Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's reappointment as Federal Reserve Chairman is up for a vote in the Senate this week.  Alan Blinder, a former Fed governor and Princeton colleague of Bernanke's, makes the case that he should be reappointed (New York Times, 28 Jan. 2010).

President Obama announced a new approach to bank regulation designed to curb the size and risk of banks (New York Times, 21 Jan. 2010).
The new approach is designed to strike at the "too big to fail" problem and the "moral hazard" problem of banks taking on too much risk because they know they are insured.

Review of economic principles, for students in need of a refresher
-- Alas, these notes do not include graphs.  Here, however, are some related notes, courtesy of Prof. John Kane, with multi-colored graphics.  One would do well to take a look at these, too:
---- * Notes on supply, demand, pricing, and profits in a perfectly competitive market
---- * Notes on monopoly pricing and the dead-weight loss from monopoly

Practice quizzes from Spring 2007
Some more old (Spring 2006) weekly quizzes and solutions
Some more old (Fall 2005) weekly quizzes and solutions

In November 2008 the Federal Reserve began paying interest on bank reserves.  James Hamilton explains how and why this matters (8 Nov. 2008).

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