The Wonderful World of Economics

America maybe heading for an economic down grade by years end

2011-10-24T16:50:00.002-04:00

Big trouble maybe a head...

Mohamed El-Erian, co-chief investment officer at Pacific Investment
Management Co, said that “The global system must now adjust to the many
implications and uncertainties of the once-unthinkable loss of America’s
AAA”.Well, only three months later, Merrill Lynch warns that another
downgrade
is not only a significant blow to the current slow recovery
but a
fact if the
Congress does not agree on a credible long-term
plan
to reduce
the country’s
deficit.Ethan Harris, economist
with
Merrill
Lynch North
America, explains: “The
credit rating
agencies
have strongly
suggested that
further rating cuts are
likely if
Congress does not come
up with a credible
long-run
plan”. In fact,
Merrill expects either
Moody’s or Fitch to reduce
U.S.’ rating in
late November
or early
December.

The thing is that if congress could you know come together with each side giving on someting we could get out this mess easy but right not we are so divide no one wants to set at the table and get what needs to be done...done. Which honest will be some cuts as well as some tax increases.

Is the occupy wall street movement just the free market in action?

2011-10-09T10:42:00.001-04:00

Is the occupy wall street movement just the free market in action? An interesting question may seem odd to some because many of the people protesting are against the free market or at least calling for regulation of business and because of that fact the first reaction to that question is no of course the occupy wall street protestor have nothing to do with the free market. But that view would be wrong.

Often the rebuttal to the ideal of regulations is that ultimately it’s not needed because in the end the invisible hand of the free market will regulate the actors in the economy. Examples of this would be things like the ideal that we don’t need something like the FDA or the USDA because if any of the food we eat turns out to be unsafe then people will stop eating it. This ideal moves out to anything else that is or can be regulated, there is no need for the regulating because consumers will reject bad actors in the economy.

In this cause the invisible hand of the free market isn’t acting against a company that is putting out a shoddy product and people refusing to buy it. This time the invisible hand is being moved by the masses who have not been enjoying the fruits of this economy, the people who weren’t allowed to get capital in this capitalist economy. The recent (and not so recent) college grad who can’t find a job. The person who has been working hard at a company for decades only to have their job shipped over seas, etc, etc.

The current economic system is not working for them, in fact some of them are actually being harmed by it. Just as people would stop buying a product they found out is no good or even dangerous, people will also rise up against systems that have turned out to be no good or dangerous to them. History is littered with rulers and nations being over turned by the people because they didn’t feel like they where being treated fairly.

Looking at history there seems to be a breaking point for a certain level of inequality. It’s not that people don’t expect there to be those that are doing better then others in fact I think people find that to be the norm. The problem isn’t that there are the rich and poor, it’s when it comes to a point when people feel that the rich are taking from them (to the point they are getting poorer) to get richer. That’s the point many in America feel today and that is point when people feel the economic system isn’t working for them and rebel against it.

As I see it there are basically two paths that the rich can take when the market gets like this. They can keep going along the same path and take the risk that the people rebelling win and in the act of fixing things to work better for them make the rich suffer or the rich can make some changes and allow the non-rich to earn a decent living and the rich can continue to be wealthy. Logically I think people would go with the later path but right now it seems that people are set to keep on the same path as before, but it’s early and that may change. I believe the reason the later path often doesn’t get chosen is that people either don’t believe they are going to be over turned by the masses or think it’s worth the risk because even thought they will be making money on both paths they will be making more in the first then the second one. Or maybe it’s just a case of those people knowing how to work the current economic system but fear they won’t be able work what comes next and still be wealthy.

Though I guess there are those who really believe in the free market principle and the market means let the people get so angry that they try to change the system let them because that’s is what the market it wants.

Irene an economic stimulus that I hope we can avoid

2011-08-26T16:40:00.000-04:00

I like I assume everyone else is looking at the news about hurricane Irene with a bit of fear. Even though I don’t live on the east cost I have family that does and hope for their safety and I dread the thought that of so many people that maybe killed or their lives ruined because of this hurricane.

But as I have these worries I can’t help but also think about the fact that if Hurricane Irene is bad as they say it might be then we are going to need a massive recovery. A lot of money will need to be poured in to rebuild these towns and cities. Which would be good for the economy. In a time when many business are holding onto their money instead of using it to grow (both their business and the economy) this could force them to spend that money to rebuild buildings they may lose during this storm.

I know this reads like I’m cold and the truth is I feel a little odd writing this, and as the tittle of this article points I rather this not happen, but the truth is if it does then we will have a bump in the GDP as people have to pay for rebuilding.

Down Grading America and what maybe the start of the Tea party depression

2011-08-07T10:35:00.000-04:00

It is a great understatement to say that we are living in interesting times. America has just avoided default last week as Congress finally reached a deal to reach the debt ceiling. Most people thought that this would be enough to avoided all the bad prediction on what will happen to the economy if that ceiling isn’t raised and at first that is what seemed to have happened. Moodies has kept our AAA rating, the pundits where happy since it seemed that catastrophe was narrowly avoided. Sadly this may not be the cause for the last few days the stock market has been having a huge sell off, Standards, and Poors as down graded the USA from a AAA rating to an AA rating.
The reason this is happening is because faith in American government has been shaking by they way politicians have been handling things. Not just due to the childish drama we went through just to get the debt ceiling raised, but also because the deal reached has lead to many to wonder how well America be able to get it self out of the recession it is in. That’s right people don’t have hope that cutting spending will get us out of a recession and for good reason, when you think about the fact that these takes cuts will put millions of people out of work. Giving that we already have unemployment around 9% (or depending on how you count the unemployed nearly double that) it makes since that people aren’t at ease with job killing government spending cuts. Some also worry that the deal will tie the governments hand when it comes to rolling out any stimulus plans that could jump start the economy.
I am sure faith in America can be restored but people need to act wisely. Sadly we have many in office who seemed to refuse to act in any manner that can be confused with wisdom. The debt ceiling was an issue only because it was made an issue when the tea party refused to raise it unless they had the cuts they wanted. The thing is a clean raising of the debt ceiling was something that was routine. It is true that fault lays not only with the Republicans but the Democrats as well. The issue of the debt ceiling could have been avoided if Obama let the Bush tax cuts expire instead of listing to the Republicans who demanded that it was extended in return for extending unemployment. To get out of this mess we most remember that economic policies are like steering a car. Just as one can’t say I refused to turn my steering wheel to the left or right, one can only hold onto one policy in ever situation. Some times you have to raise taxes, sometimes it’s better to cut them, sometimes spending cuts need to be down right now and others times it’s actually wiser to increase spending. The fact that we have people in government that refuse to see this is the problem and that wont change unless they change their ways or they are voted out of office.

1954 to 1963 richest americans paid 91% tax rate

2011-04-28T15:09:00.002-04:00

1954 to 1963 richest americans paid 91% tax rate

today they only pay 35%

with all the talk about the budget and debit this nation is facing it makes you really think could the problems we are facing economic be linked to are low tax rate.

1954 to 1963 richest americans paid 91% tax rate by wonderfulworldofecon
Browse other Tax T-Shirts

Macolm Gladwell writer of the tipping point talks about higher taxes on the rich are they good or bad?

2011-01-04T12:36:00.001-05:00

higher taxes the thrid rail of politics that could power America's economy

2010-12-07T11:32:00.001-05:00

I was talking earlier about raising taxes. I would like to note another reason why politicans aren't quick to raises taxes on the rich and that's because the highest tax bracket no longer just covers them. due to a mix of inflation and the fact that in 80's the number of tax bracket where lowered to simplefly them the top income bracket starts at the upper middle class.

Bill Gates is taxed as much as some as the family making $350,000 a year. That family maybe doing pretty well with that income they aren't doing nearly as well as Bill Gates and I don't think they should be taxed the same.

This is simple fixed by adding more tax brackets that cover a higher and higher income groups. The people making $350,000 well be taxed the same they are being taxed right now. Then the group above them a bit more and so on and so on.

economic tax plans and the road seldom taken

2010-11-29T09:28:00.000-05:00

There have been a number of economic plans making the news recently. Some even bi-partisan and even though these plans are being hailed for taking ideals of both sides to make sure we don't face a deficate. But I notice that I have really seen anyone talk about raising taxes on the richest Americans. Yes they talk about ending tax cuts but the bushes tax cuts where set to end anyway. I'm talking about actually raising taxes on the richest americans well above what they paid before Bush (hell more then they payed before Reagon) in a move to raise revunue for America.

As I stated before taxes are currently at one of the the lowest rates they have ever been for the rich.

I know it's a third rail issue and politicans are afiard to touch it, not because it's a bad ideal but because no one really wants to pay taxes (though we like the benifits we get from paying taxes) and if you are going to aim a new tax hike on the rich you are taxing the people with loads of money. They are either the people that give the politicans the money they need to run or those with the power to raise a ruckus and mount a campiagn against the ideal.

But even though it's easy to see why a politican would back away from pushing the issue of higher taxes. It still stands that it is one of the most logical ways to make sure the United States is well founded.

Not only are you making sure we increase tax revune, if the tax is high enough it can act as an economic stimulus as people who currently are setting on large sums of money are forced to either use it (in things like highering people, giving to charities etc) or losing it in taxes.

Are taxes really too high?

2010-11-24T11:43:00.000-05:00

Often we see politicians talking about lowering taxes. Often they say that it will spur economic growth or they say we are paying high taxes. They say that as if right now we are paying some historically high tax rate.

But if you look at the history of the American tax rate it is clear that this is not true, if you look at the top tax rate. There have only been a few periods where taxes have been below where they are at right now (35%) on the top income earners. Those times where 1988-92, 1925-31 and 1916 to 1916.

Truth be told taxes have often been much higher. In fact if you look at America after WW II (a period of great economic expansion for this country) the richest Americans paid at least nearly twice what they do now. Normally taxes for people in the top income bracket was in the 70's to 80's percent but reached as high as 92% in 1952.

So while we have politicians pushing to make sure the rich keep tax cuts, there isn't much historic proof that keep taxes as low as they are now on the rich is actually a good thing.

Economic improvement For sale or lease

2010-11-10T12:08:00.000-05:00

Driving around town (and surrounding areas) I've notice that a lot of retail buildings are up for sale or up to be leased.

It's similar to how I used to (ok still see) so many homes for sale and both are due to the down turn of the economy. But it seems like the housing market has already hit the bottom and is claiming up it seems like I am seeing more retail space up for sale.

Like the years before the crash of the housing market there was a boom of houses either being build or solid well over market value the same is true for retail commercial zoning. At least there was a lot of building of new retail buildings. For years I've notice new shopping centers pop up and tons of suburban/urban sprawl.

It seemed like a good thing at the time but I wonder did we see a little to much growth? Clearly some of these business have gone out of business because the economy is down but how many places are out of business because they where effected by the sprawl that may have over estimated the economy's growth in the first place.

An example I notice is that over the past few years a few new malls have opened up which has lead to the closing of the mall that has been in the area for decades. Since the new malls been built the old mall slowly started to die off until last year they closed down with sears being the only store in that mall opened.

I wonder how many of the buildings I see with a for sale sign are like that business are closed not just because of the bad economy but because business has been shifted to somewhere else or maybe we have one to many similar stores nearby and so business has been split between them but none of the stores got big enough of the pie to stay in business.

But even though it's economically troubling to see so many business out of business, I also have hope. The fact that there is so much commercial space out for sale means that business can buy propriety at low prices this is good for people looking to start their own business. The ground is ripe for new business to start up.

Also while I see so many for sale or lease signs up it seems a store in my neighborhood that's been closed since the late 80's/early 90's and before that it was closed since the 60's, has been bought and someone is working on that building. I assume that it was bought because the price was rock bottom low.

Of course people are going to have to be smart if they want success for both themselves and the economy. People are going to have to look at what is around them and build something different instead of going for the same types of stores. Maybe some of those buildings will have to be rezoned and turned to something else instead of retail space. Ie as we try to regrow are economy we will need to be smarter about the growth then we where before not fall into some of the same problems we are facing now.

But the space for economic development is for sale or lease all we have to do is buy it and build something.

Nobody likes paying taxes shirt

2010-09-21T19:31:00.002-04:00

Nobody likes paying taxes... by martinjackson
Browse zazzle for a different t-shirt . zazzle

43.6 million American in poverity and counting

2010-09-17T15:16:00.002-04:00

1 out of 7 Americans or 14.3% if Americans are living in poverty, as the recent census poll done in 2009 reveals.

That's something to think about as you hear politicians worry about tax cuts for the wealthy or talk about budget cuts on programs aimed at helping the poor.

Ronald Reagan head of the Office of Management and Budget talks about what really lead up to our current economic problems

2010-09-02T17:09:00.002-04:00

This is a very interesting article where David Stockman Ronald Reagan's former head of the Office of Management and Budget.

Basically he is saying that the Republican party has had a big rule in it (though he doesn't say the Democrats are much better) and in fact it all started with Nixon getting us off the gold standard.

then he talks about the fact that the Republicans push for tax cuts but don't cut spending enough to match and in fact when looking at the military they are really the big spenders of government dollars.

Too much freedom and money has been giving to wall street.

and because of the lost of jobs and the growing wage gap Stockman thanks there maybe a class war in the United States where the poor (and middle class or what used to be the middle class) raise against the rich.

Hopefully things will get fixed before we need to get to that point, but I fear he may have a point about that.

Did the Bush whitehouse know about the dangers of the economy crisis, yet did nothing to stop it?

2010-05-03T18:05:00.002-04:00

Well that's what Nancy Pelosi believes. She says that Bush knew yet didn't let the fed to tell congress about the predicted economic depression.

Black women on average have the lowest wealth in the nation

2010-03-10T16:03:00.003-05:00

I just read this shocking article form the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette about the fact that the median wealth (ie how much money they have saved or investmented - things like credit card bills, mortgages, student loans and auto loans) of African-American women is really low.

And by low the average is about $5 for Black women ages 36 to 49.

Five dollars.

Why is that you may ask. Well the article brought up something I talk about a bit on this blog, that Black women where targeted in the subprime loan mess.

Another interesting thing they brought up is the fact that Black women actually give a lot of money away by doing things like helping family and giving to their church.

What is the value of a job

2009-12-14T18:14:00.005-05:00

The New Economics Foundation a UK think tank took a look at 6 jobs 3 high paying and 3 low income jobs and tried to figure out what is the social value of those jobs.

What the study found was was that the 3 high paying jobs they looked at actually created less value (and in some causes actually caused economic and social harm) then the low paying jobs.

here is a look at their findings

for the 3 high earning jobs (Bankers, Advertising executives, and Tax Accountants)

They found that bankers don't actually create wealth but for every pound (or about every $1.64 earned) they earn they actually help destroy 7 pounds (or about $11.42) in social value. This is pretty much due to banks role in the current economic crisis.

because Ad executives jobs are to get people to want something they cause people to be sad and over spend (which leads to stress) because of this the study says that for every pound ($1.64-ish) they make they actually take out 11 pounds (or about $17.94) out of the the social economies networth.

Tax accountants are bad because even though they save their clients money they take away money that could have gone to the government, so for every pound a tax accountant makes they actually take out £47 ($76.63) that could have been used by the government.

Looking at the three low paying jobs (Childcare Workers, Hospital Cleaners, and Waste recycling workers) they found out that these jobs actually created a lot more social value to the economy.

Everyone says the children are the futures and it shows with Childcare workers. For every £1 they earn they actually create £9.50/$15.50 in value for the economy and that is only looking at the fact they allow parents to keep working.

Hospital cleaning staff create £10 pounds (or about $16.31) for every £1 they get paid. The value they create is that by making hospitals clean they cut down on the spreading of diseases.

And finally Waste recycle workers help the environment and for making the world a cleaner place they create £12 (around $19.58) of economical beneficial value for every pound they make.

The study then goes beyond looking at those jobs and looks at the fact that we have been experiencing a widening gap in incomes between the rich and the poor and that there are now less middle class jobs.

They also give a few ideals of what can be done to make sure people actually get a better return from the value they create and those who are harmful pay a little more.

Young Blacks hit hardest by the Recession

2009-11-26T00:29:00.002-05:00

The current job market has been hard for people across the board. But the Washington post has an article up showing that African-Americans from the ages 16-24 are being hit the hardest by this recession.

Their unemployment is at 30.5% well above the 19.1% for people in that age group all together, as well as the unemployment rate for African-American of every age (15.7) and the nation the nation as a whole (10.2)

The article focus on a few you people looking for work and bring some of the reason why they are being hit the hardest. Mainly a lot of jobs that target younger people are being filled by older workers as well as being cut, which effects all young people and the fact that they may face the extra challenges such as discrimination and not having the right connections.

Over $5 for a Big Mac! Iceland's economy hit hard

2009-10-31T21:32:00.004-04:00

The whole world has been hit hard by this recession but Iceland has been hit extra hard.

The value of there currency the Krona, has dropped over 70% since 2008. To but it in simple turns the cost of Big Mac in Iceland would be 650 krona or $5.50 in US dollars.

Elinor Ostrom becomes the first woman to win a the Nobel Prize in Economics

2009-10-12T14:17:00.002-04:00

big congratulation to Elinor Ostrom who becomes the first woman to win the Nobel Economic Prize. She wins the award along with Oliver Williamson.

Ostrom one the award for her study on public commons and how commons made open to everyone to use can become abused and how people self govern to make sure that doesn't happen.

Williamson studied why business organized in the ways that they do.

Free Trade cartoons

2009-09-22T17:49:00.003-04:00

Here are a few political cartoons (some interactive) dealing with the subject of Free Trade by Mike Thompson.

check them out here

The Black Depression

2009-09-14T16:20:00.002-04:00

The New York times ran an op-ed piece on Saturday written by Barbra Ehrencreich and Dedrick Muhammad on the current recession is effecting people differently based on race (well just Black and White)

I titled this post The Black Depression because of this bit of the article.

In fact, you could say that for African-Americans the recession is over. It occurred from 2000 to 2007, as black employment decreased by 2.4 percent and incomes declined by 2.9 percent. During those seven years, one-third of black children lived in poverty, and black unemployment — even among college graduates — consistently ran at about twice the level of white unemployment.

That was the black recession. What’s happening now is more like a depression.

something I found interesting was this bit about how the Black Church became part of the problem we are all in due to the recession as well as showing a bit of racism from the people at Wells Fargo.

At Wells Fargo, Elizabeth Jacobson, a former loan officer at the company, recently revealed — in an affidavit in a lawsuit by the City of Baltimore — that salesmen were encouraged to try to persuade black preachers to hold “wealth-building seminars” in their churches. For every loan that resulted from these seminars, whether to buy a new home or refinance one, Wells Fargo promised to donate $350 to the customer’s favorite charity, usually the church. (Wells Fargo denied any effort to market subprime loans specifically to blacks.) Another former loan officer, Tony Paschal, reported that at the same time cynicism was rampant within Wells Fargo, with some employees referring to subprimes as “ghetto loans” and to minority customers as “mud people.

but I think this line about the fact that really the reason this recession is effecting African Americans worst is...

If any cultural factor predisposed blacks to fall for risky loans, it was one widely shared with whites — a penchant for “positive thinking” and unwarranted optimism,

the problem as pointed in the article was that we all maybe be overly optimistic but African Americans have had a history of being discriminated from in the banking and mortgage sector for a long time and it still continues today but instead of being denied a loan they get improved for one under worst terms then others get.

Is the Recession increasing drug use?

2009-08-29T21:01:00.003-04:00

In a recent study reported on by the BBC 95% of the dollar bills in DC have traces of cocaine on them and other major cities in America have similar numbers. This is up 20% form two years ago, the reason is thought to be due to people turning to drugs to get away from the stress of the recession.

I can't help but to think that if this is true and the reason drug use is up right now is due to the poor economy, then really the best thing for these people to do is to take the money they spend on drugs and spend them in other parts of the economy we could get a nice little boost. thought I guess even if the money is going into the black market it will end up in the main economy eventually (drug dealers do buy things)

Cash for clunkers failure of success?

2009-08-23T16:52:00.003-04:00

The Cash for clunkers (officially called Car Allowance Rebate System or CARS) program comes to an end Monday.

Looking at the coverage of the is program I was always surprised with the number of people that thought the program was failing.

looking at the goal of the program that is far the from the cause.

The program was in acted because car sales where lagging and dealerships across the nation had lots full of cars that they couldn't sale.

This program was enacted to move those cars, as well as make sure people upgrade to more fuel efficient cars.

and under those terms the program worked, car sells went up enough that American car companies re-open some car plants that they had closed. Putting people back to work.

in fact it work so well that the CARS program ran out of money because they the demand was much higher then they thought and the government needed to add money to make sure the program could make it to it's end date. Maybe that's the closet thing this program was to a failure, if you count reaching your set goals at much faster rate then you thought you would as being a failure.

But with the program coming to and what do you think was Cash for clunkers a success or a failure?

Free by Chris Anderson Is giving stuff away really the new economic model?

2009-08-21T20:30:00.003-04:00

Here is the first 50 something pages of Chris Anderson's book Free.

in the book Anderson talks about how giving stuff away is revolutionary (not so) new economic model

Hacking Wallstreet

2009-07-18T15:12:00.004-04:00

many big investing companies such as Goldman Sachs use computer programs to buy and sell stocks and commodities. These programs agergate data (such as the news) to know when is the best time to buy and sell. This allows them to be a head of the average investor.

Goldman Sachs has the best of these programs and they use it to buy stocks a few milliseconds after news that will make the stock go up hits and sell as soon as their is an up tick in the stock.

it seems that a former employee of Goldman Sachs named Serge Aleynikov (who maybe the same Serge Aleynikov in this linkedin page) stole the code.

well at first Serge Aleynikov says it was an accident and he was only downloading open source information but it seems that he tried to erase his trail by deleting his bach files but he didn't realize Goldman sachs saves that information.

though Serge Aleynikov did send the info he retained German website, owned by a person in London. That plus his Russian background leads some to think that was a plot of international espionage and some fear that people could use this program to manipulate the market (of course I'm not sure why one should feel much safer knowing a company can manipulate the market vs people in a different country)

Serge Aleynikov also has had history of IP violation in the past including a case in 1997
Aleynikov Pacer

after leaving Goldman Sachs Serge Aleynikov went to work for Teza Technologies, LLC, in Chicago. They paid him 3 times what he made at Goldman Sachs. It's easy to wonder if they have any part in this or was Serge Aleynikov just looking for the next company to work for and maybe still sensitive information from.

recently Serge Aleynikov has been released on bond. but I don't think he is no longer dancing (like he was with wife in this video...both enjoy ballroom dancing)