Combs Spouts Off

"It's my opinion and it's very true."

  • Calendar

    March 2024
    S M T W T F S
     12
    3456789
    10111213141516
    17181920212223
    24252627282930
    31  
  • Recent Posts

  • Tag Cloud

  • Archives

Posts Tagged ‘economics’

Thanking the producers again

Posted by Richard on November 26, 2009

The first ThanksgivingThis time each year, I get lots of hits on my 2006 post The real Thanksgiving story, and a smaller bump on my 2007 post This Thanksgiving, celebrate the producers. Please check them out (and please read T.F. Stern’s comment and my reply on the latter). This year, courtesy of Doug Fabian, I bring you another thanks to the producers, this one from Jim Woods:

This Thursday is Thanksgiving, and I suspect that most of you reading this have plans to spend time with friends and family feasting on a sumptuous meal. I know I will be gourmandizing on various gastronomic delights, not the least of which will be of the fine fermented variety.

Now, amidst tomorrow’s day of celebration, I undoubtedly will be bombarded by numerous television news spots aimed at making me feel guilty for my bounty. Although not directed specifically at me, the purpose of these stories will be to remind me that I should feel fortunate to have a roof over my head, warm clothes on my back and a hot meal on my plate. Because, these stories will imply, it could be me — or any one of us — who suffers the indignity of poverty, hunger or homelessness.

The plight of those less fortunate, shown to us via remote telecast from the nearest homeless shelter or inner city soup kitchen, is supposed to be a stark reminder that those whose lives aren’t immersed in peril should be thankful for all that we have.

Well, to this I ask, thankful to whom? Who are the people responsible for providing us with the tremendous bounty most Americans enjoy?

This year, I want you to give thanks to those who truly deserve it.

This year, I want you to thank the men (and women) of genius who first discovered how to harness fire and how to forge tools for hunting. I want you to thank the men of genius who discovered how to cultivate crops and how to ferment grapes and create wine.

I want you to thank the men of genius who are responsible for creating the planes, trains and automobiles that delivered the bounty to your table. And I want you to thank the men of genius who, throughout history, plied their various trades — often in the face of unimaginable opposition — to help lift us all out of a squalid state of nature and into the magnificence that is 21st-century America.

And finally, I think we should all give extra thanks to the real unsung heroes, the capitalists, who put their money and their livelihoods at risk to fund the various enterprises throughout the ages that made modern life possible.

To all of the great capitalist heroes, I thank you from the very core of my own productive mind. I can offer you no greater tribute this Thanksgiving than to enjoy, without the slightest hint of guilt, the life-sustaining bounty you all have made possible.

This Thursday, we need to thank the men and women of genius, both past and present, who truly deserve the gratitude, yet who so often get nothing but condemnation in exchange for their tremendous achievements.

I toast you all in the name of the best within us. 

Cheers,

Jim

Cheers to you, Jim, and to Doug for sharing your fine comments with us. And thank you, dear visitor, for dropping by. I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner with family and friends, and as I said in 2007, remember to thank the producers who made it possible — including yourself!

If you’re religious, by all means thank God for giving humans the faculties that make our achievements possible. But don’t forget that we have free will. It’s the choices we’ve made — and that countless others alongside us and before us have made — that are responsible for the bounties for which we’re thankful today. We have to choose to exercise those faculties productively and to establish and maintain societies in which such exercise is not just possible, but encouraged and rewarded. The incredible riches all around us aren’t the result of wishes or prayers, they weren’t just handed to us — they exist because of the creativity and hard work that countless people chose to exercise. And they will disappear if people stop making those choices.

So say thanks also to William Bradford and the Pilgrims, and their Massasoit Indian friends. And to the patriots of the American Revolution. And to the Founding Fathers. And to all the scientists and entrepreneurs and capitalists and laborers who’ve created this incredible modern world in which we live. And to all the people proudly and productively working to create more every day. I bet you’re one of them, so in the words of Debi Ghate, “selfishly and proudly say: ‘I earned this.'”

On a more somber note, don’t forget that today is also the first anniversary of the Jihadist attack on Mumbai. In recent years, our friends in India have joined us in embracing freedom, opportunity, progress, and modernity. For their achievements, they were brutally punished by 7th-century barbarians. There are those who will not rest until they destroy everything we value and the wealth, freedom, and opportunity for which we give thanks. Don’t forget that.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Sowell on the economics of medical care

Posted by Richard on November 3, 2009

Does the current debate about health care reform have you confused? Do the many arguments, counter-arguments, and conflicting claims leave you not knowing what to believe? If you're like most Americans, that may be because you know woefully little about the basic principles of economics and how to apply them to a given problem. It's not your fault; your education taught you almost nothing about economics, and some of what it did teach is probably wrong.

Investor's Business Daily is providing a resource that will correct that — specifically about health care, but in a broader sense as well. They're publishing an entire chapter of Dr. Thomas Sowell's highly-acclaimed Applied Economics: Thinking Beyond Stage One, entitled "The Economics of Medical Care." The nine-part series is available here (at this time, the first five parts have been posted). (Link omitted. Fixed now. Thanks, David!)

If you suspect that your understanding of economics is lacking — and even if you don't — I strongly encourage you to read this series. Sowell is arguably America's greatest living economist (I've been a huge admirer since reading Knowledge and Decisions, one of the most important works in economics of the past half-century, almost 30 years ago). And yet, his writings for the lay audience are remarkably readable and clear. 

Be aware, however, that in the process of getting the text on line, IBD unfortunately lost some of the formatting. I noticed that block quotes are no longer distinguished by indenting or any font change — it's annoying, but you can probably figure out where those quotes begin and end. It's only a minor distraction in an immensely valuable resource. Thank you, Investor's Business Daily!

Oh, and if that chapter whets your appetite, get the whole book. Better yet, get both it and his earlier Basic Economics. And read the latter first. 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

Flynn v. Holder: the fight for marrow cell liberation

Posted by Richard on October 31, 2009

The Institute for Justice is one of my favorite non-profits. This "merry band of libertarian litigators" just keeps finding wonderful ways of using the courts and the court of public opinion to fight for individual liberty, especially economic liberty. And they keep winning. IJ has been the leader in the fight against eminent domain abuse and for school choice, and it's helped countless minority entrepreneurs overcome arbitrary and discriminatory licensing laws, regulations, and other barriers to entry erected by governments.

On Wednesday, IJ and a diverse group of plaintiffs took on another stupid and unconstitutional law against capitalist acts between consenting adults — and this time there are many lives at stake. Flynn v. Holder seeks to overturn the ban on compensating marrow cell donors:

Every year, 1,000 Americans die because they cannot find a matching bone marrow donor.  Minorities are hit especially hard.  Common sense suggests that offering modest incentives to attract more bone marrow donors would be worth pursuing, but federal law makes that a felony punishable by up to five years in prison.

That is why on October 28, 2009, adults with deadly blood diseases, the parents of sick children, a California nonprofit and a world-renowned medical doctor who specializes in bone marrow research joined with the Institute for Justice to sue the U.S. Attorney General to put an end to a ban on offering compensation to bone marrow donors.

The National Organ Transplant Act (NOTA) of 1984 treats compensating marrow donors as though it were black-market organ sales.  Under NOTA, giving a college student a scholarship or a new homeowner a mortgage payment for donating marrow could land everyone—doctors, nurses, donors and patients—in federal prison for up to five years.

NOTA’s criminal ban violates equal protection because it arbitrarily treats renewable bone marrow like nonrenewable solid organs instead of like other renewable or inexhaustible cells—such as blood—for which compensated donation is legal.  That makes no sense because bone marrow, unlike organs such as kidneys, replenishes itself in just a few weeks after it is donated, leaving the donor whole once again.  The ban also violates substantive due process because it irrationally interferes with the right to participate in safe, accepted, lifesaving, and otherwise legal medical treatment.

Jeff Rowes, a senior attorney with the Institute for Justice, said, “The only thing the bone marrow provision of the National Organ Transplant Act appears to accomplish is unnecessary deaths.  A victory in this case will not only give hope to thousands facing deadly diseases, but also reaffirm bedrock principles about constitutional protection for individual liberty.”

Read the rest to learn about the people involved and their compelling stories.

It's the time of year when I make the bulk of my charitable contributions, and IJ is always near the top of my list. This suit strikes me as a terrific cause, so I'm going to donate online right now. Won't you help, too?

HT: Megan McArdle, whose column about this in the Atlantic I strongly recommend.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Happy Friedman Day!

Posted by Richard on June 7, 2009

You've no doubt heard of the Tax Foundation's "Tax Freedom Day," the day when Americans have finally earned enough money to pay all our taxes. This year, it was April 13. But because of borrowing, taxes don't pay the full costs of government. This year, it's not even close.

Today, we've finally reached what the American Institute for Economic Research calls Friedman Day, the day that we've worked enough to pay for all government spending. Friedman Day has been coming later and later in the past eight years, and this year it came seven weeks after Tax Freedom Day and nearly halfway through the year: 

The reason? The federal government deficit for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30 has mushroomed to $1.84 trillion.  This means that about 46 cents of every dollar of federal spending will be financed by borrowing through the sale of new U.S. Treasury securities. 

Nor is the current 2009 deficit simply a one-year spike. The most recent estimate for the 2010 deficit is $1.3 trillion, still about 8.5% of GDP.

And the debt will go up accordingly, by another $1.3 trillion.

The United States seems to have entered a new era of historically high deficits and a national debt that is therefore growing by leaps and bounds.  Emergency or not, temporary or not, this is new territory for the federal government and for the economy.

You and I aren't paying the difference between Tax Freedom Day and Friedman Day out of our pockets, but we're on the hook for it — or our kids and grandkids are. And no, we don't "owe it to ourselves." We owe more than two-thirds of it to foreign investors and governments. And they've been getting antsy about our government's profligacy. 

When the subprime mortgage crisis heated up last July, foreign governments began to worry about the value of the U.S. securities they were holding.  When Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac started to look insolvent, Treasury officials had to make phone calls around the world, reassuring foreign holders of Treasury and especially "agency" (Freddie and Fannie) securities. Then the government nationalized Freddie and Fannie, taking explicit responsibility for their liabilities.

This was America's "Argentina moment." Suddenly, the United States could be viewed as a debtor nation, obliged to persuade the owners of its debt that everything would be OK. 

Friedman Day, as it inches ever closer to Milton Friedman's July 31 birthday, should serve as a warning that government is consuming way beyond its means. In the years ahead — and for future generations — everything may not be OK.

So take a moment to celebrate Friedman Day today. But then spend some time in sober reflection about our future.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | 3 Comments »

Trickle-down socialism

Posted by Richard on May 18, 2009

With the federal government nationalizing banks and automobile companies, rewriting mortgages, and spitting on the sanctity of contracts, it was only a matter of time before state and local governments began emulating it. Especially when they get federal money to do so.

The city of Aurora, Colorado, got a $5 million federal grant to buy homes in foreclosure. So that's what they're doing. By outbidding private individuals and investors for the properties.

(Note: I tried to embed the video, but the code from kdvr.com doesn't seem to work. The link above should take you to their video. As of now, there is no text version of the story.)

I've seen significant advances in liberty — both social and economic — throughout my adult life. And because of that, and my own inherently optimistic nature, I've always felt pretty good about the future. No more. Toward the end of the Bush Administration, I saw that trend grind to a halt. And in the early months of the Obama Administration, I've seen it reversed with a vengeance.

We're not just re-creating the dreadful Carter years, we're descending headlong into the socialist and statist policies that crippled the Great Britain of half a century ago. 

If and when I'm ever able to contemplate retirement, Costa Rica is looking more and more appealing. Those of you who are still young have my sympathy — and my sincere hope that you'll have the good sense and courage to reverse this trend.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | 2 Comments »

The federal doorbell subsidy

Posted by Richard on February 5, 2009

Nothing better epitomizes what a craptastic thing the "stimulus" bill is than the hundred grand it includes for doorbells in Laurel, Mississippi. I found that item at StimulusWatch.org, where provisions of the bill are rated, ranked, and commented on by locals who know about a project. It's a good resource, along with ReadTheStimulus.org (which I linked to last week), for understanding just how much pork, special interest payoffs, and expansion of government (and how little real stimulus) this bill contains.

Also, check out the NRO piece by Stephen Spruiell & Kevin Williamson cataloging what they think are the 50 most outrageous things in the stimulus bill.

Once you're sufficiently motivated, contact your senators. Do it now and do it by every means you can manage. This thing is coming to a head quickly. There's no deal yet, but some of the RINOs are pretty wobbly, and those senators in particular need to hear from their constituents.

If you haven't already, take a minute to sign this petition. Then, go here and have Citizens Against Government Waste send a letter to each of your senators (take a few minutes to personalize the text they provide) — there's no charge, although they'd appreciate a donation. For a minimum $25 donation, you can send a fax message to the President and all the Republican senators.

But personal contact beats petitions and blast emails or faxes. Call your senators' Washington and/or local offices — it only takes a minute to tell the staffer who answers that you oppose this irresponsible bill. If you're a Coloradan, call Senator Michael Bennet at (202) 224-5852 and Senator Mark Udall at (202) 224-5941. For other Senate office phone numbers and for email addresses of senators and staffers, go here.

You can get phone numbers for your senators' local offices on their web sites, which you can get to from here

Do it now. Do it all. This bill will, all by itself, cost you and your family ten grand. And, far from stimulating the economy, it will cripple it for years to come.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Fight the stimulus bill

Posted by Richard on January 30, 2009

Want to know what's in the $819 billion stimulus bill the House passed? ReadTheStimulus.org has the entire 1588-page monstrosity on line in both PDF and text form, and it's searchable. They also have the Senate version, the House GOP alternative, the CBO report, and other related documents.

If you read even a tiny portion of this behemoth bill, you're ahead of almost all the 244 Democrats who passed it.

After you've had your fill of perusing this profligate pork-fest, head over to NoStimulus.com and sign the petition against it (sponsored by Americans for Prosperity ). It's commendably brief and to the point:

“Congress should not enact an expensive spending bill under the pretense of stimulus or recovery. We cannot spend our way to prosperity, and such an expansion of the federal government will put a crushing burden on taxpayers in the long-term.”

Then please make a donation to help fund this fight. 

Don't think this is a quixotic quest. The opposition is mounting. In the House, Republicans showed uncharacteristic resolve and unanimity, with every single one of them voting no. And they even got eleven Democrats to vote with them — so in fact, the opposition to this bill was bipartisan! It was the pro vote that was entirely partisan. 

It's looking possible that GOP Senators will be similarly united in opposition, and if the Republican leadership handles it competently, given the Senate rules of procedure, they may be able to block this thing.

Meanwhile, the American people seem to be turning against this abomination. The latest Rasmussen poll shows support for the Democratic spendfest has slipped to 42%, and support for a GOP all-tax-cut alternative is growing. And a new Opinion Dynamics poll found that:

Less than half (45 percent) of Americans think “Barack Obama’s proposed $825 billion dollar economic recovery plan” will help the economy. Twenty-nine percent think the plan will not make a difference, while 18 percent think it will hurt the economy. …

Just 27 percent of Americans think elected officials in Washington are part of the solution when it comes to improving the economy, while 61 percent think they are part of the problem. …

More Americans think the focus of an economic stimulus plan should be “cutting taxes” (50 percent) than "increasing government spending on new programs and infrastructure projects” (29 percent).

Contact your senators, sign the petition, make a donation, write a letter to the editor — if we want to avoid Carter II or worse, we've got to stop this thing!

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Remove impediments

Posted by Richard on January 28, 2009

In a newspaper ad (PDF) paid for by the Cato Institute, hundreds of economists, including Nobel laureates and others prominent in the field, have challenged President Obama's claim that "we need action by our government, a recovery plan that will help to jumpstart the economy" (emphasis added):

Notwithstanding reports that all economists are now Keynesians and that we all support a big increase in the burden of government, we do not believe that more government spending is a way to improve economic performance. More government spending by Hoover and Roosevelt did not pull the United States economy out of the Great Depression in the 1930s. More government spending did not solve Japan's "lost decade" in the 1990s. As such, it is a triumph of hope over experience to believe that more government spending will help the U.S. today. To improve the economy, policy makers should focus on reforms that remove impediments to work, saving, investment and production. Lower tax rates and a reduction in the burden of government are the best ways of using fiscal policy to boost growth. 

Call your Congresscritter's office and tell them you think spreading around another trillion dollars that we don't have is insane and irresponsible, and giving billions of it to organizations like ACORN is contemptible and criminal. Tell them tax rate cuts will stimulate the economy, just as they did for Kennedy, Reagan, and Bush. Tell them you get more of what you reward and less of what you punish, so we should reward production, job-creation, and success — not failure.

UPDATE: I've learned via email from Cato that the ad ran in today’s New York Times (page A11) and is also scheduled to appear in the Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, and Washington Times. Good work, Cato!

UPDATE2: The House passed the abominable $819 billion monstrosity, but with all the Republicans and 11 Democrats voting no: 

The 244-188 vote was not what Mr. Obama had hoped for. A week of presidential wooing — including a visit to the Capitol, a return visit to the White House by moderate House Republicans and a bipartisan cocktail party Wednesday night — did not yield a single Republican vote. The president also lost 11 Democrats.

Instapundit passed along this suggestion: 

UPDATE: Reader Mark Cates writes: “You might mention that it would be worthwhile to send these guys a Thank You for their vote. They probably need as much encouragement as they can get. I sent one to Shuler.”

Good suggestion.

Yep. And if, like me, you're represented by one of the 244 sleazeballs who are gleefully increasing the federal budget by 30% in one year, and during a recession to boot, send them a "Shame on you!" This battle may have been lost, but the war is just beginning. Keep the heat on!

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a Comment »

This can’t go on

Posted by Richard on January 23, 2009

Remember how the feds recently "bailed out" General Motors and Chrysler? That money — at least part of it — was in the form of loans. So what's GM doing with the money? Well, I wouldn't call it spending it wisely. Mark J. Perry noted today that GM is now offering 0% financing to car buyers, and pointed out what that means (emphasis in original):

Quote of the day from Jeff Macke (CNBC Fast Money contributor) via Dennis Gartman's "The Gartman Letter":

"GM has become a company that borrowed money from the U.S. government at 8% and lent it to the American public at 0%. This is not a model we would like to build upon.”

MP: And GMAC lowered credit standards at the same time it offered 0% financing.  

The late economist Herb Stein famously said, "If something can't go on forever, then it won't."

It looks like GM won't.

This bailout/stimulus crap has got to stop.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , | Leave a Comment »

Why Detroit can’t compete

Posted by Richard on January 6, 2009

Mark J. Perry posted pictures of Ford's 1941 and 2007 UAW union contracts. A picture is worth a thousand words, so go check them out. But here are the key stats:

1941: 24 pages (3.5 x 5 inches).

2007: 2,215 pages (8.5 x 11 inches), weighing 22 pounds.

But that's not the only problem. The other day, Perry linked to this Stop the ACLU post. It described a Detroit TV station's exposé of how union officials abuse what are laughably called the "work rules" in that 22-pound contract: 

One of the bosses, Ron Seroka, a union job security officer, takes off half a day nearly everyday to go home to lounge around the house while he is on the clock. Seroka punches in at the plant at 6AM every single day and is home by 11:30 AM for some nice leisure time at home. Yet he gets a steady 10 hours pay every single day despite the fact that he is rarely at work.

Seroka’s union boss is even worse. Union chairman Jim Modzelewski buys beer on a daily basis while on the clock and clocks himself in for overtime pay hours before he even wakes up to go into the plant. TV 4 found that after he punches in, he typically leaves for a beer run mere hours later. Again, all this is on a daily basis. He is also paid overtime pay on a daily basis as he sits home drinking his daily beer. With over 2,500 hours of overtime, Modzelewski made a six-figure salary last year.

The problem isn't just a few corrupt union officials (emphasis added):

The TV news also briefly interviewed an auto business expert that says in the last ten years one in three American union auto workers would not show up to work on any given day while foreign auto plants would see 98 out of 100 of their workers dutifully show up for work. Makes it a bit hard to plan on a work force in the US with unions in control, doesn’t it?

Thanks to the Democratic Congress and the "compassionate conservative" in the White House, it's now your tax dollars (and your children's, and grandchildren's…) that are paying these louts. Think about that as you're dutifully showing up for work in the morning. 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | 2 Comments »

Holiday quote of the day

Posted by Richard on December 19, 2008

Christmas is a time when kids tell Santa what they want and adults pay for it. Deficits are when adults tell the government what they want and their kids pay for it.

— Richard Lamm

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , | Leave a Comment »

Bailout bubble

Posted by Richard on November 28, 2008

Catching up on a couple of days' worth of Instapundit, I spotted one of those short, brilliant quips for which Glenn is known:

Could we be in the midst of a “bailout bubble?” And if so, what happens when it bursts?

Yes, we could. Especially as the line for bailouts (predictably) keeps growing beyond all reason, and the politicians keep feeding it beyond all reason. 

The problem is, when this bubble bursts — unlike the housing bubble, tech bubble, or "tulip mania" bubble — it won't hurt just those who willingly (and foolishly) bought into it. 

This time, we've all bought into it, whether we wanted to or not.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

Porker of the month

Posted by Richard on November 22, 2008

Citizens Against Government Waste named Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA) its "Porker of the Month" for something he said in late October, which confirmed that he's an arrogant, economically illiterate socialist (emphasis added):

The remark occurred during an October 27, 2008 Indian-American Forum Candidate Night in suburban Virginia with his challenger Mark Ellmore (R).  Rep. Moran stated “Now, in the last seven years, we have had the highest corporate profit ever in American history, highest corporate profit.  We’ve had the highest productivity.  The American worker has produced more per person than at any time.  But it hasn’t been shared and that’s the problem.  Because we have been guided by a Republican administration who believes in this simplistic notion that people who have wealth are entitled to keep it and they have an antipathy towards the means of redistributing wealth.  And they may be able to sustain that for awhile, but it doesn’t work in the long run.”

“Rep. Moran’s punitive conclusion about creating wealth reflects the prevailing ethos of the current Congress,” said CAGW President Tom Schatz.  “His remarks offer a window into the soul of the congressional leadership and offer a bare-knuckled preview of the kind of confiscatory policies taxpayers can expect now that there are even fewer fiscal conservatives on Capitol Hill.  This Congress intends to reward hard work and productivity with a government-mandated ‘sharing’ program.”

It is no surprise that Rep. Moran cannot grasp the concept of benefiting from the fruits of one’s labor because all he has ever produced is hot air.  He entered politics soon after graduate school, where he must have majored in putting his foot in his mouth.  In 2003, he said, “If it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for this war with Iraq, we would not be doing this.”  In June, 2006 he told a local group that when he took the helm of a House appropriations subcommittee he was going “to earmark the s__ out of it.”

Apparently, Moran believes that rewarding productive activity doesn't work in the long run, but punishing achievement does.

Or maybe he's not really that stupid. Maybe he's just another unprincipled demagogue with power-lust who figures most of his constituents are that stupid, and he's more than willing to exploit their ignorance, envy, and greed. Sadly, it seems to be working for him.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

Crony capitalism

Posted by Richard on November 20, 2008

When you start handing out free money, expect a long line to form. Wall Street bankers and insurance companies have been joined in the bailout line by student loan debtors (and their creditors), domestic auto makers, states, municipalities, … I'm sure the line will get longer day by day.

The heads of the "big three" car makers were in Washington begging today (after flying there in their private jets). They were accompanied by UAW president Ron Gettelfinger, who joined them in begging for taxpayer money. But Gettelfinger made it clear that the union wouldn't accept any pay or benefit cuts.

This is absurd, and the claim that the current financial crisis caused the carmakers' problems is nonsense. GM's losses have averaged more than $1.5 billion per month for years, so its share of the proposed $25 billion bailout merely lets it continue on an unsustainable course for a few more months. It's like giving someone a transfusion while their severed carotid artery continues spurting blood. 

The severed artery that the "doctors" in Congress don't want repaired is the UAW contract. Total employee compensation for the "big three" averages about $73 per hour. For the American factories of Toyota, Honda, and Nissan, it's about $44 per hour.

And that cost disparity doesn't even take into account the deleterious effect of an inch-thick union contract full of bureaucratic, restrictive, and onerous work rules. Or the thousands of union members in the "jobs bank" program getting $31 an hour plus benefits to work crossword puzzles and watch TV for 40 hours a week.

Bill Wilson, president of Americans for Limited Government, neatly summarized what's wrong with this bailout plan in a letter to Congressional leaders: 

“The automotive industry’s problems cannot and should not be passed on to the American taxpayer. And they will only be compounded if the federal government now offers billions of dollars of taxpayer-financed loan guarantees to companies that would otherwise file for bankruptcy,” Wilson wrote in the letter.

“These taxpayer loans will, by design, perpetuate these companies in their present form,” Wilson said. “However, it is the very present forms of each company that must be addressed and resolved by market forces, a process that will not occur if government gets in the way of bankruptcy.”

Newt Gingrich has a name for what's happening in Washington these days: 

There’s a term that’s commonly applied to the economic systems of some Asian and Latin American countries. It’s “crony capitalism.”

Crony capitalism is when government controls significant parts of the economy. Under this kind of bureaucratic micromanagement, politicians — not the free market — call the shots. And that means that the decisions that control the economy are of necessity political decisions, not economic ones.

Crony capitalism is bad for government. Economic power in the hands of politicians breeds corruption. 

Crony capitalism is bad for democracy. Individuals and businesses outside favored industries have an unequal voice in self-government.

Crony capitalism is bad for business. Politicians wedded to the status quo stifle growth and innovation.

And there’s one more thing about crony capitalism: It’s come to America.

Read the whole thing. Then contact your senators and representative and tell them, "Enough! No more bailouts! No more crony capitalism!"

UPDATE: The Center for Individual Freedom will blast fax the President and Congressional leaders on your behalf. But in addition (or instead), it's best to call your congresscritters' offices and tell the nice staffer whose keeping a tally of calls for and against what you think. (Oops, forgot the link — fixed now.)

 

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Money hole

Posted by Richard on November 16, 2008

Friday night, Jed Baer emailed a few of us about this video at the von Mises Institute, but it wouldn't load for me. Yesterday, LGF posted it. It's damned funny, but in a slightly disturbing way — both the overall idea and the positions of the panel members are just too close to the truth.

It's from the Onion News Network, which Charles Johnson called "one of the last remaining credible mainstream news sources." Enjoy!


In The Know: Should The Government Stop Dumping Money Into A Giant Hole?

UPDATE: OK, the Flash embed here doesn't seem to be working reliably either. Click the link above to view it at the Onion site.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a Comment »