Category Archives: Capitalism

Is Germany's Finance Minister An Austrian?

Capitalism, Federal Reserve Bank, Inflation, Political Economy

Is Germany’s finance minister really an Austrian … economist, that is?

I don’t know if Peer Steinbrück is with von Mises, but Chancellor Angela Merkel is fortunate to have him in her cabinet. He has been vetoing the assorted Pan-European economic rescue responses, which would fall on Germany’s back.

The Social Democratic finance minister is talking a little like a free market Austrian economist—advocating what this column, Ron Paul, Peter Schiff, and other libertarians advocate: suck it up.

Read the entire interview, “‘It Doesn’t Exist!: Germany’s outspoken finance minister on the hopeless search for ‘the Great Rescue Plan.'”

Newsweek being Newsweek, Steinbrück’s assessment of the a “crass Keynesianism” undertaken by the US, UK, and EU will be like pearls before swine. Here are some particularly poignant excerpts (the kind you’ve heard before here):

• No matter how much any government does, the recession we are in now is unavoidable.
• The speed at which proposals are put together under pressure that don’t even pass an economic test is breathtaking and depressing.
• The switch from decades of supply-side politics all the way to a crass Keynesianism is breathtaking. When I ask about the origins of the crisis, economists I respect tell me it is the credit-financed growth of recent years and decades. Isn’t this the same mistake everyone is suddenly making again, under all the public pressure? [The Mercer version: “A crisis that was created by cheap credit must be corrected by less of the same.”]
• The risk is greater of burning money without significant effects and in the end having a budget weighed down with even more debt. [Remember, Germany is not bankrupt like the USA is.]
• I’m ambivalent about leadership. [Mercer’s version: “’Leadership’ is a euphemism for overriding the will of the people. No sooner does the pesky popular will intrude into the debate than the top Republican contenders begin to yammer about their obligation to demonstrate ‘leadership.'”]

Here we have a European “Social Democratic” who’s more free market than the American centrists (which is what Republicans pride themselves on being).

Is Germany’s Finance Minister An Austrian?

Capitalism, Economy, Federal Reserve Bank, Inflation, Political Economy

Is Germany’s finance minister really an Austrian … economist, that is?

I don’t know if Peer Steinbrück is with von Mises, but Chancellor Angela Merkel is fortunate to have him in her cabinet. He has been vetoing the assorted Pan-European economic rescue responses, which would fall on Germany’s back.

The Social Democratic finance minister is talking a little like a free market Austrian economist—advocating what this column, Ron Paul, Peter Schiff, and other libertarians advocate: suck it up.

Read the entire interview, “‘It Doesn’t Exist!: Germany’s outspoken finance minister on the hopeless search for ‘the Great Rescue Plan.'”

Newsweek being Newsweek, Steinbrück’s assessment of the a “crass Keynesianism” undertaken by the US, UK, and EU will be like pearls before swine. Here are some particularly poignant excerpts (the kind you’ve heard before here):

• No matter how much any government does, the recession we are in now is unavoidable.
• The speed at which proposals are put together under pressure that don’t even pass an economic test is breathtaking and depressing.
• The switch from decades of supply-side politics all the way to a crass Keynesianism is breathtaking. When I ask about the origins of the crisis, economists I respect tell me it is the credit-financed growth of recent years and decades. Isn’t this the same mistake everyone is suddenly making again, under all the public pressure? [The Mercer version: “A crisis that was created by cheap credit must be corrected by less of the same.”]
• The risk is greater of burning money without significant effects and in the end having a budget weighed down with even more debt. [Remember, Germany is not bankrupt like the USA is.]
• I’m ambivalent about leadership. [Mercer’s version: “’Leadership’ is a euphemism for overriding the will of the people. No sooner does the pesky popular will intrude into the debate than the top Republican contenders begin to yammer about their obligation to demonstrate ‘leadership.'”]

Here we have a European “Social Democratic” who’s more free market than the American centrists (which is what Republicans pride themselves on being).

The Big Three Uniquely American? My Eye!

Business, Capitalism, Economy, Government, Socialism

“We’re lectured that the automobile industry is a ‘uniquely American’ industry; its workers more American—and, hence, more deserving—than the rest of us. Since equality before the law is no longer apple-pie, I’d like to know what’s so quintessentially American about a failing industry. If anything, failure is un-American.”

“How uniquely American is a $75.86 hourly compensation package? How many un-uniquely American workers are rewarded to the tune of $133,000 a year? The truly American (because productive), local workers of Toyota and Honda cost their employers, all told, $44 an hour. The Bureau of Labor Statistics puts the average hourly remuneration for regular Americans, benefits and all, at around $28.50.”

“The workers of The Big Fat Three are unique alright; they’re freaks of industry, as they receive 150 percent more in compensation than the average, American working stiff.”

The excerpt is from my new WND column, “The Big Three Uniquely American? My Eye!”

Jews Against Judaism

Capitalism, Democrats, Economy, Free Markets, Judaism & Jews

The excerpt is from “Jews Against Judaism,” which you can read on WND.com:

“Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Florida) has become a popular participant on cable TV shout-fests. The pretty blond puts her velvety voice and forceful personality to use in promoting Obama’s statist schemes. (“Obama, a leftist big-government progressive”, has, naturally, captured the media’s imagination more so than “McCain, a conservative big-government progressive.”) …

Wasserman Schultz’s Jewishness is central to her political pitch. (But her double-barreled, affectatious surname isn’t; so I’m dropping it.) Her congressional page states that she is “the first Jewish Congresswoman ever elected from Florida.” Another of Wasserman’s listed accomplishments is to have called on the president to declare a Jewish American Heritage Month. He, and the House, obliged her. Wasserman regularly touts Obama, former friend to race-baiters and Israel haters, as a solid ally of Israel. …

Jews, with the exception of Wasserman and her ilk, have always been among the most individualistic, original, and entrepreneurial members of American society. Think of Ayn Rand, Ludwig von Mises, Murray Rothbard, and Milton Friedman. Or, of Google co-founder Sergey Brin, the eponymous mastermind of Dell Inc., casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, and many more.

Unfortunately, fellow Jews like Wasserman have done more than their fair share to swell the counterproductive ranks of the State. The congresswoman fits the well-founded stereotype of the well-to-do, left-liberal Jew. …

An existential contradiction, really. Overwhelmingly self-reliant and self-made, Jews thrive in the free market—and in bygone, perilous times have survived by it. Nevertheless, they’ve consistently championed an elaborate, intrusive welfare state.

“American Jews are the most educated ethnic group in the United States,” write Corinne and Robert Sauer of the Jerusalem Institute for Market Studies. …

“Champaign Socialism” is how the Sauers characterize this penchant among American Jews—they tenaciously defy “any empirical regularity that links higher income levels with more conservative, or economically liberal (in the European sense), political positions.”

The complete column, “Jews Against Judaism,” now on WND.com.