rdan Movie Guy asks in comments: I would prefer to read the risk assessment viewpoints of bankers and underwriters as they understand that subject matter far better than most. That’s the best starting point in my opinion. Whether their models were wrong or were simply ignored internally or by regulators is a question that hasn’t […]

by cactus GW is on vacation. He’s certainly had a lot of these vacations. And yeah, I understand, he still gets his briefings and the like. (I note, most white collar workers I know take work home during their vacations and weekends too.) I realize he doesn’t have a boss and he’s not accountable to […]

Robert Waldmann Over at the Washington Post, Robert O’Harrow Jr. and Brady Dennis have a fairly interesting first of 3 articles on what went wrong at AIG. Of course, they tend to stress personalities and personal conflicts, but they do slip in some good points about economics. I’d say the key bit was that AIG […]

While the brood was at Mary Poppins, I took advantage of the Academy Awards rules and went to see Revolutionary Road. The incremental cost was subway fare (arguably a sunk cost, since I have old Metro cards) and the $12.50 NYC film ticket price. So that was quite rationalisable; met up with an old friend […]

Shira, the kids, and the m-i-l went to see Mary Poppins on Broadway for the former’s birthday. In this version, the father still works for the bank and is given a choice early on: he can loan money to someone who promises to invest the money in business ventures in Foreign Lands and make marvelous […]

rdan The LA Times reports on news regarding shale oil development: Salt Lake City – A titanic battle between the West’s two traditional power brokers – Big Oil and Big Water – has begun. At stake is one of the largest oil reserves in the world, a vast cache trapped beneath the Rocky Mountains containing […]

cross posted with Health Care Think Tank by STR “Should we return to the Certificate of Need (CON)? In the 70s and 80s many states had health care Certificate of Need laws. In general, the CON required state approval for the construction or major renovations of hospitals, the construction or major renovation of nursing home […]

rdan Jamie Galbraith in the Predator State: Galbraith follows with an impertinent question: if conservatives no longer take free markets seriously, why should liberals? Why keep liberal thought in the straitjacket of pay-as-you-go, of assigning inflation control to the Federal Reserve, of attempting to “make markets work”? Why not build a new economic policy based […]

davenoon at LG&M and Kikuchiyo Jones subbing for the good Roger Ailes both clobbered the WSJ’s most egregious fluffing this year. Martin Feldstein continues to try to destroy the previously-brilliant David Warsh’s reputation by openly declaring that the major Bush administration policy initiative was a complete failure, and that a dollar spent with a multiplier […]

Via Dr. Black, this piece yields preciousness: “You have to stay on top of your game,” said Sklar, 65, a straight-talker who wears cuff links to work and has managed sales crews for a quarter-century. “You have to maximize your opportunities. You have to do what you have to do to make a deal.” [emphasis […]