Economics

Paul Krugman argues in a New York Times article "Raise the wage" that raising the minimum wage is a good idea because it's good policy, good economics and good politics for President Obama.

Krugman notes "the minimum wage is one of the most studied issues in all of economics."

What Krugman doesn't note is that this allows everyone to cherry-pick which study "proves" or "disproves" one's position on the minimum wage.

A grand old classical-liberal masterpiece has been adapted, updated and made eminently available and relevant for today's modern young libertarians.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute has remade Leonard E. Read's I, Pencil as an animated film, released on their website Thursday.

According to recently released Census Bureau stats America'spoverty rate remains at record levels.

Recent economic data show that U.S. job growth in May was negligible, while the official unemployment figure-- at least the figure the Labor Department admits to-- rose to 9.1%. The real unemployment figure, however, as compiled by economist John Williams, may well be higher than 20%. It is clear the U.S. economy is in terrible shape, and that no amount of government spending or Federal Reserve quantitative easing can reduce unemployment, increase real productivity, or address our debt fiasco.U.S. jobs and productivity are dependent on the accumulation of private capital to finance existing businesses or fund new entrepreneurial activity. Private capital-- whether accumulated by profitable U.S. businesses, invested by private equity and venture capital firms, or attracted from abroad-- is the key to economic growth and new jobs. But we cannot create jobs if we demonize profits, punish risk-taking capitalists, and stay hostile to foreign investment.

The only thing you will ever learn about history is that nobody ever learns from history! In effect, we, as individuals, who live in our short time span on earth, think we live in an infallible society. Has it ever occurred that you might be living in either one of 3 phases of an empire?

Well fellow people on this board - all signs of an Empire in Free Fall Decay are here ...

Last week I was very pleased that the Financial Services Committee held a hearing on the Federal Reserve Transparency Act, HR 1207. The bill has 295 cosponsors and there is also strong support for the companion bill in the Senate. This hearing was a major step forward in getting the bill passed.

I was pleased that the hearing was well-attended, especially considering that it was held on a Friday at nine o’clock in the morning! I have been talking about the immense, unchecked power of the Federal Reserve for many years, while the attention of Congress was always on other things. It was gratifying to see my colleagues asking probing questions and demonstrating genuine concern about this important issue as well.

It has been an interesting week indeed for the Federal Reserve. Early this week, it was announced that President Obama intends to reappoint Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke to a second term in January, signaling a vote of confidence in him. Bernanke seems to be popular with the administration and with Wall Street, and with good reason. His lending policies have left big banks flush with newly created cash that covers up old mistakes and allows for new ones. By buying up mountains of Treasury debt he has also enabled spending to soar to ridiculous levels that should startle any responsible economist, and scare any American concerned about the value of the dollar. However, these highly sensitive decisions about our money are not made by economists, they are made by politicians. Bernanke, like most of his predecessors, is the politician’s best friend. However, there is no reason to believe any other central planner would behave any differently, considering the immense political pressure on the Fed.

Google the phrase, with quotes, "Going Galt" and you'll get "about 215,000" results or so.

Are libertarians witnessing the mainstreaming of John Galt?

This article touches on one of the reasons why the idea of Going Galt is becoming so popular. But it needs to begin with this caveat:

As the healthcare debate rages on, there is one reality that even the proponents of this hostile takeover of healthcare by government cannot ignore – and that is money. The government simply does not have the money for a new, expansive, public healthcare plan. The country is in a deep recession that will deepen even further with the coming collapse of the commercial real estate market. The last thing we need is for government to increase and expand taxes to pay for another damaging, wasteful program. Foreigners are becoming less enthusiastic about buying our debt, and creating another open-ended welfare program when we cannot pay for what is already in place, will not help. Champions of socialized medicine want to tax the rich, tax businesses that already cannot afford to provide health plans to employees, and tax people who don’t want to participate in the government’s scheme by buying an approved healthcare plan. Presumably, all these taxes are to induce compliance. This is not freedom, nor will it improve healthcare.

In my last column, I joked that with public spending out of control and the piling on of the international bailout bill, economic collapse seems to be the goal of Congress. It is getting harder to joke about such a thing however, as the non-partisan General Accounting Office (GAO) has estimated that the administration’s health care plan would actually cost over a trillion dollars. This reality check may have given us a temporary reprieve on this particular disastrous policy, however an equally disastrous energy policy reared its ugly head on Capitol Hill last week.

The Cap and Trade Bill HR 2454 was voted on last Friday. Proponents claim this bill will help the environment, but what it really does is put another nail in the economy’s coffin. The idea is to establish a national level of carbon dioxide emissions, and sell pollution permits to industry as the Catholic Church used to sell indulgences to sinners. HR 2454 also gives federal bureaucrats new power to regulate a wide variety of household appliances, such as light bulbs and refrigerators, and further distorts the market by providing more of your tax money to auto companies.

When Obama is not busy appeasing militant Islamists and making timid statements against other terrorist nations or organizations, he is busy encroaching on individual rights and the conditions under which American business must operate. Obama is going “soft” on potential enemies abroad, taking a policy of appeasement that is likely to invite attack. He is riding roughshod on individual rights of citizens at home. He has this back-assward.

Congressman Ron Paul's Federal Reserve Transparency Act, HR 1207, has reached and surpassed the level of 218 cosponsors in the House of Representatives, which means it is now cosponsored by a majority of the members.

The 218th cosponsor was Dennis Kucinich (OH-10), and the bill has since received its 222nd cosponsor.

Welcome to the age of dozens of Czars within the U.S. government, of the nomination of an “empathetic” Supreme Court Justice rather than one who will apply the Constitution as it was written, an age where government forgets its mission – to protect individual rights – and instead promises to put a Yugo in every garage, ending the War of Terror by renaming it, printing money because it has run out of wealth to tax.

In the last few years in interviews on the economy, I have been asked what I would do if I were in charge. In answering the question I usually started with explaining the errors we made that gave us the crisis. The interviewer frequently responded by saying that he wasn’t interested in the cause of the problem, only what we should do now to correct it.

This is a typical attitude in Washington. But, we cannot expect correct policies to be implemented if we don’t understand the cause of the crises. Instead, we have pursued all the wrong policies. Let me list a few mistakes we have made.