The Occupy Wall Street demonstrations are lackluster at best. One troublesome aspect of the whole “movement” concerns the poor economic logic underlying their causes. The occupiers are targeting the wrong enemy when they claim corporate greed and income inequality caused by capitalism is generating the problems in Washington. These claims have been propagated by…
Read More »
In the new article on runaway spending from the Pentagon, “How Many More Trillion$ for Defense?”, Independent Institute Research Fellow Winslow Wheeler explains the dire need for effective budgetary controls over the Pentagon.� As it stands the Pentagon “is literally ‘unauditable.’” �Since Sept. 11, 2001, Congress and the Defense Department have added more than…
Read More »
In this new article on United States transportation infrastructure and spending, Gabriel Roth explains the� wasteful spending endemic to the central planning approach taken to transportation.� Rather than a leaky bucket, Roth proposes using market forces based on local transportation needs: “President Obama�s recent announcement of a $50 billion ‘up-front investment’ for ‘renewing and…
Read More »
In a new article in Defense News, Winslow Wheeler reports on the trillions of dollars of wasteful spending by the Pentagon, and the poor state of the armed forces that result: “You�d think all that added money would give us larger forces, a newer hardware inventory and better trained people. Instead, the windfall made…
Read More »
Dr. Emily Skarbek, Director of the Government Cost Calculator was interviewed on the nationally syndicated web radio blog, “Taking Back America”.� During the interview, Dr. Skarbek uses MyGovCost.org to explain the specific effects of rampant government spending for any individual in America. Dr. Skarbek illustrates how an individual can find out what their own…
Read More »
The New York Times on Monday, columnist Peter Orszag addresses the important issue of the the unsustainable budget deficit problem and the current high unemployment. What Orszag suggests as a “compromise” neglects the heart of both problems. Orszag suggests that “ideally only the middle-class tax cuts would be continued for now” but that doing…
Read More »
For many, economic logic and application to a wise management of finances is a chore considered best left to the �professionals�. After all, crunching numbers given the vast array of rules and regulations can be taxing (pardon the pun). However, debt finance is a particular economic subject that can be easily understood and just…
Read More »
Not everyone has the stomach for perusing the national income and product accounts, but one who does can learn a great deal about what ails the present economy and about its prospects for returning to a healthier condition. (I draw the data I discuss here from Table B-2, Real Gross Domestic Product, 1960-2009, in…
Read More »
When President Obama presented his budget recently for fiscal year 2011, he proposed that the Pentagon’s outlays be increased by about 4.5 percent beyond its estimated outlays in fiscal 2010, to a total of almost $719 billion. Although many Americans regard this enormous sum as excessive, few appreciate that the total amount of all…
Read More »
 |
 |
 |
 |
