This Economic Letter reviews the factors contributing to the projected slower pace of labor force growth over the next decade and focuses in particular on the challenges and uncertainties surrounding one aspect, labor force participation behavior.

This Economic Letter discusses the sources of the recent discrepancy between two employment growth data series produced by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Over the past four decades, overall income inequality has increased in the U.S. One particularly striking feature of the data is that the income gap has widened most between the top and the middle of the distribution, while it has remained relatively stable between the middle and the bottom. The...

This Economic Letter analyzes the extent to which recalls have led to fewer U.S. imports from China in affected industries and whether there has been a general backlash against the "Made in China" label.

This Economic Letter reviews recent work that focuses on micro-level data to study the impact of the launch of the EMU on the currency denomination of international bonds.

Commodity prices have soared several times in recent years, raising concerns that overall inflation could rise substantially. However, crops, oil, and natural gas make up only about 5% of the cost of U.S. consumer goods and services. Thus, about one percentage point of the 10% cumulative...

Historically, oil and natural gas prices have moved hand in hand. However, in the past few years, while oil prices climbed to near record peaks, natural gas prices fell to levels not seen since the mid-1970s as a result of new hydraulic fracturing technology. U.S. consumer energy expenditures...

Historically, businesses in most countries have not been able to sell bonds denominated in their home currencies to foreign investors. In recent decades this trend has been changing. Research shows that bonds denominated in currencies other than the major global currencies have increased,...

The European sovereign debt crisis has created tensions in the global corporate debt market. Investors increasingly hold international assets and companies issue bonds in many countries. Thus, shocks to the European corporate bond market are readily transmitted to the U.S. corporate bond market....

The countries of the European periphery are experiencing a balance of payments crisis stemming from persistent current account deficits and sharply lower private capital inflows, a condition known as a sudden stop. In countries with fixed exchange rates, sudden stops typically drain foreign...