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Tuesday, July 9, 2013

General Economics

News                                                                                                                             
Bloomberg | Obama Sees 2013 Deficit Lowest in Five Years, GDP Growth at 2.0%
The Obama administration projects that the federal budget deficit will drop to the lowest level in five years, $759 billion for the year ending Sept. 30, as the economy improves and tax collections increase.
CNN Money | Governments lose trust as corruption soars
Released Tuesday, the survey finds that corruption is a growing problem, with a majority of respondents saying that the situation has deteriorated in their country over the past two years.
Market Watch | NFIB small-business optimism drops in June
A measure of small-business optimism dropped in June after six of its 10 components fell, according to data released Tuesday.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Politico | Tackling America's retirement crisis
We’re living longer — the average 65-year-old has nearly two decades of life ahead, and one in every four will live past 90 — but producing fewer workers. That combination is producing a big bill for longer retirements that we’re already struggling to pay.
WSJ | An Opportunity to Strengthen U.S.-China Ties
The fifth round of the China-U.S. Strategic and Economic Dialogue will be held in Washington, D.C., on July 10 and 11. It is another important step forward taken by the two governments in their efforts to build a new model of major-country relationship after President Xi Jinping and President Barack Obama met at the Annenberg Estate in California last month.
Washington Times | Approaching economic stall speed
Stall speed is the airspeed at which an aircraft stops producing lift. Unless immediate corrective action is taken, such as reducing the wing’s angle of attack or the weight of the aircraft, the results are not likely to be good. An economy can hit “stall speed” when it becomes burdened with too much dead-weight loss.

Blogs                                                                                                                             
WSJ | Nearly 1 in 6 Americans Receives Food Stamps
One of the federal government’s biggest social welfare programs, which expanded when the economy convulsed, isn’t shrinking back alongside the recovery.

Health Care

News                                                                                                                             
Politico | Study: Some on Medicaid lose out under Obamacare
As millions of low-income adults gain access in just a few months to Medicaid coverage under Obamacare, those already in the program could be shut out of some of the key preventive services included in the law.
CNN Money | Air pollution cuts life expectancy by 5.5 years in China - study
Severe pollution has slashed an average of five and half years from life expectancy in northern China, as toxic air has led to higher rates of stroke, heart disease and cancer.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
National Journal | White House Has Known For Months Obamacare Implementation Wouldn't Work
If you've been reading all the Obamacare stories lately, you might get the impression that the administration has just realized it will not be able to implement the massive health reform as designed.

Blogs                                                                                                                             
CATO | Yes, Delaying Obamacare’s Employer Mandate Is Illegal
Last week, when most Americans were starting their Fourth of July holiday, the Obama administration announced it will wait until 2015 to implement Obamacare’s penalties against employers who fail to offer “affordable” and “minimum value” coverage to their workers, rather than impose this “employer mandate” in 2014, as the statute requires.

Monetary

News                                                                                                                             
Bloomberg | U.S. Banks Face Two Ratios as FDIC Sets Capital Vote
Capital standards at the biggest U.S. lenders would rise to 5 percent of assets for parent companies and 6 percent for their banking units under a plan proposed today by federal regulators.
WSJ | Central Bankers Hone Tools to Pop Bubbles
In Seoul's upscale Gangnam neighborhood, made famous by pop star Psy's viral music video, government curbs on real-estate lending froze a market in which home prices had been rising as fast as 25% a year.

Blogs                                                                                                                             
Market Watch | When is that first rate hike coming? Not soon, says B. of A. Merrill
Taper, schmaper. By now, if not a foregone conclusion, it’s more than likely that the Federal Reserve will begin reducing its $85 billion-per-month bond-purchase plan come September.

Taxes

News                                                                                                                             
Politico | Chairmen Max Baucus, Dave Camp hit the road to sell tax reform
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-Mich.) and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) kicked off a summerlong “road show” with a pair of campaign-style stops here. They played with new technology from manufacturing giant 3M and ditched their suit coats for hard hats to tour the new facilities of a family-owned bakery.

Employment

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Forbes | Relaxed Immigration Barriers Correlate with Powerful Economic Growth
Relaxed immigration correlates with a thriving America. Few remember that most of our grandparents (including those of this columnist) who immigrated to America did so freely. They just showed up and came right in without confronting a crazy quilt of laws or phalanx of DHS agents. Relaxed immigration is part and parcel with economic growth.
Mercatus | Regulation, Growth, and Labor Market Recovery
It has now been a full four years since the end of the Great Recession. Unfortunately, the US labor market is far from recovery. At the end of the recession, just 59.4 percent of working age Americans had employment. Today that number is even lower, at 58.7 percent.

Budget

News                                                                                                                             
CNN Money | Credit card delinquencies lowest since 1990
Delinquencies on bank-issued credit cards -- on accounts that were 30 days or more overdue -- fell to 2.41% in the first quarter of 2013, the lowest level since 1990, according to an American Bankers Association report released Tuesday.
Bloomberg | Consumer Borrowing in U.S. Rises $19.6 Billion, Most in Year
The $19.6 billion increase in credit followed a revised $10.9 billion gain the previous month that was less than initially reported, Federal Reserve figures showed today in Washington. The median forecast in a Bloomberg survey called for a $12.5 billion advance.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Washington Times | The futility of stimulus
Markets went into a tailspin recently when Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke’s hinted that the central bank might end monetary stimulus. That alone should be evidence of the dangers of intervention by the Fed that continues for years. Monetary stimulus, or manipulation of the money supply, rarely comes alone.