Should We Tax the Rich?
The central tenet of Obama’s economic platform is to raise marginal rates on the wealthiest 2% of Americans. There are many reasons why this may or may not be a good idea, or a “fair” one…. but let’s just assume that it is, and it was implemented. Below is a thought experiment that examines whether […]
On mammals and dairy
Journalists and bloggers love to be the first to break a story. They love to have history validate their predictions, and be able to have the satisfaction of citing a story they wrote months ago so that they can sit back in their spinney computer chair, and with a grin, type: “I’ve been saying this […]
The Importance of Incentives
Those who know me know that I have an unhealthy addiction to talkradio. I don’t discriminate much in my listening habits, I’ll listento conservative, progressive, book talk, baseball, whatever. I findthe combination of dynamic radio personalities and often ridiculouscallers to be a recipie for first rate entertainment. My fiancee (andalmost any everday American) disagees, so […]
An Inconvenient Truth About the Economic Environment – Part II
This post is largely in response to a claim made by a reader, Michael. He is a soon to be fellow Miami University alumnus, who pointed out his perception that politicians (particularly speaker John Boehner) tend to oversimplify their assesments of the economy (See response to Feb 17th post). Michael is a bright guy, has the benefit of the education […]
The Road to Growth
It is day four of our trek into Machu Picchu. For the past three days I have been immersed in what can only be described as paradise on Earth: Hummingbirds, orchids, wildlife, and views that truly take your breath away. The Salkantay Trail Trekking through the Peruvian jungle along the Salkantay Trail is described as […]
An Inconvenient Truth About the Economic Environment
Speaker John Boehner forwarded at three paragraph letter (wow, that must have been pretty comprehensive!) to the White House from 150 economists saying, among other things, “To support real economic growth and support the creation of private-sector jobs, immediate action is needed to rein in federal spending.” An interesting and valid claim, but one which does […]
A look at the New Deal and new deals
I spent the summer of 2010 attempting to run the final stretch of achieving my masters degree: writing my exit paper. This paper could be of any topic of my choosing, as long as I had a faculty member at Miami that was willing to advise along the way. I knew from the get go […]
The Great Recession in the long run
About two years ago I can recall sitting in the back of my econ 417 class. It was a class which focused on business cycles; what they’re caused by, their effects, etc. I remember that this particular day, my professor had been thinking on the topic, and advised that given the recent cataclysmic economic collapse […]
