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Dean Baker's right again.

by Flavius 5/19/2013 - 12:25 pm

From about 2000 Dean Baker reported that we were in a real estate bubble which would end with a collapse. In Jan  2004 he even offered a $1000 prize for the  economist who could make the best attempt at disproving  him (and paid it to Hilary Croke a researcher for the Fed. )
 

Here was Baker last week, commenting on the Washington Post's view of the economy.

 QUOTE

However the real gem is this line: [Read more]

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Did you know that.....

by Flavius 5/16/2013 - 8:09 am

 

 

o In New York city “Between 2006 and 2010, the amount spent (by the school system) on arts and music equipment and supplies was cut by 79 percent

o nearly one fourth of all public schools have not a single art, music, theater or dance teacher on staff

o at Brooklyn Tech (where Flavius'  grandson goes) 24 percent of the students were black in 1999-2000, compared with 10 percent during the 2011-2012 school year

o At Bronx Science, the share of black students dropped from 9 to 3.5 percent over the same period.

o….only nine have been accepted into (Stuyvesant) for next year.

o In 2006, 53 percent of students in (the gifted and talented programs) were black or Hispanic; now less than one-third are [Read more]

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There's this thing about the king's trousers......

by Flavius 4/18/2013 - 11:08 pm

 

An excerpt from  Dean Baker in yesterday's Guardian

Just to remind folks, Reinhart and Rogoff (R&R) are the authors of……………..(a) history of financial crises, This Time is Different. ....…the main conclusion…….. is that high ratios of debt to GDP lead to a long periods of slow growth. [Read more]

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If you're going to offer marshmallows to a bear

by Flavius 4/12/2013 - 12:36 am

be sure you have a big bag.

Obama was wrong to put the chained CPI on the table. I'm fully aware that the Social Security fund will be exhausted in 2000 something or other . And it won't make any difference . The then current contributions from payroll taxes will cover some large % of the requirements and the balance can bloody well be contributed by the public. After all,by then there would have been around 100 years during which the public enjoyed lower taxes because of the subsidy from the social security surplus it'll be time for the public to return the favor. [Read more]

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The truth and nothing but the truth

by Flavius 4/8/2013 - 8:41 am

 

“It goes without saying that Republicans oppose any expansion of programs that help the less fortunate-along with tax cuts for the wealthy, such opposition is pretty much what defines modern conservatism”

 

Krugman today.

 

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

 

And the rest of the column is similarly cogent. With one piece missing. Along with wanting to deprive the less fortunate, modern conservatives dislike them. Them, personally. Not just the resources they consume but them. Personally.  So conservatives are not just indifferent to the suffering of the poor, they feel they’re a good thing. Serves them right. A well-deserved punishment. [Read more]

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The Pauline doctrine

by Flavius 4/6/2013 - 8:26 am

• Paul Krugman: The Urge to Purge: "When the Great Depression struck, many influential people argued that the government shouldn’t even try to limit the damage…. Andrew Mellon…. Joseph Schumpeter… “artificial stimulus leaves part of the work of depressions undone.” Like many economists, I used to quote these past luminaries with a certain smugness…. How naïve we were. [Read more]

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Figures don't lie but liars............

by Flavius 3/19/2013 - 11:00 pm

Brad Delong, today.

 

 

Those of us who know the numbers, or who simply live in America and look around, know that the 47 percent who aren’t paying federal income taxes this year are by and large not “moochers.” About a fifth are elderly retired. About two-thirds are in households with incomes of less than $20,000 a year—definitely not living high. And nearly one-third owe no income taxes because of the earned-income and child tax credits, which both became law with bipartisan support. [Read more]

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Now it just takes a puff of smoke

by Flavius 3/18/2013 - 1:19 pm

Herod 

Today has been one of those perfect winter days, cold, brilliant and utterly still, when the bark of a shepherd’s dog carries for miles, and the great wild mountains come up close to the city walls…

Barges are unloading soil fertilizer at the river wharves. Soft drinks and sandwiches may be had in the inns at reasonable prices. Allotment gardening has become popular.

…Things are beginning to take shape. It is a long time since anyone stole the park benches or murdered the swans. There are children in this province who have never seen a louse, shopkeepers who have never handled a counterfeit coin, women of forty who have never hidden in a ditch except for fun…. [Read more]

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It's time for a little more Krugman

by Flavius 3/7/2013 - 11:20 pm

Brad Delong carried a piece today worthy of Paul Krugman ( I can think of no higher praise) .By Paul Krugman.

Here’s a taste

                                   

The original argument against expansionary fiscal policy in the current conjuncture was that it was not worth undertaking because of crowding-out. Fiscal expansion would push up long-term real interest rates and that would diminish private investment. The net effect on demand, employment, and spending would be zero--or even less than zero: the "expansionary austerity" meme.

  [Read more]

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Of "good enough" mothers and Mack trucks

by Flavius 1/3/2013 - 11:02 pm

Until 1960 a mother who had an autistic child not only had to deal with that heart break , she also had to listen when the  Freudian  psychiatrists or psychologists  she consulted "helped" her by telling her she made her child autistic.. 

They described how a perfect mother would deal with a child who spread feces on the wall, bit his mother's cheek when she leaned over to kiss him, and pulled out his sister's hair.And asked whether she was demonstrating that perfection. No? Well then she was responsible for her child not only not being perfect but being highly imperfect . "Like you" was the unstated clause. [Read more]

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