The Economist lists the Union payoff:
Mr Obama has revoked some Bush-era executive orders that unions hate and issued a few they adore. He has appointed union insiders to top jobs, allowed Congress to add “buy American” provisions to the stimulus bill, risked a trade war with China to please tyre-workers, let other trade deals wither […]
Archive for February, 2010
Feb24th2010
Feb23rd2010
When Obama proposed his credit card regulations, economic theory predicted what would happen: harm those with less than perfect credit scores (primarily the poor). Bryan Caplan, professor of economics at George Mason University, explained it best when he wrote:
” When you make lending to high-risk people less attractive, the result is not worse terms for […]
Feb22nd2010
“Scientists now think that King Tut may have died of malaria….this is a good excuse to meditate on just how rich we are. King Tut was probably the wealthiest man in the world during his time. He died of something that wouldn’t kill the most abjectly immiserated welfare mother in the United States today, because […]
Feb19th2010
I remember reading that Malcolm X, being the radical that he was, increased the support for Martin Luther King Jr. In a world without a Malcolm X, MLK would have been the radical one. But with Malcolm X in the picture, it pushes people to compromise on a more ‘moderate’ person - and MLK fit […]
Feb18th2010
Fiscal Stimulus And Hypocrisy
Published by in Economics, Fiscal Stimulus and ModernPolitics. 1 CommentMany Democrats, including Obama, have criticized Republicans for both opposing the Stimulus bill and helping to direct some of that stimulus money to their districts. They claim its hypocrisy. Greg Mankiw argues otherwise:
It seems perfectly reasonable to believe (1) that increasing government spending is not the best way to promote economic growth in a depressed […]
Feb17th2010
“If you did a simple cost-benefit comparison, the Obama plan vs. a simple extension of Medicaid, more R&D through the NIH, and some targeted public health expenditures, I believe the latter would win hands down. And the latter seems more politically feasible too. It avoids the mandate, the unworkable and ridiculously low penalties for those who don’t […]
Feb16th2010
Megan McArdle gives the loss breakdown:
It’s looking increasingly like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are going to cost the US government much more than AIG. In its latest long-term budget outlook released in late January, the CBO projected that the AIG bailout would ultimately cost the Treasury $9 billion dollars. Indeed, the entire private financial […]
Feb12th2010
Affirmative Action - Not Win-Win
Published by in Hispanics (Minority Issues) and affirmative action. 0 CommentsDuke University professors Peter Arcidiacono and Jacob Vigdor have a forthcoming paper in Economic Inquiry “Does the River Spill Over? Estimating the Economic Returns to Attending a Racially Diverse College”, Mark Perry provides a summary:
“Do white and Asian students at elite schools benefit from the presence of Under- Represented Minority students on campus or […]
Feb11th2010
Economist Arnold Kling gives what should be the Republican healthcare points in their upcoming healthcare summit with Obama:
1. All Medicare savings must be used to shore up Medicare. None of those savings can be used to fund new insurance subsidies or entitlements. Medicare is unsustainable, and it is going to need every dollar that we […]
Feb10th2010
I admit it, I get uneasy feelings when people congratulate Obama for increasing Pell Grants. I don’t see it as the universal positive that many others do. For three reasons.
First, Pell grants are politically cheap. Increasing funding for Pell grants takes little courage and comes with no political cost. Who disagrees with more funding for […]
Feb9th2010
Obama On Education
Published by in (modern day) Liberalism, Education, Hispanics (Minority Issues), ModernPolitics and Vouchers. 2 CommentsJay P. Greene, professor of education reform at the University of Arkansas, writes on Obama’s Education policies:
In a major address last March, President Obama declared that his administration would “use only one test when deciding what ideas to support with your precious tax dollars: It’s not whether an idea is liberal or conservative, but whether […]
Feb8th2010
“Apparently, the administration has issued rules requiring parity for mental health treatment with other illnesses. They’ll take effect July 1st. If you want to know why health insurance costs keep marching upward seemingly uncontrolled, this is why: mandating new benefits is always popular, and the government doesn’t have to pay for them.” — Megan McArdle
Feb5th2010
“As has been voluminously documented here, one of the most notable aspects of the first year of the Obama presidency has been how many previously controversial Bush/Cheney policies in the terrorism and civil liberties realms have been embraced. Even Obama’s most loyal defenders often acknowledge that, as Micheal Tomasky recently put it, “the civil liberties […]
Feb4th2010
You need to a flashplayer enabled browser to view this YouTube video
“The Lottery, a documentary due out May 7, follows four New York City families hoping to win the lottery to enroll their children in a Harlem charter school”. Via Joanne Jacobs.
Feb3rd2010
Eliot Spitzer On The Recent Supreme Court Decision
Published by in Judicial Nominees and ModernPolitics. 1 CommentEliot Spitzer on the Supreme Court decision that struck down the heart of campaign finance reform:
As an elected official who often tangled with wealthy corporations, I recognize that there is a superficial appeal in the prospect of being able to silence their political voices. Of course that is precisely why the First Amendment protects them […]
Feb2nd2010
Obama is fond of saying that he ‘inherited’ a $1.3 trillion budget deficit and is merely ‘only increasing it to $1.4 trillion in 2009 and to $1.6 trillion in 2010′.
Dick Morris gets behind the numbers and tells the part that Obama left out:
In 2008, Bush ran a deficit of $485 billion. By the time the […]
