Yesterday, I pointed out that a study by one of the leading economic modeling companies shows that military spending increases unemployment and decreases economic growth. I have located (giant hat tip to Gordon) a paper by economist Robert Pollin published in 2007 by The Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst – […]
Read more...By Edward Harrison of Credit Writedowns L. Randall Wray has a post up at New Deal 2.0 which puts forward an idea which is pretty innovative. I would label it a private sector replacement for unemployment insurance. It’s the kind of thinking that might bring Obama out of a policy cul-de-sac as the economy hemorrhages […]
Read more...Submitted by Edward Harrison of Credit Writedowns I am posting this in the interest of widening the discussion at Naked Capitalism to include some topics in Europe. Fitch, the credit rating agency, has just downgraded the sovereign debt ratings for the Republic of Ireland from AA+ to AA-. That is two notches and is proof-positive […]
Read more...By George Washington of Washington’s Blog Many people – including former analyst for the U.S. Treasury Richard Cook – argue that credit is too important a function to be left to the private banks. Indeed, even after taxpayers have given trillions in bailouts, backstops, guarantees, and other gifts, the giant banks are still not lending […]
Read more...By Edward Harrison of Credit Writedowns If you have been wondering whether a statistical recovery is at hand, today’s ISM manufacturing report should be the clincher. The report was definitely bullish with the ISM index rising to 55.7 and sub-components supporting the understanding that the manufacturing sector is expanding. This is quite a contrast to […]
Read more...By George Washington of Washington’s Blog. Keynesians argue that we must increase fiscal stimulus to prevent a full-scale depression. They argue that “deficit hawks” are wrong when they say that we can’t afford any more stimulus, and that worrying about debt in a crisis of this size is penny wise and pound foolish, given the […]
Read more...By DoctoRx, who writes at EconBlog Review:Introduction A few days ago, Naked Capitalism kicked off a series of posts on government deficits with a first-of-two posts by me. My Debate on Deficits, was followed by posts by Marshall Auerback, Rob Parenteau and Dr. Edward Harrison. My initial post was itself a response to Dr. Harrison’s […]
Read more...By George Washington of Washington’s Blog. As I have repeatedly written, the largest U.S. banks have repeatedly gone bankrupt due to wild speculation which was blessed by the Fed, and then the government covered up their bankruptcy. Indeed, the New York Times writes today about one of the too big to fails: Over the past […]
Read more...By George Washington of Washington’s Blog. When a liberal labor leader and a conservative financial policy analyst unite against something, you know that something is really bad (actually, I don’t believe in the whole false left-right dichotomy; I think its Americans versus those trying to steal our wallets and our rights, but that’s another story). […]
Read more...By Edward Harrison of Credit Writedowns. DoctoRx, Rob Parenteau and Marshall Auerback have each written articles here to bring clarity to some issues I first raised at the beginning of the month in my post, “The recession is over but the depression has just begun.” As I see it, the issue we are debating has […]
Read more...By Marshall Auerback, an investment strategist and analyst who writes for New Deal 2.0. A major shortcoming in an otherwise thoughtful post by DoctoRX on deficit spending is a traditional mistake in which analysts seek to analogise the expenditures of government with that of a private household or business. The government is sovereign. This fact […]
Read more...By George Washington of Washington’s Blog. I have repeatedly pointed out that big banks are not more efficient than smaller banks. For example, I previously noted that an article in Fortune concluded: The largest banks often don’t show the greatest efficiency. This now seems unsurprising given the deep problems that the biggest institutions have faced […]
Read more...Rob Parenteau, CFA, sole proprietor of MacroStrategy Edge, editor of the Richebacher Letter, and a research associate with the Levy Economics Institute, responds to DoctoRx’s post, “Debate on Deficits.” DoctoRx raises a wide swath of excellent questions regarding the correct approach to financial crises, the economic contractions they can induce, and the best way forward. […]
Read more...We are going to feature a series of posts this week on the merits of the idea of using Federal deficits to stimulate an economy in severe recession or depression. The first offering is from DoctoRx, who writes at EconBlog Review: Part I. INTRODUCTION Robert Rubin’s home town of Miami Beach contains any number of […]
Read more...Submitted by Edward Harrison of Credit Writedowns. This is a re-post of an article I wrote last night at Credit Writedowns where I stressed a U.S.-centric view of Faber’s comments that the Fed is a money printer. However, here I have re-dubbed the post to reflect Faber’s comments, which are more comprehensive, in effect pointing […]
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