Politicians, financiers and pundits are all busily attempting to jawbone a normal cyclical downturn, already made tougher by the Fed’s seesaw monetary policy, into a permanent downturn in US and world economic growth. A failed $700 billion financial bailout is to be followed by a $50 billion bailout of the failed US auto industry that […]

Congratulations are due to President-elect Obama and his supporters on a well earned and historic victory. Senator McCain hit the nail on the head: …his success alone commands my respect for his ability and perseverance. But that he managed to do so by inspiring the hopes of so many millions of Americans who had once […]

If George Bush weren’t President, he’d make a great finance professor. He just explained mortgage markets as well as anybody I’ve heard in the first quarter of a 13 minute speech. I don’t think Franklin Roosevelt gave as good a TV speech himself in 1929. I was a little disappointed that he didn’t give any […]

It’s literally impossible to get through a news talk program anymore without some guest using the phrase, “At the end of the day.” Who cares about the end of the day? The truth is, nothing gets done at the end of the day. This is a problem that reaches across the aisle, so it demands […]

Several libertarian economic commentators have gotten caught up in a meme opposing drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf and other US locations. Somehow they’ve gotten the idea that the political rhetoric of “energy independence” somehow makes removing government regulations anti-freedom and inefficient. Maybe they’re under the misapprehension that when we talk about drilling here, what […]

Apparently some on the left are trying to blame Phil Gramm for the subprime lending crisis and the ensuing credit crunch. The theory is that somehow the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which repealed most of the Depression era firewall between investment and commercial banking somehow created the runup in mortgage lending and home values. In an interview […]