PGL, in the process of an optimistic piece, points us to Martin Feldstein ringing in 2011. Apparently, the reason is this: The most substantial potential boost to spending comes from a temporary reduction of the payroll tax, lowering the rate paid by employees on income up to about $100,000 from 6.2 per cent to 4.2 […]
I was going to point out that finance people are not so dumb as economists,* but Echidne’s takedown of Gary Becker is so divine it deserves your attention more: This argument was initially made by Gary Becker, an economist, a very long time ago.** It is not an uncommon argument from conservatives (or from certain […]
Welcome to the New United States. Trust that Jared Bernstein (if this one shows up, instead of this one) will have more on how much future damage can be done to the economy. UPDATE: Scott Lemieux weighs in, correctly seeing it as worse than any reasonable examination of the facts would have permitted*: Systematic discrimination […]
Despite winning the big prize, evolution scores low on the scale at the Miss USA pageant: Only Miss Massachusetts and [newly crowned Miss USA, Alyssa] Campanella stood up for Darwin. Score one for Charles Darwin. Campanella, 21, of Los Angeles, who calls herself “a huge science geek,” says evolution should be taught in public schools. […]
I’ll add the scene from It later. Or someone can put it in comments and we’ll promote it to here. UPDATE: R.I.P., Clarence Clemons. QOTD from Walter Jon Williams: Young folks may be shocked to discover that Clarence Clemons had a band before Lady Gaga.
Go. Read. US Bank Exposure to Greece, part 3. The FT lets someone from Nomura argue that Kash’s declaration of U.S. bank exposure to Greek default in Part 2 (referenced here, but just go to Kash’s link for the gist) was overstated. Nomura and The FT lose the argument, badly. “Disasters for an economy — […]
I’m not going to do this with graphics (at least for now), but the finger exercise seems intuitive. Assume—against all evidence—that the “once we educated them, 30% said they would stop offering health insurance to their lowest-paid employees” study is accurate. How does that, as John Boehner declares, cost America jobs? From Boehner’s site: At […]
Alea gives the lie to that lie. Italy!!!?
Yahoo! News, Tuesday early afternoon Dr. Black, Wednesday, just before noon. Brad DeLong, about fifteen minutes after Dr. Black Me, Monday morning. But this isn’t a “First Mover” claim. It’s a note that there are no “savings” in getting rid of the website. There aren’t even the “registration fee” that applies to private enterprises. Commenter […]
I left out of the last post why David Vitter (claims) he is blocking the two SEC nominees: Sen. David Vitter (R., La.) will block two nominees to the Securities and Exchange Commission until the agency announces whether victims of R. Allen Stanford’s alleged Ponzi scheme are owed compensation from the Securities Investor Protection Corp….“We’ve […]