Arnold Kling is taking up the case that less government is better than more government. Since I have been banned at his site I will respond here. From 1850 to 1950 US trend per capita real GDP growth was 1.4%. Since 1950 US trend per capita real GDP growth has been 2.1%. From 1850 to […]

One thing there is almost universal agreement on is that the US economy has very large excess capacity and that capacity constraints are unlikely to be a significant factor for the foreseeable future. But is it. In November capacity utilization in manufacturing rose to 75.2%. But this does not mean that the manufacturing sector has […]

Time to lighten-up, even if some of the most recent news is better. And I could not find one of my all time favorites that the economy is so bad that the mob in Rhode Island had to lay-off six judges.

Given the other recent economic data that suggested the economy was improving and that the economy might actually be achieving self-sustained growth the November employment report was a major disappointment as the unemployment rate ticked up from 9.6% to 9.8%. Non-farm employment was little changed as it only ticked up 39,000, less than half the […]

I just want to remind everyone that the last president to implement a federal pay freeze was Nixon. And of course we all remember how that worked. Just after that was when I left government for about a 33% raise in total compensation — including fringe benefits and retirement. So much for over paid federal […]

Spencer The New York Times had blog commenting on the suggestion that we should return to a gold standard. (NYT Back to the gold standard) My question about such a proposal is what should be the price of gold in the new gold standard ? The 18th century gold standard system that so many people […]

How many of you read Frank Rich In the Sunday New York Times? http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/07/opinion/07rich.html?_r=1 It is an interesting approach. But I would do him one better. I would suggest to Obama that he offers the Republicans a deal for the Bush tax cuts for those making more than $250,000. Offer to sign legislation for this […]

While the employment report was weak, it was among the best we have seen this cycle. Nonfarm payroll employment rose by 151,000 and the unemployment rate was unchanged at 9.6%. Compared to the historic norm in earlier recoveries this employment gain was very weak, but compared to the same point in the last two jobless […]

It was fascinating watching Jack Welch on CNBC this morning. He kept talking about how we needed to sacrifice to balance the budget. But at the same time he kept pushing that the Bush tax cuts had to be preserved. I kept wanting to ask Welch what he was willing to sacrifice to balance the […]

Auto and light trucks sales rose from 11.76 million to 12.26 million in October, a 4.25% gain. Since the bottom auto sales have been rising at a 10% to 12% annual rate — depending on if you calculate the trend as a linear or an exponential trend and October sales were right on this trend […]