(Dan here…Lifted from Robert’s Stochastic Thoughts.  Just a comment.) by Robert Waldmann Most absurd use of “Most” Two of the bees in my bonnet are the www.WashingtonPost.com Headline writer(s) and the abuse of the word “most.” In a bit of a shift*, I complain about the www.nytimes.com headline:  “Most Americans Oppose Health Law, Poll Finds” […]

by Tom aka Rusty Rustbelt Health Care Thoughts: How Old is Too Old Former VP Dick Cheney had a heart transplant according to several news sources today. I will refrain from making “he never head a heart before jokes.” Serious question though – Cheney is 71, how old is too old to receive a heart […]

The key failing in Krugman’s response to Steve Keen’s response to Krugman’s paper (PDF) is here: If I decide to cut back on my spending and stash the funds in a bank, which lends them out to someone else, this doesn’t have to represent a net increase in demand. Krugman assumes here that people have […]

I’ve written repeatedly now on AB that the challenge to the constitutionality of the ACA’s minimum-coverage provision (a.k.a., the individual-mandate provision) is not really a Commerce Clause challenge but instead a challenge under the Fifth Amendment’s due process clause, under what is known as the “substantive due process” constitutional law doctrine.  The Fifth Amendment’s due […]

To the general public, all that matters are the headlines, reflecting the bottom line.  The universal consensus among reporters who attended the 90-minute Supreme Court argument yesterday on whether an 1867 law called the Anti-Injunction Act bars the Court from considering challenges to the constitutionality of ACA’s individual-mandate provision was that the justices will decide […]

by Linda Beale Senate Dems unveil their tax cut proposal Senate Democrats, led by majority leader Harry Reid, unveiled a $26 billion tax-cut bill on March 26, 2012. See, e.g., Richard Rubin, Senate Democrats Said to Prepare $26 Billion Tax Cut Measure, San Francisco Chronicle (Mar. 26, 2012). The proposal revives the lapsed 100% expensing […]

Yves Smith  points us to information on our notions of new business and venture capital: Amar Bhide, who has written the classic, The Origin and Evolution of New Businesses, has decisively debunked the idea underlying the Obama Bucket Shop act, which is that public stock offering are an important source of funding for new businesses. […]

Financeaddict comments on a St. Louis Fed study: Their research asks whether there’s evidence that lenders changed their behavior to meet CRA, Fannie or Freddie-mandated goals by: making more subprime loans than they otherwise would have? lending to riskier borrowers than they otherwise would have? charging risky borrowers less than they otherwise would have? …If […]

by Tom aka Rusty Rustbelt Health Care Thoughts: Innovation is Good Except…. …. when it is not politically correct. For a long time large employers have used self-funded insurance plans backed up by stop-loss insurance for large claims. I have worked with employer plans down to the 100 employee size. Now small employers are trying […]

Below Dan pulled a post questioning Jon Chait’s claim that US economist’s generally support a broader tax base and lower rates. I am expert neither on taxes nor economists, but I will write at length on the question after the jump. Before the jump, I must note that Chait made many of the points I […]