Category Archives: Business & Economy
Contemplating Stocks without QE
Some influences on the stock market are casual, subtle or open to interpretation, but the catalyst behind the current stock market rally really shouldn’t be controversial. As far as stocks go, we have lived by Quantitative Easing. The only question now is, whether we will die without it. Other Business & Economy Texas A&M To Spotlight Grass-Fed Beef June 24-25 In […]
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“History Has Been Rather Kind to the American Voter”
“History has been rather kind to the American voter.” When Ludwig von Mises wrote those words in 1953 he was referring to the fact that Americans had the opportunity to learn from the lackluster economies of Europe where states were busy nationalizing industries, imposing price controls, and generally imposing more socialism at every turn. Share This ArticleFacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedinemail
Read moreVoters Know the Economic Recovery Is Fake
The latest jobs numbers were released today, and the financial media is making much of the drop in the unemployment rate – now 5.8% according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Obviously, the economy must be getting better, just like Janet Yellen and Barack Obama have been telling us, right? Not so fast. The results from Tuesday’s elections tell a […]
Read moreIt’s Currency War! – And Japan Has Fired The First Shot!
This is the big problem with fiat currency – eventually the temptation to print more of it when you are in a jam becomes too powerful to resist. In a surprise move on Friday, the Bank of Japan dramatically increased the size of the quantitative easing program that it has been conducting. Share This ArticleFacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedinemail
Read moreQE Worked! Or Did It…?
It’s official. The Federal Reserve has ended its third quantitative easing program, QE3. The Fed claims that the economy is continuing to improve, yet they’re still going to keep interest rates at near-zero for a “considerable time.” Share This ArticleFacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedinemail
Read moreThe Minimum Wage Forces Low-Skill Workers to Compete with Higher-Skill Workers
The efforts underway by the Service Employees International Union, and its political and media allies, to raise the minimum wage from $7.25 to $15 per hour would, if successful, cause major unemployment among low-skilled workers, who are the supposed beneficiaries of those efforts. Share This ArticleFacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedinemail
Read moreStrange Value of Gold in a World That Demands It
A recent CNBC article tells us that “gold is sending wacky signals.” … Why? Because of a strange, emergent “correlation” that gold is now exhibiting with the recently rising dollar and bonds. Share This ArticleFacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedinemail
Read morePublic Accommodation and Social Engineering
Last weekend, city officials in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho ordered the owners of a local wedding chapel to conduct same-sex marriages or face jail time. One-hundred-and-eighty days of jail time, to be exact, plus a $1,000 fine for each day they continue to decline. Share This ArticleFacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedinemail
Read moreThe End of QE3, Trouble Ahead for the Bulls?
Austrian economist Micheal Pollaro writes that with the end of QE3 coming that stock market bulls need to take a note of caution because the Austrian measure of the money supply is already falling. This is typically a sign of trouble for stock markets. Share This ArticleFacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedinemail
Read moreThe Problem With Steve Forbes’s New Gold Standard
Money: How the Destruction of the Dollar Threatens the Global Economy — and What We Can Do About It, by Steve Forbes and Elizabeth Ames, McGrawHill, 2014 Money is an odd book. Its odd character can be brought out through an analogy. Imagine that someone wrote an eloquent book about price and wage controls. The book showed how attempts to […]
Read moreHow Third-Party Payers Drive Up Medical Costs
These days, a lot of people are worried about their rising healthcare costs. So, the United States, the federal government implemented a scheme to “fix” the problem. At least, that was the original plan. The scheme, which Americans know as “Obamacare” caused an uproar, both politically and economically, over rising costs, and whatever the case may be, people are in agreement […]
Read moreRising ER Visits Latest Obamacare Undoing
Review Journal – Unintended consequences are one thing. Broken promises are another. But it requires a special blend of arrogance and incompetence to craft a law that accomplishes precisely the opposite of what it was supposed to do — a law that significantly worsens the problems it was supposed to fix. Share This ArticleFacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedinemail
Read moreInflation Is Counterfeiting
Forbes – Most people have a basic idea that inflation is when prices rise, and that this is caused by an increase in the money supply. Since the Federal Reserve is rapidly increasing the money supply, it is only common sense to expect this will hurt us sooner or later. It is absolutely wreaking havoc, though not how you might […]
Read moreShould E-Cig Manufacturers Love the FDA?
“E-Cig Execs Are Actually Thrilled With New FDA Regulations” was the lead story last morning on Time magazine’s website about the Food and Drug Administration’s proposed rules banning the sale of electronic cigarettes to minors, their sale in vending machines, and (of course) extending those ridiculous and ignored warning labels we now see on tobacco products to e-cigarettes too.
Read moreEurope and Deflation Paranoia
Mises – There is a current incessant flow of articles warning us of the certain economic calamity if deflation is allowed to show its nose for even the briefest period of time. This ogre of deflation, we are told, must be defeated with the printing presses at all costs. Of course, the real objective of this fear mongering is to enable continued […]
Read moreDifferences Don’t Necessarily Equal Discrimination
Another Equal Pay Day has come and gone. This year it came on April 8th to represent how long into 2014 a woman would have to work to make what a man did in 2013. The highlight this year was when White House Press Secretary Jay Carney tried to explain away the pay gap between men and women in the White House by saying […]
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