Unlike Fannie and Freddie, AIG was royally and truly doomed. The Fed tells us so: In unusual and exigent circumstances, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, by the affirmative vote of not less than five members, may authorize any Federal reserve bank, during such periods as the said board may determine, at […]
Via Dr. Black, Douglas Holtz-Eakin eliminates his last shred of credibility as he tells us what John McCain invented: “He did this,” Douglas Holtz-Eakin told reporters this morning, holding up his BlackBerry. “Telecommunications of the United States is a premier innovation in the past 15 years, comes right through the Commerce Committee. So you’re looking […]
By Mike Soraghan Posted: 09/04/08 03:07 PM [ET] Georgia Republican Rep. Lynn Westmoreland used the racially-tinged term “uppity” to describe Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama Thursday. Westmoreland was discussing vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin’s speech with reporters outside the House chamber and was asked to compare her with Michelle Obama. “Just from what little I’ve […]
Notice the change on the left side bar for our series on Social Security and the numbers that indicate it is okay. Whew!!!
In honor of Bruce Webb’s “hibernation” post (and reinvigoration of his own blog), a partial retrospective of his 50-part series (for which some enterprising publisher should contract for a book version): Intergenerational Equity, Unfunded Liability and Selfish Boomers Unfunded Liability Bookended Social Security 2027: A date for action? CBO: Updated Long-Term Projections for Social Security […]
Emanuele Millemaci and Robert Waldmann This paper focuses on two main issues. First, we find that, on average, households’ discount rates decline. This implies dynamically inconsistent preferences. Second, we calculate an indicator of the degree of dynamic inconsistency that may help us to understand how households overcome their self-control problems. We use a micro dataset […]
Perception, per the NYT: Fed Leaves Key Rate Steady as It Worries About Growth Reality: TSLF (Mar 11), PDCF (Mar 16), expanded acceptable collateral pool (multiple times, most recently Monday), loans to the parent from the subsidiaries to cover capital needs.* And it may not be enough. (Of course it’s an AIG link.) There’s more […]
Time for this adopted Angry Bear to go into hibernation for the winter. Events out of Alaska and now out of Wall Street make it extremely unlikely that Social Security itself will return to the center of the policy table anytime soon. Rather than rallying to crush one of the remaining cornerstone’s of the New […]
Floyd Norris lists the Unlucky 13, a.k.a., my portfolio.* Ignoring AIG (of which more later, maybe), here are the top Market Cap losers in the S&P 500 YTD, who combined have dropped by more than half a trillion dollars: EXXON MOBIL GENERAL ELECTRIC MICROSOFT AT&T CITIGROUP BANK OF AMERICA After reading that list, I fully […]
McCain and Obama on Lehman BrothersMcCain: “The crisis in our financial markets has taken an enormous toll on our economy and the American people — first the decline of our housing markets followed by the collapse of Bear Stearns, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and now Lehman Brothers. I am glad to see that the Federal […]