Assignment 1: News Article Review

News Article Review
Author’s Name
Institutional Affiliation

News Article Review
Article: Bloomberg
Title: Quicktake: Full Employment
Date: July 6, 2018
Author: Clive Crook
Page: n.pPublisher &, Copyright: Bloomberg
Web Address: https://www.bloomberg.com/quicktake/full-employment
Summary of the Article
In this article, Clive Crook talks about the economic situation in the U.S. According to Crook (2018), the U.S. has been experiencing decreased unemployment rates since its economic recovery in 2009. As a result, the Federal Reserve is worried that if the level of employment continues to rise, the country may plunge into an inflation as employers will compete to recruit workers and increase wages. Between 2009 and 2017, cases of unemployment decreased by 6.6 million with the total employment increasing from 138 million to 155.6 million (Crook, 2018). Such a decrease has elicited different views from economists and the Fed, with some proposing that wage rates are more precise indicators of the labor market conditions than unemployment rates. Others also think that Fed should continue to increase the short-term interest rate of 2 percent while others propose that the Fed should remain patient as the official unemployment levels may fall further even before the inflation concerns are addressed.
How the Article relates to the learning outcomes
The article relates to unemployment and inflation. Moreover, the concept being discussed in the article relates to the Philips curve, which demonstrates an inverse relationship between inflation and unemployment (Hoover, 2018).

According to the theory of Philip’s curve, when unemployment decreases, the rate of inflation increases (Hoover, 2018). As such, the U.S. Federal Reserve is worried that the decrease in unemployment rates could plunge the country into inflation. 
What is your critique of the article?
The article tends to be too general in its analysis as it has not provided a specific solution to the decreasing unemployment levels in the U.S. Besides, the U.S economists and the Fed tend to recommend approaches that could ensure a reduction in the level of employment (Crook, 2018). The stagflation experienced in many countries in 1971 that was characterized by high unemployment and inflation elicited reactions that the Philips curve was unstable and not usable for policy purposes (Hoover, 2018). Therefore, the U.S. cannot solely rely on the idea of the inverse relationship between inflation and unemployment in making their economic predictions and decisions.

Reference
Crook, C. (2018, July 6). Full Employment. Bloomberg. Retrieved September 5, 2018, from https://www.bloomberg.com/quicktake/full-employmentHoover, D. (2018). Phillips Curve. The Library of Economics and Liberty. Retrieved September 5, 2018, from https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/PhillipsCurve.html