There is so much crookedeness among our elites that it’s hard to know, absent more systematic study, whether Harvard is playing a leading role in this decline.
However, the glaring gap between Harvard president Drew Faust’s talk on ethics and her recent actions has stuck with me and I’ve concluded it merits discussion.
Read more...More old and new delights from the little shop of horrors that is the New Zealand Company Registry
Read more...A recent post by Ezra Klein, “What ‘Inside Job’ got wrong,” manages the impressive feat of being spectacularly off base, rhetorically dishonest, and embarrassingly revealing of the lack of a moral compass all at once.
Since being off base is a major part of Klein’s brand, I suppose one should not be surprised; those who’ve had the good fortune to have limited contact with his output can read Jon Walker’s “Ezra Klein: Insurance Exchanges Don’t Work and Must be Expanded Dramatically,” or Physicians for a National Health Care Program’s “Does Ezra Klein really think ‘managed care didn’t kill anyone’?” for two of many examples.
I’m going to shred this piece in some detail, first, because it will be entertaining, and second, I hope that it will encourage readers to take a cold, bloodyminded look at the excuses made for malfeasance in our elites.
Read more...We wrote a couple of days ago about the young versus old economy struggle over who will be the next leader of the IMF in the wake of Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s resignation. Ever since its inception, the IMF had had a European in charge. Christine Lagarde, the finance minister of France, is the favorite, and the US and Europe have enough votes to determine the outcome.
Representatives of several emerging economies voiced their objections, pointing to a comment made by Jean-Claude Junker, president of the Euro group, in 2007: “The next managing director will certainly not be a European”.
The Financial Times reports that the unhappiness has gone beyond complaints in the media to an open rift.
Read more...By Satyajit Das, the author of “Traders, Guns & Money: Knowns and Unknowns in the Dazzling World of Derivatives”
Martin Gilman (2010) No Precedent, No Plan: Inside Russia’ 1998 Default; MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts
Victor C. Shih (2008) Factions and Finance in China; Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts
Carl E Walter and Fraser J. T. Howie (2010) Red Capitalism: The Fragile Financial Foundation of China’s Extraordinary Rise; John Wiley, Singapore
According to myth, Russian minister Grigory Potyomkin ordered the erection of fake settlements, consisting of hollow facades of villages along the Dnieper River, to impress Empress Catherine II, about the value of her new conquests during her visit to Crimea in 1787. More than two centuries later, emerging market nations have borrowed the strategy. These three books provide insights into the Potemkin-village-like structure of emerging economies.
The Pentagon, to secure supply lines, is effectively making payments to warlords in Afghanistan. Not only is that undermining the central government (as in by reinforcing competing centers of power), but it also appears to be helping to fund the insurgents. Now before you put that overview in the “You cannot make this stuff up” […]
Read more...It’s easy for Americans to pooh-pooh bearish talk about the dollar. Yet the sterling was once the reserve currency, and has fallen, what, by 80% since it lost its standing. With increasingly dubious accounting and lax enforcement, the US capital markets no longer stand out by virtue of being better regulated. Yes, they still may […]
Read more...The Financial Times reports that the freeze on depositor withdrawals at Russian bank Globex is leading to high levels of withdrawals at other Russian banks, which doesn’t qualify as being a run…..yet. From the Financial Times (hat tip reader Michael): Globex on Wednesday banned depositors from withdrawing their money as confidence in the Russian banking […]
Read more...Griping Online? Comcast Hears You and Talks Back New York Times Economists’ new research shows positive effects of minimum-wage increases PhysOrg A Turkish theater for World War III Chan Akyam, Asia Times. I have no idea how likely the author’s scenario is, but the piece does suggest, if nothing else, that Turkey is going to […]
Read more...Bond maven Bill Gross has raised his estimate of losses from the credit crunch to $1 trillion. One has to note that his firm is a large holder of Freddie and Fannie debt and he issued this pronouncement the day after the GSE rescue bill passed the House and looks certain to become law. Note […]
Read more...We’ve cribbed the title of a provocative post by Satyajit Das at Eurointelligence. He argues that the US’s days of continuing to borrow abroad with little worry as to the consequences may be nearing an end. A good companion piece is Menzie Chinn’s Implications of adjustment to riskier dollar assets in a portfolio balance framework, […]
Read more...As he is often wont to do, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard worries, in dire terms, about the poor prospects for growth and stability, It would be easy to dismiss him as histrionic were it not for the fact that some commentators who have been right so far about the progress of the credit crunch, are also hyperventilating. […]
Read more...Before you break out the champagne on the news that international investors like the US (or more accurately, hate its stocks less than those of other nations), the article does not address the weighting of equities relative to other asset classes (ie, total allocations could still be down due to shifting more capital to commodities, […]
Read more...Ambrose Evans-Pritchard appears to be trying to corner the market in apocalyptic financial news. But his sources aren’t evangelicals, survivalists, or even goldbugs. The experts he cites are with respected financial firms, meaning they don’t sound alarms casually. Even more significant, the terms they are using to describe what might be coming are uncharacteristically dire. […]
Read more...Ambrose Evans-Pritchard in “Monetarists warn of crunch across Atlantic economies” in the Telegraph points to a troubling development: a fall over last few months in M1 and M2 in the US, UK and EU. Many have criticized the Fed for “printing money” of late. But the evidence suggests otherwise. First, all of the cash injections […]
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