Online Journal of Politics and Foreign Affairs
For the fourth time in the last 5 weeks first time jobless claims have risen. WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of newly laid-off workers filing initial claims for jobless benefits rose unexpectedly last week, evidence that layoffs are continuing and jobs remain scarce. The rise is the fourth in the past five weeks. Most economists [...]
While progressives are kvetching and conservatives are chortling over President Obama’s failures to enact his most visible policy initiatives, he’s quietly ratcheting federal control of society up to unprecedented levels. In a lengthy TNR feature, John Judis details how “Obama has reinvented the state in more ways than you can imagine.” Obama’s three Republican predecessors [...]
Once Again the CBO is bringing bad news to the Obama Administration. With the expiration of the AMT provisions at the end of 2009, an estimated 27 million people will be paying some amount of the AMT paying on average an additional $3,900 in taxes (granted the median tax increase is probably considerably less). Good [...]
The CBO’s look at the numbers (the Director’s Blog post) suggest it isn’t going to work out too well for the Obama Administration and whatever administration follows on. Now granted this is just a projection and quite a bit could happen between now and 2020. However, the idea that the Obama Administration is going to [...]
The special election to fill the Massachusetts Senate seat vacated by the passing of Teddy Kennedy is ongoing, with most expecting a win by Republican Scott Brown. Andrew Sullivan sees this as the death knell of American politics. I can see no alternative scenario but a huge – staggeringly huge – victory for the FNC/RNC [...]
Several months ago there was a bit of a flap between Greg Mankiw, Arnold Kling, Paul Krugman and Brad DeLong about how robust the recovery was going to be. Mankiw and Kling were pointing out that it is entirely possible the recovery might not be that robust. Mankiw cited the “unit root hypothesis” in economics [...]
In a rather bizarre case, the District of Columbia is suing AT&T for the value of unused money on calling cards owned by someone else. The attorney general for Washington D.C. has filed a lawsuit against an AT&T Inc (T.N) unit, seeking to recover consumers’ unused balances on prepaid calling cards. The suit claims that [...]
The federal government is placing limits on the ability of airlines to mistreat customers. They don’t go nearly far enough. U.S. airlines could face stiff fines for stranding passengers aboard grounded planes for more than three hours, according to a regulation that officials said on Monday was aimed at upholding passenger rights. The Transportation Department [...]
Greg Mankiw has 9 reasons on why an investment tax credit (ITC) is a good idea. The one that I think will resonate most with people is number 7, 7. So much for theory, but would it work? The cash-for-clunkers program is thought by many to have promoted, or at least accelerated, car purchases. An [...]
And be done with it for God’s sake. UPDATE (James Joyner): An excerpt from the story for those who can’t click through or in case the story goes away: Matthew Freeman is struggling to move on with his life, six years after being convicted of having sex with a high school girlfriend who was one [...]
The CBO has completed an analysis where non-group health care policies will increase in price somewhat substantially, but with those increased costs being offset by subsidies. The bottom line for non-group policies, CBO and JCT estimate that the average premium per person covered (including dependents) for new nongroup policies would be about 10 percent to [...]
Daphne Eviatar reports that the two people who crashed a state dinner last week may be facing criminal charges. Over at the Volokh Conspiracy, Orin Kerr explains the most likely legal theories for it. I’ve no doubt that the party crashers most likely broke the law, but I think that a Federal prosecution is absurd. [...]
New York City’s ban on food cooked with transfats is forcing shelters to throw out food donated to homeless shelters. When a small church comes to the Bowery Mission bearing fried chicken with trans fat, unwittingly breaking the law, they’re told “thank you.” Then workers quietly chuck the food, mission director Tom Bastile said. “It’s [...]
Josh Marshall points me to a story by WaPo’s Dan Eggen that sheds light on a little-known aspect of how Washington works: Hundreds, if not thousands, of lobbyists are likely to be ejected from federal advisory panels as part of a little-noticed initiative by the Obama administration to curb K Street’s influence in Washington, according [...]
The BEA has revised its estimates for the third quarter’s growth down to 2.8% from 3.5%. This is also a bit below the expected growth of 2.9% for the quarter. The main factors behind the downgrade: consumers didn’t spend as much, commercial construction was weaker and the nation’s trade deficit was more of a drag [...]
Nick Schultz points us to this interesting graphic on the private sector experience of presidential cabinets: The chart “”includes secretaries of State, Commerce, Treasury, Agriculture, Interior, Labor, Transportation, Energy, and Housing & Urban Development, and excludes Postmaster General, Navy, War, Health, Education & Welfare, Veterans Affairs, and Homeland Security—432 cabinet members in all.” If this [...]
Remember the bizarre case of Bill Sparkman, the census worker found hanging from a tree in Kentucky with the letters FED scrawled on his chest? Remember the media frenzy about crazy Southerners and their hatred of the federal government? At the time, I cautioned against jumping to conclusions, saying there could be any number of [...]
Paul Krugman has taken some rather interesting stances on the fiscal situation here in the U.S. First up is a piece entitled Fiscal Train Wreck from March 2003, With war looming, it’s time to be prepared. So last week I switched to a fixed-rate mortgage. It means higher monthly payments, but I’m terrified about what [...]
Well looks like the entire town of New London, Conn. is going to get screwed by Pfizer. “Look what they did,” Mr. Cristofaro said on Thursday. “They stole our home for economic development. It was all for Pfizer, and now they get up and walk away.” That sentiment has been echoing around New London since [...]
The Urban Institute’s Eugene Stuerle is not very happy with the health care expansion legislation that is likely to be passed into law. Stuerle argues that the legislation violates the standards of equal justice. Of course, families in this income bracket pay far more than $14,700 for health care. They get hit by uninsured expenses [...]
Reason‘s Nick Gillespie has a bit of fun with the UPS-FedEx fight to make a larger argument about unions. What’s particularly amusing about this is that, rather than seeking to get the favorable regulatory treatment that FedEx enjoys, UPS is fighting to put FedEx under the same onerous rules. I’m reminded of the old joke [...]
The recently passed health care “reform” noted by James below is going to have another impact some have noted, but many have not given much thought too. It will, in effect, make labor more expensive. When something becomes more expensive for firms then tend to use less of it. They will substitute away from it [...]
It looks like the Obama Administration’s brilliant political jujutsu move of using “jobs saved or created” is making its way around some of the economics blogs again. First up is Brad DeLong’s attack on Allan Meltzer. Meltzer wrote the following, There is no greater recognition of the failure of the stimulus program to create jobs [...]
Back when talks about bailing out General Motors started one potential issue was that GM would “encouraged” to make decisions based on political considerations vs. a sound business plan. Looks like there is evidence for such concerns with this story of how Montana’s Congressional Representative and two Senators are pushing to get a contract reinstated [...]
Yesterday afternoon, in a bit of faux transparency like you’ve never seen before, the administration released the names of everyone who has toured the White House from Obama’s inauguration through the end of July. This, after various Freedom of Information Act requests to determine whether, say, William Ayers and Jeremiah Wright have stopped by. A [...]
The New York Times has an interesting multiple choice question regarding how to spend money to help stimulate the economy, If you wanted to help the economy and you had $14 billion to bestow on any group of people, which group would you choose: a) Teenagers and young adults, who have an 18 percent unemployment [...]
President Obama has declared that the swine flu, which is much less prevalent and deadly than the ordinary influenza virus, is an “epidemic” and a “national emergency.” Silly as it sounds, it was the right call. President Obama has declared H1N1 swine flu a national emergency, clearing the way for his health chief to give [...]
I periodically hear this during presidential campaigns and when various elected officials are trying to push a green policy, often in response to global warming. Because of [insert environmental problem here] we need to pursue a policies that will promote [insert one or more alternative fuel/energy sources here]. And not only will it address [the [...]
Mickey Kaus noted the other day that the UAW, which owns large stakes in both GM and Chrysler without paying a cent thanks to their support for the election of President Obama, is cutting their own companies a break and sticking it to Ford. I knew they’d find a way to punish Ford: The new UAW [...]
Peter Suderman and Berin Szoka provide sane, libertarian arguments against the Nanny State regulating the volume of television commercials. While they both find the longstanding practice where the ads are several decibels higher than the surrounding programming annoying, they nonetheless argue that it’s not a matter where government should intervene. Says Suderman, It’s easy enough [...]
James Capretta does a back of the envelope calculation on the Baucus health care reform bill and concludes that it would be like having a 70% marginal tax rate on the low income. According to CBO, family coverage in 2016 is likely to cost about $14,400 under the so-called “silver option” in the health-care reform [...]
Tyler Cowen passes along a paper [PDF] which finds that “every death of a helmetless motorcyclist prevents or delays as many as 0.33 deaths among individuals on organ transplant waiting lists.” The study is titled “Donorcycles: Do Motorcycle Helmet Laws Reduce Organ Donations?” On balance, I oppose helmet and seatbelt laws on the grounds that [...]
Ezra Klein enjoys cooking and endorses “Naked Chef” Jamie Oliver’s notion that we’d be a healthier society if we cooked our meals at home rather than eating so much high calorie fare at chain restaurants. Still, he notes, The problem is that the evidence suggests meals aren’t driving the rise in obesity — snacks are. [...]
Former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican and world renowned heart surgeon, argues that the federal government must require all Americans to purchase health insurance. In our reimbursement-driven, public-private health sector (which delivers the most robust health services on the globe), the only way affordable access can be achieved is for every citizen [...]
A census worker was found hanged in Kentucky in a bizarre and grisly case. When Bill Sparkman told retired trooper Gilbert Acciardo that he was going door-to-door collecting census data in rural Kentucky, the former cop drew on years of experience for a warning: “Be careful.” The 51-year-old Sparkman was found this month hanged from [...]
In a brief aside about the Joe Wilson “Liar!” comment, Matthew Yglesias writes: Personally, I sort of liked Rep Joe Wilson’s idea of introducing British-style heckling to the halls of congress; totally disrespectful and out of step with American tradition, true, but their tradition is better. I agree with this sentiment. I spent many a [...]
Tyler Cowen has written several posts in favor of the bailouts. His argument goes something like this: Note that even when the Fed “bails out” a large investment bank, or insurance company, they are checking a chain reaction which would likely spread to some commercial banks, thus bringing in deposit insurance as well, not to [...]
Over at his web site Dave has put up a post discussing how resources are allocated. I’ve touched on this very briefly in comments and a post or two, but nothing this extensive. As such, go read it, it’s good. Here is a snippet, Despite the author’s attempt to assuage concern by pooh-poohing the idea [...]
In the last several posts on health care it is often pointed out that health insurance companies engage in dubious practices. For example, they’ll deny coverage for the most trivial of reasons. Many posting comments focus on this issue as well as others such as quality of care, the moral nature of providing health care, [...]
“Is is possible to make a coherent argument that government-provided healthcare is a moral obligation but that our obligation doesn’t extend to people in Zambia? I don’t think it is but I’m willing to listen to the arguments.” – Dave Schuler It’s possible to make a practical argument along those lines, as well as to [...]
Dave Schuler reports that this is exactly what happened in his hometown of Chicago. The Monday furlough that was touted as a draconian way to cut the budget wound up hurting only the government employees who get screwed out of a day’s pay. Dave suggests, “If this keeps up the people of Chicago may decide [...]
The Obama Administration may be dropping the public option requirement from its health care agenda. PHOENIX — The White House, facing increasing skepticism over President Obama’s call for a public insurance plan to compete with the private sector, signaled Sunday that it was willing to compromise and would consider a proposal for a nonprofit health [...]
The Obama Administration is pushing an 8-pronged list of “Health Insurance Consumer Protections.” No Discrimination for Pre-Existing Conditions Insurance companies will be prohibited from refusing you coverage because of your medical history. No Exorbitant Out-of-Pocket Expenses, Deductibles or Co-Pays Insurance companies will have to abide by yearly caps on how much they can charge for [...]
Matt Yglesias notes that Shanghai has a long-term plan for expanding their subway system and laments that we’re not so forward thinking here in America. What’s striking is the extent to which we don’t operate like that here in the United States. I think everyone believes that over the next couple of decades the Washington, [...]
David Frum frets that conservatives might be in for a Pyrrhic victory in the health care fight if they define winning as “beat back the president’s proposals, defeat the House bill, stand back and wait for 1994 to repeat itself.” [W]e’ll still have the present healthcare system. Meaning that we’ll have (1) flat-lining wages, (2) [...]
Following up on this post about US life expectancy at birth by Dr. Joyner last Friday, it occurs to me that there’s a quick and easy step the federal government could take that would significantly increase our life expectancy almost overnight. Unfortunately, while it would without a doubt have a much more profound effect on [...]