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Professor Mark J. Perry's Blog for Economics and Finance
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
About Me
- Name: Mark J. Perry
- Location: Washington, D.C., United States
Dr. Mark J. Perry is a professor of economics and finance in the School of Management at the Flint campus of the University of Michigan. Perry holds two graduate degrees in economics (M.A. and Ph.D.) from George Mason University near Washington, D.C. In addition, he holds an MBA degree in finance from the Curtis L. Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota. In addition to a faculty appointment at the University of Michigan-Flint, Perry is also a visiting scholar at The American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C.
Previous Posts
- Foreclosures Concentrated in Four States
- Problem Banks in 2008: Nowhere Close to 1990-91
- Bank Deliquency Rates for 2008:QIV
- Grade Inflation: University of Michigan Law School
- Corporate Income Tax = $3,190 Per Household
- Why Skilled Immigrants Are Leaving the U.S.
- Get To Work and Bail Yourself Out
- Real Disposable Personal Income Grows by 3.3%
- Savings Rate Rises to 14-year High in January: 5%
- Bankruptcy Could Actually Save GM
10 Comments:
Yes because the laissez fair approach has worked so well for us all. Let's try it again.
The Obama Administration's US Trade Nominee Ron Kirk owes about $10,000 in taxes, making him the fifth(?) Obama nominee to have tax issues.
Everyone loves "big government" when they're not the ones paying for it.
Yes because the laissez fair approach has worked so well for us all. Let's try it again.
Unfortunately we do not have, and have never had, a "laissez fair approach" to our economy. Free market capitalism has provided more welath and a higher standard of living, for more people, than any other system in the history of the world. Billions of people have been lifted out of poverty by free markets.
If the left really cared about people, they would be embracing capitalism and free markets, but they don't. What they really care about is power.
"If the left really cared about people, they would be embracing capitalism and free markets, but they don't. What they really care about is power"...
Amen sir!...
"Yes because the laissez fair approach has worked so well for us all. Let's try it again."
Please explain to me when and where we tried a laissez fari approach?
Free markets aren't free unless the externalities are considered. Right now we are paying the externalized cost of rampant derivatives just as surely as we are paying the externalized costs of asbestos and mercury.
If the right really cared about freedom we would not have the abuses of power that epitomized the Nixon and Bush years. They would not embrace social and religious issues designed to restrict freedom.
If the left really cared about poor folks, equality, and the environmment they woould not be so glib about property rights or what constitutes a public benefit. They would not suggest that public benefits can be had for free.
Neither the left nor the right is actively promoting the best results for the most people. Each side is equally spreading the spin, half truth and lies that they think will keep them in power.
The ugly truth is that free markets are not always efficient and not always rational. As a result we have never allowed a truly free market, and we never will.
Thinking that the free market can solve all our ills is another of those ideas that is elegant, simple, and wrong.
These are amusing cartoons that play on popular stereotypes and misconceptions. Stereotypes don't get that way without a reason, so it is reasonable to assume that gov't doesn't know much about autos.
But without government guidance and assistance and funding we would be waiting a long time for the free market to give us the SR71 blackbird or the F-22 Raptor.
Without which we might not have the "free market", such as it is.
Hydra
Right now we are paying the externalized cost of rampant derivatives just as surely as we are paying the externalized costs of asbestos and mercury.
"Rampant derivatives"? "Derivatives" covers a lot of ground, pal. In fact, derivatives, more often than not, provide a means of managing risk by allowing people to hedge exposure. All things considered they have added value, not diminished it. What we are paying for now is leftist manipulation of the loan market (CRA, Fannie, Freddie) and the resulting misallocation of credit.
As for "paying the costs of asbestos and mercury", one only had to take a peek behind the iron curtain, where there were no free markets, to see what an environmental nightmare really looked like. Of course it's not just corporate waste that extracts a price, as this quote form a National Geographic article reveals:
"The ban on DDT," says Gwadz of the National Institutes of Health, "may have killed 20 million children."
It's leftist drivel as well.
If the right really cared about freedom we would not have the abuses of power that epitomized the Nixon and Bush years. They would not embrace social and religious issues designed to restrict freedom.
Ah yes, those terrible Bush years. Why it was just like Nazi Germany. And exactly which "social and religious" issues would those be, you sanctimonious boob.
The ugly truth is that free markets are not always efficient and not always rational.
So, what? No one is claiming that the markets are perfectly efficient and rational at all times, they are simply a pricing mechanism. What's the alternative, allowing a bunch of self-important academics and politicians to determine the value of every commodity, good or service? You need to read a little Hayek.
But without government guidance and assistance and funding we would be waiting a long time for the free market to give us the SR71 blackbird or the F-22 Raptor.
Government "guidance and assistance" in these instances consisted of making demands on private firms who used their expertise to deliver.
So yes, we realize that there is a need for minimal regulation of the market. But the government should be acting as a referee not picking winners and losers.
But without government guidance and assistance and funding we would be waiting a long time for the free market to give us the SR71 blackbird or the F-22 Raptor.
Government "guidance and assistance" in these instances consisted of making demands on private firms who used their expertise to deliver.
So yes, we realize that there is a need for minimal regulation of the market. But the government should be acting as a referee not picking winners and losers.
Are you serious?! Do you know anything about the defense industry? Both of those programs are great examples of corporate/government partnership/collusion. The SR-71 sure is cool, but is it useful?
Are you serious?! Do you know anything about the defense industry? Both of those programs are great examples of corporate/government partnership/collusion.
Wow, really, the government "colludes" to fulfill it's constitutionally mandated defense needs? And how do they handle this collusion? Oh, that's right, they have public hearings and, in most cases, seek multiple bids from competing private companies. The whole process is scrutinized by irate, conspiracy gushing leftists in the media and academia who insist on further hearings and investigations.
Do defense contractors lobby the government for business? Of course, and why shouldn't they? They have a substantial interest.
Why is it we never hear anything about the "corporate/government partnership" when it's billions of taxpayer dollars going to some constitutionally non-specific expenditure, like "green" technology and the army of lobbyists lined up for handouts?
The SR-71 sure is cool, but is it useful?
I don't know, let's ask someone from the former Soviet Union.
"Derivatives" covers a lot of ground, pal. In fact, derivatives, more often than not, provide a means of managing risk by allowing people to hedge exposure. "
Agreed, derivatives and specualtors both have legitimate uses. Like alcohol, they can be overused. People and firms have taken massive losses mostly on derivatives, and you blame this on too much regulation?
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"The ban on DDT," says Gwadz of the National Institutes of Health, "may have killed 20 million children."
Right, so regulations have externalities, too. It doesn't mean that all regulations are more bad than good anymore than less regulation is more good than bad. Bothe events have costs and the goal is to find the best, and least costly combination of both.
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"Ah yes, those terrible Bush years. Why it was just like Nazi Germany. And exactly which "social and religious" issues would those be, you sanctimonious boob."
Don't take it so personally. The facts are that Nixon and Bush both worked to subvert freedoms and guarantees that all Americans expect and cherish. I don't believe that idiots like that are working in my favor.
I notice you ignored my comments about the left becoming virtual thieves. I don't think those idiots are working in my favor either.
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"No one is claiming that the markets are perfectly efficient and rational at all times, they are simply a pricing mechanism."
We can do better than that. The markets price only those things that can be owned bought and sold. There is more to life liberty and happiness than that.
If we had the right to own and trade most everything, then the markets would be more efficient. We would be more able to make the right balance between the damage from DTT and the damage from NOT DDT.
People who want to prevent pollution could buy up pollution rights and sit on them: but they would have to absorb the cost, not stick it on the "polluters" who make everything we own and use.
Etc. Etc. I understand Hayek, i don't understand right wing nutcases incapable of original thought. Or left wing nut cases either.
Why are you so far right that you attack a centrist as if he was a leftist. What is your win plan to bring me closer to your point of view?
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"Government "guidance and assistance" in these instances consisted of making demands on private firms who used their expertise to deliver."
I said the government set the requirements and provided the funding. We agree on that.
The "Free Market" did not invent the SR71 and pay for it on its own. We still agree right?
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"We agree tht there is need for minimal regulation of the market."
No, I don't agree. Thee is aneed for the CORRECT regulation of the market, whatever that turns out to be.
I don't know what CORRECT is, but I know we are less likely to discover the right answer if we limit the discussionat the outset, looking only at minimalist solutions. I knw that gratuitous insults are unhelpful in discovering the truth.
Hydra
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