News
Bloomberg | Global Poll Predicts U.S. Economy Rebounding
The U.S. receives its highest rating from international investors in more than two years on new optimism that the world’s largest economy will weather the financial crisis in Europe and avoid a recession in 2012, according to a Bloomberg poll.
CNN: Money | Big Oil sees energy bonanza ahead
Just three years after fears of an energy supply shortage, executives of the world's leading oil companies now foresee a bonanza of oil and natural gas on the horizon.
Washington Times | Germany, France downplay possible S&P downgrade
German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday downplayed Standard & Poor’s warning that it might cut the credit rating of 15 eurozone countries, including Germany’s, because the region’s financial crisis is worsening without any imminent fix.
Bloomberg | U.S. Consumer Bureau Plans Simpler Credit Form
The standardized, two-page card agreement outlines prices, risks and terms that are shorter and more concise than conventional agreements, augmented by an online glossary to aid consumers on such items as billing disputes, privacy, rights, interest-rate calculations and the consequences of late payments.
WSJ | The Battle Over Too-Big-to-Fail Continues
Although the Dodd-Frank Act attempted to rein in banking behemoths, there are still calls to break them up, repeal this legislation or do both. And the clamor may grow louder as the Republican primary process gets underway and the presidential campaign unfolds.
Washington Times | U.S. firm reverses 1-way flow of shoes from Asia
Most shoes bought in the U.S. were likely made in China. Now an American shoemaker wants to put the shoe on the other foot, by persuading the Chinese to wear shoes made in the U.S.A.
Econ Comments
Cato Institute | Dodd-Frank Law: Regulations Won't Fix What's Wrong
The new agency is a distraction from the real flaws of our financial system.
Washington Times | LAMBRO: Obama’s statistical slump
Unemployment decline can’t hide numbers that portend voter payback.
Politico | High-speed rail has a bad day
Tuesday was a bad day for high-speed rail on both coasts. Republican lawmakers bashed the Obama administration’s handling of billions in stimulus money just hours after a new poll found Californians, if given a second chance, would reject a $10 billion rail bond measure.
RCM | Eight Reasons Public School Teachers Aren't Underpaid
The claim that teachers are underpaid rests on a single isolated fact: that on average, public school teachers receive salaries about 19 percent less than private sector workers with bachelor's or master's degrees. But it's really not that simple. Here are eight reasons why.
Daily Finance | Confused by Economic Forecasts? There's a Good Reason
With all the varied estimations of the chances that the U.S. is headed into a new recession, someone must have gotten it right ... right? But whom?
RCM | Eurozone Failure Is Warning To US
Nowhere has the collectivist mindset become more entrenched than in Europe, with the rise and full flowering of the welfare state model.
Blogs
Atlantic: Megan McArdle | First, Let's Kill All the Creditors
One of the provisions in the latest, er, provisional eurodeal, is that no matter what happens, no creditors other than those who lent to Greece will be forced to take a haircut on sovereign debt.
Café Hayek | What’s worse than an apocalypse?
Maybe all we’re doing is kicking the can down the road and making the reckoning even worse than it otherwise would be. His answer is made more powerful by recent history. In 2008, we rescued the creditors relentlessly that helped pave the way for this crisis. What will the next one look like?
WSJ: Real Time Economics | Paychecks May Be A Bit Fatter Than We Think
A popular explanation was that shoppers were drawing down their savings. The drop in the saving rate, to 3.8% in the third quarter from 5.6% a year earlier, supports the idea that consumers are using up their seed corn to put a iPad under the tree.
Café Hayek | F.A. Hayek, economist
The Pure Theory of Capital was Hayek’s attempt at his own grand theory and even he found it deeply dissatisfying. Then came the second phase of Hayek’s macro.
Daily Capitalist | The Worldwide Depression/Recession Of 2012
The big powerhouses of the world, the eurozone including Germany, Japan, and China are leading this trend and there is no reason to believe that the U.S. will not follow.
Reports
NBER | Estimates of the Social Cost of Carbon: Background and Results from the RICE-2011 Model
A new and important concept in global warming economics and policy is the social cost of carbon or SCC. This concept represents the economic cost caused by an additional ton of carbon-dioxide emissions or its equivalent. The present study describes the development of the concept as well as its analytical background.
Cato Institute | Trading with the Bear: Why Russia's Entry into the WTO Is in America's Interest
The only question is whether the United States will embrace Russia as a fellow WTO member or forfeit the benefits for the sake of an outdated policy rooted in the Cold War.
