Just Released: New Web Feature Provides Timely Data on the Job Market for Recent College Graduates

Jaison R. Abel and Richard Deitz



Many newly minted college graduates entering the labor market in the wake of the Great Recession have had a tough time finding good jobs. But just how difficult has it been, and are things getting better? And for which graduates? These questions can be difficult to answer because timely information on the employment prospects of college graduates has been hard to come by. To address this gap, today we are launching a new interactive web feature to provide data on a wide range of job market metrics for recent college graduates, including trends in unemployment rates, underemployment rates, and wages. We also provide data on the demand for college-educated workers, as well as differences in labor market outcomes across college majors. These data will be updated regularly and are available for download.

Crisis Chronicles: The Gold Panic of 1869, America’s First Black Friday

Donald P. Morgan and James Narron



Wall Street in the late 1860s was a bare-knuckles affair plagued by robber barons, political patronage, and stock manipulation. In perhaps the most scandalous instance of manipulation ever, a cabal led by Jay Gould, a successful but ruthless railroad executive and speculator, and several highly placed political contacts, conspired to corner the gold market. Although ultimately foiled, they succeeded in bankrupting several venerable brokerage houses and crashing the stock market, causing America’s first Black Friday.

Fundamental Disagreement: How Much and Why?

Richard Crump and Stefano Eusepi



Everyone disagrees, even professional forecasters, especially about big economic questions. Has potential output growth changed since the financial crisis? Are we bound for a period of “secular stagnation”? Will the European economy rebound? When is inflation getting back to mandate-consistent level? In this post, we document to what degree professional forecasters disagree and discuss potential reasons why.

Working as a Barista After College Is Not as Common as You Might Think

Jaison R. Abel and Richard Deitz




The image of a newly minted college graduate working behind the counter of a hip coffee shop has become a hallmark of the plight of recent college graduates following the Great Recession. Recurring news stories about young college graduates stuck in low-skilled jobs make it easy to see why many college students may be worried about their futures. However, while there is some truth behind the popular image of the college-educated barista, this portrayal is really more myth than reality. Although many recent college graduates are “underemployed”—working in jobs that typically don’t require a degree—our research indicates that only a small fraction worked in a low-skilled service job in the years following the Great Recession. We find that underemployed recent college graduates held a wide range of jobs and, while most of these positions were clearly not equivalent to jobs that require a college education, some were actually fairly skilled and well paid. Further, our analysis suggests that many of those who started their careers in a low-skilled service job transitioned to a better job after gaining some experience in the labor market.

Hedging Income Fluctuations with Foreign Currency Assets

Bianca De Paoli and Hande Küçük



The world has gone through a process of financial globalization over the past decades, with countries increasing their holdings of foreign assets and liabilities. At the same time, countries have started to have a more positive foreign currency exposure by reducing their bias toward holding assets in domestic currency instead of foreign currency. One possible reason for these changes is that nations view demand shocks as more likely than supply shocks. That is, a dip in output will be accompanied by lower inflation rather than higher inflation. Monetary policy responds to demand shocks by cutting interest rates and letting the domestic currency depreciate. As a consequence, shifting the currency composition of assets and liabilities to increase net foreign currency holdings is a hedging strategy to protect the country’s income and wealth during downturns.

Who is Driving the Recent Decline in Consumer Inflation Expectations?

Olivier Armantier, Wilbert van der Klaauw, Giorgio Topa, and Basit Zafar

Correction: In the right panel of the chart, “Mean Probability of Deflation in the SCE,” we have corrected the labels for the group earning less than $75k, which were initially transposed. We regret the error.



The expectations of U.S. consumers about inflation have declined to record lows over the past several months. That is the finding of two leading surveys, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s Survey of Consumer Expectations (SCE) and the University of Michigan’s Survey of Consumers (SoC). In this post, we examine whether this decline is broad-based or whether it is driven by specific demographic groups.

Characterizing the Rising Settlement Fails in Seasoned Treasury Securities

Michael Fleming and Frank Keane

Note: Updated versions of the charts in this post showing data through March 31, 2016, can be viewed here.

In a 2014 post, we described what settlement fails are, why they arise and matter, and how they can be measured. A subsequent post explored the determinants of the increased volume of U.S. Treasury security settlement fails in June 2014. Part of that episode reflected a steady increase in settlement fails of seasoned securities. In this post, we explore the characteristics of seasoned fails in recent years, in order to better understand the risks associated with such fails.