Archive for January, 2009
And Now for Something Completely Different
Some banks don’t want taxpayer money. From the AP: A small but growing number of community banks are backing out of the government’s bailout, which they see as fraught with hidden strings and government interference.About 20 banks so far that applied for or had been approved to receive about $1 billion combined in taxpayer money [...]
30Jan2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedThe Goal Is Freedom: Washington Logic
Let me see if I have this straight. The U.S. government is going to borrow $819-$??? billion, largely from the Chinese (if they’ll lend it, which they may not) and put that money into people’s pockets in a hundred different ways, from paying workers for filling potholes, to extending unemployment benefits, to expanding Medicare, to [...]
30Jan2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedWhen the Bottom Line is the Bottom Line
Leave it to Forbes to address the concerns of the populace: we want the economy to be profitable again. Arnold Kling’s article points us to the root of the problem: The economy is in trouble today because of, pardon the pun, false profits. The financial sector reported as much as 40% of all profits in [...]
30Jan2009 | Margaret Morgan | 0 comments | ContinuedDirty Logic
Robert Murphy discusses one of Paul Krugman’s arguments in his blog post and shows that Krugman’s logic is, indeed, ‘dirty,’ because, (discussing the stimulus package) “when this pork spigot turns off, won’t you have 5 million people suddenly thrown out of work?” He goes on to say that “Friedman famously said (though apparently didn’t coin), ‘There’s no [...]
29Jan2009 | Margaret Morgan | 0 comments | ContinuedOn Rhetoric
I tend to think that labels and rhetorically eloquent phrases are an ineffective trick of rhetoric that allows individuals (and, perhaps, particulary politicians) to avoid expressing real thoughts. Take, for instance, the term “stimulus spending.” At face value, these words imply two things: first, that there is actual money being spent, and that by spending [...]
29Jan2009 | Margaret Morgan | 0 comments | ContinuedProtectionist "Stimulus"
The Washington Post reports: The stimulus bill passed by the House last night contains a controversial provision that would mostly bar foreign steel and iron from the infrastructure projects laid out by the $819 billion economic package. Without endorsing any of the eventual infrastructure projects, we must acknowledge that this protectionist rider to the bill [...]
29Jan2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedGates on Market Superiority
Matthew Bishop interviewed Bill Gates the other day for The Economist about Gates’ letter that he wrote to citizens. It’s worth watching for a number of reasons. First, because of what Mr. Gates has to say about the role of private enterprise in social aid (approximately 2:19 into the interview), and second, because of his [...]
28Jan2009 | Margaret Morgan | 0 comments | ContinuedRisky Business.
L. Gordon Crovitz said in his Wall Street Journal article yesterday that “Markets thrive when information flows freely, and they seize up when uncertainty replaces understanding.” This basic principle is key for risk analysis, mortgage-lending, and when considering long-term effects of any decision. So the question becomes: how do we restore certainty into the markets? [...]
27Jan2009 | Margaret Morgan | 0 comments | ContinuedDog Bites Man
President Barack Obama’s ban on earmarks in the $825 billion economic stimulus bill doesn’t mean interest groups, lobbyists and lawmakers won’t be able to funnel money to pet projects.They’re just working around it — and perhaps inadvertently making the process more secretive….The result, as The Associated Press learned in interviews with more than a dozen [...]
27Jan2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedKrugman Watch, cont'd.
[I]t’s clear that when it comes to economic stimulus, public [taxpayer] spending provides much more bang for the buck than tax cuts — and therefore costs less per job created … — because a large fraction of any tax cut will simply be saved. –“Bad Faith Economics” And saving has absolutely nothing to do with [...]
26Jan2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedKrugman Watch
Because someone has to do it. Remember, Herbert Hoover didn’t have a problem making unpleasant decisions: he had the courage and toughness to slash spending and raise taxes in the face of the Great Depression. Unfortunately, that just made things worse. –“Stuck in the Middle” Federal spending rose in 1930 and1931.From Murray Rothbard’s America’s Great [...]
26Jan2009 | Sheldon Richman | 5 comments | ContinuedPenthouses for playmates? More like the poorhouse for the populace.
It is when the porn industry asks for a $5 billion dollar bailout that I hope citizens have an interest in just where our tax dollars go. On the other hand, when I mentioned this bailout to the president of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, Joe Lehman, his response was something to the effect: “Why wait [...]
26Jan2009 | Margaret Morgan | 0 comments | ContinuedBottom Line
[T]here is no way for government macroeconomic policy to correct an incorrect perception of how [savings/consumption] plans have changed. There is no way for government to acquire the knowledge necessary to be able to coordinate individual plans. Such information simply does not exist. If it is going to ever exist it will be generated by [...]
24Jan2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedTGIF: Boon or Doggle?
Even if government spending in theory could “stimulate the economy” in a genuine, sustainable way, it would not follow that politicians and bureaucrats would know how to spend the money intelligently. The pressures to do something now and the perverse incentives facing those in charge of the money guarantee there would be more doggle than [...]
23Jan2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | ContinuedThe Myth of Public Works as an Economic Stimulus
Words to ponder as the stimulus bill snakes through Congress: While we have legitimate infrastructure needs, public-works spending historically has been too slow, has delayed private and local government spending, and created few jobs for the unemployed. The programs are not labor-intensive and require skills few unemployed have. Public works did not end the Great [...]
23Jan2009 | Sheldon Richman | 0 comments | Continued"Vive la liberte!"
Or so came the cry of the French Revolutionaries. As anyone interested in history and liberty can attest, liberty requires a good deal of hard work. I was especially struck by the relationship between liberty and work when reading French chef Jacques Pepin’s autobiography earlier this week. The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen recounts [...]
23Jan2009 | Margaret Morgan | 0 comments | Continued-
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