A while ago I did a story comparing the change in employment rates in recessions in the U.S. and in Europe, and what I found was that America fired a lot of people and rehired a lot of people faster than Europe. That difference is disappearing, and that is a problem.
When you see government leaders really bullying business, you know that government's economic policy is failing. They get angry and they get desperate.
I'm always for lower taxes because lower taxes make people want to do things. Less burden, more fun, and economics is about people wanting to have fun. Growth is fun for people in the marketplace.
By playing on people's desire to belong to groups, Facebook creates a new, inclusive society. After all, Facebook is not like Harvard College. Anyone with access to the Internet can sign up.
Eventually the dollar won't always rule. Eventually there will be a challenge to the United States and it will have to be like other countries that are a bit concerned about their currency, and then have to ratchet back in order to - right, in order to sustain. We just haven't reached that point yet.
With demands for special education or standardized test prep being shouted in their ears, public schools can't always hear a parent when he says: 'I want my child to be able to write contracts in Spanish,' or, 'I want my child to shake hands firmly,' or, 'I want my child to study statistics and accounting, not calculus.'
In the end, all new schools, public or private, snobby or not, add value to the education market, making it bigger and more efficient, in the same way that Zuckerberg added wealth to the economy even for non-Facebook fans.
The result of the collaborative culture is that corporations or government institutions focus intensely on internal culture and pour their energy into achieving minuscule policy changes relating to workplace efficiency, gender or race.
Policy people suffer their own kind of agony, and no wonder. After all, what is the average life of the policy person? You go into government if you are lucky, do your best, aren't appreciated, take all the blame for policies for which you are only partly responsible, leave, realize your reputation has been damaged, maybe permanently.
Anti-parent music seems to be all the pop-rock market wants.
Grades can matter, especially for those students and parents who live for the next round of applications to graduate or professional schools. But there's a problem with the grade emphasis. Math or science graduates earn more than students majoring in the humanities.
The most remarkable thing about Calvin Coolidge is that he served for 67 months, and when he left office, the budget was lower than he came in. In real terms - in nominal terms with vanilla on top - he cut the budget year over year.
The phrase 'perception is reality' is overused generally. But perception can be reality in monetary policy. The bond market doesn't act merely on what it sees. It acts on what it expects of the Fed or the government.
Disillusionment can come as fast as a gust, but building faith that the government won't inflate again is like building a new sailboat, a project of years.
The New Deal exists principally on an emotional plane for Obama. To him, the New Deal is something you play like a song, to make you or your constituents feel better.
McCain likes strong defense, and he's viscerally suspicious of big companies. So he's more a Square Deal guy than a New Deal guy.
What's wrong with the auto industry isn't that it failed to create jobs. What's wrong is that it emphasizes jobs over general growth itself.
The Grand Old Party's abiding affection for a 'bigger and better' presidency isn't entirely logical. After all, the Obama presidency commenced with an effort to reenact the Hundred Days. Yet President Obama's first-term economic performance itself was not 'big' but mediocre - tiny, even.
Young parents in America are holy and not to be messed with. If they say something is correct, we all acquiesce. And is there any man, woman or canine who doesn't leap out of the way when one of those giant, all-terrain Bugaboo strollers comes barreling down the sidewalk?
Democrats who see virtue in the estate tax are doing the equivalent of aborting future enterprises. They deprive businesses of oxygen with their support for capital gains taxes and disregard for contracts.
