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Monday, June 23, 2014

General Economics

News                                                                                                                             
WSJ | Drop in Short Sales Trims House Inventory
Short sales of underwater homes have fallen sharply amid the expiration of a key tax break, a situation that could slow the housing recovery and further limits an already thin supply of houses for sale.
CNN Money | Oil prices spark economic growth concerns
Islamist militant gains in Iraq sent world oil prices higher Monday, sparking concerns that this could hurt global economic growth, especially in Europe where the recovery seems to be faltering.
Market Watch | Consumers, businesses still penny pinching
Hiring is up. Car sales are strong. U.S. manufacturers are growing faster. The economy seems to have emerged from a winter slumber on an upbeat path.
WSJ | Cities in South, West to Grow Faster
The U.S. economy seems headed to a long-run growth rate well below 3%, but some metropolitan areas will see their economies surge above 4% annually for the rest of this decade, according to a study released by the U.S. Conference of Mayors.
Washington Times | U.S. oil flow helps keep prices in check as threats rise overseas
America’s growing energy independence is paying major dividends this spring, helping to keep a lid on fuel prices despite sudden threats to major global oil supplies in Iraq and Russia that in the past would have sent prices soaring.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
NY Post | The greatest wealth transfer in human history is coming
It’s the greatest migration of wealth ever to hit humanity: The unprecedented flood of money, four times the size of the US gross domestic product, that will be passed along to a younger generation over the next half-century.
WSJ | 'Pikettymania' and Inequality in the U.S.
The attention that's been showered on Thomas Piketty's best-selling tome, "Capital in the 21st Century," has been something to behold. Pikettymania has raised public awareness of inequality in the U.S. as no one has managed to do since the 1960s. Predictably, Mr. Piketty, a professor at the Paris School of Economics, is being lionized by the left and vilified by the right.
Real Clear Markets | 'Doing Something' To Help the Poor Is Often Impoverishing
The desire to help the poor is an understandable one. Almost all of us want to do so, and even those with the most negative views about the welfare state probably agree that there is a strong moral duty to help the poor.
Washington Times | New EPA rule will burden the economy
Earlier this month, the Obama administration offered its latest and best thoughts on how to rearrange the American economy — and bring yet another part of it firmly under the control of the federal government.
Forbes | Rob Lowe Explains Economics Through Stories Once Only Told To His Friends
It was during high school in the Los Angeles area in the late 1980s that my political views began to take shape. Though I’d self-identified from early childhood as a Republican (kids usually adapt their parents’ Party affiliation), it was then that I started to read National Review, books by Thomas Sowell, and most prominently of all, I began reading the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page (overseen by the legendary editor Robert Bartley) on a daily basis.
Heritage Foundation | Reducing the Burden on Small Public Companies Would Promote Innovation, Job Creation, and Economic Growth
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulations impose high costs on companies seeking to access the public securities markets. These costs are prohibitively high for small and medium-sized companies and impede their ability to access the capital needed to grow, innovate, and create jobs.

Health Care

News                                                                                                                             
National Journal | What a GOP Senate Would Mean for Obamacare
For now, the GOP isn't talking much about what would come after Election Day. Its candidates are falling over themselves to pledge their support for full repeal—which may well be a winning message in a campaign but will be politically impossible even with the Senate majority. After all, President Obama will still be in the White House.
National Journal | Obamacare Is Getting a Management Overhaul
Just two weeks into the job, Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell is overhauling the fractured management structure that led to the disastrous HealthCare.gov rollout.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
NBER | Impact of Premium Subsidies on the Take-up of Health Insurance: Evidence from the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA)
We study the impact of the 65-percent federal health insurance premium subsidy, which aimed to help unemployed workers retain coverage and was in effect from February 2009 to May 2010 through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).

Monetary

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Bloomberg View | Type the Title You Want People to See
Type the sentence(s) summarizing the link here.
AEI | Type the Title You Want People to See
Type the sentence(s) summarizing the link here.

Blogs                                                                                                                             
WSJ | Fitch Report: Fed’s Reverse Repos Are Reshaping the Securities-Borrowing Market
Although it’s only in a testing phase, a Federal Reserve program aimed at improving central bank control over short-term interest rates is already reshaping the markets where dealers go to finance their bond-trading positions.
WSJ | What the Gap Between CPI and PCE Means for Fed Overshooting
One of the biggest debates right now over the outlook for inflation is whether the Federal Reserve would allow inflation to overshoot its target – that is, allow inflation to rise above 2% for some period of time. Chicago Fed President Charles Evans and San Francisco Fed President John Williams have argued perhaps it should.
Library of Economics | The Fed at 100: A century of procyclical policy
Up until 2008 I had a sort of "Whig view" of Fed history. They made many mistakes, but learned enough from those mistakes to gradually improve. Now I'm not so sure.

Taxes

News                                                                                                                             
WSJ | Spain Unveils Sweeping Cuts on Income, Corporate Taxes
Spanish leaders who broke their no-new-taxes pledge after taking office 2½ years ago announced sweeping tax cuts on Friday, saying it was time to compensate a recession-battered populace for its sacrifices and boost a nascent recovery.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Daily Signal | Hiking the Federal Gas Tax Is a Mistake. Here’s Why.
Much clamoring for more federal transportation spending, and fuel tax hikes to pay for it, has come out of Washington recently. The Highway Trust Fund faces a $15 billion gap in 2015 between projected spending and the money it will collect in fuel taxes and fees.

Employment

News                                                                                                                             
National Journal | The Top 10 and Bottom 10 Places Gaining Employed People in America
This week, the Bureau of Labor and Statistics released new numbers showing the number of employed people in each of the country's largest 334 counties. A large county, as classified by the bureau, has an average annual employment level of 75,000 people or more.
WSJ | Big Law Firms Resume Hiring
The chances of landing a job at a large law firm have improved from the hiring nadir a few years back, when sputtering demand for legal services triggered layoffs and cutbacks. Of class-of-2013 law graduates working in private practice about nine months after graduation, 20.6% landed a job at a firm with more than 500 lawyers, according to the National Association for Law Placement. Such positions accounted for 16.2% of law-firm jobs held by 2011 graduates.

Blogs                                                                                                                             
WSJ | Two-Thirds of U.S. States Still Haven’t Recovered the Jobs Lost in the Recession
The U.S. economy last month finally recovered all the jobs lost in the 2007-2009 recession. But it’s been an uneven recovery, leaving two-thirds of states still short of their peak for total payrolls.

Budget

News                                                                                                                             
CNN Money | Detroit gets $195 million closer to salvation
Detroit is getting a $195 million boost that will help end its bankruptcy nightmare and allow city retirees and art lovers to breathe a little easier.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Market Watch | 5 must-know retirement savings lessons
When it comes to investing for retirement in your 401(k) and the like, there are just five basic financial planning concepts you need to know. It’s that simple.

Blogs                                                                                                                             
CBO | Effects on Economic Growth of Federal Investment and Reductions in Federal Deficits and Debt
Following a hearing on the budget and economic outlook, a Member of Congress asked whether federal investment or reductions in federal deficits and debt would be better for achieving economic growth. Below is our answer (provided as part of a set of answers to questions for the record).
Daily Signal | Your Government Is Sending Your Money to These Less-Than-Friendly Countries
Did you know there’s a federal agency that loans taxpayer money to foreign governments and businesses to turn around and buy things from politically favored American companies? Not all of these foreign countries are exactly friendly. Our video shows where your money goes when the Export-Import Bank gets ahold of it.