Dean: Employers will drop coverage under Obamacare

Welcome to first year economics.

Dean told Morning Joe, “The fact is it is very good for small business. There was a McKinsey study, which the Democrats don’t like, but I do, and I think its true. Most small businesses are not going to be in the health insurance business anymore after this thing goes into effect.”

The reason Democrats fought so hard to dismiss the McKinsey survey when it was released is because its conclusion undermines two major claims  Obama made during health care debate: “If you like your health plan, you can keep it” and “It will not add one penny to the deficit.”

more.

Unemployment Rate for Those with College Degrees

 

I’ll be if you graphed the number of students whose reason for enrolling falls under one or more of the following headings, you will get a similar graph:

a.  “Mom and Dad are going to make me get a job or pay rent unless I go to school”

b. “If I don’t go now I might never go!”

c. “It’s an important stage of personal development, it’s a right, man.”

 

Probably not exactly, but I’ll bet it would trend quite similar.

 

 

Money Pressure is what drives housing prices

The concept is simple.  Imagine an average income.  Say, $70k for a couple.  Imagine no debts, and ability to acquire a down payment.  Imagine the government changes the mortgage rules such that this couple can now qualify to borrow twice as much as they used to.  Imagine now this couple and many others compete to purchase a house.  False desperation and emotional decision making lead to a bidding war on “omg this one is perfect” house.  Imagine the Canadian Housing Bubble.

“It’s not people who buy houses, it’s people with mortgages that buy houses.”

Entitlements. Killing Europe. Killing America

 

Socialists will destroy us.  Eventually the entitlements will greatly exceed the money available to support them an it all comes crashing down (Iceland, Greece).  Yet there are still people ignorant enough to believe liberal politicians and union leaders.

The American Debt Ceiling and Arguments for a Flat Tax

In America, the middle class and lower income brackets contribute very little or nothing at all to taxes.  This is radically different from Canada.  In the US, the federal basic tax exemption is around $45k vs Canada’s roughly $10.5k.  State tax exemptions vary drastically, with California at $55k, and Texas not collecting a state income tax.

The simply matter is progressive tax brackets are dangerous.  When the economy is booming it’s rather easy to shift the burden to the wealthy.  But when the recession comes, your tax base dries up.  Think of it this way, a person with an income of 10 million annually suddenly finds the market sour and is now only making 1 million annually.  At first, most people (being jealous bitter little things) say “so what? Poor baby has only a million dollars now.”  But the problem is you just lost 9 million in taxable revenues.  This is how massive government deficits arise during recessions.  You simply don’t have the same wealth to lay the punishing “rich pay their fair share” taxes upon.

Now, the best solution is obviously no income tax and use consumption taxes to finance the government.  Of course, this also requires fiscal restraint and a government that truly understands it’s role is to provide only the most essential of services, and it is not responsible for charity work, moral enforcement, and the like.  Good luck with the leftists elites.  A thousand Grecian style collapses could happen and they still wouldn’t understand.

Failing a consumption only tax system, a flat tax is your next best approach.  However, flat tax revenues will still swing with the fortunes and misfortunes of the rich.  Consumption taxes tend to remain pretty steady.  The requisite fiscal restraint is really the only true barrier.

Finally, do a little research on Texas.  You will find that:

• Texas has no state income tax.
• Texas has the strongest economy in the US.
• Texas responsible for over 50% of all new jobs.
• Texas has steady state revenues, even in the recession.

And here’s the article that started this post:

As is well known, the president has also drawn his line in the sand; he has insisted that the new revenues needed to close the deficit must be obtained from either raising taxes on affluent individuals or raising corporate taxes. The vulnerable and needy are to be kept free from their share of the tax burden.

more at hoover.org. ht SDA

Jack Layton’s Plan for Canada: Greece.

What socialism gets you:

Violent protests continued Wednesday in Greece after parliament passed an unpopular austerity plan to avoid defaulting on the country’s massive debt.

The five-year, €28-billion plan includes higher taxes, privatization and deep cuts to spending and benefits. The plan was passed by a slim margin – winning by just 17 votes – and met with protests from an already angry public. The country is in the midst of a 48-hour general strike and violent street protests have become an increasingly common sight in Athens.

GOP economics slam fails.

original article here.

This is what happens when liberals play with math.  They fit linear trendlines to non-linear data and look absolutely stupid while trying to assert their self-claimed intellectual superiority.  This data needs curve fitting to be extrapolated.  Take a math class.

A key tenet of the GOP is this: The economy is being held back because businesses are nervous about deficits and taxes, and that if we just removed that uncertainty, businesses would spend and we’d have more jobs.

The tragedy is that that’s a total canard.

One big problem? It’s just not true that businesses aren’t investing or spending.

All this graph shows is that there is a floor where capital investment / GDP levels out.  Why?  Because even during a recession businesses simply are not going to let their capital investments deteriorate and rot away.  At some point you reach a spending floor.  The problem is that this writing lets liberal emotions get in the way of the simple fact that “afraid to hire” does not equal “willing to let the whole business waste away.”

There is a bunch of typical liberal whining in the article (and especially the comments) but the simple fact is that businesses in the US do not want to invest in human capital because they view the future of tax laws regarding said human capital as being unstable.  Why would you hire someone when there is a very real risk that they could suddenly cost twice as much (with payroll tax increases, mandated benefits  increases, etc..).  In a business you make all choice based on available data and best-estimate projections.  When the future is very uncertain and the risk is both high in cost and probability you do not advance.  That is all.

Fanniegate: Gamechanger For The GOP?

http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2011/06/07/fanniegate-gamechanger-for-the-gop/

The villains?  An unholy alliance between Wall Street, the Democratic establishment, community organizing groups like ACORN and La Raza, and politicians like Barney Frank, Nancy Pelosi and Henry Cisneros.  (Frank got a cushy job for a lover, Pelosi got a job and layoff protection for a son, Cisneros apparently got a license to mint money bilking Mexican-Americans of their life savings in cheesy housing developments.)

Home Values

American:

Canadian:

Western Canada:

 

How much does renewable energy cost?

Nevermind that:

Ethanol and Biodiesel comes with food shortages.  Food riots are fun.  You can make some biodiesels from fryer grease and other waste, but there’s only so much of that available.

Wind energy consumes habitats, shreds birds, and causes a variety of other health problems.  And it only works when the wind blows just right.

Solar energy requires exotic ores that come from strip mining third world countries, which used to be bad until it was green.