Tag Archives: Economics

Student Loan Consequences: Real, Costly, and Personal

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“Under the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act (SAFRA) signed into law as part of ObamaCare in March of 2010, students may borrow money directly from the federal government regardless of their credit score or any other financial ‘issues’ they may be facing. They are not priced according to any ‘individualized measure of risk’ nor are there loan limits. They are instead politically determined by Congress with undergraduates receiving lower interest rates than graduate students, but graduate students allowed to borrow more than undergrads. This forced entry by the government into what was once a private market transaction has numerous consequences.”

http://www.thenewamerican.com/economy/markets/item/14363-student-loan-consequences-real-costly-and-personal

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The Three Types of Austerity

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“Reading the financial press, one gets the impression there are only two sides to the austerity debate: pro-austerity and anti-austerity. In reality, we have three forms of austerity. There is the Keynesian-Krugman-Robert Reich form which promotes more government spending and higher taxes. There is the Angela Merkel form of less government spending and higher taxes, and there is the Austrian form of less spending and lower taxes. Of the three forms of austerity, only the third increases the size of the private sector relative to the public sector, frees up resources for private investment, and has actual evidence of success in boosting growth.”

http://mises.org/daily/6523/The-Three-Types-of-Austerity

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Scandinavian Welfare States Realize Too Many Handouts Are Destructive

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“It’s hardly radical libertarianism to reduce unemployment benefits from four years to two years, but it is rather significant when even politicians realize that it’s not good – as illustrated by these powerful cartoons – to lure people into the wagon when nations need more people pulling the wagon.  It’s a bit depressing that Denmark actually ranks higher than the United States in the most recent Economic Freedom of the World rankings.  Yes, their welfare state is too big, their tax system is a nightmare, and they are saddled with one of the world’s most expensive bureaucracies, but Denmark has ultra-free market policies in other areas.”

http://danieljmitchell.wordpress.com/2013/09/01/even-scandinavian-welfare-states-realize-too-much-dependency-and-too-many-handouts-are-destructive/

 

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Obama Calls Income Gap ‘Wrong’ — After Widening It

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“The Census Bureau’s official measure of income inequality — called the Gini index — shows similar results. During the Bush years, the index was flat overall — finishing in 2008 exactly where it started in 2001.  It’s gone up each year since Obama has been president and now stands at all-time highs. It’s worth underscoring that the growing income gap under Obama isn’t the result of the rich getting fabulously richer. Nor is it any sort of indictment of ‘trickle down’ economics. Instead, it is the direct result of Obama’s historically weak economic recovery, which has left the rest of the country falling behind while the wealthy have managed to make gains.”

http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/073013-665705-income-gap-grew-sharply-under-obama.htm

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Jeffrey Tucker: How to Fake a Fast Food Strike

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Jeffrey Tucker: Bitcoin and E-commerce

“There’s every indication that people outside the restaurants protesting didn’t actually work for the place they were protesting. It was a classic ‘rent-a-mob’ situation, and the rent was being paid by political activists whose agenda has nothing to do with helping the average burger flipper. These were mostly media stunts cooked up by the Service Employees International Union, which bused in these so-called workers as a fulfillment of a little charade and subsequent media blitz. The SEIU coordinates these protests with various professional worker groups and in conjunction with the press to make the biggest possible splash.”

http://lfb.org/today/how-to-fake-a-fast-food-strike/

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Can We Pay a Minimum Wage That Makes Everyone Rich?

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“More people — an increase in the supply of labor — want to work at McDonald’s at a rate of $15 an hour than $7.25. That leads to an influx of workers into the labor force and higher unemployment as new entrants fail to find a job.  The road to a higher-paying job goes through education, training for the jobs of tomorrow, and incentives such as the earned income tax credit, not through the imposition of a floor on wages.  So the next time someone tells you that the U.S. needs to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour, ask him what’s so special about $15. Why not raise it to $50, or $100, and make everyone rich?”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-04/can-we-pay-a-minimum-wage-that-makes-everyone-rich-.html

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McDonald’s Dollar Menu Is About To Become “The Dollar Menu & More”

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EPJ13

“McDonald’s Corp. says  it has been testing higher priced versions of its famous value menu.  The Dollar Menu & More that was tested has three price points -$1, $2 and $5 or ‘shareable’ items such as 20-piece McNuggets. Another version that was tested has prices of $1, $1.79 and $4.99.  Earlier this year, Wendy’s revamped  its 99-cent menu to a ‘Right Price Right Size’ menu, with prices ranging up to around $2.  Sure looks like signs of price inflation, not deflation, to me.”

http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2013/09/hey-krugman-mcdonalds-dollar-menu-is.html

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When It Comes To Healthcare, Paul Krugman Is Wrong 100% Of The Time

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“In a recent New York Times column Krugman pronounced Obamacare a success before it has even been tried. Why? Because the premiums to be charged in California health insurance exchange are apparently lower than what the experts thought they would be. Aah… let’s see… Everybody thought health insurance premiums would be 100% higher. In fact, they are only 60% higher… Hooray… Break out the champagne! I’ll come back to these price comparisons in a minute. For the moment, I would ask: What kind of an economist would celebrate an expected price decline without asking what happened to quantity or quality? This is an Econ 101 mistake.”

http://www.forbes.com/sites/johngoodman/2013/05/30/when-it-comes-to-healthcare-issues-paul-krugman-is-wrong-100-of-the-time/

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Note to Fed: Giving the Banks Free Money Won’t Make Us Hire More Workers

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“As anyone in the actual position of hiring more staff knows, it is not a lack of cheap credit that makes adding workers unattractive, it is the lack of opportunities to increase profit margins by adding more workers. If the economic boom of the mid-1980s proves anything, it is that the cost of credit can be very high but that in itself does not restrain real growth. What restrains growth is not interest rates, it is opportunities to profitably expand operations.  What the Fed cannot dare admit is that in a crony-capitalist, globalized, State/cartel-dominated economy, there are few profitable opportunities, regardless of the cost of credit.”

http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.de/2013/02/note-to-fed-giving-banks-free-money.html

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Turning New York City into Detroit?

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“Some large cities in California already have declared bankruptcy, for instance, and you can find the same pattern of overcompensated bureaucrats and escaping taxpayers. And the same thing may happen to New York City if the next Mayor is successful in pushing for more class-warfare tax policy.  But there’s a big problem with de Blasio’s plan. Rich people are not fatted calves meekly awaiting slaughter.  Gelinas warns that the city would have less money if just 20 percent of rich people escaped. She doesn’t think that will happen, but she does explain that rich people can stay but take some simple steps to reduce their taxable income.”

http://danieljmitchell.wordpress.com/2013/09/04/turning-new-york-city-into-detroit/

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