Posts Tagged ‘debt’

Regime Uncertainty


Sunday August 14th, 2011   •   Posted by Emily Skarbek at 11:19am PDT   •   1 Comment

The market is a yo-yo following the S&P downgrade – investors are searching for stability amid the policy flux created by the current Congress and Administration. Businesses and investors are struggling to create and sustain stable and accurate expectations as to the rules they are likely to face in the future. Steve Horowitz gives…
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Should Congress Raise the Debt Ceiling? Weigh In!


Thursday July 14th, 2011   •   Posted by Emily Skarbek at 9:18am PDT   •   10 Comments

Freakonomics reports yesterday that a new poll from the Pew Research Center and the Washington Post shows more people see raising the debt limit as a bigger risk than not raising it. Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner conduct their own poll. Weigh in here! As Ezra Klein reports on the development of the Capitol…
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Alternative Debt Solutions: Intergovernmental Debt and Asset Sales


Wednesday July 6th, 2011   •   Posted by Emily Skarbek at 5:51am PDT   •   5 Comments

Ron Paul has gone public with proposals for the Fed to destroy $1.6 trillion in government bonds that it is currently holding. As The New Republic’s Dean Baker reports, such a plan might be a way around the impass that has mounted on the Hill. Aside from the practicalities of politics, Paul’s plan is…
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How Costly Would a U.S. Default Be?


Monday June 27th, 2011   •   Posted by Emily Skarbek at 10:05am PDT   •   1 Comment

Discussions of a Treasury default all share one common feature�no one is certain as to what a default would actually entail. A recent article in The Economist highlights a study by Terry Zivney (Ball State University) and Richard Marcus (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee) that looked at the last instance of U.S. default in 1979. The…
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Bernanke Responds to Incentives


Wednesday June 15th, 2011   •   Posted by Emily Skarbek at 9:59am PDT   •   1 Comment

Bernanke urges for an increase in the debt ceiling, demonstrating the wisdom of James Buchanan and Richard Wagner. In Democracy in Deficit, Chapter 8, the authors set out to model Keynesian-oriented fiscal policy with the “the plausible hypothesis that monetary authorities are, like elected politicians, subjected to both direct and indirect political pressures, and…
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Is Social Security a Good Deal? Antony Davies Answers


Monday May 16th, 2011   •   Posted by Emily Skarbek at 8:41am PDT   •   5 Comments

Social Security “Trust Fund” Deficits to Add $5 Trillion to U.S. Debt


Sunday May 15th, 2011   •   Posted by David Theroux at 9:39am PDT   •   3 Comments

Jed Graham in Investor’s Business Daily reports that a new study of the financial condition of Social Security and Medicare indicate that with baby boomer retirements, rising health costs, and the ongoing economic malaise, these federal entitlement programs are producing massive deficits in perpetuity unless major changes are made to cut these unsustainable liabilities….
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Social Security is a Sinking Ship


Friday February 4th, 2011   •   Posted by Emily Skarbek at 11:05am PST   •   3 Comments

A wonderful graphic by Third Way is available here showing the path of Social Security towards insolvency. Jim Kessler and David Kendall advocate: “a ‘Savings-Led’ Social Security reform plan that actually increases the program�s progressivity. Our plan makes roughly two dollars in benefit reductions for every one dollar in revenue increases, and achieves solvency…
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Consensus on Cutting the Deficit?


Friday January 21st, 2011   •   Posted by Emily Skarbek at 8:34am PST   •   0 Comments

Yesterday The New York Times published the results of a poll on how to cut the national deficit. Interestingly, a majority of people think necessary action is needed, the deficit can be reduced without increasing taxes, and it is necessary to cut back on programs they benefit from. Cause for optimism? I think not….
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A Capital Hill Compromise?


Friday December 3rd, 2010   •   Posted by Emily Skarbek at 5:05am PST   •   0 Comments

The Washington Post reports that the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform has come up with a plan to address the nation’s fiscal house of cards. The major points of the plan include: Deficit reductions by nearly $4 trillion over the next decade Large reductions in discretionary spending Tax code reform He hits…
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