Ron Paul Has Already Won

Ron Paul’s bid for the U.S. presidency ranks among the most heroic anyone has ever undertaken. We live in emergency times, with a choice between forms of socialism or fascism. The parties’ leadership have embraced this decrepit old model, despite all evidence of the bankruptcy of statism. Ron alone dared pose a challenge. His bid has also been the most unusual in modern history.

Why We Should Worry about Deflation

In a recent post on Mises.org Doug French argued that we should not worry about deflation. There are some sound theoretical reasons to favor deflation. Since increasing productivity brings prices down deflation is a sign of progress. Furthermore, the common arguments against deflation are not well founded. For example, some say that deflation could cause consumers to hold back on spending, and this could slow down the economy.

Standing Keynesian GDP on Its Head: Saving Not Consumption as the Main Source of Spending

According to the prevailing Keynesian dogma, consumption is the main form of spending in the economic system, while saving is mere nonspending and thus a “leakage” from the spending stream. This dogma underlies much of government economic policy in the United States, including the so-called economic stimulus package that has just been enacted. In this article, I prove, to the contrary, that consumption is not the main form of spending in the economic system and that the source of most spending is, in fact, saving. I prove my claims by starting with the very formulations of the expenditure aggregates presented by the Keynesian doctrine itself. Thus, the simplest, core accounting relationship of Keynesian economics is that national income, which is essentially the sum of profits plus wages, is equal to the sum of consumption expenditure plus net investment. It is only a small step from national income to gross domestic product (GDP). Essentially all one does is add business depreciation allowances to profits on the left-hand side of the equation and to net investment on the right-hand side. This last raises net investment to what contemporary economics calls gross investment. The sum of consumption plus gross investment is held to equal GDP.

Jonathan Lebed: criminal or just one smart stock-trading cookie?

I can recall reading this article by Michael Lewis when it first appeared, but it holds up 6 years later. It is his detailed out of how a 15-year old made the big bucks on Wall Street through day trading -- until the SEC cracked down for reasons that are oddly unclear. It also reminds us of one good thing about working at the New York Times. Investigators at the SEC actually call you back and tell you what they are thinking. In this case, it is devasting.

Britney, The Paparazzi And Land Socialism

The city of Los Angeles is considering an ordinance that would create a paparazzi-free bubble of safety around celebrities whereby the proceeds of the sale of photographs taken within the bubble would be confiscated. Situations such as this one exist due to a lack of property rights. Roads, parks and other areas are made available to everyone by the state, and in so doing, it has to try to accommodate as many groups as possible, even when each group wishes that the other would disappear.

A new year coming

The Chinese stock markets have been closed for several days to celebrate the new year--the year of the Rat. One wonders what the Chinese market will do when they reopen. During the last three days the less volatile Japanese stock market lost 6% while the Dow lost 3%. Of course the Chinese themselves during this time have experienced the worst storms in the last 50 years with many areas out of power, while others managed to celebrate the new year while listening to reports of a possible recession in the US.

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