Archive for the ‘Economics’ Category
Friday, July 31st, 2015
Another month down! here’s one final LinkSwarm to finish off July:
“Donations to the Clinton Foundation by Swiss bank UBS increased tenfold after Hillary Clinton intervened to settle a dispute with the IRS early in her tenure as secretary of state, according to a published report.” What are the odds?
Hillary way, way, way underwater in swing states. (Hat tip: Moe Lane.)
Lot of Democrats listed among indicted congress critters. And the Kay Baily Hutchison indictment was bogus.
“Nineteen sixty-eight was the year normal Americans saw the Democrats for what they were, and that’s the danger for them in 2016 too – that normal Americans will be reminded about what a circus of welfare-chiseling, race-obsessed, work-averse, baby-shredding freaks the Democrat party is.”
Iran says it can ban U.S. arms inspections at will. Wow, that Iran deal just keeps getting better… (Hat tip: Jihad Watch.)
Speaking of that Iran deal, the Obama Administration is hiding documents from the public, even though they’re not classified.
And the International Atomic Energy Agency refuses to testify to the Senate on Iran, even in a classified setting. Golly, it’s almost like they’re trying to hide something… (Hat tip: Ed Driscoll at Instapundit.)
Michael Totten on Hanoi’s Capitalist Revolution. I dare say that Hanoi more capitalist (and hopeful) than Detroit these days…
Medicare/Medicaid: Driving us into bankruptcy for half a century.
And Social Security could be broke in 12 years.
Another day, another American murdered by an illegal alien.
More guns, less crime. (Hat tip: Adam Baldwin’s Twitter feed.)
“The fact is that there is no point in arguing with liberal gun-control advocates because their argument is never in good faith….The liberal anti-gun narrative is not aimed at creating the best public policy but at disarming citizens the liberal elite looks down upon – and for whom weapons represent their last-ditch ability to respond to liberal overreach.”
“Anti-bullying” school seminar is turned into gay sex demonstration.
Brazil joins the league of the boned.
The mystery of China’s capital outflows.
Dice to sell Slashdot. They managed to take a thriving community and managed to drive much of it away with a combination of poor UI design (Beta, anyone) and pro-social justice warrior posts.
How #GamerGate shattered shattered Gawker’s myth of invincibility. Turns out that insulting your readers on behalf of social justice warriors isn’t a sustainable business model. Who knew?
Even before the hack, Ashley Madison was a complete scam. (Hat tip: Borepatch.)
Tags:#GamerGate, Border Controls, Brazil, China, Crime, Democratic Party, Democrats, Foreign Policy, Gawker, Guns, Hanoi, Hillary Clinton, Hillary Clinton Scandals, Iran, Jihad, Kay Bailey Hutchison, Kurt Schlichter, Michael Totten, ObamaCare, Slashdot, Social Justice Warriors, Vietnam
Posted in Border Control, Communism, Crime, Democrats, Economics, Elections, Foreign Policy, Guns, Jihad, Obama Scandals, ObamaCare, Social Justice Warriors | No Comments »
Monday, July 27th, 2015
A new trade agreement was struck at the World Trade Organization.
A new global trade agreement that eliminates tariffs on more than 200 kinds of IT products should result in lower prices to technology buyers around the world as it is implemented over the next three years.
The tentative deal, struck on Friday at a World Trade Organization meeting in Geneva, affects a wide variety of products ranging from smartphones, routers, and ink cartridges to video game consoles and telecommunications satellites. It covers US$1.3 trillion worth of global trade, about 7 percent of total trade today.
This is one of those pieces of Snooze Inducing News that could very well turn out to be A Great Big Hairy Deal. Free trade is a win-win for the nations involved, so this could potentially help alleviate the real nasty recession that’s careening down the pike at us.
A complete list of the products covered range from the excessively specific to the frustratingly general (“memories”). But a whole lot of them look related to semiconductors and semiconductor manufacturing equipment, an industry that American and Japanese companies dominate. (Almost makes me wish I hadn’t sold all my Applied Materials stock. Almost.)
(Hat tip: Slashdot.)
Tags:business, Economics, Regulation, World Trade Organization
Posted in Economics, Regulation | No Comments »
Friday, July 10th, 2015
I came across this comment from a Slashdot thread on programmers leaving Greece (usual online source caveats apply), and thought it was meaty enough to be worth excerpting and highlighting on its own:
Let me tell you what happens when you’re 100% legal and declare everything up to the last penny you get as a software developer. In 2012 I had 100,000 Euros income paid 86,000 Euros spent on taxes (income tax with surprisingly different brackets than last year, “temporary” property tax, “temporary special contribution” 4% on the total turnover, mandatory social security, 55% of your current income tax as downpayment for next year). The year before I made 74,000 Euros and paid “only” 50,000 or thereabouts. In return I got: no schools, no roads, no pension, more taxes, more family members depending on me to live. The more you work the less you make (unless you have an ever-shrinking business). Crazy? That’s the Greek tax brackets for you.
Meanwhile: I have to pay for my own hospital plan because in case I get sick I have to notify the public insurance carrier 15 days in advance of emergency surgery (no kidding!) or 3-4 months before booking an appointment with a doctor. I have to get an additional, expensive pension plan on top of the 350 Euros per month I am currently paying as mandatory social security because there will be no money when I’m 67 years old or have worked 40+ years to get the minimum pension of 700 Euros (nominal; actual payment after taxes and mandatory social security is around 480 Euros). I also need to set aside money to get the kids I’m planning on having to a private school because there are no teachers (not even substitutes) half of the time in the public schools.
If you are wondering why people tax evade you have to first ask the questions: 1. how much does the state take in taxes and 2. what does the state offer for the money it takes from its citizens? If the answers are “most of your money” and “not that much at all” respectively it doesn’t take a genius to see why you get an endemic tax evasion for free.
Anyway. After three years of battling the system I gave up and moved away. My last tax filing in Greece was 2014 for my income in 2013. I am owed a 13,000 Euro tax return since August 10th, 2014. Of course it’s NOT credited. And we’re talking about money I have paid as a tax downpayment to the state since August 2013. They hold my money hostage for 2 years and they won’t give it to me. Also, don’t make the mistake of asking whether there’s an interest rate for those two years. Don’t be silly. There’s not! Adding insult to injury I’m still a Greek tax citizen which means I get to pay taxes for the dividends I’m paid from my company abroad. Don’t be ridiculous, of course they are NOT offset by the money the Greek state owes me! I have so far paid another 40+ thousand Euro taxes in these two years where the Greek state owes me the 13,000 Euro tax return.
I understand all this sounds alien to you. Why so much taxation, why no services in return, why the state isn’t punctual in paying back. Beats me, brothers and sisters. I have concluded that one must be outright insane to try and do business if they’re born in Greece.
And here you have the endpoint of the cradle-to-grave welfare state: benefits are theoretically generous for those on the dole (though good luck navigating the maze of inefficient, corrupt bureaucracy to collect them), while taxes are prohibitively high for those actually work for a living.
This is why implementing fake austerity through higher taxes never works: It drives out the productive, the social compact is irreparably broken, and those living off the state’s largess feel no qualms about wringing every last possible penny from it.
Tags:Budget, Foreign Policy, Greece, tax evasion, Taxes, Welfare State
Posted in Budget, Economics, Foreign Policy, Welfare State | No Comments »
Wednesday, July 8th, 2015
Maybe those are connected, maybe not.
As Zero Hedge has been reporting for weeks, China’s stock market continues to slid with no end in sight, despite such measures as making it illegal for some people to sell stocks.
In a possibly unrelated story, trading on the New York Stock Exchange has been suspended, supposedly due to a computer glitch. Maybe that’s true, maybe not.
How does it feel to live in interesting times?
Tags:China, Economics, New York Stock Exchange
Posted in Economics | No Comments »
Saturday, June 20th, 2015
The bank runs have started in Greece. Why the Greek peeople would even keep their money in banks, having the example of Cyprus’s bank “bail-ins” before them, would keep any but the most minimal amout of cash in a Greek bank is a mystery.
Given that Greek banks are insolvent without the European Central Bank’s backstop, one wonders why Greek PM Alexis Tsipras thinks he can continue to bluff the EU caving on reform demands. It’s tough to bluff when you have no hole cards…
There’s talk of a “new” Greek proposal, which could mean Tsipras and Syriza are finally coming to their senses and giving in to EU demands, or it could be just another smokescreen. I mean, we’ve only seen about a dozen “new” Greek proposals this year that didn’t offer meaningful reform. What’s one more?
Stay tuned…
Tags:Alexis Tsipras, bank run, Budget, Economics, European Central Bank, European Debt Crisis, Foreign Policy, Greece, Syriza, Welfare State
Posted in Budget, Economics, Foreign Policy, Welfare State | No Comments »
Wednesday, June 3rd, 2015
Looks like all of Greece’s creditors have finally decided it’s put up or shut up time for reform. “Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras is expected to face demands for tough reforms of Greece’s pension system, labor laws and other areas, as well as creditors’ insistence on painful budget measures to ensure that Greece runs a fiscal surplus before interest.”
At this point Greece seems completely and utterly broke, unless there’s more upfront money in that still unsigned Russian pipeline deal than reports indicate (doubtful, given Russia’s own financial straits), or Tsipras finds yet another hidden money reserve to tap (“We can can pay pensions from the children’s bone marrow fund!”). So despite Tsipras’ insistence that they be allowed to keep spending other people’s money on their bankrupt welfare state, this time the jig may finally, finally, really, we mean it this time, for sure, be up.
Here’s a piece that explains in terms of game theory why Tsipras overplayed his weak hand:
Now, as long as the EU keeps Greece in the Eurozone then the Tsipras administration will find itself forced to either exit the Eurozone or apply the austerity it promised to end. Not only would such an outcome send a clear signal to other Eurozone nations that exiting was foolhardy, it would also indicate that radical, nationalist, anti-establishment and anti-austerity parties cannot deliver on their promises.
The EU won’t force Greece to exit the Eurozone but it won’t offer anything to keep Syriza in power, either. The EU simply needs to keep negotiating without offering anything but strict compliance with what was already agreed upon, which is continued austerity in return for loans. In effect, to use a sports analogy, the EU just needs to “run out the clock.” In the end, it appears that Tsipras will either be forced out of office or forced to break up his coalition and form a new government with the mainstream parties, the outcome that EU and Germany have been angling for all along.
(Though make no mistake: that “primary surplus” was always illusory.)
A few more Greek debt crisis links:
Now Greece is threatening not to pay this week’s debt payment to the IMF unless a deal is agreed on. Once again, Tsipras is playing chicken with a Yugo, while his opponents are driving a Tiger tank…
Tsipras needs to stop making empty promises and get a clue. “He cannot expect Germans to volunteer the money Greece needs, so he can spend it on the kind of leftist economic fantasy that was discredited all over Europe in the 1970s and 1980s. Just ask Argentina where default followed by populist economics leads.”
Germany has good reason to stop subsidizing Greece, namely their own crashing demographics: “Germany’s birth rate has collapsed to the lowest level in the world and its workforce will start plunging at a faster rate than Japan’s by the early 2020s, seriously threatening the long-term viability of Europe’s leading economy.” (Hat tip: Powerline.)
“A Greek exit is already priced into the euro.”
Tags:Alexis Tsipras, Budget, Euro, European Debt Crisis, Eurozone, Foreign Policy, Germany, Greece, PIIGS, Welfare State
Posted in Budget, Economics, Foreign Policy, Welfare State | No Comments »
Friday, May 15th, 2015
I knew if I was just lazy enough, I could get the Friday LinkSwarm back to Friday!
“If Baltimore wants to get its economic act together, it has to get something else right first: policing.”
What the left says is the same thing the 9/11 hijackers told the passengers: “Stay quiet and you’ll be OK.”
ObamaCare exchanges are melting down across America.
Coalition airstrikes against ISIS are increasingly targeting frontline fighting positions.
ISIS list of states to be attacked strangely doesn’t include Texas. Gee, I wonder why…
Is Hillary the new Bob Dole? Without, of course, the war service or dry wit…
Real editorial, or masterful New York Times trolling? “Let Syrians Settle Detroit”.
Mark Halperin asks Ted Cruz to play “Babalu.”
“This is America: You can go to the bookstore and buy yourself copies of everything from The Basketball Diaries to The Motorcycle Diaries to The Turner Diaries.”
On the other hand, the DEA can just take your money without a trial.
Verizon buying AOL. Remember when AOL was important enough to merge with Time Warner as an equal?
I chuckled:
It’s not enough to believe in climate change, you must also abjure cost-benefit analysis of how to tackle it.
George Stephanopoulos: It’s conflict of interest all the way down. What, did you expect Renfeld to actually serve any other master? (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
“The vile dishonesty of the Democrat-Media Complex is exceeded only by the vile hypocrisy of the Democrat-Media Complex.”
Ben Carson gets to pandering early.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has said UT must turn over requested documents to its own regent Wallace Hall. So why haven’t they?
Bill to mandate E-verify for all Texas agencies moves forward.
Psychologist discusses porn and video game addition and a discussion of modern manhood’s discontents breaks out.
Seattle pizza shop closes due to minimum wage hike.
So former Smashing Pumpkins front man Billy Corgan is going to form a tranny wrestling league? The proposal seems as ill-conceived as his entire post-Melon Collie career…
Tags:AOL, Baltimore, Ben Carson, Billy Corgan, Bob Dole, Border Controls, business, Crime, DEA, Democrats, Detroit, Economics, Elections, George Stephanopoulos, Global Warming, Hillary Clinton, Hillary Clinton Scandals, Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, Jihad, Ken Paxton, Kevin D. Williamson, Mark Steyn, Media Watch, Military, ObamaCare, police, Republicans, Robert Stacy McCain, Slashdot, Social Justice Warriors, Ted Cruz, Texas, Texas 84th Legislative Session, Verizon, Wallace Hall
Posted in Border Control, Crime, Democrats, Economics, Elections, Foreign Policy, Global Warming, Jihad, Media Watch, Military, ObamaCare, Republicans, Social Justice Warriors, Texas | 3 Comments »
Friday, May 8th, 2015
And the Greece shell game over implementing reform (or, since it’s Greece, “reform”) continues.
Greece’s finance minister Yanis Varoufakis (who’s evidently still doing the negotiating, reports to the contrary notwithstanding) has handed the Eurocrats a proposal that doesn’t match what was discussed in negotiations. It’s like a cheap farce, or a con game to see how long they can keep string Europe along without actually agreeing to anything.
Greece Syriza government has said to their creditors: Economic reality? We don’t need your stinking economic reality! “Greece defied its international creditors on Thursday, refusing to cut pensions or ease layoffs to meet their demands, dimming prospects of progress next week towards securing desperately needed financial aid.”
Greece’s government also rehired public sector employees they previously laid off. What’s giving the engine a little more gas when you’re headed for the wall at full speed?
Other Greek debt crisis tidbits:
Greece introduces mandatory surcharges on tax withdrawals above €1,000 Euros.
Plus an 18% hotel and restaurant tax. Extra bonus: It will hit some tourists who have already prepaid for vacations. “It’s catastrophic.”
Living life under the threat of default. “I’ve got a bad feeling we’re not going to get a good ending.”
European “Commission President Jean Claude Juncker said that if Greece left the single currency area, the ‘Anglo-Saxon world’ would try everything to break it up.” Hey Jean Claude: Reality is doing a great job breaking up the Eurozone all by itself, between its unsustainable welfare state, its aging population, and the insistence of Euroelites on cutting those filthy commoners from having any say in the matter. And as for the “Anglo-Saxon world” trying to break up the Eurozone, have you seen whose in charge of things these days?
Greece’s Blazing Saddles act is wearing thin. (I seem to remember having made this exact comparison before…)
Tags:Budget, European Central Bank, European Debt Crisis, Eurozone, Foreign Policy, Greece, Jean Claude Juncker, Syriza, Welfare State, Yanis Varoufakis
Posted in Budget, Economics, Foreign Policy, Welfare State | No Comments »
Tuesday, May 5th, 2015
Happy Cinco de Mayo! My efforts to move the LinkSwarm back to it’s usual Friday position by posting early have failed, so I’m trying to get it there by letting it drift back one day later each time…
“Canadian Partnership Shielded Identities of Donors to Clinton Foundation.” Just in case you missed that. Because trying to keep up with all the sleazy bribery angles of the Clinton Foundation is like trying to drink from the firehose…
Speaking of which:
“Hillary may want to talk about inequality, but is there any better example of a couple who gorged at the trough of Wall Street and foreign autocrats, chose not to follow the rules, never could stop chasing more and more money and (in Hillary Clinton’s case) went to extraordinary lengths to destroy “personal” e-mails that might have pulled back the curtain on all that?” (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
Hillary hires Scott Hogan, an organizer of the failed “Everytown” gun-grabber astroturf to run her “Grassroots” campaign. Hopefully he’ll bring Hillary the same outstanding success he brought to gun control…
Russian stooges in Ukraine: “Soviet terror famine? No, that was all just a big misunderstanding!” (Hat tip: Dwight.)
Islamic State murders 600 more Yezidis. (Hat tip: Jihad Watch.)
The Islamic State also claimed post facto credit for the Garland attack.
Speaking of which, here’s an interview with Bosch Fawstin, the winner of the Draw Mohammed contest. (Hat tip: Legal Insurrection.)
Emergency room visits up under ObamaCare.
Lefty lawyer Laurence Tribe calls Obama’s “force everyone to use green energy without congressional approval” plan unconstitutional. “After studying the only legal basis offered for the EPA’s proposed rule, I concluded that the agency is asserting executive power far beyond its lawful authority.”
Drug cartel violence heats up in Mexico: “Gunmen shot down a Mexican military helicopter Friday in the western state of Jalisco, killing three soldiers, and set fire to buses, blocked roads, and attacked banks and gas stations in a sharp escalation of violence against the government.” This is evidently the handiwork of the New Generation drug cartel.
Minimum wage hike hits San Francisco Comic Store.
When the Social Justice Warriors started attacking the company Protein World over their “Beach Ready” ad campaign, Protein World didn’t cave, they fought back. Result: They earned an additional $1 million in four days.
Not understanding that the Presidency is not an entry level job, and that the Republican field was already packed, Ben Carson joins the Presidential race.
Ditto Carly Fiorina, whose tenure as CEO of Hewlett-Packard was not an unqualified success, and whose 2010 California Senate race lost to Barbara Boxer by 16 points.
And evidently Mike Huckabee is going to run as well.
Texas Democrats are furious that a new ethics bill might keep them from scratching each other’s backs. (Hat tip: Push Junction.)
The Austin American Statesman is moving printing and packing operations to San Antonio and Houston, resulting in about a 100 jobs lost in Austin. Previously. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
Social Justice Warriors can’t even win elections at UCLA.
Austin’s Highland Mall closed on April 30th.
Tags:2016 Election, 2016 Presidential Race, Austin, Austin American Statesman, Ben Carson, Border Controls, Bosch Fawstin, Carly Fiorina, Charlie Hebdo, Clinton Foundation, Communism, Crime, Democrats, drug lords, Elections, Everytown for Gun Safety, Garland, Garland Shooting, genocide, gun control, Hewlett-Packard, Hillary Clinton, Hillary Clinton Scandals, Holodomor, Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, Jalisco, Laurence Tribe, LinkSwarm, Media Watch, Mexico, Mike Huckabee, Military, New Generation drug cartel, ObamaCare, Regulation, Republicans, Russia, Texas, Ukraine, Yezidis
Posted in Austin, Border Control, Communism, Crime, Democrats, Economics, Elections, Foreign Policy, Global Warming, Guns, Jihad, Media Watch, Military, ObamaCare, Regulation, Republicans, Social Justice Warriors, Texas, Uncategorized | No Comments »
Monday, April 20th, 2015
Amidst word that other European banks are urging Greek banks to dump Greek securities, and continued mutterings of Greek contingency plans to nationalize banks, Zero Hedge just tweeted this:
Not seeing confirmation yet, but if true, those quiet bank runs in Greece are about to stop being quiet…
Update: Here’s Zero Hedge’s post, citing an (unlinked) Bloomberg piece citing internal Greek decree, saying it’s the start of capital controls. If so, bank runs are all but assured…
Update 2: Now seeing news reports saying that Greece is “The Greek government is forcing the country’s municipalities to transfer cash reserves to the Bank of Greece in a bid to shore up its short-term finances, according to officials…The decree on Monday mandates the transfer of cash that is not needed to cover spending in the next 15 days, as Athens continues negotiations with creditors to unlock bailout funds.”
So, no forced bank funds transfers.
Yet.
Tags:European Debt Crisis, Foreign Policy, Greece, Welfare State, Zero Hedge
Posted in Economics, Foreign Policy, Welfare State | No Comments »