Amity Shlaes: How Government Unions Became So Powerful – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Amity Shlaes of the Council on Foreign Relations explains how the American workforce became divided between vulnerable private-sector workers and protected public-sector workers.”

Review & Outlook: Postcard From the NHS – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“The Wall Street Journal on Dr. Berwick’s health-care model at work.”

Is Your University Complying With the New Textbook Law? – NYTimes.com

freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com

“University students are returning to campuses throughout the country. It is a migration that raises my spirits – seeing the energetic, eager faces tackling another course in contracts or intellectual property. But this year something is different. For the first time, a federal law has taken effect which requires “institution[s] of higher education receiving Federal financial assistance” to provide students with information on textbook pricing.”

‘Clunkers,’ a classic government folly

www.boston.com

From the Department of Unintended Consequences: This article from the Boston Globe documents the effect of last fall’s “Cash for Clunkers” program on prices in the used car market today. Apparently used car prices are now higher because “…your Uncle Sam decided last year to destroy hundreds of thousands of perfectly good automobiles as part of its hare-brained Car Allowance Rebate System …or, as most of us called it, Cash for Clunkers. That was the program under which the government paid consumers up to $4,500 when they traded in an old car and bought a new one with better gas mileage. The traded-in cars – which had to be in drivable condition to qualify for the rebate – were then demolished: Dealers were required to chemically wreck each car’s engine, and send the car to be crushed or shredded…In short, Washington spent nearly $3 billion to raise the price of mobility for drivers on a budget.”

What Kinds of Tax Cuts are Best?

jeffreymiron.com

“With just two months until the November elections, the White House is seriously weighing a package of business tax breaks – potentially worth hundreds of billions of dollars – to spur hiring and combat Republican charges that Democratic tax policies hurt small businesses, according to people with knowledge of the deliberations.”

Interest rates and the US housing boom: A call for more research

www.voxeu.org

“The debate over the cause of the US housing boom and bust is far from concluded. This column questions the explanation that low interest rates were a critical factor, arguing that it sits uneasily alongside theories of household behaviour and historical evidence. With the causes remaining uncertain, the authors call for more research in this area.”

A Lifetime of Career Changes – The Numbers Guy – WSJ

blogs.wsj.com

“Though it’s often said that the average American will have seven careers in a lifetime, there is no statistical support for that figure.”

Elaine Chao: Another Unhappy Labor Day – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In the Wall Street Journal, former U.S. Labor Secretary Elaine Chao writes that Americans are aware of the folly of Washington’s economic policies.”

Michael Boskin: Summer of Economic Discontent – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“Stanford University’s Michael Boskin writes in The Wall Street Journal that the Obama administration’s ‘summer of recovery’ has fizzled in almost every way imaginable. The growth rate is less than half what it was at this stage after the 1974-75 and 1981-82 recessions.”

Joe Queenan: Goodbye to the Clichés of Summer – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In the Wall Street Journal, satirist Joe Queenan writes that somewhere among Julius Caesar, Edgar Degas, Lady Godiva and Lady Gaga, the word ‘legacy’ got hijacked.”

Where Columbia Beats Harvard: On the Battlefield of Curricula – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“James Piereson writes on The Wall Street Journal’s Taste page that away from the sports arena, Columbia beats Harvard on the battlefield of curricula. Excerpted from a longer version of his original article in the September issue of The New Criterion.”

Scott Brown: Want Middle East Peace? Deny Iran Nukes – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In the Wall Street Journal, Sen. Scott Brown of Massachusetts writes that Israeli-Palestinian talks are good, but Tehran’s nuclear drive continues.”

The Small Business Tax Hike and the 97% Fallacy

online.wsj.com

“In the Wall Street Journal, Kevin A. Hassett and Alan D. Viard of the American Enterprise Institute write that the president’s plan to raise top marginal rates is holding back the very people who should be leading the economic recovery.”

Charles Krauthammer – Our distracted commander in chief

www.washingtonpost.com

“Obama sees the war in Afghanistan as an unwanted interference with his true vocation.”

The Mosque’s Lesson on Loyalty

www.thepublicdiscourse.com

“Liberal charges of xenophobia reveal more about those making them than about those at whom they are aimed. This is not to say that those charges are merely cynical, that they are used only as weapons against the left’s political enemies. These charges, though misplaced, are sincerely made. And precisely because of their sincerity they shed light on contemporary liberalism, which is powerfully inclined to see xenophobia where it does not exist—or at least to regard as xenophobic thoughts and actions that most non-liberals regard as normal and just.”

The Generation That Can’t Move On Up: The Growing Gap Between Young Working-Clas

online.wsj.com

“Andrew Cherlin and W. Bradford Wilcox write on the Wall Street Journal Taste page about new statics and surveys that show a widening gap, both economic and social, between young people from working-class families, and the middle class.”

Bret Stephens: The Paula Abdul Theory of Foreign Policy – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In the Wall Street Journal, Global View columnist Bret Stephens writes that self-esteem does not make for good policy (or singers).”

The Costs of War, Continued – NYTimes.com

economix.blogs.nytimes.com

“As the Afghanistan conflict drags on, the costs of expected veterans’ benefits become a smaller fraction of the total cost of the conflict, an economist writes.”

Incentives Work for Pigeons. Can They Motivate American College Students? — The Amer

www.american.com

“How to improve the academic atmosphere of contemporary high schools and colleges.”

How to Tell When a CEO Is Lying – NYTimes.com

freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com

“In a nifty piece of forensic analysis, two researchers claim to have figured out how to tell when executives are lying. David Larcker and Anastasia Zakolyukina analyzed 30,000 conference calls between 2003 and 2007 to see if certain “tells” during the call were associated with earnings that were later “materially restated.”

www.nber.org

Here’s an interesting research paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research which provides a detailed assessment of the extent and nature of the federal subsidy given to state and local governments in the form “Build America Bonds” that were offered as part of the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act: “In 2009, BABs offered an average yield of 3.69 percent. The federal subsidy brought down the cost of borrowing for states and local governments to 2.32 percent.”

How Dismal is the Fiscal Future For America and Europe? Becker – The Becker-Posner Blog

www.becker-posner-blog.com

Here’s Nobel Laureate Gary Becker’s views on the possibility of a (developed economies) debt crisis: “Posner lays out clearly many of the present and future solvency and default risks to the United States federal government. He bases some of the analysis on a valuable recent Morgan Stanley report with the provocative title “Ask Not Whether Governments Will Default, but How”.”

O’Grady: Kirchner’s Assault on the Press – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In the Wall Street Journal, Americas columnist Mary Anastasia O’Grady writes about the Argentine president’s campaign to silence the country’s two most influential daily newspapers.”

Mark Helprin: The World Trade Center Mosque and the Constitution – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In the Wall Street Journal, Mark Helprin of the Claremont Institute writes that proponents have a right to build the mosque, but no American can be forced to pour concrete or cross a picket line of grieving families.”

Robert Barro: The Folly of Subsidizing Unemployment – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In the Wall Street Journal, the economist Robert Barro of Harvard writes that his calculations suggest the jobless rate could be as low as 6.8%, instead of 9.5%, if the Obama administration hadn’t extended jobless benefits to 99 weeks.”

Paul Rubin: Ten Fallacies About Web Privacy – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In the Wall Street Journal, Paul Rubin of Emory University writes that we are not used to the Internet reality that something can be known and at the same time no person knows it.”

Life-Insurance Coverage Wanes for U.S. Households – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“Nearly a third have no policies, a combination of the financial pressures on middle-income families and a reticence to purchase insurance due to the high cost of some policies and the hardball tactics used by some agents.”

ABREAST OF THE MARKET: The Decline of the P/E Ratio – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“As investors fixate on the global forces whipsawing the markets, one fundamental measure of stock-market value, the price-to-earnings ratio, is quietly shrinking, both in size and importance.”

FASB’s Tort Bar Gift – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“The Wall Street Journal editorial board on the accounting group’s proposal to require companies disclose the potential costs of litigation.”

Alex Epstein: Obama Follows Nixon on Oil Spill – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Alex Epstein writes that when it comes to handling oil spills, Barack Obama most resembles Richard Nixon.”

The Avastin Mugging – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“The Wall Street Journal writes that the FDA rigs the verdict against the breast cancer drug Avastin. ”

Jeremy Siegel and Jeremy Schwartz: The Great American Bond Bubble – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“Jeremy Siegel and Jeremy Schwartz write in The Wall Street Journal that today’s bond bubble resemble the tech bubble a decade ago. If 10-year interest rates, which are now 2.8%, rise to 4% as they did last spring, bondholders will suffer a capital loss more than three times the current yield. ”

Dogs for Everyone? – Freakonomics Blog – NYTimes.com

freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com

“New research shows that, in addition to being man’s best friend, dogs improve productivity in the office.”

The Government Mortgage Subsidy, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty

econlog.econlib.org

“ABC News quotes PIMCO’s Bill Gross. ‘Without government guarantees, mortgage rates would be hundreds — hundreds of basis points higher, resulting in a moribund housing market for years.’… What Gross is saying might be true if you are an unqualified borrower buying a house with little or no money down. But once upon a time we had a mortgage market in which borrowers with documented income and assets took out loans for 90 percent or less of the price of the house they were buying…”

Boaz on Media Bias, Bryan Caplan | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty

econlog.econlib.org

“[M]ainstream (liberal) media regularly put an ideological label on conservative and libertarian organizations and interviewees, but not on liberal and leftist groups…”

Jeffrey Miron » Blog Archive » A Government Role in the Mortgage Market?

jeffreymiron.com

“Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner, kicking off a half-day conference on housing finance, said Tuesday that it was important for the federal government to continue guaranteeing mortgage loans.”

In view of all of the discussion in the media concerning how firms are flush with cash these days, it is interesting to read the summary below, which notes that according to the most recent survey, “CFOs … are concerned about the availability of credit” (italics added for emphasis). Furthermore, I can’t help but wonder whether these cash holdings also correspond to chief financial officers having deflationary expectations; in a world with falling prices, it actually does make quite a bit of sense to horde cash.  Anyway, I am looking forward to “tuning in” to this webcast to learn more!

William McGurn: Are Americans Bigots? – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Main Street columnist William McGurn says elites have become far too ready to attack the motives of those who disagree with them.”

Henry Olsen: Unemployment: What Would Reagan Do? – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Henry Olsen of the American Enterprise Institute says no other recession in the last 60 years saw such rapid job destruction.”

Student-Loan Debt Surpasses Credit Cards – Real Time Economics – WSJ

blogs.wsj.com

“Consumers now owe more on their student loans than their credit cards. Americans owe some $826.5 billion in revolving credit, while student loans outstanding today total some $829.785 billion.”

From Gutenberg to Zoobert – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Information Age columnist Gordon Crovitz discusses the fate of the printed book in the age of the Kindle and the iPad.” Imagine this: the market capitalization of “Barnes & Noble, whose more than 700 stores make it the largest bricks-and-mortar book chain, … is less than $1 billion, compared with Amazon’s $55 billion.”

In silhouette – The Big Picture – Boston.com

www.boston.com

Fairness and the Capital Tax Fetish – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Columbia University’s business school dean Glenn Hubbard says the Bush dividend, capital gains and marginal income tax rates should be preserved. These tax cuts spurred economic growth, and letting them expire would have a dampening effect on the economy.”

When Congress Is Away, the Market Will Play – Freakonomics Blog – NYTimes.com

freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com

“Anxious investors can take heart: Congress’s August recess begins at the end of this week, which has historically been a good thing for the markets. Michael Ferguson and Hugh Douglas Witte found that “about 90% of the capital gains over the life of the Dow Jones Industrial Average have come on days when Congress is out of session.”

Michael P. Fleischer: Why I’m Not Hiring – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Michael P. Fleischer writes that punishing tax rates discourage job creation by businesses.”

Book review: The Five-Year Party – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“Melanie Kirkpatrick reviews The Five-Year Party: How Colleges Have Given Up on Educating Your Child and What You Can Do About It.”

Economics One: The Ryan Roadmap versus the Road to Ruin

johnbtaylorsblog.blogspot.com

“There are alternative plans of course, but at the very least the facts shown in these charts demonstrate that the Ryan Roadmap is a big improvement over the road we are on now.”

Review & Outlook: The Taliban Method and the Brutal Murder of Aid Workers – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“A Wall Street Journal editorial says that the murder of 10 aid workers in Afghanistan reveals the brutal nature of our enemy.”

Canada, the Land of Smaller Government – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Jason Clemens says that Canada’s government for the last 20 years has cut taxes and spending. It is emerging out of the recession faster than the U.S.”

Gary Hubbell: The Redneck tree hugger | AspenTimes.com

www.aspentimes.com

“Barack Obama is the best thing that has happened to America in the last 100 years. Truly, he is the savior of America’s future. He is the best thing (read more)…”

Treasury Lover Bets on Disinflation – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“The investment thesis of loyal Treasury-debt buyer Van Hoisington of Hoisington Investment Management cuts to the heart of an important question facing the global economy: Is inflation about to rise or will a chilling deflation take hold?”

Nature or nurture: What determines investor behavior

www.sciencedirect.com

Here’s the abstract from this fascinating article: “Using data on identical and fraternal twins’ complete financial portfolios, we decompose the cross-sectional variation in investor behavior. We find that a genetic factor explains about one-third of the variance in stock market participation and asset allocation. Family environment has an effect on the behavior of young individuals, but this effect is not long-lasting and disappears as an individual gains experience. Frequent contact among twins results in similar investment behavior beyond a genetic factor. Twins who grew up in different environments still display similar investment behavior. Our interpretation of a genetic component of the decision to invest in the stock market is that there are innate differences in factors affecting effective stock market participation costs. We attribute the genetic component of asset allocation—the relative amount invested in equities and the portfolio volatility—to genetic variation in risk preferences.”

Unions and the Obama Administration

www.becker-posner-blog.com

Here’s the latest from Gary S. Becker, 1992 Nobel economics laureate, on the topic of unions and the Obama administration: “Are the Democratic-controlled Congress and President Obama very much pro union? Unquestionably. Do the economic effects of unions on the welfare of workers as a whole justify that union bias? No. Has their pro-union orientation seriously retarded the recovery from the recession? Probably…”

Housing markets: Doomed to repeat history

www.economist.com

“Now, qualified homebuyers in the three states pioneering Affordable Advantage do not need to put down the 3.5 percent minimum down payment required by the Federal Housing Administration, or much of a down payment at all. They can get 100 percent financing — a loan as big as the purchase price of…”

Art Sales Revive From Their Swoon – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“It looks like the art market’s Blue Period is over. A year and a half after art prices plunged, the world’s chief auction houses say they have recaptured much of their pre-recession momentum.”

Daniel Henninger: The Great-Guy Theory of History – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Daniel Henninger writes that Charlie Rangel forgot that America’s voters want more than a great guy.”

GM’s Latest Nemesis: VW – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“Holman Jenkins writes in The Wall Street Journal that the real test will be whether GM can go forward and adapt successfully to a relentlessly competitive market.”

Betsy McCaughey: ObamaCare and the Constitution—An Update – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Betsy McCaughey notes that a federal court has denied the government’s motion to dismiss the challenge to the health reform law. Courts will have to take the arguments against the law more seriously.”

Dorothy Rabinowitz: Liberal Piety and the Memory of 9/11 – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Dorothy Rabinowitz says the enlightened class can’t understand why the public is uneasy about the Ground Zero mosque.”

More U.S. Children Being Diagnosed With Youthful Tendency Disorder

www.theonion.com

“REDLANDS, CA–Nicholas and Beverly Serna’s daughter Caitlin was only four years old, but they already knew there was a problem.

Obamacare Only Looks Worse Upon Further Review: Kevin Hassett

www.bloomberg.com

American Thinker: Paul Krugman Gives Up

Texas: The lone star

www.economist.com

“AMERICA’S recession has been a bad one, but it’s been much worse in some states than in others. The downturn in the West and Midwest has been long and deep. In the plains and on the East Coast, the recession was a bit milder and ended sooner. And among large states, no one matched Texas…”

Paul E. Peterson and Martin R. West: African-Americans for Charter Schools – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Paul E. Peterson and Martin R. West write that new survey data show black support for charters is on the rise. So why is the NAACP opposed?”

Virginia & the ObamaCare Legal Challenge – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“The Wall Street Journal writes that a U.S. district judge rejected the Administration’s argument that one of the key Constitutional challenges should be dismissed outright.”

Bret Stephens: Is Afghanistan Worth It? – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, Global View columnist Bret Stephens writes that the U.S. cannot remain a superpower if the suspicion takes root that we are a feckless nation.”

Hurricane Neal: Cat. 5 – Barrons.com

online.barrons.com

“Rep. Richard Neal’s bill has foreign insurance companies worried.”

‘Dilbert’ Cartoonist Puts His Money Into ETFs – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“Scott Adams uses his ‘Dilbert’ strip to mock actively managed funds and their managers.”

Connecticut Probing Pricing of E-Books – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal is conducting a preliminary review of digital-book deals between publishers and sellers including Amazon and Apple, noting similarity of prices.” Hmmm… I wonder if this means that the local gas stations are also colluding, since it sure seem (to me anyway) like they also offer their products at very similar prices!

We’re Still #1 (Unfortunately) « Donald Marron

dmarron.com

“The Bureau of Economic Analysis rewrote history on Friday. Along with GDP data for the second quarter, BEA also published revisions to its GDP estimates since the start of 2007…Bottom line: The recession was worse than originally thought. The economy contracted by 4.1% from peak to trough (Q2 2008 to Q2 2009), up from the 3.9% previously estimated. The Great Recession has thus solidified its position as the worst downturn since World War II…”

Report: Unemployment High Because People Keep Blowing Their Job Interviews

theonion.com

“With unemployment at its highest level in decades, the U.S. Department of Labor issued a report Tuesday suggesting the crisis is primarily the result of millions of Americans just completely blowing their job interviews.”

Number of the Week: Default Repercussions – Real Time Economics – WSJ

blogs.wsj.com/economics

“Twenty-five percent of Americans now have a credit score of less than 600. In an economy where credit plays a central role, that presents a significant obstacle to recovery.”

Book review: Higher Education? – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“Mark Bauerlein reviews Higher Education? How Colleges Are Wasting Our Money and Failing Our Kids—and What We Can Do About It, by Andrew Hacker and Claudia Dreifus.”

Paul Rubin: A Gulf Spill Tort Primer and Why BP SHould be Fully Liable – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“In The Wall Street Journal, economist Paul Rubin explains why BP should be held fully liable for all economic damages.”

Arthur Laffer: The Soak-the-Rich Catch-22 – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“Arthur Laffer, writing in The Wall Street Journal, says few things are so clear in economics as the fact that high tax rates don’t succeed in raising revenue or increasing the burden on the wealthy.”

Crovitz: WikiLeaks and ‘War Crimes’ – WSJ.com

online.wsj.com

“WikiLeaks.org founder Julian Assange says he wants to protect civilians. In fact he’s endangering them.”

UTIMCO move into gold a warning | Viewpoints, Outlook | Chron.com – Houston Chronicle

www.chron.com

“The Chronicle recently reported that The University of Texas Investment Management Company (UTIMCO) invested $500 million in gold. Normally, it’s not significant news when UTIMCO allocates 3 percent of its portfolio to a particular investment, but this particular investment decision was widely reported…”

Sand Drawings :: Jim Denevan

blog.2modern.com

“Jim Denevan is an artist based out of Santa Cruz, California who travels the globe creating large scale pieces of land art. Drawn on sand, earth, and ice, these incredible works of art are both created and destroyed by the very materials that enable their existence.”