March 01, 2010
You know, other than giving another term to its originally Bush-appointed leader? Last I heard it was kind of important. But the two vacancies remain unfilled, and now there'll be a third opening this summer....
October 14, 2009
I find our country's tendency to president-worship to be both moronic and out of step with what the country was designed to be. Furthermore I find it both appalling and nuts that our currency honors one or more presidents whose...
September 22, 2009
Bruce Bartlett lays out why people shouldn't fall for that constant, simplistic talking-point....
August 25, 2009
I see that Obama just re-nominated Bernanke to head the Fed for another four years. This would be the same Bernanke that led the Fed through the worst recession in since the great depression. I'm certainly not convinced the guy...
August 14, 2009
Krugman uses this chart to note that economic inequality continues to rise. But I think an as interesting point is that the share of national income made by the top 0.01% has increased notably (in terms of a % rise...
July 07, 2009
Emphasis mine: An EPA official told FOXNews.com on Monday that Carlin, who is an economist - not a scientist - included "no original research" in his report. The official said that Carlin "has not been muzzled in the agency at...
June 10, 2009
This graph suggests that while it's not happening on the last president's watch, the current deficit has a lot to do with his decisions (plus, of course, the global economic downturn)....
May 18, 2009
This book is not about the modern financial crash, but is instead about the global depression of the late 1920s and early 1930s (though the author has a short final chapter that tries to tie the present financial crisis to...
April 20, 2009
This is a great, if depressing, graphic. It shows job gains/losses since the start of 2007. Texas and the Plains states appear less affected than many others (of course there are few jobs to start with in the latter). Detroit...
March 22, 2009
Krugman: "I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life. But failing to complain over the last 8 years wasn’t one of them."...
March 21, 2009
Here's a graphic of where it has gone....
March 15, 2009
Hosted by the Economist, a roundtable featuring Dani Rodrik and others....
March 07, 2009
You know the WV Quarter? Nice mountain... be a shame if something happened to it....
March 06, 2009
Bruce Bartlett looks at the numbers. Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton raised taxes - and the economy grew....
February 17, 2009
Woe to the economists. Supply and demand, indeed. Once upon a time I was married to an economist (I know, an unholy alliance of social science) who told me the reason that they made more money than we did was...
February 10, 2009
I'm someone who has usually been in the "we have to do something, even if we don't like the particulars of it" school when it comes to the financial crisis because 1) it is frighteningly bad and 2) the "if...
February 07, 2009
President Sarkozy commenting on the UK's response to the economic crisis: "Britain is cutting taxes. That will bring them nothing."...
January 19, 2009
This sounds silly and expensive. Why go through these contortions? The answer seems to be that Washington remains deathly afraid of the N-word - nationalization. The truth is that Gothamgroup and its sister institutions are already wards of the state,...
January 17, 2009
Marcy Wheeler notes it was a lot of union members. Also related to that crash - do we really want Cost Benefit Analysis applied to matters like airline safety?...
January 14, 2009
January 13, 2009
Ritholtz gets shrill. Its long overdue. From the efficient-market theories, to the concept of man as rational profit maximizers, much of the edifice that is was the Chicago school of economics is based on a foundation that is false, disproven...
December 14, 2008
...as I see all the discussion about whether or not autoworkers make too much. It's a word I think of when I wonder about the supposed wisdom of planning to pay future pensions by hoping there will be enough money...
December 12, 2008
Via WV Public Radio, we find out that our somewhat-local bank BB&T has given money to some local universities to fund a teaching position in capitalism. On of the requirements is that Rand' Atlas Shrugged must be read and discussed....
November 28, 2008
Most days are "buy nothing" days for me. I make my lunch. I don't buy gas except maybe once a month. I don't shop for clothes except like once a year, maybe twice. So making Black Friday into a solidarity...
November 10, 2008
I realize that financial news has dropped off most people's radar screens these days, but the crisis continues to roll through our markets (and most everyones). Today's news comes via a discussion on naked capitalism on the (continuing) AIG bailout....
October 28, 2008
I've long assumed Tim Geithner was the favorite for the job, but here Robert Kuttner makes a good case for naming the Republican head of the FDIC....
October 25, 2008
Check it here. Of course, there's a lot of steps between a plan and a tax cut, but this goes to show the "Joe the plumber" argument doesn't hold much water....
October 22, 2008
Academics, remind yourselves of how much you believe teaching is calling before going here....
October 15, 2008
Take time out of your day to read the second half of this. It's hilarious (and a tiny bit sad)....
October 13, 2008
He won the Nobel. About time....
October 12, 2008
From the files of "duh", but since the Right seems to think they are to blame David Goldstein and Kevin Hall did some reporting to investigate if that was true and found, no, it's not. Fannie and Freddie, however, didn't...
October 10, 2008
It's remarkable to read such a headline in The Washington Post....
October 09, 2008
He's blunt: His disdain for government has led to the largest government bailout in the history of the planet, and essentially caused the nationalization of the finance sector....
October 06, 2008
Nothing political here. Anyone interested in boning up on the massive problems (with, as best I can tell, more to come as Europe sorts its banks out) might like these primers. I'm not a econ-head, but these are reasonable enough...
September 30, 2008
Anyone care to translate that for me? It sounds bad....
Jacflash will have seen it already, but this is definitely a fun way to look at yesterday (at least for fans of Fight Club).And Blodgett/Hussman's solution to this does appear a better way to go: A better approach would be...
Jacflash will have seen it already, but this is definitely a fun way to look at yesterday (at least for fans of Fight Club).And Blodgett/Hussman's solution to this does appear a better way to go: A better approach would be...
September 29, 2008
Of course no one outside the far right thinks it is. I mean, c'mon - Do people really think that racial minorities control the US economy? Do people really think bankers are knocking each other out of the way to...
September 27, 2008
McCain seems to believe that if we eliminate all the earmarks, we'll save just tons of money. This is incorrect: Earmarks are generally bad. I'm happy to do away with them. Eliminating them, however, isn't going to solve anything. (NOTE:...
September 18, 2008
T-Bills traded at negative interest rates for a while this morning. Isn't this the equivalent of "I'll give you $50 today for $48 dollars in three months."? That can't be good for financial stability. Where is the bottom of this?...
September 17, 2008
Details. Sounds like a reasonable compromise to me, though I'll confess to not being an expert on this.The US House approved an energy bill last night that would allow offshore drilling as close as 50 miles from the Atlantic and...
August 17, 2008
Obviously a complicated relationship, the this finding of a "monetary-industrial complex" is rather interesting....
July 02, 2008
From today's WaPo: Americans' love affair with 22-inch rims, eight cylinders and four-wheel drive wrapped in an 8,000-pound package is over. And the breakup is going to cost. With $4-a-gallon gas coming between drivers and their very large vehicles, consumers...
June 22, 2008
Can you imagine the sheer amount of data? And how tempting it would be to crack the security? And the burden on small business? Washington, DC - Hidden deep in Senator Christopher Dodd's 630-page Senate housing legislation is a sweeping...
June 10, 2008
There's a lot of work suggesting that oil wealth hurts the cause of democratization, so perhaps it's not too surprising that apparently it also has a negative effect on women's rights....
May 06, 2008
The fight for labor protections didn't only turn deadly in the famous conflicts in West Virginia and the Rocky Mountain States. It happened in mild-mannered Wisconsin too....
April 29, 2008
Tumulty (who I think's been doing rather nice posts over on Swampland) offers her take on the proposed gas tax holiday (favored by Senators Clinton and McCain, opposed by President Bush and Senator Obama - and of course opposed by...
April 18, 2008
Larry Bartels had a column in yesterday's New York Times noting that it's not working-class people who vote at unusual levels on social issues - it's wealthier people. This holds internationally too right? The green revolution in Europe, or the...
April 15, 2008
That's a huge amount of "black gold", lots more (lots and lots and lots more) than exists in US reserves: A deep-water exploration area could contain as much as 33 billion barrels of oil, an amount that would nearly triple...
April 14, 2008
Something I did not know. In the latest report, for March, the Labor Department reported the jobless rate - also called the "not employed rate" by some - at 13.1 percent for men in the prime age group. Only once...
April 02, 2008
April 01, 2008
Krugman is talking about regulating financial markets: For example, there was a 2003 photo-op in which officials from multiple agencies used pruning shears and chainsaws to chop up stacks of banking regulations. The occasion symbolized the shared determination of Bush...
March 19, 2008
Yay. Some good economic news....
March 08, 2008
This expansion seems like a no-brainer, and other Gulf Coast ports are spending big bucks to improve their facilities as container shipping booms. Why won't Gov. Jindal support a similar expansion of the port of New Orleans?...
March 01, 2008
Two of the ten principles of economics....
February 15, 2008
Oy. It's not only the likes of the State Department and the Justice Department that stops producing data when it might become politically painful. Today we see another example of this in economics. Got bad economic indicators? Well, then stop...
January 31, 2008
Not remotely surprising, but nonetheless troubling....
January 24, 2008
Calculated Risk has a post up bemoaning what the stimulus package is likely to look like. It's actually a "worst idea" thread. But that post also proposes something to me that sounds relatively simple, and more likely than most of...
January 18, 2008
Bobby Fischer has died; I used to play chess (was on the team in high school), and Bobby was always a hell of an individual (and at one point, a decent chess player). (Oh, and does anyone want to disagree...
January 15, 2008
Ezra Klein's posted a handy graphic from the Treasury. Mike Huckabee wants to stick it to the middle class, while lightening the tax bills of the rich and the destitute. I'm shocked. Just shocked....
December 04, 2007
When the Brazilians start heading for home (bold is mine): That decision - to give up on life in the United States - is being made by more and more Brazilians across the country, according to consular officials, travel agencies...
November 26, 2007
Referring to this article, FDL scores it Whedon 1, NYT 0 : Reporters are funny people. At least, some of the New York Times reporters are. Their story on the strike was the most dispiriting and inaccurate that I read....
November 15, 2007
There are a couple of excellent discussions happening in the IR-o-sphere, one regarding graduate degrees and the other about Dani Rodrik's new book [Warning, NSFNG]. First, a discussion going between the Duck of Minerva and Lawyers Guns and Money, with...
October 06, 2007
I'm betting you already knew the answer was no....
October 04, 2007
From the Cunning Realist, that is. couldn't believe the Fed would be so breathtakingly reckless as to deliver a big rate cut with the dollar at an all-time low, gold at a quarter-century high, oil at an all-time high, and...
October 03, 2007
September 26, 2007
Interesting numbers. Not that surprising, but interesting....
September 10, 2007
Last week this post went up on Orcinus. Makes perfect sense that patterns in lynching varied this way. As to the broader implications - yeah I think the comparison to today's immigration "debate" is reasonable, and the general dynamics of...
July 30, 2007
The argument that a "critical mass" of any population is necessary before adequate representation can occur is often found in discussions of electoral politics (some examples from my area of the world). Pandagon has a discussion of this article, about...
July 02, 2007
Also from Neatorama, a simple modification to a time worn practice: water jugs that roll, so people without running water can transport more easily....
May 16, 2007
In the mail today arrived the health newsletter sent to all those on the state insurance plan. Generally it is full of useless tidbits and bland advice about various healthy living items. Presumably, the prevention advice will save the subscribers...
May 14, 2007
At least you can if you are the Pope (emphasis mine): Pope Benedict XVI blamed Marxism and unbridled capitalism for Latin America's problems on Sunday, and urged bishops to mold a new generation of Roman Catholic leaders in politics to...
March 04, 2007
Cameron Scott has compiled this list of data on the economic benefits that would stem from legalizing gay marriage....
March 03, 2007
Foreclosures rising on risky loans. An old post of mine commenting on how housing sales partially masked declining income in the United States. Wage growth slows, particularly for workers at lower pay levels. Severe poverty hits 32 year high in...
February 28, 2007
...projecting your values on capitalist enterprise (emphasis mine): While many shoppers find the new stores exhilarating places to shop, the company also faces critics who feel it has strayed from its original vision. In angry postings on blogs, they charge...
January 06, 2007
Brad DeLong notes here that the new US House of Representatives is going to take economic responsibility much more seriously than its predecessor, noting these remarkable changes in the House's rules.He's much less pleased with the economics journalism, or journamalism...
December 18, 2006
Hilzoy explains that there are preferences and then there are preferences. One of the whole points of the market is that, absent market failures, it's a wonderful mechanism for transmitting information about consumer preferences to producers, and for giving producers...
December 10, 2006
This is a great choice for the Nobel Peace Prize: Bangladeshi economist Muhammad Yunus accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on Sunday, saying he hoped the award would inspire "bold initiatives" to fight poverty and eradicate the root causes of terrorism....
August 23, 2006
Ever since I read Pinko Feminist Hellcat's post about the abuses by collection agencies (trying to make people pay debt they don't owe), I've been working on a low level seethe. The tactics collectors use on those who owe debt...
Because of a post of a Paul Krugman email by Brad DeLong that was picked up by Kevin Drum, I have two things to say: 1) Of course we can do something about inequality, but we choose not to. 2)...
August 03, 2006
Byrd's voting record leaves a lot to be desired, and his actions that would annoy many Democrats extend far beyond his votes for Justice Alito, Chief Justice Roberts and former Attorney General Ashcroft. He's made lots of unfortunate calls on...
July 25, 2006
Everyone else seems to think so.This is really pathetic, awful and destabilizing all roled up in one. Yet more big-government lovin'/corporate welfare (subsidies) from Team Bush (though yeah this version is kind of retro and whatnot with the beneficiaries including...
July 23, 2006
I read the Sunday papers so you don't have to: Most Interesting Story: The US is reducing our military spending in Africa. Why is this interesting? Al Qaeda (short term) and raw materials (long term). Follow me here. The Republican...
June 24, 2006
I'm thinking about dumping Polanyi. It's not that I dislike the book. And I don't get into the economists' debate about whether he over-romanticizes "primitive" reciprocal trading networks over self-regulating markets. It isn't even that I find the detailed discussion...
June 21, 2006
There were 52 votes in the Senate in favor of raising the minimum wage, but the Republican leadership still blocked it. For the record the wage hasn't been raised in 9 years. Tell you what, if they are going to...
May 29, 2006
The Cunning Realist makes this interesting point that's all too often overlooked - by running up giant deficits the Bush administration is putting the control of our interests rates in the hand of foreigners! What's troubling is that we don't...
May 16, 2006
For those of you interested in a little more reading on Voodoo economics and the effects of tax cuts ...Jonathan Rauch has a good little comment in the June issue of The Atlantic. To give you a taste:Niskanen recently analyzed...
April 22, 2006
A short flash film on why Congressional steps toward eliminating net neutrality might result in serious restrictions on consumers' access to the internet. The upshot is, net neutrality means that providers can't privilege some content and/or block other content. More...
April 16, 2006
The Dark Wraith does it again, with charts and graphs and everything (oh my!): If any hope can be found in this multi-year federal budget catastrophe, it is in the growing possibility that the scandals now engulfing the Bush Administration...
March 27, 2006
Quiddity has an interesting post linking together Paul Krugman's "North of the Border" column with a piece by Harold Myerson. Krugman sees little economic benefit from large-scale immigration and thinks both the president's guest worker plan and the immigration plan...
February 23, 2006
Because Bloodless Coup is based in a poor state, we're used to hearing bad news about the economic picture, or at least to the idea that there are a significant number of people who are not doing OK economically. But...
February 13, 2006
Via Atrios, Bush appointments to the Fed: Bush's nomination of the 35-year-old White House aide -- a lawyer by training who would become one of only two members of the Fed's seven-member board of governors without a Ph.D. in economics...
February 12, 2006
The NY Times today did a nice little piece on Amazon.com. The article isn't about anything new at Amazon, but about their business model. It turns out that Amazon makes money from (according to the article) three things: selling other...
January 27, 2006
The easy explanations are garbage, and Echidne of the Snakes does a careful job showing us why. Why would men on average receive higher wages (or salaries, but I will use wages for simplicity from now on)? At the risk...
January 14, 2006
Nikon plans to stop making 35mm film cameras. Nikon will discontinue seven film-camera models, leaving in production only the current top-line model, the F6, and a low-end manual-focus model, the FM10. It will also stop making most of its manual-focus...
January 02, 2006
Republicans like tax cuts so they can invest their own money, and they invest it in the stock market, and they like Bush because he helps with this right? Right? In other words, after five years of Bush's presidency, the...
December 29, 2005
Ezra has a link to a story about high housing costs. Havng recently been home to another coastal state with insanely spiraling real estate values, I can identify with the sentiment. As the attentive reader may have noticed, Bloodless Coup...
And the only thing coming out my ass is money to pay for it. Several of my friends - and most everyone in this part of the state no doubt - received the lovely missives from the gas company this...
December 19, 2005
News is coming out that WTO negotiators may have reached an agreement on agricultural subsidies. This is not just a deal, it's a big deal, a huge deal, if they can pull it off. WTO negotiators reached a breakthrough on...
December 14, 2005
I love the state quarter program, but I think this is a truly horrible idea. Why? In the first place it really perverts our understanding of history to focus on the contributions of only a handful of dead white guys...
Not Dan Drezner: The result is that the events that capture the most attention are the ones with the greatest celebrity or the greatest divergence of views. Yesterday, for example, OxFam attracted a great deal of press coverage for its...
November 28, 2005
Maybe people just like cheap shit. The mall-based merchants, on the other hand, largely avoided circulars or television advertising. Gap, in a surprising break with tradition, stopped marketing its marquee brand on TV after years of aggressive campaigns with stars...
November 07, 2005
Ah, Diego. That detox in Cuba helped you with your spare tire, and now this to help a new career as chat show host. I saw Maradona play. Once. 1989. Maracanã. Brasil/Argentina. Leading up to the World Cup. 100,000 Brazilians....
November 06, 2005
Or at least he did the other day when I was stuck in the car listening to him and his listeners cream themselves over remembering the 25th anniversary of Reagan's election. The Dark Wraith thinks not: From a well-balanced portfolio...
November 01, 2005
The Tax Panel report is in. Daniel Gross, at Slate: On the one hand, gutting the mortgage-interest deduction seems progressive, because the deduction now favors the well-off: The mortgage deduction gets more generous the more expensive the home you buy,...
October 23, 2005
Honestly, I haven't thought about Connie Mack for years, since the days of Walkin' Lawton Chiles decision not to run against him for the Senate, and then Mack subsequently beat Buddy McKay in part by tarring him with the Liberal...
September 23, 2005
...and you were in control of the Federal Budget, what would you do? Via ObWi....
August 30, 2005
"The nation's poverty rate rose to 12.7 percent of the population last year, the fourth consecutive annual increase, the Census Bureau said Tuesday." C'mon, you didn't think it was going to be something good did you? I'm surprised all those...
July 21, 2005
In a major shift in economic policy, China announced that it will cease to peg the yuan to the dollar. This will open the market further, but not completely, as the "float" will be moderated, only allowed to fluctuate within...
July 18, 2005
This morning as I was drinking my coffee celebrating the absence of dried mud, I browsed the big news sites. Krugman examines inconsistencies in the conclusions drawn from labor market data. He also mentioned the website of Brad DeLong which...
July 08, 2005
Toyota gives up on stupid Americans. They can't even be bought off with huge government subsidies because our workers are that inept. Yikes.The factory will cost $800 million to build, with the federal and provincial governments kicking in $125 million...
March 03, 2005
Reports are blossoming all over the 'net about Greenspan's comments regarding a "consumption" tax. The first kind of consumption tax that would spring to most minds is a simple sales tax. Other would imagine something more along the lines of...
February 01, 2005
Alright, sorry about that last bit, but it's starting to have that feel to it, no? Laugh over? Good, because now I'm going to talk about economics. Oh no, not in that much detail, but I have a two part...