Yes I'm sure some unspecified measures to cut down on obscene executive pay will be enacted by the Tories any minute now...
Wednesday, January 04, 2012
Between The Lines
I've read this article a few times and I can't quite figure it out. I think there's an implied allegation here, I'm just not sure precisely what it is.
REUTERS - MF Global unloaded hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of securities to Goldman Sachs in the days leading up to its collapse, according to two former MF Global employees with direct knowledge of the transactions. But it did not immediately receive payment from its clearing firm and lender, JPMorgan Chase & Co, one of the sources said.
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
If I Had A Hundred Billion Dollars
I'm not sure if California HSR is where I would spend it. I'd probably spend it on intra-city transit projects instead. But that's not a choice which actually exists. So build the damn thing.
Unpunished Sexy Time
I'm glad anti-choicers are finally being more up front about what they really want. Some of us crazy people on the internets have, for years, tried to inform (sometimes) well meaning liberals that the abortion conflict wasn't really about abortion, or specifically it wasn't about any desire to actually reduce the number of abortions, it was about increasing the punishment for unapproved sexytime. And we were, you know, proved fucking right, so to speak.
Growth For Whom
I don't think there's much wrong with thinking that growth is important, what's problematic is the general unwillingness by economists to dirty their beautiful minds by concerning themselves with distributional aspects. Essentially the implicit welfare function is W=f(GDP), where higher GDP means higher social welfare. This is true even if the increase in GDP benefits, to use the current parlance, the 1% at the absolute expense of the 99%. Without getting too deeply into what a social welfare function should look like (and of course people will disagree), it seems reasonable to suggest increasing GDP to the detriment of most of the population shouldn't automatically be seen as an improvement.
The View From The Core
Now I'm not a big fan of Germany's plans to destroy most of the rest of the European economies, but one thing our leading economic geniuses don't ever seem to do, aside from trotting out false stereotypes about hardworking Germans and lazy Spaniards, is to come to terms with just how that country manages to thrive with high wage high value added manufacturing economy.
German unemployment fell to its lowest rate in December since 1991, according to the German Federal Labour Agency.
The adjusted jobless rate fell to 6.8% from 6.9% in November, the Federal Labour Office said.
The Righteous Shall Prevail
I don't think most of our hucksters really believe in their bullshit, they just want tax cuts and free money for rich people and will invoke any argument to achieve that goal. They don't really care if such policies grow the economy or not, because they don't care about the economy. They care about the pocketbooks of themselves and their friends and their donors and the general Galtian Overlord class.
In Yurp, however, it seems some of the "technocrats" do actually believe that through the widespread application of leeches to the moochers and parasites, every country can magically run a trade surplus. Or something.
In Yurp, however, it seems some of the "technocrats" do actually believe that through the widespread application of leeches to the moochers and parasites, every country can magically run a trade surplus. Or something.
They Can Just Take Pictures Of Each Other
Not a new point, but there are several political events where the media presence comes close to being larger than the number of actual participants themselves. I've heard some not so plausible justifications for this, but basically they're like journalist conventions. You need to go to see and be seen because that's where anyone who is anybody is.
Fortunately We Have A Proven Policy For Dealing With This Issue
Austerity!
Registered unemployment (SPUECHNG) in Spain, where almost half of young people are out of work, rose for a fifth month in December as the euro area’s fourth-largest economy contracted.
Monday, January 02, 2012
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