal or monetary stimulus,” the authors write in “Miracle to Malaise: What’s Next for Japan?”

“Much deeper problems hindered Japan, however, and a strong case can be made that the culprit was widespread impediments to economic change.”

Cox and Koo cite high taxes, trade barriers, government roadblocks to business startups, labor-market restrictions and inflexible banking regulations as major economic barriers. However, they found that Japan is showing a new willingness to reform and gaining labor-market flexibility with temporary and contract workers.

President and CEO Richard W. Fisher said that upcoming issues of Economic Letter will address post-Greenspan monetary policy and impediments to increasing world oil production.

“We will not neglect the national economy, but you will see in Economic Letter a focus on the changes being wrought by globalization. The topic is not fully understood. Freer cross-border movement of goods, services, labor, money and ideas raises new questions about how the economy operates,” he said.

The January 2006 issue of Economic Letter can be found at www.dallasfed.org.

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