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Ifo Institute: Middle East Price Shock Hits Poorer Households in Germany the Hardest
MUNICH, Germany, Aug. 11 (TNSxrep) -- ifo Institute issued the following news release on Aug. 10, 2026:
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Middle East Price Shock Hits Poorer Households in Germany the Hardest
Price increases resulting from the Middle East conflict are impacting low-income households in Germany far more than affluent ones, according to a recent study by the ifo Institute. "We see that poorer households are less able to weather a price shock originating thousands of kilometers away and suffer greater losses in purchasing power," says ifo researcher Tiphaine Wibault.
According to the analysis, the crisis
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MUNICH, Germany, Aug. 11 (TNSxrep) -- ifo Institute issued the following news release on Aug. 10, 2026:
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Middle East Price Shock Hits Poorer Households in Germany the Hardest
Price increases resulting from the Middle East conflict are impacting low-income households in Germany far more than affluent ones, according to a recent study by the ifo Institute. "We see that poorer households are less able to weather a price shock originating thousands of kilometers away and suffer greater losses in purchasing power," says ifo researcher Tiphaine Wibault.
According to the analysis, the crisisin the Middle East is causing consumer spending by German households to rise by a total of around EUR 16.8 billion. As a result, households in the lowest income decile are losing an average of 2.87 percent of their disposable income, while the highest-income households are losing just 0.65 percent.
Across all households, the average loss is 1.15 percent. "Because there's no European price cap for this shock, as was the case during the 2022 energy crisis, the burden is falling almost entirely on households, and especially on those with low incomes," explains ifo researcher Andreas Peichl.
According to the study, older people are also heavily affected: Retired couples are losing 1.53 percent of their income due to the price shock, while seniors living alone are losing 1.45 percent. The reason for this is that they have no wage income to fall back on and have to spend an above-average share of their budget on heating and energy costs.
In their analysis, the ifo researchers compare economic forecasts from before and after the start of the war, and translate the difference into losses in purchasing power for individual household types. These estimates should be viewed as upper limits, since households adjust their consumption behavior as a rule in response to sharp price increases.
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2026 Working Paper
A Regressive Shock? The Distributional Consequences of Middle East Conflict-Driven Inflation for German Households
Michael Christl, Andreas Peichl, Tiphaine Wibault
CESifo Working Paper No. 12853
Learn more (https://www.ifo.de/en/cesifo/publications/2026/working-paper/regressive-shock-distributional-consequences-middle-east-conflict)
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Original text here: https://www.ifo.de/en/press-release/2026-08-10/middle-east-price-shock-hits-poorer-households-germany-hardest
[Category: ThinkTank]
Hudson Institute Issues Commentary to Wall Street Journal: How to Salvage Science in Fauci's Wake
WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 -- Hudson Institute, a research organization that says it promotes leadership for a secure, free and prosperous future, issued the following commentary on Aug. 10, 2026, by distinguished fellow Mike Gallagher to the Wall Street Journal:
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How to Salvage Science in Fauci's Wake
A White House report argues that competition and freedom can bring about a new 'golden age.'
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Anthony Fauci finally found a camera he didn't like. Under questioning from the Senate Homeland Security Committee on July 29, the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious
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WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 -- Hudson Institute, a research organization that says it promotes leadership for a secure, free and prosperous future, issued the following commentary on Aug. 10, 2026, by distinguished fellow Mike Gallagher to the Wall Street Journal:
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How to Salvage Science in Fauci's Wake
A White House report argues that competition and freedom can bring about a new 'golden age.'
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Anthony Fauci finally found a camera he didn't like. Under questioning from the Senate Homeland Security Committee on July 29, the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and InfectiousDiseases and onetime media darling invoked the Fifth Amendment to avoid discussing his actions during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The last smug gasp of the disgraced administrator startled even prominent Democrats. Sports commentator Stephen A. Smith was so embarrassed by Dr. Fauci's display that he used his show's monologue to apologize to NBA guard Kyrie Irving for having pilloried him for choosing not to take the Covid vaccine.
Ashish Jha, President Biden's Covid response coordinator, declared after Dr. Fauci's disastrous Senate hearing that he believed the origin of the Covid outbreak was "more likely to have been a lab leak."
Dr. Fauci's refusal to answer any questions about the pandemic eerily mimics the tactics of his Communist Party collaborators in China, who have repeatedly blocked any international investigation into the origins of the outbreak. His silence denied transparency to millions of people who lost loved ones and livelihoods during the pandemic.
In spite of his efforts to shirk accountability, Dr. Fauci has taught Americans plenty with the release of his diaries by Sen. Rand Paul, Homeland Security Committee chairman.
Read in Wall Street Journal (https://www.wsj.com/opinion/how-to-salvage-science-in-faucis-wake-245a39dc).
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Mike Gallagher is a distinguished fellow at Hudson Institute. He is also head of defense at Palantir Technologies.
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Original text here: https://www.hudson.org/domestic-policy/how-salvage-science-faucis-wake-mike-gallagher
[Category: ThinkTank]
Hudson Institute Issues Commentary to Wall Street Journal: China Presses a Weakness in America's Tech Policy
WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 -- Hudson Institute, a research organization that says it promotes leadership for a secure, free and prosperous future, issued the following commentary on Aug. 9, 2026, by senior fellow David Feith, and Jimmy Goodrich, senior fellow at the University of California Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, to the Wall Street Journal:
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China Presses a Weakness in America's Tech Policy
Washington's semiconductor strategy must address not only who controls chip-making but also who controls the language those chips speak.
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Washington has spent the past decade working
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WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 -- Hudson Institute, a research organization that says it promotes leadership for a secure, free and prosperous future, issued the following commentary on Aug. 9, 2026, by senior fellow David Feith, and Jimmy Goodrich, senior fellow at the University of California Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, to the Wall Street Journal:
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China Presses a Weakness in America's Tech Policy
Washington's semiconductor strategy must address not only who controls chip-making but also who controls the language those chips speak.
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Washington has spent the past decade workingto secure choke points of the semiconductor industry: fabrication plants, lithography equipment, advanced packaging, critical minerals and the handful of companies that dominate each.
Now a new choke point has emerged in part of the industry that policymakers have barely considered: the instruction set architecture, or ISA.
ISAs are the language through which software tells a chip's processor what to do, such as perform calculations, move data or execute commands in a program. For more than two decades, two ISAs have dominated mainstream computing: x86, which powers most personal computers and servers, and Arm, which dominates smartphones and is expanding into cars, defense systems and artificial intelligence.
The two operate through different business models: x86 is used almost exclusively by Intel and AMD, while Arm historically has licensed its technology broadly to other chip designers.
Read in Wall Street Journal (https://www.wsj.com/opinion/china-presses-a-weakness-in-americas-tech-policy-2391ed0e).
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David Feith is a senior fellow at Hudson Institute. He specializes in US-China relations and technology policy, including artificial intelligence, export controls, and managing dual-use risks.
Jimmy Goodrich, Senior Fellow at the UC Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation.
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Original text here: https://www.hudson.org/technology/china-presses-weakness-americas-tech-policy-david-feith
[Category: ThinkTank]
Center for Economic & Policy Research: Colombia's Debt Burden Is Largely a Legacy of the Pandemic Era, New Paper Finds
WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 (TNSrep) -- The Center for Economic and Policy Research issued the following news release on Aug. 10, 2026:
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Colombia's Debt Burden Is Largely a Legacy of the Pandemic Era, New Paper Finds
New research (https://cepr.net/publications/beyond-the-headlines-what-colombias-public-debt-numbers-actually-show/) from the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) shows that Colombia's substantial public debt burden, often blamed on decisions made by former President Gustavo Petro, is in large part a legacy of COVID pandemic-era borrowing and other inherited fiscal obligations,
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WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 (TNSrep) -- The Center for Economic and Policy Research issued the following news release on Aug. 10, 2026:
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Colombia's Debt Burden Is Largely a Legacy of the Pandemic Era, New Paper Finds
New research (https://cepr.net/publications/beyond-the-headlines-what-colombias-public-debt-numbers-actually-show/) from the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) shows that Colombia's substantial public debt burden, often blamed on decisions made by former President Gustavo Petro, is in large part a legacy of COVID pandemic-era borrowing and other inherited fiscal obligations,while persistently high central bank interest rates increased the cost of servicing domestic debt.
"The Petro administration in Colombia was blamed for racking up public debt through supposed profligate spending, but the facts tell a very different story," Paola Jaimes Santamaria, who coauthored the new CEPR brief, said. "Much of this is actually a COVID story and began before Petro became president."
"Recent media coverage and commentary often framed the fiscal situation in stark terms, warning of a 'lack of fiscal control,'" the authors of the new CEPR brief write, with "the debt burden becoming 'unpayable', or the government borrowing at increasingly high costs." But this did not happen. The Petro administration inherited fiscal pressures from the pandemic period before Petro became president in August 2022. These included short-maturity emergency external borrowing made during the pandemic and legacy fuel subsidy obligations that had accumulated over previous years.
Contrary to the narrative of irresponsible spending by Petro, central government expenditure remained reasonably stable under his administration, ranging from 21.9 to 22.6 percent of GDP during its three full calendar years. The Petro government reduced external debt relative to GDP and increasingly relied on domestic borrowing instead. Interest payments as a percentage of GDP were lower by 2025, the authors note, and under Petro external debt edged back toward pre-pandemic levels relative to GDP.
The share of Colombia's debt stock denominated in foreign currency decreased from about 40 percent in January 2023 to 29 percent in September 2025. This shift from external debt to domestic borrowing had important ramifications, as countries have to use scarce foreign exchange reserves, mostly gained through exports and remittances, to service external debt. External debt payments can siphon away public resources that are otherwise used to pay for essential imports and support balance of payments stability.
"By lowering foreign-denominated payments, Colombia potentially gains a more secure external position, and thereby is less likely to face balance of payments problems or even crises -- or the inflationary risks or increased interest rates on external borrowing that can also result from external financing pressures," the brief states.
The brief also notes that the relatively high interest rate maintained by Colombia's central bank -- which acts independently of the government -- has increased domestic borrowing costs, and that lowering the policy rate would lighten the domestic debt burden and ease fiscal pressure.
"The Petro administration inherited substantial debt and fiscal obligations, but managed those challenges well, reduced reliance on foreign debt, and kept the economy stable despite persistently high interest rates," coauthor Ivana Vasic-Lalovic said.
Previous CEPR research (https://cepr.net/publications/colombia-under-petro-social-gains-amid-monetary-and-fiscal-constraints/) has highlighted the positive social gains during the Petro administration, including a historic decline in poverty, a substantial increase in the real minimum wage, and an expansion of the social safety net.
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Original text here: https://cepr.net/newsroom/colombias-debt-burden-is-largely-a-legacy-of-the-pandemic-era-new-paper-finds/
[Category: ThinkTank]
Center for American Progress: Illinois Becomes Third State To Advance New Model for Rideshare Workers to Unionize, Continuing National Trend
WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 -- The Center for American Progress issued the following news release on Aug. 10, 2026:
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Illinois Becomes Third State To Advance New Model for Rideshare Workers to Unionize, Continuing National Trend
Illinois has become the third state to advance a new model for rideshare workers to unionize, underscoring a growing national trend toward modernizing labor law for the gig economy, according to a new analysis from the Center for American Progress. The state's landmark legislation would allow Uber and Lyft drivers to collectively bargain through a sectoral bargaining framework,
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WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 -- The Center for American Progress issued the following news release on Aug. 10, 2026:
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Illinois Becomes Third State To Advance New Model for Rideshare Workers to Unionize, Continuing National Trend
Illinois has become the third state to advance a new model for rideshare workers to unionize, underscoring a growing national trend toward modernizing labor law for the gig economy, according to a new analysis from the Center for American Progress. The state's landmark legislation would allow Uber and Lyft drivers to collectively bargain through a sectoral bargaining framework,following similar efforts in Massachusetts and California.
In Massachusetts, approximately 70,000 rideshare drivers selected the App Drivers Union as their official bargaining representative earlier this year, creating the largest new private sector bargaining unit since 1941. California drivers are also organizing under the state's new law, while workers in additional states are pursuing similar legislation. If drivers in Massachusetts, California, and Illinois successfully negotiate collective bargaining agreements, roughly 1 million workers could ultimately gain union coverage.
"States don't have to wait for Congress to modernize labor law," said David Madland, senior fellow and senior adviser to the American Worker Project at CAP and author of the analysis. "By creating a simpler path to unionization and sectoral bargaining, states are giving workers the tools to build power in the modern economy while helping firms compete on a level playing field. With Illinois joining Massachusetts and California, this model is quickly proving that it can expand collective bargaining to industries where too many workers have been left behind."
Sectoral bargaining is uniquely suited to the rideshare industry, where workers are dispersed, classified as independent contractors, and often excluded from traditional labor protections. The new Illinois state law provides drivers with a faster path to forming a union, stronger protections against employer delay tactics, and the opportunity to negotiate industrywide standards that can improve pay, benefits, and working conditions.
Among the analysis's key findings:
* Illinois is the third state in less than two years to enact a sectoral bargaining framework for rideshare drivers, following Massachusetts and California.
* Approximately 1 million workers could gain union coverage if drivers in Massachusetts, California, and Illinois successfully negotiate collective bargaining agreements.
* Massachusetts' newly certified bargaining unit represents approximately 70,000 rideshare drivers, making it the largest new private sector bargaining unit formed since 1941.
* Sectoral bargaining is designed for industries with dispersed workforces, allowing workers across an industry to bargain together while helping employers compete on a level playing field.
* Half of American workers say they would like to join a union, yet only 6 percent of private sector workers are union members because current federal labor law makes organizing and bargaining extraordinarily difficult.
Read the column: "New Illinois Law Continues Momentum for Rideshare Sectoral Bargaining" (https://www.americanprogress.org/article/new-illinois-law-continues-momentum-for-rideshare-sectoral-bargaining/) by David Madland
For more information on this topic or to speak with an expert, please contact Christian Unkenholz at cunkenholz@americanprogress.org.
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Original text here: https://www.americanprogress.org/press/release-illinois-becomes-third-state-to-advance-new-model-for-rideshare-workers-to-unionize-continuing-national-trend/
[Category: ThinkTank]
CSIS Issues Commentary: What Happens If Congress Codifies Russia Sanctions?
WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following commentary on Aug. 10, 2026, by Director Philip Luck and research intern Brad Spicher, both of the Economics Program and Scholl Chair in International Business:
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What Happens if Congress Codifies Russia Sanctions?
The Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026 gives Congress its best opportunity since 2017 to reassert a role in Russia sanctions policy. The act will move to the House of Representatives in the coming weeks after being passed by the Senate on August 7. But the legislation
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WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 -- The Center for Strategic and International Studies issued the following commentary on Aug. 10, 2026, by Director Philip Luck and research intern Brad Spicher, both of the Economics Program and Scholl Chair in International Business:
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What Happens if Congress Codifies Russia Sanctions?
The Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026 gives Congress its best opportunity since 2017 to reassert a role in Russia sanctions policy. The act will move to the House of Representatives in the coming weeks after being passed by the Senate on August 7. But the legislationwill not, on its own, restore the pressure that has eroded since early 2025. It delivers on three narrower but critical points: (1) It signals that congressional support for economic pressure on Moscow has not decayed along with the sanctions designation tempo; (2) it fortifies three years of hard won and impactful restrictions on Russia; and (3) it contains tariff and shadow-fleet provisions that will impact the market conditions that determine what Russia can earn from a barrel of oil. That said, the degree to which these provisions create economic pressure on Russia and reduce its ability to wage its illegal war depends on implementation by the executive branch. If congressional will is to become policy, implementation has to change, and the most durable way to make it change is to require the executive to explain, on a schedule, how it is enforcing sanctions written by a coequal branch.
From 2022 through early 2025, the U.S. sanctions program against Russia continually expanded with new designations and export control actions, capturing the changing companies and jurisdictions supporting Russia's procurement of dual-use items and energy sales. Since early 2025, this continuous implementation activity has largely ceased.
Nonetheless, Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries, energy infrastructure, and transport hubs, as well as fuel shortages have worsened the Kremlin's domestic position. High inflation and interest rates are also straining the Russian economy. Greater pressure on Russia's wartime economy and its sources of foreign income stands to be uniquely impactful at this point in time.
New Authorities on Energy and the Shadow Fleet
The act's most consequential new authority is its provision to place tariffs of up to 100 percent on third countries purchasing significant volumes of Russian energy. This replaces the blanket 500 percent tariff in the 2025 version with a more measured instrument, alongside a carve-out for countries taking significant steps to reduce dependence on Russian energy and whose imports amount to less than 15 percent of Russia's annual natural gas exports.
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Figure 1: China and India Are Russia's Largest Energy Importers
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The EU phase-out following the invasion largely redirected Russian energy to China and India (Figure 1). Any use of a new tariff authority may amount to a decision about U.S. economic relations with these two countries. That cost is worth stating plainly. The authority bites hardest against the two economies Washington has the least appetite for a second front with, which is why the volume reduction carve-out should be read as an off-ramp for buyers rather than a loophole in the regime. The natural gas carve-out, meanwhile, shields European economies that have not yet completed the transition away from Russian energy from being swept into the tariff regime alongside its intended targets.
The tariff regime aims to restrict Russia's war financing through two pathways: (1) incentivizing China and India to limit purchase volume of Russian energy to protect their exports to the United States, and (2) deepening the price discount that Russian energy faces in the global oil market.
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Figure 2: Russia Sanctions Implementation Drives Oil Price Discounts for Russia and Iran
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Figure 2 provides a notional estimate of the discount on Russian crude oil exports to China as a benchmark against other oil suppliers to China. The initial implementation of sanctions and export controls against Russia after the full-scale invasion saw many of Russia's trade partners begin to cut purchases and observe coalition price controls. The remaining buyers of Russian oil willing to risk secondary sanctions in turn had a stronger negotiating position in importing from Russia, allowing them to purchase this oil at discounted prices. The net effect was a decrease in revenue for the Russian war effort, regardless of changes in the volume of oil exported.
This mechanism is why the tariff authority is the most durable thing in the bill. A designation holds its value only as long as someone maintains it, adding the new fronts and entities that appear as networks adapt. A tariff schedule changes the option set facing every large buyer of Russian energy and keeps doing so for as long as it stands, weakening Moscow at the negotiating table in markets well beyond the ones Washington designates directly. While the exact impacts of a new tariff regime against purchasers of Russian oil will depend highly on implementation, new pressure on large purchasers of Russian energy will again find those willing to evade Western sanctions in a stronger negotiating position with Russian suppliers.
Notably, Russia sanctions are also timed with a relative price decrease for Chinese purchases of Iranian oil, and new pressure in the Russia sanctions effort may produce a similar negotiating advantage for buyers of Iranian crude.
The act additionally places greater pressure on the shadow fleet used to transport Russian energy. Curtailing the activities of the shadow fleet as a whole relies on implementing continuous designations against its constituent vessels. The United States has fallen behind its European allies in this effort. The act enables the White House to use as prima facie evidence that a vessel is subject to sanctions imposed by the United Kingdom, European Union, G7, or a member of the Five Eyes in new designations. This provision will enable rapid alignment on designations across jurisdictions and is a model for resolving the persistent coordination challenges that have emerged throughout this sanctions effort.
Locking in Stalled Economic Restrictions
The United States currently maintains roughly 6,800 Russia- and Ukraine-related sanctions designations, nearly all of which were implemented before January 2025. Since April 2022, it also maintains robust investment and financial restrictions against Russia for U.S. persons. The vast majority of these economic restrictions are imposed through executive orders put into place around the time of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The act would codify existing restrictions into law and impose mandatory sanctions on Russia's leadership, energy sector, financial institutions, and evasion networks within 30 days of enactment. It sends a signal to Moscow and markets that American resolve remains strong and will not decay with time. While that signal is important, Congress's job will not end with passage. The act permits the president to waive any provision upon a written national interest certification. Without continued pressure on the executive branch, the practical policy change stemming from the legislation will be limited.
Sections 107 through 109 have drawn less attention than the tariff and shadow fleet provisions, and they may prove among the more consequential. They would make permanent the investment prohibitions that now rest on a 2022 executive order, with termination tied to a negotiated settlement or an explicit waiver. The practical effect is to remove a rapid, unilateral reopening of U.S. investment in Russia from the menu of available options. Any move toward normalization would have to be made on the record rather than executed by revoking an order. For European partners who have absorbed the costs of disengagement, that durability carries value independent of what the prohibitions do to Russian access to capital.
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Figure 3: U.S. Russia Sanctions Have Stalled Since 2025
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Figure 3 shows that U.S. designation activity flatlined in early 2025 as the administration pursued negotiations with Moscow. The United Kingdom and European Union continued designating through the same period. Sanctions lists degrade when they stop growing, as sanctioned actors adjust their operations and find new ways to conduct financial transactions. An 18-month pause thus erodes coverage of Russia's evasion networks even without removals from the list.
Evasion Routes Are Reopening
Codification is necessary but not sufficient. Enforcement is where the executive branch's inaction shows. The success of any sanctions program depends on the ability of the sanctioning party to stop circumvention. For the Russia sanctions program, this means restricting the transshipment of Western dual-use goods to Russia through third countries. Here, the record is mixed, and recent data suggests the problem is worsening again.
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Figure 4: Third-Country Evasion Indicators Are Reappearing
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Kazakhstan offers a case study in how transshipment channels respond to sustained pressure. Following the invasion, Kazakhstan's imports of a particular category of network and transmission equipment from sanctioning coalition countries surged far above prewar levels, with a corresponding surge in exports to Russia through late 2022. Coordinated pressure and coalition export controls in 2023 and 2024 suppressed Russia-bound flows, but more recent data shows the channel reopening as excess exports to Russia have climbed back to their 2022 peak. This trend in Figure 4 is indicative of a broader pattern--evasion networks adapt faster than static trade control tools.
The authority to designate dual-use transshipment networks already exists today under Executive Order 14024 and related export control tools. Whether channels such as Kazakhstan's are closed remains a matter of executive implementation, and the recent pause in both sanctions and export controls is the reason to doubt that it will. The channel is reopening under authorities that were never withdrawn, which locates the gap precisely: not in what the executive may do, but in what it has chosen to do. No provision of the act changes that, and no provision likely could.
Recommendations
Congress cannot compel ongoing designation activity without continuous legislation, and the waiver provision means it cannot compel much else. It can compel an explanation. A specific, recurring, on-the-record account of economic pressure policy is the mechanism that makes discretion visible, and visible discretion is harder to exercise quietly. Congress should pursue three specific actions:
* Mandate circumvention designation implementation and enforcement reporting to Congress. Continued progress in restricting Russian transshipment networks should be mandated in quarterly reporting to Congress. These reports should cover the additional sanctions and export control actions used to limit these networks, outline the analytical practices being used to identify them, and highlight the actors and jurisdictions driving circumvention for diplomatic outreach.
* Expand required criteria in waiver certifications. A national interest certification should identify the provision waived, the entities or jurisdictions spared, the expected duration, and an impact assessment explicitly tied to circumvention risks. Waiver authority is a reasonable executive prerogative. Exercising it without a public account of what it covers converts a codified sanctions program back into a discretionary one.
* Benchmark U.S. designation activity against coalition partners. Reporting should assess new U.S. designations against UK and EU activity over the same period. Divergences between the United States, United Kingdom, and European Union will continue to produce opportunities for circumvention and should be minimized. If coordination issues persist, Congress should consider expanding its prima facie approach for vessel designation to more subjects.
Conclusion
The Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026 comes at a pivotal moment in the Ukraine war and would mark the most significant congressional intervention in Russia sanctions policy since the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) in 2017. Codification would harden roughly 6,800 designations and standing investment restrictions against reversal, and the tariff authority would provide a credible instrument against the Chinese and Indian purchases now funding Moscow's war effort. But the White House already possesses many of the options provisioned by the act, and its waiver provisions mean that statute alone will not guarantee strong implementation and enforcement.
That is an argument for congressional attention after passage, not for discounting the legislation. The act restores Congress to a policy area it has largely ceded since 2017, and it does so at a moment when Russia can least afford new pressure on its export earnings. Whether that standing amounts to anything will depend on whether Congress uses it to demand a regular accounting of how its own law is being enforced.
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Original text here: https://www.csis.org/analysis/what-happens-if-congress-codifies-russia-sanctions
[Category: ThinkTank]
American Action Forum Issues Commentary: Tracker - Federal Reserve's Balance Sheet Assets
WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 -- The American Action Forum issued the following commentary on Aug. 10, 2026, by Financial Services Policy Director Thomas Kingsley:
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Tracker: The Federal Reserve's Balance Sheet Assets
Introduction
This tracker follows the Federal Reserve's (Fed) total consolidated assets, held on its balance sheet, as the best indicator of the Fed's direct intervention in the economy.
Context
The Fed's dual mandate requires it to ensure both stable prices and maximum employment. The traditional tool the Fed uses to accomplish these goals is the adjustment of the federal funds rate,
... Show Full Article
WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 -- The American Action Forum issued the following commentary on Aug. 10, 2026, by Financial Services Policy Director Thomas Kingsley:
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Tracker: The Federal Reserve's Balance Sheet Assets
Introduction
This tracker follows the Federal Reserve's (Fed) total consolidated assets, held on its balance sheet, as the best indicator of the Fed's direct intervention in the economy.
Context
The Fed's dual mandate requires it to ensure both stable prices and maximum employment. The traditional tool the Fed uses to accomplish these goals is the adjustment of the federal funds rate,the short-term interest rate that determines how much it costs for banks to lend to each other overnight.
The 2007-2008 financial crisis, however, demonstrated that even lowering the interest rate to zero was considered insufficient to shore up economies in freefall, and the Fed turned to more unusual tactics. One of these measures was what the Fed refers to as "large-scale asset purchases," which is more commonly known as "quantitative easing."
Under this process, the Fed enters the market to buy securities, typically mortgage-backed securities (MBS) and Treasuries, injecting both capital and liquidity into the market. This approach is not without risks - for the first time in its history, the Fed is regulator, supervisor, and now participant in the economy.
The development of quantitative easing as a go-to tool for the Fed in times of crisis has led to an unprecedented focus on one of its traditionally unremarkable aspects - the Fed total assets. Just as with any other firm, securities that the Fed purchases are considered assets and therefore are represented on the Fed's balance sheet. This therefore is the most reflective guide of the state of quantitative easing and, by extension, the degree to which the Fed has deemed it necessary to intervene in the economy.
Each week, the Federal Reserve publishes its balance sheet, typically on Wednesday afternoon around 4:30 p.m.
As of August 5, the Fed's assets stand at $6.7 trillion, up $10 billion from the prior week and over $108 billion higher than a year ago.
Sources:
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/WALCL
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TREAST
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/WSHOMCB
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Original text here: https://www.americanactionforum.org/insight/tracker-the-federal-reserves-balance-sheet/
[Category: Think Tank]
