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Wednesday, October 29, 2014

General Economics

News                                                                                                                             
Wall Street Journal | U.S. Earnings Reassure Investors but Growth Lags
America’s companies have a message for markets: Don’t panic yet.
Market Watch | Homeownership drops to two-decade low
Showing that the housing market is still far from normal, U.S. homeownership dropped to the lowest rate in two decades, with declines across the country and income spectrum, according to government data released Tuesday.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Wall Street Journal | Obama Soaks the Rich, Drowns the Middle Class
The curse of the U.S. economy today is the downward trend in “take-home pay.” This is the most crucial economic indicator for most Americans, but when President Obama said in a recent speech at Northwestern that nearly every economic measure shows improvement from five years ago, he conspicuously left this one out.

Health Care

News                                                                                                                             
Market Watch | Insider-trading probe focuses on Medicare agency
The day Medicare officials began discussing whether to set new coverage limits on a costly new prostate-cancer treatment, the official in charge emailed three colleagues to put a “close hold” on the process. That meant: Keep quiet until an announcement later that month.

Monetary

News                                                                                                                             
Wall Street Journal | Fed Set to End QE3, but Not the QE Concept
The Federal Open Market Committee is meeting today to plot the future path of monetary policy.
Market Watch | How QE worked in the first place — and how it can be used again
American investors seem tired of quantitative easing. No one less than Carl Icahn said it’s making the market sick.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Market Watch | With the Federal Reserve, timing isn’t everything
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Blogs                                                                                                                             
Wall Street Journal | Grand Central: Fed Critics Have Been Wrong About QE’s Most Ill Effects
In an open letter to former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke in 2010, a group of prominent academics and hedge fund managers urged the central bank to stop its bond purchases known as quantitative easing, warning it risked “currency debasement and inflation.”

Taxes

News                                                                                                                             
CNN Money | Millionaire tax on the ballot in Illinois
Prairie State voters next Tuesday will be asked whether they think the state's constitution should be changed to impose an additional 3% tax on income over $1 million. Revenue from the ballot measure would help fund schools.

Econ Comments & Analysis                                                                                            
Forbes | Canada Shows How to Eliminate the Tax Bias against Saving
Since all economic theories – even Marxism and socialism – recognize that capital formation is a key to long-run growth, higher wages, and improved living standards, it obviously doesn’t make sense to penalize saving and investment.

Employment

News                                                                                                                             
CNBC | Police pay gap: Many of America’s finest struggle on poverty wages
In the aftermath of the police shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, last August, police officers from throughout St. Louis County were dispatched there to respond to mounting protests. Though the officers were doing the same jobs, they were paid starkly different wages, some as low as $10.50 an hour.