The Epicurean Dealmaker notes that the stock market “game” is irrevocably rigged against the individual investor, and the best thing anyone can do is realise that is so: I believe [Leo E. Strine Jr, vice chancellor of the Delaware Court of Chancery]’s analysis should conclusively disabuse participants in the current debate over financial regulatory reform […]

Robert Waldmann One strange thing about the health care reform debate is that insurance companies claim to support reform. I have tended to suspect that they are just playing possum. Now I find positive proof that WellPoint is willing to do what it takes to make sure health care reform passes — they sued the […]

by Linda Beale(cross posted with ataxingmatter) What’s Your Top Ten List for Tax Reforms? Tax Prof’s ongoing discussion of potential tax reforms to be suggested to the Volcker Commission got me thinking what my own “top ten” would be. I’ll list them here, but I invite readers to provide their own as well. (Much of […]

rdan Trent Lott demonstrates pretty normal behavior for people who think they are prepared and are not…I guess he did not need to sign a waiver of never regretting not buying public backed insurance. Of course, how that gibes with the rhetoric of no public option and ‘taking responsibility’ is very human…it tends to change […]

Robert Waldmann Paul Krugman does not think highly of Austrian or liquidationist theories of the business cycle. He recently remade an argument which is hard to refute “the whole notion falls apart when you ask why, say, a housing boom — which requires shifting resources into housing — doesn’t produce the same kind of unemployment […]

Robert Waldmann OK now that I have your attention, the policy is publicly funded primary care in public clinics staffed by federal employees (including the MDs). This is an excellent policy which provides care for the uninsured and reduces health care spending, because then they don’t have to go to emergency rooms then declare bankruptcy. […]

By Spencer, Reading the financial press, various economic blogs and watching CNBC clearly leaves the impression that the current weakness in the dollar is having such a massive adverse impact on the holding of the Peoples Bank of China ( the Chinese central bank) that they are very seriously considering selling their dollar holdings and […]

rdan Adam Smith’s Lost Legacy, a blog maintained by Gavin Kennedy who resides in Edinburgh, Scotland, is a wonderful gem to visit to take a thorough look at the broad extent of Smith’s writings. He makes a wonderful defense of Adam Smith that rescues his reputation as a thinking man instead of the one dimensional […]

by Rebecca Ex post, it is obvious that the Fed was way too tight in the second half of 2008. To be sure, the FOMC was actively engaged in its standard easing policies; however, the Fed got the Treasury to aid in its sterilization efforts, and later the Fed fast-tracked the interest on reserves (IOR) […]