"11 Long-Term Trends That Are Absolutely Destroying The U.S. Economy"

Business, Debt, Labor, Outsourcing, Political Economy

The Business Insider’s list of “Long-Term Trends That Are Absolutely Destroying The U.S. Economy” should form the sub-headings issuing from an overarching main causal agent: The State, its onerous regulations, and its mint. Over the decades, the Federal Reserve Bank, with State imprimatur, has debauched the currency and it manipulates interest rates so that the economy can never self-regulate.

In any event, The Business Insider may, at times, confuse cause with consequence, but, at least, it has looked beyond short-term trends; in itself a break from the trend.

See what you think (and do follow the hyperlinks before you accuse me of being remiss):

Long-Term Trend #1: The Deindustrialization Of America.
Long-Term Trend #2: The Exploding U.S. Trade Deficit
Long-Term Trend #3: The Shrinking Middle Class
Long-Term Trend #4: The Growing Size Of The U.S. Government
Long-Term Trend #5: The Constantly Growing U.S. National Debt
Long-Term Trend #6: The Ongoing Devaluation Of The U.S. Dollar
Long-Term Trend #7: The Derivatives Bubble
Long-Term Trend #8: The Health Care Industry
Long-Term Trend #9: Financial Power Is Becoming Concentrated In Fewer And Fewer Hands
Long-Term Trend #10: Rampant Corruption On Wall Street
Long-Term Trend #11: The Growing Retirement Crisis That Threatens To Bankrupt America

See the details HERE.

“11 Long-Term Trends That Are Absolutely Destroying The U.S. Economy”

Business, Debt, Economy, Labor, Outsourcing, Political Economy

In any event, The Business Insider may, at times, confuse cause with consequence, but, at least, it has looked beyond short-term trends; in itself a break from the trend.

See what you think (and do follow the hyperlinks before you accuse me of being remiss):

See the details HERE.

UPDATED: ‘How Do You Create A Job?’ (Hint: Food Stamps)

Business, Democrats, Economy, Free Markets, Socialism

In the Connecticut Senate debate, Republican Linda McMahon floored Democrat Richard Blumenthal with this simple question: “How Do You Create A Job?” Via the Free Republic: “Blumenthal stammers like an idiot. When he gets done, Linda McMahon schools him on the correct answer.” Writes David Freddoso of the Washington Examiner: “If you’re willing to suffer through Blumenthal’s answer, the response is pretty good”:

McMahon touches on the most important part of the production process: profits.
“Profits are the street signs of the free market—without profits there’d be no products.” [That’s Mercer, not McMahon.]

McMahon ought not to have used the active form of the verb, “create,” as it suggests that a central planner is involved in the creation of jobs. Her response, however, was instructive and refreshing. She might have also taken the opportunity to point out that production and jobs begin with savings and capital accumulation; not spending, as the DC establishment will have you believe.

But for an impromptu turning of the tables on a vile opponent (which is what McMahon’s performance was); she did a good job.

UPDATE (Oct. 7): Want to boost the employment prospects? “Do food stamps and unemployment insurance,” says Nancy Pelosi: “It is the biggest bang for the buck when you do food stamps and unemployment insurance — the biggest bang for the buck.”

Repeating the line twice was a form of self-persuasion.

Hot Air explains the liberal calculus whereby you forcibly take money from producers and hand it over to consumers and it magically multiplies:

“Pelosi, for her part, continues to insist that food stamps and unemployment stimulate the economy, and claims that every dollar spent in food stamps returns $1.79 to the economy. She floated this notion earlier this summer while trying to defend more borrowing to pay for yet another extension on jobless benefits rather than funding it through monies already authorized in Porkulus. That argument assumes that the $1 food stamp in question got plucked off the food-stamp tree at no cost to the government, rather than costing the full dollar plus the administrative costs of distribution and accountability. Even then, that dollar won’t generate a 79% ROI as it travels through the retail sector; if that were true, investors would put their money into nothing else.”

UPDATED: Big , Bad Business Generates The Jobs

Business, Economy, Labor

The Economist: “It is true that small companies create jobs, especially when they are first born. And small companies destroy millions of jobs when they die—which is often. In fact, only a small fraction of smaller enterprises are capable of generating sustained growth of very many jobs. Yet lawmakers of both parties fall over themselves as the protectors of small business, creating programmes that often help big corporations (and wealthy hedge-fund managers) as much or more than favoured smaller enterprises.”

The Economist’s statement, being the Economist, is somewhat incoherent, at least in its tenor. The writer editorializing, being of the Left, wants the politicians to help small business, even though his facts tell him the returns on such assistance are minimal and that small business is not necessarily the engine of economic growth.

Of course, contra the SE Cupp cool model of “capitalism,” helping big business is as capitalistically crony as helping the smaller concerns.

UPDATE: To Robert G.: Yes, indeed, and WHAT IS AN OPEN ECONOMY?

“The voluntary free market is a sacred extension of life itself. The free market—it has not been unfettered for a very long time—is really a spontaneously synchronized order comprising trillions upon trillions of voluntary acts that individuals perform in order to make a living. Introduce government force and coercion into this rhythm and you get life-threatening arrhythmia. Under increasing state control, this marketplace – this magic, organic agora – starts to splutter, and people suffer.”—ILANA (April 23, 2010)

True too is that Big Biz was once small biz.