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Know how the economy works? Find out by taking my weekly Konomy Quiz. I post sources for anybody who wants to learn more and encourage feedback and discussion. If you're mean, go somewhere else!

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Cars are one of the things that got more expensive during the last few years--and stayed that way. Why did car prices rise so much? Take the quiz and find out. Eleven questions. Go!





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Car price info comes from Cox Automotive, parent of Kelley Blue Book, one of the go-to-sources for automotive data.


Price-change data comes from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which anybody can use (unless Trump shuts it down).


I've analyzed the components of car inflation in several Yahoo Finance stories, including this recent one. I grudgingly admit I'm biased against expensive cars. My Yahoo Finance pal Pras Subramanian might have a different perspective. We argue all the time about the virtues of fancy stitching and knurled shifter knobs.


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President Trump thinks he can manage the economy better than the Federal Reserve and its chair, Jerome Powell. Can he? How effective is the Fed, anyway? What does it even do? Take the quiz to find out. Eleven questions. Go!





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Here’s a list of recessions and depressions since 1854. The Fed has a nice summary of the Gilded Age panics from 1863 to 1913. You can google the panics of 1819, 1837 and 1857 separately. It's a million times better to be a bank customer today.


This chart shows that inflation falls when the Fed raises rates. You can play with the data yourself.

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My Yahoo Finance colleagues and I have extensively covered Trump's effort to fire the Fed chair, force rates lower and co-opt the central bank.



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