Click the image to enlarge it and make it a lot clearer. I'm still trying to perfect the art of blogging charts. I need to create a good template and use it.
I wanted to post this earlier, but I've been under the weather for a few days, hence no posts for the last couple days.
Anyway, I am going to do a series of occasional posts for the next few weeks on the similarity of the fed funds easing/tightening cycles in the early 1990s and the early 2000s. The rise at the end of the chart (blue line) takes us into early 1995--the last real tightening that produced not a recession, but a "soft landing." In fact, I think the term "soft landing" was first applied to Fed tightening in the 1994-95 episode. As you can see here, the dollar was also at a low point in 1995. Yet, 1995 was the beginning of a pretty good number of years. As I recall, there was also a bit of a movement to fix Social Security that started about that time. What else is the same, and what has changed since 1995.
In no way do I mean to suggest that past performance is suggestive of future results. Please don't take that away from this observation. It is just that, an observation. I do, however, think there are some striking similarities as well as differences. I should also point out that the heady days of the mid-1990s in which money flowed like crazy into emerging markets led to the Asian financial crisis in 1998. I should also point out that in late 1994, the Mexican peso collapsed, causing much alarm.
No, 1994 and 1995 weren't perfect. But they were years in which a number of forces came together for better or for worse to shape the last half of the decade. Whether the reason things worked out the way they did was because we were good or because we were lucky is still up for discussion. But the last half of this decade could similarly depend on the decisions we make this year.
Expect occasional posts on this from time to time. Reader comments and observations are welcome.
But now I must get some rest.
William,
I have the same issues regarding chart images. What I've found to work best, thus far, is to create two images - one full size, which the reader may click to from a smaller image displayed on the post.
Example: http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2005/03/how-long-will-you-live.html
It takes a little bit of tweaking going from Microsoft Excel full size image to a smaller, more blog-friendly image. First, I display the chart at smaller size (55%) in Excel. Then I tweak the text on the chart to ensure it's readable at that scale. This step is followed by a "print screen," after which I paste the captured image into image-editing software to write into *.gif format, which typically works out to be 502 x 383 pixels in dimension.
Please let me know if you find a better solution! In the meantime, I hope this helps....
I hope you feel better soon. I am lookng forward to your analysis of the similarities and differences in the underlying conditions producing the Fed response.
On graphs, I too will endorse sizing them appropriately in Word or Excel, then making them into gif. Something else that helps a lot is to right click on the lines, choose properties, then change the line thickness from .75 to something larger (I often use 1.25). This seems to really help with clarity - but if you go to far it looks like crayon...
Mark and Ironman,
Thanks for the hints. I've been copying them from Excel at full size. I will definitely try resizing them in Excel first.
Thanks again!