Why Ricardian Economics Persists

Krugman points out that the economics of austerity has a long and persistent history. Current commentators are not the first to point out why this might be the case. As usual, Keynes was there first.

Sounds Like a Book to Read

I missed this when it appeared (during my first year of retirement, I was playing way too much golf) but it looks like the acorn hasn't fallen too far from the tree. A review of Jamie Galbraith's "The Predator State."

The Big Disconnect

I've commented before about the socially unproductive uses of resources that go to Wall Street. This blog by Sir Charles on Cogitamus is a biting commentary on a posting by an unnamed member of the "masters of the universe." Read the original post if you'd like a view of a guy without a clue. Anyone who thinks they can walk cold into a class of third graders and not get eaten alive by the second week, not to mention climbing 30 feet up a ladder to rescue a child from a burning building or disarming a drunk holding a family hostage, has way too high an opinion of themselves. It's a measure of how skewed our world has become when the people that matter end up the victims of the bad actions of the people who don't. We've managed to save the salaries and bonuses of people on Wall Street who produce things we don't need while people we do need see their positions cut and their workloads increase.

How Did this Liar Get Elected?

Because some people will believe anything. Perry is an unrepentant liar and will say anything that will promote him personally. Texas used stimulus money to plug the state's budget hole at the same time he was posturing about "big government."

How Can Ideology Trump Logic and Facts?

Easy, once people make up their minds they are apparently immune to what's actually going on around them. Supply siders versus the real world.

Makes Me Wish I'd Caught More of "Countdown"

From Litbrit at Cogitamus. Will Comcast make MSNBC as bad as their cable service?

An Unending Supply of Republican Morons

The reasons Republicans give for repealing ACA continue to pummel the brain. Here's an example from Texas. I hope this sort of stupidity is not infectious. How can elected representatives be so uninformed? There should be a test. I took an on-line civics test a couple of days ago along with a number of my friends. As I looked over the results, I noticed that elected officials performed far worse on the test that ordinary citizens--and I mean far worse. Since when has ignornace become a prerequisite for public office and what does it say about those of us who elect them?

This Is the Best Conservative Economists Have To Offer as Criticism of the ACA

Ezra Klein on Greg Mankiw's latest right-wing economic nonsense. It proves that Harvard doesn't discriminate against weak intellectual argument.

Why Can't People Think Straight About the Federal Budget?

Our budget issues are likely to be insoluble as long as the majority of us want the government to provide what we regard as essential services but are unwilling to pay for them. A new poll from the New York Times exposes how conflicted people are about spending and taxes. Too bad there ain't no thing as a free lunch. It's going to be interesting to watch the Republican leadership wrestle with the recently elected members of their party who want deep cuts in government spending--cuts the populace is unwilling to tolerate. The Republicans may have dug their own grave by convincing so many people that we can have all the government we want and not have to pay for it. The complete lack of intelligence and logic in the policy proposals of the Republicans is beginning to show.

Just in Case You Thought Geithner, Et Al. Hadn't Sold the Public Down the River

Simon Johnson analyzes the Treasury response to the Dodd-Frank Bill and the "Too Big" argument.

Sargent Shriver

From Cogitamus. Compelling quote and good music.

Why the Republican Party Hates Facts and Logic

Paul Krugman writes about the Upton Sinclair effect. It explains, at least in part, how conservatives have been able to reverse themselves on so many issues over the past couple of decades--from health care to deficits. They have no core position (unless it is to make rich people richer). Because they can reverse course so easily, logic and evidence can have no effect on their positions. To paraphrase Mark Twain: "Lies, damn lies and Republican policy."

A Clear Description of Health Care Basics

Paul Krugman provides a simple and clear description of the basics of health care provision. This is particularly relevant for the US, given that we have taken the first steps towards clearing up our current health mess. The basic problem is that each of the three requirements under the Affordable Health Care Act approach (and the approach in Massachusetts) means that someone's ox gets gored. The fight now is over whether any of the three legs gets repealed (the one under the gun now is mandated coverage), which of course means that the whole logic of affordable health care falls down.

Health Care Repeal

There's been a lot of misinformation about the Affordable Care Health Plan that begins to go into effect this year. In addition to reducing the federal budget by over $200 billion dollars over the next few years, it also changes the access people of all ages have to decent health care. Please read this petition, especially the last part which outlines the first steps to improve health care for children, young adults and seniors. If you think these are worthwhile goals and think that reducing the deficit is important, please sign the petition.

http://stophealthcarerepeal.com/

Ain't That a Big Enough Majority...?

D.J. Tice, in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, makes a point many of us may have missed in the debate over "sanitizing" Huckleberry Finn. It seems particularly relevant in these days of constant polling to find out "what the public thinks."

Milton Friedman as an Economic Liberal

It's a measure of how looney things have become that Keynes and Friedman are closer in an economic sense than Friedman and the purported "conservative" economic thinkers (or at least those conservatives who profess to be thinking about economics). Ron Paul and others who present themselves as a conservative alternative to Keynesian economics are actually far on the fringe of economic thought. Their theories have no relation whatsoever to fact and are refuted by all of modern economic history.

We're Number 1! (And Number 3!)

According to the Daily Beast, Northwestern is the top academic school among BCS conference teams (according to graduation rates across all sports) and Missouri is number 3. The Big Ten dominates the top 25 with nine teams (all but Iowa and Michigan made the Top 25) with the SEC second with five. The Pac 10 (6), Big East (6) and SEC (5) dominate the bottom 25. Both of the BCS finalists are in the Bottom 25.

How do we achieve a "Moral" Economy?

Paul Krugman : More Thoughts on Equality.

[W]e should try to create the society each of us would want if we didn’t know in advance who we’d be.

Penetrating Insights from William Greider

In The Nation.

The Facts on Repealing the Affordable Healthcare Act

If you want to know the effects of repealing this act, look here.

The "Morality" of Free Markets

Reading this column by Paul Krugman this morning, I realized that I have maybe been missing something. As and economist and historian, I've always been somewhat perplexed by a negative reaction to the idea of government intrusion into economic activities. Some people have a great aversion to progressive income taxes and their redistributive element. Some people label public policy such as the Affordable Care Act as "socialist." As Krugman points out, these reactions to government policy aimed at assisting the less fortunate or providing equal access to essential services are based on the assumption that the free market somehow yields up the morally best outcome. Perhaps if we all started out with exactly the same opportunity when we are born, then outcomes would reflect inherent abilities (with a certain amount of luck thrown in). The fact is we don't all start with the same opportunities and we are not all provided the same access to the education, health care and other things that affect economic success. Throw in discrimination on the basis of race, religion and sex, and the lack of a moral justification for economic outcomes in a free market becomes obvious. The market is not "free." The outcomes experienced by many Americans are affected by more than innate ability and hard work.

In the US, income distribution and economic opportunity are becoming more skewed every year. The transfer of wealth to the top 5-10% over the past decade is a major reason why the current recession has been so prolonged and shows little sign of ending any time soon.

No Comment

Guns in the Texas Capitol. All people in the press are by definition rational.

More from the Hate-Mongering Republican "Leadership"

Matt Taibbi in Rolling Stone:

Another Ohio Democrat, Steve Driehaus, clashed repeatedly with Boehner before losing his seat in the midterm elections. After Boehner suggested that by voting for Obamacare, Driehaus "may be a dead man" and "can't go home to the west side of Cincinnati" because "the Catholics will run him out of town," Driehaus began receiving death threats, and a right-wing website published directions to his house. Driehaus says he approached Boehner on the floor and confronted him.

"I didn't think it was funny at all," Driehaus says. "I've got three little kids and a wife. I said to him, 'John, this is bullshit, and way out of bounds. For you to say something like that is wildly irresponsible.'"

Driehaus is quick to point out that he doesn't think Boehner meant to urge anyone to violence. "But it's not about what he intended — it's about how the least rational person in my district takes it. We run into some crazy people in this line of work."

Some people don't realize that words are not just words.

I Guess We'll Just Have to Focus on the Entertainment Value of the the Next Two Years

and hope the country comes to its senses once it sees these morons in action. It looks like most of the Republicans should spend some time listening to what they intend to say before saying it. But diarrhea of the mouth is difficult to cure. Some of them might also want to have recourse to a dictionary--sometimes those big important sounding words don't meant what they think.

Music Recommendations

I'm a fan of Irish and Irish American Celtic punk rock. I posted some links to the Pogues (Ireland), Flogging Molly (LA), and the Dropkick Murphys (Quincy, MA). You can add the Tossers (Chicago) to those groups. I should emphasize the "punk" in Celtic punk rock. At times the lyrics are not for the faint hearted.

I also like Tejano music (sometimes called Norteno or conjunto)--basically guitars and accordions. My favorite group is the Texas Tornados, which contain some of the all time greats: Doug Sahm (now deceased and replaced by his son), Augie Meyers, Freddy Fender and Flaco Jimenez.

The Republicans Are Coming

All Talk, No Substance

Apparently no brains, either. Are the Republicans ready to govern anything? They don't seem to have any plan but rhetoric.

Kill Jobs? Kill People?

Republican policies will actually do both. The key is what kind of jobs and what kind of people get killed. If you are a state, local or federal government employee, killing your job doesn't matter to the Republicans. For all the push to reduce the size of government, teachers, firemen and police are government employees, but the death of their jobs doesn't matter to Republicans. If you are elderly or young and can't afford health care, your death doesn't matter to Republicans. This is another example of Republicans co-opting a pejorative term and applying it to things they don't like.

Are We Finally Getting Somewhere with Economic Policy?

Matt Yglesias on the appointment of Gene Sperling as chair of the NEC. Maybe what President Obama needs is a good dose of President Clinton. Ideas on fixing the economy are great, but without followup, they aren't worth much.

Maybe Rick Perry Would Have Been Better Off Losing the Election

The Texas miracle may not be a miracle after all. It looks like we have an uphill battle. It will be us ordinary folks, especially the very young and the very old, that pay for Perry's bad stewardship.

How Bad Can It Get? Wait and See.

The Republicans have introduced a bill to repeal the Affordable Health Care Act. The new bill's title is a lie: "Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act." The non-partisan CBO has provided the (required) analysis of the bill. The Republican's push to repeal the AHCA shows at least two things. First they are not serious about reducing the deficit, given that repeal would add billions to the budget shortfall. Second, they don't care a whit about ordinary Americans, 32 million of which would be left uninsured under repeal as compared to the AHCA. Republican leadership has exempted the bill from their requirement that all legislation that increases the deficit be offset by cuts elsewhere. Apparently lying has become a reflex for Congressional Republicans.

Education

XKCD

Republicans vs. Us

Unless you make over a million dollars a year, the Republicans are not your friends. If you voted Republican in the last election, just wait and see what they have in store for you.

And Again I Say: I'm Shocked, Shocked!

Republicans apparently can't help themselves. They profess to care about the deficit, going so far as to change House rules about passing legislation that increases the deficit. But when it comes to repealing the Affordable Care Act, which will decrease the deficit, they suspend the rules the other way. What a bunch of scumbags.

Women in Science

This makes my daughter's earning tenure at UT even more impressive. It's still tough for women to succeed in science.

Texas? Miracle?

I wondered when the national press was going to tip to this. Things are as bad fiscally in Texas as anywhere else--maybe worse on a per capita basis.

I'm Shocked, Shocked, I Tell You

On Republican deficit hawks.

What's in Store for 2011

I've been reading what the incoming Republican leadership has been saying about their plans for the next legislative session and I have to tell you that I'm scared spitless. Even if one agrees with their plan to repeal the Affordable Health Care legislation (and I don't), the rest of their plans are scary. After railing against the Democrats for increasing the deficit, they forced a budget busting tax cut for the wealthiest 1% of Americans. Now they want to change House rules so that increases in deficits caused by spending have to be offset by spending cuts elsewhere, but deficits caused by tax cuts don't have to be offset. This after stripping out budgetary pay-as-you-go rules during the Bush administration so they could finance the war in Iraq with a huge deficit. When it comes to the deficit, Republicans fail math. Why people want to delude themselves into thinking that we can cut taxes without cutting the core areas of the budget--Social Security, Medicare, defense--escapes me. The Republicans say they want to cut a trivial $100 billion from non core areas--the court system, public safety, health, education--after giving up a $800 billion tax cut. Please tell me how they think this will cut the deficit.

The inmates have definitely taken over the asylum.

Matt Yglesias on the Hypocrisy of Greg Mankiw

Greg Mankiw is widely regarded as the dean of conservative economists. He was chairman of George Bush's Council of Economic Advisors and is a professor of economics at Harvard. He appears in a position to speak with authority on economics from the Republican side. He recently wrote an editorial advising President Obama on how to deal with the Republicans on budget issues. However, a closer look at his own performance as chairman of the CEA shows that his own policy advice to George Bush (and the actions of Republicans when they were in control of the budget) are sharply at variance with the advice he has for the President. It's sad to see an economist of Mankiw's former stature fall into this state--a shill for the continuance of the bankrupt policies that got us where we are now.