News
Bloomberg | Factory Orders in U.S. Decreased More Than Forecast in March
Orders placed with U.S. factories fell more than forecast in March as a cooling economy slowed demand for metals, mining equipment and military goods.
Bloomberg | Service Industries in U.S. Expand at Slowest Pace Since July
Service industries in the U.S. expanded in April at the slowest pace in nine months, adding to signs that the world’s largest economy is cooling.
Econ Comments & Analysis
Fortune | FHA's solvency plan isn't fair
The government insurer, which may or may not be in need of a bailout, plans to generate $10 billion by locking middle class borrowers into high fees for decades.
WSJ | The Immigration Reform Opportunity
Next week, the Senate will begin making changes to and, hopefully, improve the immigration-reform legislation I introduced with several colleagues last month. This part of the process is a chance to fix America's broken immigration system and end today's de facto amnesty for those who live here illegally.
Washington Post | Europe has no exit
For most Americans, Europe is out of sight and out of mind. We figure that the worst of its debt crisis has passed. Italy has a new government. To mute social unrest, some countries are slightly relaxing austerity policies. The European Central Bank (ECB) has stabilized the bond market for weak debtor countries. Despite problems, Europe is muddling through.
AEI | Five myths about the Federal Housing Administration
The Senate Banking Committee held a hearing recently to discuss the Independent Foreclosure Review, the goal of which is to identify borrowers who suffered financial harm because of errors in their foreclosure processing. Congress could have done better by helping families avoid foreclosure in the first place, but how?
Blogs
Economist | The economic winter continues
Three months after the commission's previous stab at the future, the outlook has cooled yet again. Small wonder that the European Central Bank acted yesterday to cut its main policy rate to 0.5%, though this overdue move will do little to warm the euro zone’s frigid economy.
Friday, May 3, 2013
Health Care
News
Politico | Medicaid expansion stalls in red states
Conservative state legislators have thwarted Republican governors who broke with their base in favor of Obamacare’s massive expansion of Medicaid.
Washington Times | Business owners’ lawsuit says tax credits cannot flow to federally run Obamacare markets
A group of small business owners has filed suit against President Obama’s health care law, breathing new life into a long-simmering debate on whether the law’s premium tax credits were solely intended for states that set up their own insurance markets.
Econ Comments & Analysis
CNBC | Gartman: 'Obamacare' Stunting Job Growth
With a fresh batch of U.S. non-farm payroll data set to be released on Friday, expectations remain low for any improvement on March's surprisingly dismal figure.
Politico | Medicaid expansion stalls in red states
Conservative state legislators have thwarted Republican governors who broke with their base in favor of Obamacare’s massive expansion of Medicaid.
Washington Times | Business owners’ lawsuit says tax credits cannot flow to federally run Obamacare markets
A group of small business owners has filed suit against President Obama’s health care law, breathing new life into a long-simmering debate on whether the law’s premium tax credits were solely intended for states that set up their own insurance markets.
Econ Comments & Analysis
CNBC | Gartman: 'Obamacare' Stunting Job Growth
With a fresh batch of U.S. non-farm payroll data set to be released on Friday, expectations remain low for any improvement on March's surprisingly dismal figure.
Monetary
News
Bloomberg | G-7 Governments Not Playing Favorites as Central Banks Revamped
It’s not paying to be either an insider or the favorite when it comes to landing the top job at a Group of Seven central bank.
Econ Comments & Analysis
Fiscal Times | Why We Should Be Worrying About Deflation
Yesterday, the European Central Bank cut its principal interest rate to counter continuing slow growth. A key factor in the decision is evidence that inflation has been falling in the euro zone from 2.2 percent late last year to a current rate of just 1.2 percent.
Bloomberg | G-7 Governments Not Playing Favorites as Central Banks Revamped
It’s not paying to be either an insider or the favorite when it comes to landing the top job at a Group of Seven central bank.
Econ Comments & Analysis
Fiscal Times | Why We Should Be Worrying About Deflation
Yesterday, the European Central Bank cut its principal interest rate to counter continuing slow growth. A key factor in the decision is evidence that inflation has been falling in the euro zone from 2.2 percent late last year to a current rate of just 1.2 percent.
Taxes
Econ Comments & Analysis
Forbes | Overreaching Internet Sales Tax Is Obama's Calculated Deception Of Gullible Voters
The Internet has flourished as a generally tax free zone. Even the physical in state stores sell on the Internet too, both within the state, and across all 50 states, and even beyond. The booming Internet has consequently been an enormous boon to our entire economy. We should keep it that way.
CNN Money | What an Internet sales tax will cost you
The days of shopping at major online retailers like Amazon.com without paying sales tax could soon be history.
Blogs
CATO | New European Data: When Tax Competition Is Weakened, Politicians Respond by Increasing Tax Rates
I often argue that we need to preserve tax competition and tax havens in order to limit the greed of the political class.
Forbes | Overreaching Internet Sales Tax Is Obama's Calculated Deception Of Gullible Voters
The Internet has flourished as a generally tax free zone. Even the physical in state stores sell on the Internet too, both within the state, and across all 50 states, and even beyond. The booming Internet has consequently been an enormous boon to our entire economy. We should keep it that way.
CNN Money | What an Internet sales tax will cost you
The days of shopping at major online retailers like Amazon.com without paying sales tax could soon be history.
Blogs
CATO | New European Data: When Tax Competition Is Weakened, Politicians Respond by Increasing Tax Rates
I often argue that we need to preserve tax competition and tax havens in order to limit the greed of the political class.
Employment
News
National Journal | Forget the Unemployment Rate: The Alarming Stat Is the Number of 'Missing Workers'
The federal government’s latest snapshot of the unemployment rate offered few bright spots Friday. The economy added 165,000 jobs in April—slightly better than March’s revised number of 138,000 jobs. Unemployment went down one-tenth of a percentage point to 7.5 percent; and health care, retail trade, and the food-services industry added positions.
Bloomberg | Payrolls in U.S. Rise 165,000 as Unemployment Rate Drops
The median forecast of 90 economists surveyed by Bloomberg projected a 140,000 gain. Revisions added a total of 114,000 jobs to the employment count in February and March.
Econ Comments & Analysis
Businessweek | Why Not Target a 3% Unemployment Rate?
A safe bet is that the unemployment rate won’t breach 6.5 percent, one signal for it to start tightening monetary policy, until 2014, if not later.
Mercatus | Labor Participation Remains Low Despite Job Gains
This year the economy is adding more jobs per month than it did in 2012, according to new data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. However, Mercatus Center senior research fellow Keith Hall—a former BLS commissioner—said that the labor participation rate is still quite low and the economy is not yet adding enough jobs to stimulate a robust recovery.
Blogs
Economist | Not swooning, not soaring
Will America be fourth time lucky? A better-than-expected jobs report for April has soothed fears that the economy was swooning, as it has in the spring or summer of each of the last three years. The relief sent the Dow Jones Industrial Average over 15,000 and the S&P 500 over 1,600 for the first time.
WSJ | Economists React: Last Month ‘Largely a False Alarm’
The decline in the unemployment rate overstates the job market strength as the participation rate continues to sit at 30-year lows. On a trend basis the labor market is definitely improving. – Maninder Sibia, Contingent Macro
National Journal | Forget the Unemployment Rate: The Alarming Stat Is the Number of 'Missing Workers'
The federal government’s latest snapshot of the unemployment rate offered few bright spots Friday. The economy added 165,000 jobs in April—slightly better than March’s revised number of 138,000 jobs. Unemployment went down one-tenth of a percentage point to 7.5 percent; and health care, retail trade, and the food-services industry added positions.
Bloomberg | Payrolls in U.S. Rise 165,000 as Unemployment Rate Drops
The median forecast of 90 economists surveyed by Bloomberg projected a 140,000 gain. Revisions added a total of 114,000 jobs to the employment count in February and March.
Econ Comments & Analysis
Businessweek | Why Not Target a 3% Unemployment Rate?
A safe bet is that the unemployment rate won’t breach 6.5 percent, one signal for it to start tightening monetary policy, until 2014, if not later.
Mercatus | Labor Participation Remains Low Despite Job Gains
This year the economy is adding more jobs per month than it did in 2012, according to new data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. However, Mercatus Center senior research fellow Keith Hall—a former BLS commissioner—said that the labor participation rate is still quite low and the economy is not yet adding enough jobs to stimulate a robust recovery.
Blogs
Economist | Not swooning, not soaring
Will America be fourth time lucky? A better-than-expected jobs report for April has soothed fears that the economy was swooning, as it has in the spring or summer of each of the last three years. The relief sent the Dow Jones Industrial Average over 15,000 and the S&P 500 over 1,600 for the first time.
WSJ | Economists React: Last Month ‘Largely a False Alarm’
The decline in the unemployment rate overstates the job market strength as the participation rate continues to sit at 30-year lows. On a trend basis the labor market is definitely improving. – Maninder Sibia, Contingent Macro
Budget
News
CNN Money | France to relax austerity as recession bites
France has slipped back into recession and will need two more years to bring its budget deficit under control, the European Union said Friday, taking another step back from its austerity drive.
Econ Comments & Analysis
CNN Money | Waiting for the bond bubble to pop
The bond bubble keeps getting bigger, and investors are getting nervous. Junk bond yields have never been this low. And the Federal Reserve's moves have helped make it a great time to be a borrower.
Real Clear Markets | Paul Krugman Is Asking the Wrong Question
As is well known now, Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff have landed in a policy fight recently. A study they did has been used for several years by the authors and other people to argue that high national debt-to-GDP ratios lead to lower future GDP growth. In other words, lots of government debt will slow economic growth in the future, leaving us poorer and making it harder to afford the payments on that debt.
Blogs
CATO | Where Are the European Spending Cuts?
Paul Krugman recently tried to declare victory for Keynesian economics over so-called austerity, but all he really accomplished was to show that tax-financed government spending is bad for prosperity.
Heritage Foundation | The Unknown Cost of Federal Student Loans
Starting July 1, interest rates on federal student loans are set to rise from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent. As Congress again considers preventing the interest rate on federal student loans from doubling, the cost to taxpayers should be a central issue.
Library of Economics | My take on Reinhart and Rogoff
In the end, all the corrections advocated by the critics shift the average GDP growth for very-high-debt nations to 2.2 percent, from a negative 0.1 percent in Reinhart and Rogoff's original work.
CNN Money | France to relax austerity as recession bites
France has slipped back into recession and will need two more years to bring its budget deficit under control, the European Union said Friday, taking another step back from its austerity drive.
Econ Comments & Analysis
CNN Money | Waiting for the bond bubble to pop
The bond bubble keeps getting bigger, and investors are getting nervous. Junk bond yields have never been this low. And the Federal Reserve's moves have helped make it a great time to be a borrower.
Real Clear Markets | Paul Krugman Is Asking the Wrong Question
As is well known now, Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff have landed in a policy fight recently. A study they did has been used for several years by the authors and other people to argue that high national debt-to-GDP ratios lead to lower future GDP growth. In other words, lots of government debt will slow economic growth in the future, leaving us poorer and making it harder to afford the payments on that debt.
Blogs
CATO | Where Are the European Spending Cuts?
Paul Krugman recently tried to declare victory for Keynesian economics over so-called austerity, but all he really accomplished was to show that tax-financed government spending is bad for prosperity.
Heritage Foundation | The Unknown Cost of Federal Student Loans
Starting July 1, interest rates on federal student loans are set to rise from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent. As Congress again considers preventing the interest rate on federal student loans from doubling, the cost to taxpayers should be a central issue.
Library of Economics | My take on Reinhart and Rogoff
In the end, all the corrections advocated by the critics shift the average GDP growth for very-high-debt nations to 2.2 percent, from a negative 0.1 percent in Reinhart and Rogoff's original work.
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