Dogs are animals of integrity. We have much to learn from them.
Category: Politics
Who really understood the forces of destruction building up in the global economy?
(This Post is longer than usual but doesn’t lend itself to being divided into multiple Posts – trust it is worth the read.)
Part One – How investing in the 80s was so hit and miss.
My education with respect to the sound management of one’s wealth came from a propitious mistake by a global insurance company, one of Britain’s largest insurance companies as it happens. Here’s the story.
Steve Keen – Associate Professor of Economics & Finance at the University of Western Sydney.
I know didly squat about economics. I know a lot about the effect of economics in the sense of government policies, of inflation and debt, international trade and much more only in how they have impacted me over a lifetime of working, buying homes, raising a family, running a couple of businesses and now contemplating retirement. I can sum up my personal strategy – LUCK! I have been lucky. The other Post out today shows an example of that luck.
Frankly, economists haven’t figured widely in my role call of people that I admired, probably because I don’t really understand what they are talking about. (That’s why this Blog has a real live economist as part of the team, to help educate me and all the rest of the readers who come to this Blog!)
The other Post on this subject spoke of David Kauders, who clearly saw it coming. Now here’s an economist who also saw it coming, Steve Keen.
Important lessons from former East Germans.
Have you ever noticed how the most ardent supporters of capitalism and free markets are those who’ve experienced a world without them?
How those who speak out most poignantly against health care reform in the U.S. are those who’ve experienced nationalized health care? No?
If you can, then, take a moment and think back to the coverage, the news, the sound bites. Take a look, perhaps a second look, behind the headlines and I venture that you will find endless examples of this phenomenon. It is those who have done without freedom of choice, free markets, and self-determination who treasure it most, who most understand its value, who’ve lived with the consequences of its absence.
We need look no further than Chancellor Angela Merkel and her recent victory in Germany’s national election.
Chancellor Merkel grew up in communist East Germany and is now leading Germany out of recession with tax cuts and reduced government spending.
We should be listening to what the world is telling us. Very hard, and very quickly. We don’t want to have to lose it before we appreciate what we have.
By Sherry Jarrell
How clear, crisp September days echo 1940.
I was born in London some 6 months before the end of World War II. The echoes of that tragic event in human history rang around the torn roadways and ripped buildings of London for many years, certainly for sufficiently long that I was able to remember as a young boy, away on his bicycle, the bomb sites and and the gaps where once buildings had stood.
Sometimes, when the September weather is as it was during the Battle of Britain, it’s almost as though those echoes can still be faintly heard. Maybe all Londoners over a certain age hear them?
Baseline Scenario publishes an interesting post and triggers a wise comment.
Regular readers of Learning from Dogs will know that we greatly admire the job done by Simon Johnson, James Kwak and others over at Baseline Scenario in debating this global economic crisis.
The comments that flow in are fascinating and often deeply educational. Not surprising! Baseline Scenario has nearly 12,000 readers! But many of them show the level of anger and frustration felt by so many.
Anyway, a Post published by them on September 24th reminded me that hope is so much a more profitable emotion than anger. The Post starts like this,
The fragility of the economy shows in many areas.
Last Thursday, the mere hint of a fairly insignificant surplus in U.S. oil reserves pushed down current oil prices and energy-related futures and other speculative plays.
Oil prices have fallen sharply as weak US home sales data and high US oil inventories prompted doubts about a potential recovery in fuel demand. Source: BBC News, 24th September.
Can you imagine the reaction to an announcement of a new source of U.S. oil reserves? Or of renewed off-shore drilling capacity? Relaxed EPA standards? Additional refinery capacity?
Our energy prices would be cut in half and we’d be so much less likely to war with oil-rich nations on whom we now depend for the functioning of our economy and who, indirectly or not, limit our economic and personal freedoms.
By Sherry Jarrell
How much is “too much” Unemployment?
How much unemployment “should” our economy have? How much unemployment is too much, and how much is just right? How high does the unemployment rate have to go before significant changes are made in government policy and approaches?
The question of the optimal level of unemployment has generally been answered by reference to the so-called “natural rate” of unemployment. The natural rate of unemployment is measured as the long-run average rate of actual unemployment in an economy over time; it is a “trend line,” as seen in this graph below:
Examining unemployment in more depth.
In an earlier post, I explained how the reported U.S. unemployment rate, which was 9.6% in August of 2009, is 
measured. This post will explore the reported unemployment rate in more depth, distinguishing between the short-term, temporary sources of unemployment and the long-term, more structural, and troubling aspects of the unemployment rate.
The 9.6% U.S. unemployment rate remains the same next month if no one changes their employment status. But the rate also remains unchanged if the same number of people hired get fired. In truth, the U.S. unemployment rate nets out enormous flows of people into and out of the labor force and, for those in the labor force, between being employed and unemployed.
A representative month in the unemployment statistic tells the story.
This is not comfortable reading.
Patrice published a Post on his Blog last September 11th. Not being an American it felt wrong to echo that publication by linking to the Post on the 11th as well. No logic, just the way it felt!
But it is so deeply interesting, that not to highlight the Post would be wrong. This Blog, after all, is about integrity. In that process, if the truth is uncomfortable, so be it. And if others think that Patrice doesn’t speak truthfully then they must speak otherwise. You see, integrity is really the pursuit of truth.
Patrice’s subject title is: Why France Is Bad: Profits Define Goodness.
Exactly a year ago, Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy.
I shall avoid the temptation of pontificating on the subject as many, many others, far better qualified, will be doing so!
But two published articles seem to me to be worth visiting, one from October of 2008 from The Economist, and one from The New York Times.
Lastly, a personal comment from friend Dan that shows powerfully how the last year has affected him.
Learning from Dogs 