DeLong on the Austrians
Not surprisingly, DeLong is not too impressed with (his own understanding of) the Austrian view. Unfortunately, DeLong’s list contains views that are not the “Austrian” take.
It Is Not the Aggregate Demand, Stupid!
According to Obama’s leading economic adviser, the current double-digit unemployment rate is obviously due to a “shortfall in aggregate demand.” The only “obvious” thing about such a diagnosis and prescription is that they are very useful to the Obama gang.
Short the Delusion
To be proved right in the end is never as sweet as one imagines. The recognition goes to those who curry favor with the media through publicists and charm while reconstructing history to suit their purposes.
John Holt: Libertarian Outsider
Outsiders like Holt come at their single issues the way certain dogs come at certain bones. They don’t become movement libertarians. They just go on about their intellectual business, providing us with invaluable ammunition.
Harvard’s Yochai Benkler on Net Neutrality and Innovation
I’ve posted recently about Net Neutrality–see Net Neutrality Developments and A Libertarian Take on Net Neutrality. There’s an interesting discussion about this and related issues on the EconTalk podcast, between host Russ Roberts and Yochai Benkler of Harvard.
The Checkered Flag of Communal Ownership: The Race to Exhaust the Fisheries
Technology is not to blame for over-fishing; competition is not to blame for over-fishing; lovers of fish are not to blame for over-fishing; the culprit is the conditions created by communal ownership—the burden is the fishing chase!
The War on Cash Heats Up in Las Vegas
IRS Special Agent in Charge Paul Camacho has been meeting with nightclub owners in Las Vegas and has told them they must monitor the spending activities of their customers who pay cash. A customer spending $10,000 a year in cash with need to fill out a Cash Transaction Report (CTR).
That’s right, $10,000 per year. So, a customer who drops in 10 times a year and drops $1,000 each trip, a CTR needs to be filled out.
A Theory on Why the SEC Hit Goldman
The theory goes that the SEC slammed Goldman hard in order to push the case of R. Allen Stanford – who ran a $7 billion Ponzi scheme – out of the headlines. The SEC delayed investigating Stanford for 13 years.
Fed Banker Concerned About Easy Money and a New Business Cycle
Apparently Bernanke is not able to rule the Federal Reserve System with as tight of an iron fist as Greenspan did. Some soundness of thought is creeping in between his fingers.
From the New York Times:
A lone dissenter on the Federal Reserve’s policy-making committee warned Friday that the central bank’s monetary strategy could backfire and touch off a new boom-and-bust cycle.
All those studies about piracy losses? bunk
Take a look at the GAO’s report on losses due to piracy. It concludes that all of the studies you have heard cited a zillion times are completely made up.
Three commonly cited estimates of U.S. industry losses due to counterfeiting have been sourced to U.S. agencies, but cannot be substantiated or traced back to an underlying data source or methodology.
