Former Vice Chairman of the Federal Reserve board joined the chorus of Wall Street cheerleaders saying the Fed can afford to be patient with raising interest rates earlier this week. His rationale? Inflation as measured by the consumer price index or the Fed’s favored measure is very low: The so-called hawks, who have been calling […]
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Long-time marijuana advocate Willie Nelson is reportedly going to produce his own marijuana for sale, called Willie’s Reserve. Seems like Willie Weed would be more accurate, but hey…what do I know about marketing (or marijuana for that matter). As an aside, I went to a Willie Nelson concert circa 1980 while living in southern […]
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We often lament the ever burgeoning national debt ($18T+), and especially so when we consider the unfunded liabilities (some estimates well north of $100T). Yet while the national debt captures the public’s attention periodically, the disastrous condition of state finances is seldom discussed. There are few good states, albeit red states are typically much better […]
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You’ve heard me say this before (but not this strongly) that the monetary machinations of the global central banks (led by the Fed, and buttressed by the European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan) are flooding the world with liquidity and causing all sorts of malinvestment. In the video above, Ed Yardeni agrees, perhaps […]
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Earlier in the week I criticized the results of Dodd-Frank, because it has miserably failed at its ostensible purpose of preventing future “too big too fail” incidents. Indeed, not only did it not succeed in this–in the sense of reducing the number of potential risks–it has significantly exacerbated it as the banks are increasingly consolidating […]
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Why I am so “cynical” about Washington DC reforms–why too big too fail leads to bigger and bigger
05 Mar 2015
The main reason I am so disbelieving of the efficacy of regulatory reforms (some would say cynical) is that I don’t believe that Washington politicians are completely incompetent. I believe that much of the results that occur are desired, at least by somebody. When the progressives took power in 2009, they were very clearly going […]
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Earlier in the week I asked what the Keystone pipeline decision says about Mr. Obama. I now want to offer my answer to the question I raised: the basic problem we have with Mr. Obama’s leadership is we have the first ideologue president. I have written on this before, so it might be useful to […]
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We’ve discussed the Keystone Pipeline before, and today’s veto really doesn’t bring anything new to light. We still have an administration that has been reviewing this proposal for over 6 years, and a congress that considers this essential for creating jobs and signaling a positive climate for business. Environmentalists have made clear to the Democratic […]
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Economics Everywhere! Keynesian failure in Japan, ECB money printing and Walmart wage hikes!
21 Feb 2015
First up is the ongoing failure of Keynesian economics with its calls for government stimulus to save the day. Japan is the case study for looking at what government policy makers have done. Ever since their stock bubble burst (enabled by easy money policy) in the late 80s, the Japanese economy has went from one period […]
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So much of our lives is amazingly better, and getting better at an increasing rate. Peter Diamond makes this case in his new book, Abundance, and I have to agree with him. The progress we’ve made in quality of life during my lifetime is phenomenal. As I mentioned to one class today, I grew up […]
Bert Wheeler
Jeff Haymond
Marc Clauson
Mark Caleb Smith
Tom Mach