2010-02-08
By this 18th month of an economy that's officially recovering but still feeling awfully receded, one business that's booming is storytelling.
The story you hear is that all this - bubble, recession, agony - are what you get when you trust markets too much. The free market, we're told, failed. The free market led us astray.
2010-02-08
Gates money for vaccines will help Africa's children, but better economic policies will help them more.
2010-02-05
Moody's Investors Service, Inc. indicated today that the U.S. government bond rating of Aaa could come under pressure unless immediate action is taken by the government to stall the course of deficit spending and begin to reduce the overall deficit level. Moody's cautioned that the level of current debt in relationship to GDP has risen dramatically over the past year to eighteen months and as a result, the ratio of government debt to GDP in the U.S. economy is higher than other countries with a Aaa rating.
2010-02-05
Democrats pushed us down the path of higher spending, higher unemployment, lower wages, and, ultimately, a slower recovery. And now they are expecting to do so again with a new similar stimulus plan.
2010-02-05
The Senate health-care bill would raise effective marginal tax rates on lower and middle-income singles and families up to 41%.
2010-02-05
The European Commission recommendations for Greece are in line with our expectations, and provide a framework for conditions that would enable the delivery of support - at least once. However, implementation and adjustment are a persistent challenge in Greece. Furthermore, the political basis for providing support would be significantly tested immediately after an initial incident - a factor that contributes to an erosion of the European bias against IMF involvement in the eurozone.
2010-02-04
Article published in Der Standard on 22nd January, 2010
2010-02-03
WASHINGTON, Feb 2 (Reuters) - U.S. Federal Reserve Board Governor Kevin Warsh said on Tuesday that financial reform efforts that focus narrowly on expanding regulation could stifle the economy.
2010-02-03
It's a problem all too familiar to Greek business owners: the gnawing uncertainty of what taxes they might owe next year — and whether they'll even be hit by a sudden increase in the bill for last year.
Greece's ever-changing tax system undermines compliance and revenue — and makes a major contribution to the government financial crisis that has shaken the entire European Union and undermined the euro currency
2010-02-03
Deep in the president's budget released Monday—in Table S-8 on page 161—appear a set of proposals headed "Reform U.S. International Tax System." If these proposals are enacted, U.S.-based multinational firms will face $122.2 billion in tax increases over the next decade. This is a natural follow-up to President Obama's sweeping plan announced last May entitled "Leveling the Playing Field: Curbing Tax Havens and Removing Tax Incentives for Shifting Jobs Overseas."
The fundamental assumption behind these proposals is that U.S. multinationals expand abroad only to "export" jobs out of the country. Thus, taxing their foreign operations more would boost tax revenues here and create desperately needed U.S. jobs.
This is simply wrong. These tax increases would not create American jobs, they would destroy them.
2010-02-02
TAXPAYERS have footed a £260,000 bill to send Eurocrats and their families on holiday in the Italian Alps.
2010-02-02
One rule of budget reporting is to watch what the politicians are spending this year, not the frugality they promise down the road. By that measure, the budget that President Obama released yesterday for fiscal 2011 is one of the greatest spend-while-you-can documents in American history.
2010-02-02
Labor Department numbers show that the Obama Administrations $787 billion stimulus was a flop. Instead of holding the unemployment rate at 8 percent or below, the jobless rate soared to 10 percent. Now there is discussion of second so-called stimulus, which politicians are calling a jobs bill. But making government bigger, this CF&P Foundation video explains, is a recipe for long-run stagnation and lower living standards, regardless of what the policy is named.
2010-01-31
DAVOS, Switzerland — Germany opposes the creation of a bank rescue fund, as it would offer financial institutions a risk-free guarantee, Economy Minister Rainer Bruederle said Saturday.
2010-01-29
A new tide of employment legislation, taxes and red tape will cost firms £25billion over the next four years and hold back recovery, business leaders are warning.
2010-01-29
Social cohesion has become an excuse for avoiding necessary reforms in Europe
2010-01-29
GRASPING Euro MPs will snatch even more money from hard-pressed British taxpayers after voting themselves a bonus which puts their pay and expenses package up to £450,000 a year.
2010-01-29
His agenda on the ropes, President Obama made a calculated decision to pivot to populism. The Massachusetts Senate race highlighted a fed-up public. The White House strategy: Channel that anger away from itself and to easier targets. Its opening shots were a new tax on banks, new restrictions on banking activities, and Mr. Obama roaring, "We want our money back!"
2010-01-28
As many as 40 percent of the world’s hedge funds won’t have access to European Union investors if EU plans to oversee funds and private equity are passed in their current form, an official at Britain’s regulator said.
2010-01-27
"The questions to ask is: what should government be doing? Is it reaching into too many aspects of our lives; is it trying to do too much; are its expectations too grand; do politicians demand too much? The answers to these questions is certainly yes."
