John H. Cochrane

Senior Fellow
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Biography: 

John H. Cochrane is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. He is also a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research and an adjunct scholar of the CATO Institute. 

Before joining Hoover, Cochrane was  a Professor of Finance at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business, and earlier at its Economics Department. Cochrane earned a bachelor’s degree in physics at MIT and his PhD in economics at the University of California at Berkeley. He was a junior staff economist on the Council of Economic Advisers (1982–83).

Cochrane’s recent publications include the book Asset Pricing and articles on dynamics in stock and bond markets, the volatility of exchange rates, the term structure of interest rates, the returns to venture capital, liquidity premiums in stock prices, the relation between stock prices and business cycles, and option pricing when investors can’t perfectly hedge. His monetary economics publications include articles on the relationship between deficits and inflation, the effects of monetary policy, and the fiscal theory of the price level. He has also written articles on macroeconomics, health insurance, time-series econometrics, financial regulation, and other topics. He was a coauthor of The Squam Lake Report. His Asset Pricing PhD class is available online via Coursera. 

Cochrane frequently contributes editorial opinion essays to the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg.com, and other publications. He maintains the Grumpy Economist blog.

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Recent Commentary

Analysis and Commentary

Smith Meet Jones

by John H. Cochrane via Grumpy Economist
Thursday, December 3, 2015

A while ago I wrote up a smorgasbord of policies that I thought could increase US economic growth, at least for a few decades, in "Economic Growth".

Featured

Zoning And Inequality

by John H. Cochrane via Grumpy Economist
Thursday, December 3, 2015

I am always pleased when economists normally thought of on different ends of the political spectrum come to the same conclusions. So it is with zoning laws; traditionally a target of free-market and libertarian thinkers. Now joined by Jason Furman, Obama administration CEA chair.

Hoover fellow Richard Epstein on income inequality.
Analysis and Commentary

Fixed-Income Comments

by John H. Cochrane via Grumpy Economist
Monday, November 30, 2015

A month ago, I attended the SF Fed/Bank of Canada conference on fixed income. I had the chance to comment on Michael Bauer and Jim Hamilton's "Robust Bond Risk Premia.” My comments here.

Economics Abstract
Analysis and Commentary

A Wise Comment

by John H. Cochrane via Grumpy Economist
Saturday, November 28, 2015

Scott Sumner passes on a wise comment from his blog: ...the main problem in America is that the public, including its highly educated members, is social-scientifically ignorant.

Analysis and Commentary

Hounded Out Of Business II

by John H. Cochrane via Grumpy Economist
Saturday, November 28, 2015

Nathaniel Popper at the New York Times Dealbook, writes "Dream of New Kind of Credit Union Is Extinguished by Bureaucracy" It's a worthy addition to the series of anecdotes on how regulation, especially discretionary actions of regulators, are killing investment and businesses.

Analysis and Commentary

Spot Insurance Markets

by John H. Cochrane via Grumpy Economist
Wednesday, November 25, 2015

Obamacare/ ACA was in the news last week. Some relevant summaries, and comment below.

Analysis and Commentary

Early Fisherism

by John H. Cochrane via Grumpy Economist
Tuesday, November 24, 2015

John Taylor has an interesting blog post with a great title, "Staggering Neo-Fisherian Ideas and Staggered Contracts." John goes back to a paper he wrote in 1982 for the Jackson Hole conference, on the issue of that time, how to lower inflation.

Analysis and Commentary

Hounded Out Of Business

by John H. Cochrane via Grumpy Economist
Monday, November 23, 2015

The Wall Street Journal had a nice oped, "Hounded out of business by regulators" by Dan Epstein who was, well, hounded out of business by regulators.

Analysis and Commentary

Inflation Drumbeat

by John H. Cochrane via Grumpy Economist
Monday, November 23, 2015

Noah Smith has an interesting Bloomberg View piece on Japanese inflation.

Analysis and Commentary

Open Letter On Economic Data

by John H. Cochrane via Grumpy Economist
Wednesday, November 18, 2015

I joined a large number of economists signing an open letter supporting funding for economic data. The letter is here, twitter #SaveTheData, Financial Times story here, press release here.

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Current Online Courses

Asset Pricing, Part 1, via Coursera and the University of Chicago

This course is part one of a two-part introductory survey of graduate-level academic asset pricing. We will focus on building the intuition and deep understanding of how the theory works, how to use it, and how to connect it to empirical facts. This first part builds the basic theoretical and empirical tools around some classic facts. The second part delves more deeply into applications and empirical evaluation. Learn more. . .