Articles by John E. Tamny
Unwise and Unproductive Pandering from the GOP
With voters in Michigan set to weigh in on the next Republican presidential nominee, it's not surprising to learn that the pandering for votes has picked up. Sadly, short-term political gain has trumped sound thinking when it comes to...
Read More
|
Misplaced Hand-Wringing Over Housing
In a recent speech at Georgetown Law Center, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said the recent moderation in home prices and the externalities from same are "the most significant current risk for our economy." His view is a conventional one held...
Read More
|
Say Yes to Price Fixing
The U.S. Justice Department recently fined British Airways (BA) and Korean Air $300 million apiece after they acknowledged price fixing on international flights. With rising fuel prices cutting into their profit margins, the airlines admitted to collusion with riv
Read More
|
Generosity, Trade Deficits, and China
In a column describing the appreciation of his Brooklyn (NY) brownstone, Portfolio Magazine economics writer John Cassidy said to his wife, "Thank God for the Chinese government. It made us a million dollars." To Cassidy's way of thinking, "generous lenders"...
Read More
|
Capitalism is Not the Cause of Housing, Subprime Turmoil
Though they clashed on the inputs necessary for economic growth, John Maynard Keynes and Ludwig Von Mises had very similar views on the economic impact of falling currency values. In his Tract on Monetary Reform, Keynes wrote that when...
Read More
|
14,000 Reasons to Be (Mostly) Bullish
The Dow Jones Industrial Average's brief rise to 14,000 last week predictably engendered lots of commentary, including a Los Angeles Times op-ed by business writer Eric Weiner. Weiner's main thesis was that rather than a positive economic indicator, the...
Read More
|
Without Healthy People, There Is No Insurance
A recent newspaper headline bemoaned the fact that "Insurance rewards healthy workers." A similarly tautological headline might be that, "Employers reward productive workers." What's surprising isn't that healthy employees would be rewarded with cheaper insurance p
Read More
|
Schizophrenia in the Subprime Sector
Testifying before the House Financial Services committee in April, FDIC chairman Sheila Bair addressed problems in the subprime loan sector by calling out the industry itself; telling the committee, "I think we should hold the servicers' and investors' feet...
Read More
|
LBO Firms and the Virtue of Profits
Leveraged buyout (LBO) firms played a very necessary role in the de-conglomeration of U.S. businesses in the '80s. While much is made of allegedly excessive executive compensation today, this was a far more pressing issue back then as evidenced...
Read More
|
Laughing and Crying with Thomas Friedman
In a recent New York Times piece, Thomas Friedman laid bare the absurdity of American immigration laws. While our best-in-class universities educate students from around the world, immigration rules make it hard for them to build professional careers stateside....
Read More
|
