This is, um, interesting.
Dan Walters: Historic tax overhaul plan to hit Capitol
… The California Commission on the 21st Century Economy, better known as the Parsky Commission for its chairman, businessman Gerald Parsky, is on the verge of proposing a massive tax system overhaul to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and legislators.
Although revenue-neutral – that is, not changing [...]
Well, maybe so, but this is an especially acute angle on the question. This is John Hinderaker writing at Power Line in August 2005. I forget how I got there.
It must be depressing to be Paul Krugman. No matter how well the economy performs, Krugman’s bitter vendetta against the Bush administration requires him to hunt [...]
Fareed Zakaria interviewed Michael Lewis on GPS last Sunday. It’s one of the better takes on the underlying dysfunction of our financial system that I’ve heard.
Fareed sits down with author Michael Lewis to discuss the economic crisis. In his best-selling book “Liar’s Poker,” Lewis chronicles his days as a bond salesman at the investment [...]
It’s time for another Joe Stiglitz post!
America’s Socialism for the Rich: Corporate Welfarism
By Joseph Stiglitz
With all the talk of “green shoots” of economic recovery, America’s banks are pushing back on efforts to regulate them. While politicians talk about their commitment to regulatory reform to prevent a recurrence of the crisis, this is one area where [...]
This nice quote from Milton Friedman (in the context of overhauling the Federal Reserve, as it happens) was recently quoted in the context of health care reform, specifically in support of considering single-payer systems. I’d add democratic reforms such as proportional representation to the list.
… it is worth discussing radical changes, not in the expectation [...]
NYRB (longish).
The Crisis and How to Deal with It
Following are excerpts from a symposium on the economic crisis presented by The New York Review of Books and PEN World Voices at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on April 30. The participants were former senator Bill Bradley, Niall Ferguson, Paul Krugman, Nouriel Roubini, George Soros, and [...]
Tax employee health benefits, says Robert Reich.
The Only Sure Way to Fund Universal Health Care
… But, face it, it’s become a crazy system. You’re not eligible for these benefits when you and your family are likely to need them most – when you lose your job and your income plummets. And these days, as we’re [...]
Go ahead and peek at the answers.
Can You Find Twelve Errors in Ben Stein’s Column?
People who get upset over the appearance of Ben Stein’s columns in the Sunday NYT simply fail to understand their purpose. They are not to be treated as serious analysis of the economy or economic issues.
Rather, Stein’s columns are meant to [...]
A snippet from a longer column. It’s no less worrying to us living here.
State of Paralysis
… What’s really alarming about California, however, is the political system’s inability to rise to the occasion.
Despite the economic slump, despite irresponsible policies that have doubled the state’s debt burden since Arnold Schwarzenegger became governor, California has immense human [...]
Matthew Yglesias.
US Defense Spending In Context
I’ve shown charts before showing how absurd the American defense budget looks in context. Now a new chart making the same point, but with slightly more up-to-date 2007 spending data:
As you can see, not only is the United States spending well over double the combined defense budgets of Russia and [...]
Washington Post Victim Blaming
The Washington Post has an incredibly insightful oped column noting that the spendthrift baby boomers will have almost nothing saved for retirement. This is true as serious economists have tried to point out.
The problem with the column is that the reason the baby boomers didn’t save is because they believed the claims [...]
In case you missed them (shame on you if you did), here are a couple of fine rants from Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism. Well, fragments of them; click for the unexpurgated versions.
First rant:
Yet Another Program to Enrich Banks at Taxpayer and Borrower Expense
The chicanery never ends.
The latest bit of looting fobbed off as a [...]
Calculate Risk has a post with some very instructive charts comparing the effects of various attempts to bail out banks as they affect the bank’s balance sheets.
Calculated Risk: Bank Balance Sheet: Liquidity and Solvency, Part II
In the previous post, I tried to present a conceptual overview of a liquidity crisis using a bank’s balance [...]
Barry Ritholtz. Corporate insiders don’t seem to believe that a bull market is coming any time soon. On the contrary.
Beware Insider Selling
“Nobody ever sold a stock because they thought it would go up. And as a group, corporate insiders obviously are scarcely enthusiastic about the prospects for a genuine bull market.”
Or so said Alan Abelson [...]
NPR’s he-said she-said stories are bad enough. I don’t actually think that NPR is particularly in the pocket of Big Real Estate, but it’s hard to come up with a better explanation for this kind of consistent laziness. Well, except for consistent laziness, I suppose.
NPR Conspires With Realtors to Fleece First Time Home Buyers
This one [...]
Dean Baker is on NPR’s case again.
NPR Misinforms Listeners About Cause of Car Sale Slump
In the Morning Edition top of the hour news summary (not on web), NPR told listeners that car sales are down because of low consumer confidence. Wrong!
Car sales are down because consumers have seen $6 trillion in housing bubble wealth and [...]
Apropos the earlier post on reducing inequality, we have this chart, based on CBO data:
We had a rising tide, all right, but it didn’t trickle down to all boats. Or whatever…
via Matthew Yglesias
While we’re at it, here’s a chart from Lane Kenworthy that’s part of that same reducing-inequality package. Something happened, it seems, around 1980, [...]
Lane Kenworthy, at his blog Consider the Evidence, has an illuminating series of posts on reducing (economic) inequality in the US.
Here’s a chronological list of posts:
Reducing Inequality: What’s the Problem?
Reducing Inequality: Are Unions the Answer? Some, but not enough.
Reducing Inequality: Education to the Rescue? “Education is important for individuals and for society, and I certainly [...]
Simon Johnson, James Kwak and Peter Boone at The Baseline Scenario have been compiling a series of articles under the rubric Financial Crisis for Beginners, the latest being Financial Innovation for Beginners. Collect ‘em all!
The Baseline Scenario
Financial Crisis for Beginners
What happened to the global economy and what we can do about it
We believe that everyone should [...]
The market can remain irrational for longer than you can remain solvent.
—John Maynard Keynes
A variation on Gambler’s Ruin.
via Sam Smith