General Resources for Macroeconomics
and Financial Economics

Last Updated: 12 March 2024

Site Developed By:

Leigh Tesfatsion

Professor Emerita of Economics

Courtesy Research Professor of

    Electrical & Computer Engineering

Heady Hall 260

Iowa State University

Ames, Iowa 50011-1054

https://faculty.sites.iastate.edu/tesfatsi

tesfatsi AT iastate.edu

Econ 502 (Master's Level Macro Theory):

https://www2.econ.iastate.edu/tesfatsi/Syl502.htm

• On-Line Resources
  1. Provocative Sites for Thoughtful Young and Old(er) Economists
  2. Macro and Financial Economics Websites with a Focus on the U.S.
     1. Recent Theoretical Developments
     2. General Macro/Financial Policy Issues
     3. Current Economic News
     4. Data Sets and Data Analysis
     5. Financial Markets and Institutions
     6. Miscellaneous Other Sites
  3. Websites Focusing on International Economic Data and Events
  4. Websites Providing General Economic Resources
• Sites Providing Access to Macroeconomic and Financial Publications
  1. Contributed-Paper Economic Journals
  2. Journal of Economic Literature
  3. Journal of Economic Perspectives
  4. JSTOR Digital Library
• Library Resources
  1. U.S. Data
  2. International Data

Site Disclaimer:

The number of online sites providing macroeconomic and financial resources has now grown so large that it is no longer possible to provide a comprehensive up-to-date list. Below is collection of categorized annotated links to macro/financial resource sites maintained between 2000 and 2023 that visitors might find useful and/or of historical interest.

On-Line Resources

1.Provocative Sites for Thoughtful Young and Old(er) Economists

• Brad DeLong's Blog, now on SubStack, covers a wide variety of economic topics (e.g., business cycles, labor economics, monetary and fiscal policy, health care, the Internet, and development economics). DeLong is a professor of economics at UC Berkeley, California.

• The EquitaBlog: Economic Growth and Equity maintained by the Washington Center for Equitable Growth.

• Paul Krugman's website (Econ, Princeton University, and Op-Ed columnist for the New York Times) provides access to many of his nontechnical (and controversial) writings on important international policy issues of the day.

• Greg Mankiw's Blog covers a wide-ranging set of economic issues, with a particular stress on macroeconomic issues and current macroeconomic policy debates. Mankiw is a professor of economics at Harvard University.

• The Marginal Revolution Blog is co-maintained by Professors Tyler Cowen and Alex Taborrok at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. Launched in March 2005, it covers a wide variety of current events and economic policy issues in a readable humorous fashion.

• The Economist's View Blog has been maintained by Mark Thoma (University of Oregon, Eugene, OR) for over thirty years.

• The student-initiated journal Real-World Economics Review (formally known as the "Post-Autistic Economic Review") has its roots in a June 2000 petition initiated by students in Paris. The petition called for a reform of the economics curriculum to be based more solidly on empirical foundations and a careful reflection of concrete realities.

• The Global Economics Blog maintained by Nouriel Roubini (NYU Emeritus Professor of Economics) covers a wide variety of issues in global finance. Roubini is a professor at the Stern School of Business, New York University.

• Stiglitz's Blog: I Dissent -- Unconventional Economic Wisdom, monthly commentary by Nobel Laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz (Columbia University) for Project Syndicate: A World of Ideas, a collection of original op-ed commentaries from around the world.

2. Macro and Financial Economics Websites with a Focus on the U.S.

A. Theoretical Retrospective and Prospective Outlooks

• Macroeconomics After the 2007-2009 Crisis: What Now?

• Mark Buchanan, "Meltdown Modeling: Could Agent-Based Computer Models Prevent Another Financial Crisis?" (pdf,1.2M), Nature, Vol. 460, August 6, 2009, 680-682.

• J. Doyne Farmer and Duncan Foley, "The Economy Needs Agent-Based Modelling" (pdf,922K), Nature, Vol. 460, August 6, 2009, 685-686 .

• N. Gregory Mankiw, "The Macroeconomist as Scientist and Engineer" (pdf,102K), Working Paper, Harvard University, May 2006.

• Edmund S. Phelps, "Macroeconomics for a Modern Economy" (pdf,128K), Nobel prize lecture, Stockholm, Sweden, December 10, 2006.

• Leigh Tesfatsion, "Agent-Based Computational Modeling and Macroeconomics" (pdf preprint,148K), pp. 175-202 in David Colander (ed.), Post-Walrasian Macroeconomics: Beyond the Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium Model, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 2006.

  Abstract: Agent-based Computational Economics (ACE) is the computational study of economic processes modeled as dynamic systems of interacting agents. This essay discusses the potential of ACE modeling tools for the study of macroeconomic systems. Points are illustrated using an ACE model of a two-sector decentralized market economy.

• Michael Woodford, "Revolution and Evolution in Twentieth Century Macroeconomics (pdf, 119K), presented at the conference Frontier of the Mind in the Twenty-First Century, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

  Note: Woodford is the author of Interest and Prices: Foundations of a Theory of Monetary Policy (Princeton University Press, 1999), an influential new attempt to address macroeconomic stabilization policy from within a rational expectations framework.

• A website on Agent-Based Macroeconomics maintained by Leigh Tesfatsion (Econ, Iowa State University) provides pointers to materials related to the computational study of macroeconomies modeled as dynamic systems of interacting agents.

• The Economic Growth Resources Website maintained by Jonathan Temple (Nuffield College, Oxford) provides pointers to economic growth resources on the internet, including data, literature, and working papers.

• A website on the Economics of Networks is maintained by Nicholas Economides (Stern School of Business, NYU).

• A website on the Formation of Economic and Social Networks has been developed by Leigh Tesfatsion (Economics, Iowa State University).

• A website on Learning and the Embodied Mind has been developed by Leigh Tesfatsion (Economics, Iowa State University). Highlighted at this site is research on learning representions for strategically interacting agents in multi-market contexts, and research on behavioral economics more generally as motivated by human-subject experiments.

• The Quantitative Macro and Real Business Cycle Home Page maintained by Christian Zimmermann (U of Quebec at Montreal) provides pointers to work on stochastic dynamic general equilibrium theory motivated by the methods and aims of real business cycle theory.

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B. General Macro/Financial Policy Issues

• The annual Economic Report of the President is available online for current and past years.

• See the U.S. Office of Management and Budget for information on current and past U.S. budgets.

• The Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs (U.S. State Department) issues reports on a variety of economic issues.

• The Brookings Institution in Washington D.C. is a private, independent, nonprofit research organization that "seeks to improve the performance of American institutions, the effectiveness of government programs, and the quality of U.S. public policies." Macro source materials available for downloading at the Brooking Institute's website include Brookings policy briefs as well as research reports on foreign policy and governmental studies.

• The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities is a nonpartisan research organization and policy institute that conducts research and analysis on a range of U.S. government policies and programs, with an emphasis on those affections low-income and moderate-income people.

• The Congressional Budget Office (U.S. Congress) provides information regarding the finances and programs of the U.S. Federal government.

• The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) (Cambridge, Massachusetts) maintains a website that highlights the recent NBER-sponsored publications of economists associated with the NBER, outlines major NBER programs and projects, provides information on NBER business cycle dating, and lists pointers to related websites of interest.

• The New Economy Index provides resources relating to structural transition that the U.S. economy is currently undergoing in response to advances in information technology (IT).

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C. Current Economic News

• Business Week - Bloomberg is a weekly economic news magazine with a stress on U.S. news and events.

• The Economist is a highly regarded economic news magazine with an international orientation.

• The Wall Street Journal is a daily U.S. newspaper featuring both domestic and international news.

• The Financial Times publishes global business news and analysis.

• The New York Times is a daily U.S. newspaper featuring both domestic and international news.

• CBS maintains CBS Market Watch, a site devoted the news and commentary on current economic events.

• The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis provides a variety of news features and general information regarding the U.S. economy.

• Morgan Stanley maintains a Research Site that provides commentaries on current economic events by its staff economists.

• The Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE) is a private, nonprofit, nonpartisan research institution devoted to the study of international economic policy. The PIIE attempts to anticipate emerging issues and to be ready with practical ideas to inform and shape public debate. Linked to the PIIE home page is a "hot topics" site that provides commentaries, reports, and links focusing on important topical issues in international economics.

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D. Data Sets and Data Analysis

• The International Monetary Fund (IMF) maintains a site titled The World Economic Outlook (WEO) that focuses on global growth issues and related topics.

• The Federal Reserve Bannk of St. Louis maintains a site titled Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED) that permits users to download, graph, and track thousands of different U.S. and international time series from numerous sources.

• The Gapminder foundation describes its structure and goals as follows: "Gapminder is an independent Swedish foundation with no political, religious, or economic affiliations. Gapminder fights devastating misconceptions and promotes a fact-based worldview everyone can understand."

• The U.S. White House Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) maintains an Economic Indicators Site that provides a comprehensive listing of free, easily available time-series data (primarily U.S.) useful for economic research.

• The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) provides a public database giving current and historical data for a large variety of economic variables, including inflation and consumer spending, employment and unemployment, wages, productivity, exports and imports, and foreign labor statistics.

• The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) provides comprehensive information about the U.S. National Income and Product Accounts (NIPA), including downloadable and interactively accessible data, at a site titled National Economic Accounts. The BEA also provides a data page giving a Summary Overview of the U.S. economy in recent years and in recent quarters.

• The United States Interational Trade Commission (ITC) provides direct access to data and reports on U.S. international trade at a website titled DataWeb

• The U.S. Federal Reserve Board provides provides U.S. Financial Time-Series Data that visitors can download in formats enabling spreadsheet table and graphical representations.

• The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis provides a database of over 1000 U.S. economic time series in a variety of easy-to-use formats (e.g., MS Excel and text formats), also viewable in chart form, at a site titled FRED (Federal Reserve Economic Data).

• Market Research International (Beaumont, Texas) supports a site titled the Financial Forecast Center. This site provides freely available forecasts for stock prices, interest rates, foreign exchange rates, and other key economic indicators. Current economic indicators and historical data/graphs are also provided.

• The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) provides detailed data pertaining to U.S. Federal government expenditures and the financing of these expenditures, past and present, as well as projected budget surpluses and/or deficits under alternative possible expenditure and financing scenarios for the future.

• The U.S. Department of Commerce Homepage is an entry point to several services, including the Bureau of the Census household and business demographic data and to STAT-USA (which requires a subscription), the Federal Government's premier provider for electronic trade and economic information. In past years, STAT-USA has been available by site license to the ISU community -- check with Econ Department computer lab administrators about current ISU site license status.

• The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) website features a searchable index to over 5000 NBER working papers and books issued since 1978, a macroeconomic history database (3500 different time series), the Penn-World Tables of country data, as well as other materials.

• The Bureau of Labor Statistics maintains a website titled Top Picks: Foreign Data Retrieval Tools that provides "top pick" access to foreign labor statistics for a wide variety of countries.

• Economic History Association provides resources and promotes communication among scholars in economic history and related fields.

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E. Financial Markets and Institutions

• Campbell R. Harvey (Fuqua School of Business, Duke University) maintains a Hypertextual Finance Glossary that includes over 6,000 entries in alphabetical order, with over 16,000 hyperlinks.

• The Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRB-NY) maintains a Press Center that provides members of the media with information and resources about the Bank's actions and functions.

• The Federal Reserve Board maintains a website that explains its structure and operations and also provides recent press releases, testimony, and speeches by Federal Reserve officials.

• The most important Federal regulations imposed on depository institutions in the United States are listed and explained in a Supervision and Regulation website maintained by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

• The Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco maintains a website titled U.S. Monetary Policy: An Introduction. This site describes U.S. monetary policy as it is currently conducted by the Federal Reserve System (Fed) by addressing a series of issues, including the structure of the Fed, the Fed's goals, the tool's used by the Fed to implement its monetary policies, and how these monetary policies affect the U.S. economy.

• The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis maintains a website titled Economic Research that provides a list of links to staff researchers working on monetary policy and related issues.

• The objective of the online Museum of Money and Financial Institutions, founded by Martin Shubik (Yale), is to provide an informative, interesting, and entertaining virtual science museum to promote the understanding of money and financial institutions through interactive exhibits.

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F. Miscellaneous Other Sites

• The History of Economics Homepage provides online access to resources for teaching, scholarship, and research in the history of economics and the history of economic thought.

3. Websites Focusing on International Economic Data and Events

• The American Economic Association maintains an annotated list of pointers to online Resources for Economists.

• The World Bank maintains extensive resources on issues related to world growth and development.

• The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is an international organization among countries based on voluntary membership. As of 2001, 183 countries were members of the IMF. The stated goals of the IMF are: to promote monetary cooperation, exchange stability, and orderly exchange arrangements; to foster economic growth and high levels of employment; and to provide temporary financial assistance to countries to help ease balance of payments adjustments. The IMF maintains on-line resources regarding its own organization and function, the current economic situation of its member countries, and current world events.

• United Nations Statistics Division

• The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) is an organization that coordinates policy among developed countries.

• The U.S. CIA World Factbook provides information on the history, people, government, economy, geography, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues for numerous world entities. Graphical displays include: Flags of the World; Physical Map of the World; Political Map of the World; World Oceans map; and a World Map of Standard Time Zones.

• CountryWatch.Com (founded and managed by personnel associated with the United States Military Academy) provides continually updated political and economic coverage for each of the 191 countries of the world.

• European Union in the US is an official site sponsored by the European Union that provides information specifically directed towards Americans regarding the history, organization, and activities of the European Union.

• The European Central Bank maintains a general resource site on the euro titled the The Euro.

• Nicholas Roubini (New York University) maintains a resource site titled European Monetary Union and the Euro that provides notes, discussion questions, and readings related to the recent introduction of the euro among the member countries of the European Monetary Union.

• GapMinder is a non-profit venture for development and provision of free software that visualizes human development. The site is maintained in collaboration with universities, UN organizations, public agencies, and non-governmental organizations. The site was founded by Ola Rosling, Anna Rosling Rönnlund, and Hans Rosling (Stockholm) in February 2005.

4. Websites Providing General Economic Resources

• The American Economic Association (AEA) maintains an annotated and catalogued listing of Resources for Economists on the Internet (RFE).

• RePEc: Research Papers in Economics seeks to enhance the dissemination of research in economics and related fields through listings of economists by geographical area, research area, and other criteria, and through annotated archiving of economic literature.

• The Handbooks in Economics website maintained by North-Holland/Elsevier Science provides tables of contents for all voumes of the Handbooks in Economics Series published to date as well as chapter summaries.

• Inomics is an internet service for economists administered by Thorsten Wichmann (Berlecon Research, Germany) that offers a search engine for economics information, a listing of job openings for economists from all over the world, and announcements of economic conferences. It began operation in June 1998.

Sites Providing Access to Macroeconomic and Financial Publications

1. Contributed-Paper Economic Journals

Macro-oriented articles are sprinkled throughout most of the general mainstream economic journals such as the Journal of Political Economy (JPE), the International Economic Review (IER), and the American Economic Review (AER). More specialized articles can be found in the Journal of Monetary Economics (JME), the Journal of Public Economics (JPubE), the Journal of Public Economic Theory (JPET), the Journal of Economic Growth (JEG), Macroeconomic Dynamics (MD), the Journal of Labor Economics, the Journal of Macroeconomics, the Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control (JEDC), the Emerging Markets Review, the Review of Financial Economics, and the Global Finance Journal.

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2. Journal of Economic Literature

Each issue of the Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) begins with two or three invited survey articles on various economic topics. Articles appearing in recent journal issues are listed, sorted once by journal source and again by subject matter. Abstracts are provided for a selected subset of these articles. There is also a listing of recently published books relevant for economists, some of which are reviewed or abstracted.

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3. Journal of Economic Perspectives

Each issue of the Journal of Economic Perspectives (JEP) contains an assortment of invited articles discussing current topics of interest. The articles tend to be well-written, lively, and informative expository introductions, with a minimum of technical detail, but with a useful list of references for further study. JEP can be obtained very cheaply (along with the AER and JEL) by becoming a member of the American Economic Association.

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4. JSTOR Digital Library

The digital library JSTOR, part of the not-for-profit organization ITHAKA, provides online access to journal articles, books, images, and primary sources in numerous different disciplines.

Library Resources

1. U.S. Data

The Economic Report of the President (ERP), put out each February;

Economic Indicators (a monthly supplement to ERP);

Business Conditions Digest (monthly);

Survey of Current Business (monthly, Bureau of Economic Analysis);

Reports of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (branch of the Labor Department);

Federal Reserve Bulletin (put out by Federal Reserve Board).

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2. International Data

Holdings by CARD at ISU;

United Nations publications (wide variety);

World Bank reports;

International Monetary Fund (IMF) reports.

Copyright © Leigh Tesfatsion. All Rights Reserved.