Editors’ Summary of the Brookings Papers on Economic Activity – 1986 No 2

George L. Perry and

George L. Perry Senior Fellow Emeritus - Economic Studies

William C. Brainard

WCB

William C. Brainard

THIS ISSUE of Brookings Papers on Economic Activity contains papers
and discussions presented at the forty-second conference of the Brookings
Panel on Economic Activity, which was held in Washington, D.C.,
on September 11 and 12, 1986. One major article analyzes the oil price
collapse of 1986 and draws inferences for the future of oil prices. A
second explores the links between imperfect competition in product
markets and the performance of the U.S. macroeconomy. A third seeks
to explain the apparent upward drift of the “normal” unemployment
rate in the United States. Four shorter reports examine, respectively,
the LDC debt crisis, the role of debt in the U.S. farm crisis, the causes
of the 1980s slump in Europe, and the procedure for seasonally adjusting
the U.S. unemployment rate.