Repeat after me: "Do you want fries with that, sir?" I think what Obama really said was "I hope you can learn to count change." The job rate among 18-24 year-olds is the worst level since 1948; only 54% have a job. Plus, wages are down for youth workers while they have risen marginally for [...]
They're finally figuring it out. The Greek "bailout" deal, the terms of which seem ever-changing, includes "austerity" for the masses, but also includes this gem: From the New York Times, regarding Greece: Ms. Katseli, an economist who was labor minister in the government of George Papandreou until she left in a cabinet reshuffle last June, [...]
In a prominent article in yesterday's Richmond Times Dispatch (front page, above the fold), the paper reported that gasoline prices could reach $4 per gallon by June. The article went on and on about middle east tensions, "risk premium," "the Iran factor" and so on. Interestingly, the word "demand," as in "gasoline demand," appears only [...]
If you watch bubblevision financial news, you might think that the stock market has been great this year. After all, the government deficit-spenders and Federal Reserve money-printers have been very busy trying desperately to prop up their phony baloney managed economy so that we all "keep believing." On these pages, we have repeatedly and sincerely [...]
Bloomberg: Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke signaled he’s concerned Europe’s crisis will hobble a 2 1/2-year U.S. expansion that may need another boost from the central bank. The economy allegedly "grew" at about 2% this fiscal year. In the meantime, the federal government borrowed and spent the equivalent of 13% of GDP. SO if [...]
Welcome to a new kind of tension. All across the alien nation. Where everything isn't meant to be okay. - Green Day, American Idiot, 2004 Cui Bono (who benefits)? - unknown origin, but famously used by Cicero Live Greek RiotCam here. Had the new R majority in Congress begun investigations into the overt (obvious, in-your-face, [...]
Amid high rates of joblessness and underemployment, today’s youth are starting to feel the squeeze of a downturned American economy. The data released from the 2010 Census verifies what many experts as well as ordinary citizens had known for some time: the current generation of young adults, recently dubbed “The[New] Lost Generation”, are having a difficult [...]
The August employment report, ZERO new jobs, was a wake up call. What's going on? The mainstream press has gone to great lengths to convince us that the wise economists in their lofty heights of academia have broken economics down to a science. They'd like us to believe the economy is like some purposely-built machine [...]
This isn't a democracy. Government by polls = democracy. Democracy = two wolves and one sheep voting on what to have for dinner. ===> Democracy = Where’s my free stuff? Yet, any understanding of the simple math of how a productive free market economy actually works, which is no longer taught in government schools (hmmm, [...]
T-Bill rates now negative, general collateral at 1 (ONE!) basis point (=0.01% interest). Negative interest rates mean that you are willing to pay someone to hold your money on the belief that you will get your money back less a storage fee. Capital is going into hiding at a frenetic pace. Negative short term rates [...]
The economy is in a slump, so the government must step in and help stimulate it so we can have prosperity again. That sounds like a reasonable statement, so what’s wrong with it? A lot of things. The first is that it’s a magician’s trick. The way it works is that the government quietly takes [...]
The diagnosis of cancer is a shock to any patient and their family because it is such a devastating and life-threatening disease. Even so, there is a cure for it if caught early enough. But the cure can sometimes be worse than the disease. Radiation treatment works well at destroying the cancer, but in doing [...]
