I have tried to stay away from the term “garbage” in reference to Dr. Greenspan but today’s (Ides of March) Senate hackery went way too far: At present, the Social Security trustees estimate the unfunded liability over the indefinite future to be $10.4 trillion. The shortfall in Medicare is calculated at several multiples of the […]

As I suggested earlier, Greenspan is spouting more garbage when he claims that his support for the Bush tax cuts was justified given the projections of the budget surplus at the time. Greenspan’s deliberate implication is that the US’s budget deficits are the result of bad budgetary forecasts, not the tax cuts. That is simply […]

I finally read something from Stephen Moore worth quoting: As former Chrysler Chairman Lee Iacoca once declared, any CEO who tried this with a private firm’s pension fund would be thrown in jail. Of course, this was Lee Iacoca’s line and Stephen does not really go after his accomplice in their Soc. Sec. scam. But […]

No, Mr. Chairman. We were not all wrong: Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) sparred today at a congressional hearing over whether Greenspan deserves some blame for helping to create the federal budget deficits that he regularly deplores. Greenspan said today, “we were all wrong,” in early 2001 when government […]

David Malpass opens his NRO oped by noting Alan Greenspan’s “warnings on the deficit situation”, but then writes: In a good turn of events, however, the recently passed House and Senate budget resolutions include reconciliation instructions requesting tax-cut legislation in 2005 … Indeed, a joint House and Senate budget that includes tax-cut funding would be […]

Jack Snow’s annouces a government web site of the usual distortions. But could someone explain this line from our Treasury Secretary: So if someone promises you a 75-year fix, I encourage you to read the fine print. In 1983 we were promised a ‘75-year fix’ – but 2 years later, the system was headed out […]

Keep up the good work, PGL: Support for Bush on Social Security Wanes, Poll Finds Barely a third of the public approves of the way President Bush is dealing with Social Security and a majority says the more they hear about Bush’s plan to reform the giant retirement system, the less they like it, according […]

When I read Duncan Black’s latest Wanker, I began to wonder if David Brooks had mastered the technique known as the Vulcan Mind Meld. Greg Mankiw’s lead paragraph reads: Harvard University is, by some measures, one of the most left-wing institutions on the face of the earth. So you may be surprised to hear that […]

Donald Luskin is pushing this paper from Thomas A. Garrett and Russell M. Rhine as proof we should support Bush’s Social Security proposals. Their paper tells us two things we already knew: the expected return on stocks exceeds the risk-free rate but actual returns may vary. And one would do better if one did not […]

“Record” seems to be the favorite term for CNN of late: household wealth yesterday and record export demand today. It is true that exports have risen in nominal terms and are even higher than they were in 2000 after adjusting for inflation. Exports, however, are only 10% of GDP now versus 11.2% for 2000. BEA’s […]