Enforce the Sherman Anti-trust Act and Regulate the Shadow Banks

I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating.  Monopoly power and rent-seeking behavior are anathema to market systems. Politics should stay out of economic decisions and government should provide the framework that makes the market honest, transparent, and open to all interests.  Republican and Democratic pols need to go back to Principles of Microeconomics classes [...]

On the other hand … or is it Hoof?

In what is undoubtedly good news, the US Bureau of Economic Analysis (Dept. of Commerce) has announced that  REAL GDP grew by approximately 3.5% in the third quarter of 2009.  That is up from the second quarter growth of .7%.  It appears that the economy may be rebounding from the so-called “Great Recession”.  However, as [...]

Banking is supposed to Boring

There really isn’t much to being a banker.  It’s boring and not too difficult.  Basically, you take in deposits and safekeep them for a saver.  You keep a portion to cover any possible withdrawals.  The rest you lend out to some one at a reasonable rate of interest.   That rate needs to cover the [...]

Death by Bubble

Economist Andy Xie says Lehman Brothers died in vain and that it’s just a matter of time before we get hit by another deadly bubble.  His guest post at  Caijing Magazine is just so dead on that you must go read it.
There has been plenty to learn from last year’s miserable economy and near [...]

The Culture of Cannibalism in US Politics: The Triumph of The Cyclop’s Values Over Democratic Citizenship

{The first essay in this series introduced a model I created to explain the cycle of corruption that plagues US politics. This essay looks into the roots of this corruption. It takes a long time to get to the payoff. Further, the conclusion is somewhat ex nihilo if you have not read [...]

Common Sense and the sensus communis: anatomy of an American pressure cooker

Gay-Lussac
The pressure of a fixed mass and fixed volume of a gas is directly proportional to the gas’s temperature.
This relationship is known as the Gay-Lussac’s Law and a pressure cooker is an example of the law in practice. Cooking under pressure creates the possibility of cooking with high temperature liquids because the boiling point of [...]

Support your new Alphabet Soup Agency

A central component of the Obama administration’s Wall Street reform policy is creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA).    He mentioned it earlier this week in his speech as well as today in his radio address.  The banks are not happy about the agency.  I thought I’d spend some time on what is being [...]

The Blame Game

It’s amazing to me that so many people can get so worked up about one mid level bureaucrat in the White House who is a repentant communist and says he accidentally signed a 9-11 truther petition thinking it was just a request for more information on what the White House knew prior to those terrorist [...]

And Next Up, A Good Game of RISK

If you still need motivation to get on my bandwagon for new bank regulation, go read “Back to Business: Wall Street Pursues Profit in Bundles of Life Insurance.”  While the nation is having a good scream over communists in the White House and Bolshevik health care reform, the bankers are playing Risk with your tax [...]

It’s just a Ball of Infusion

I’m having a difficult time reconciling the new found bank profitability driving more executive bonuses to this article at the WSJ.  It’s called “Troubles for ‘Prime Borrowers Intensify” and it has some startling data.  First there’s these numbers on prime mortgages which are undoubtedly creating some of the problems at the FHA that’s fueling  rumors [...]