Monthly Archives: October 2011

Archive of posts published in the specified Month

A Growing Disparity in Income: So What?

John graduated high school.  Being of good character but not being a great student ,  he got a job in contracting starting at $30,000 a year.  He was dependable and was promoted to supervisor. Over thirty years his income grew

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Lessons from Harrisburg

The capital of Pennsylvania is bankrupt and it is not difficult to see why: excess borrowing for ridiculous unproductive or mismanaged projects. Steven Malanga writes in the Wall Street Journal, How Harrisburg Borrowed Itself Into Bankruptcy 10/28/11: Excerpts: Under seven-term

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Lost Decades and Growth Decades

Gasoline prices are  falling.  On behalf of all of those who blamed the evil oil companies for the high prices I would like to thank them for lowering prices. The oil business is booming in North Dakota.  Unemployment there is

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Rethinking Economic Assumptions

Phillip Levy praises the new Nobel Laureates in economics, Tom Sargent and Chris Sims in The End of Comfortable Keynesianism, published in  The American – The Journal of the American Enterprise Institute. (now included in the Rebel Yid Links) Excerpts.

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Dodd Frank Dummies

One of the rules of the Dodd Frank Financial Reform bill was the cutting of the bank fees charged for debit cards.  I have read much about the financial collapse of 2008 and I do not recall any analyst who

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Grove’s Law of Government

In the Wall Street Journal L. Gordon Grovitz writes Google Speaks Truth to Power. Excerpt:  (Quoting Eric Schmidt, executive chairman of Google) “So we get hauled in front of the Congress for developing a product that’s free, that serves a

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Contrarian and Independent Thinkers

A contrarian assumes the crowd is wrong without necessarily understanding why.   A true independent thinker will isolate themselves mentally from the crowd and common information and research the best information available, relying as little as possible on second hand resources,

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Questions of Civility

This picture of the Occupy Wall Street crowd shows a picture of Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein with his head on a stick. Where is the call for civility from our leaders?  How would such a display have been covered

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An OWS Reader

Wall Street was targeted presumably because the marchers think that they are getting away with crimes against the people and they profit at the expense of others’ misery. Bernie Madoff was sentenced to 150 year in prison. Jeffrey Shilling from

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Random Notes 10.22.2011

Israeli soldier Gilad Schalit was finally released in exchange for 1027 Palestinian terrorists and captured cold blooded murderers.  One should be reminded that Schalit was kidnapped on Israeli soil.  Many have weighed in on whether the exchange was worth the

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Marginalizing the Wingnuts

How much is being broadcast about the various anti-Semitic episodes at various OWS and its offshoots in other cities? The ADL made a timid response here. The Wiesenthal Center published a better analysis:   Excerpts from an essay from Rabbi

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A Nation of Immigrants for Immigrants

The nation that demonstrated the inestimable strengths of capitalism was founded by self-starters who arrived from elsewhere, which leads us to the next factor vital for economic growth: immigration. Everyone living today in the United States either came himself or

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I Would Prefer to Pay More Taxes

In 2008 General Steel, Inc, the company I run, had a good year. We generated record sales, profits and taxes. In 2009 volume fell sharply as a result of the credit collapse,  the collapse of the prices of the commodities

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Retail Strength

Economist Scott Grannis writes in his blog Calafia Beach Pundit – Retail Sales and Supply side economics. 10/14/11 Excerpt: The continued strength in retail sales also shows that consumers in aggregate can spend more even as they deleverage. In the chart

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Prosperity, Demand, and Supply

Economist Scott Grannis writes in his blog Calafia Beach Pundit – Retail Sales and Supply side economics. 10/14/11 Excerpt The reason Obama’s “stimulus” plans haven’t worked is that in grand (and mistaken) Keynesian tradition, they have focused on stimulating demand,

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A Nation of Capitalists – Still

We are still very much a nation of capitalists. But we are a nation that is increasingly reining in our capitalist instincts with regulations that make it difficult to open a business and make a profit, and with taxation that

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How Idiots Communicate

The Occupy Wall Street felt the need to develop a new way of communicating in crowds: Of course a new method of communicating does not mean they have anything meaningful to say.  A more detailed  explanation of the hand signals: But even with this new

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Anti-Semitism at OWS Rallies

I discounted much of what was happening on the Occupy Wall Street rallies and its sister rallies in other cities.  The movement seemed shallow and unserious. Many of the marchers just sound like idiots: it was hard to find any

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Civilized Taxes are Low Taxes

I’m proud to be paying taxes in the United States. The only thing is – I could be just as proud for half the money. – Arthur Godfrey.. Taxes are often defended as the price we pay for a civilized

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Which Rich?

It is just when you hear the words that “this is not a war on the wealthy” that you can expect exactly that. During the Clinton years they put a cap on the wages of corporate executives. Only the first

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