Interesting Fact of the Day
SF Chronicle -- 6.7% of world population has a college degree, and that means only about one out of every 15 people in the world has graduated from college.
CARPE DIEM
Professor Mark J. Perry's Blog for Economics and Finance
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
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.
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24 Comments:
How many of those degrees have value?
The article states:
"Since 1950, the average number of years of schooling for people 15 and older has more than doubled to 7.76, though the gap between richer and poorer countries has held relatively steady."
In the U.S., there are tens of millions of relatively poor Third World immigrants and their children. Absolute living standards improved substantially for them, while their relative living standards worsened.
Also, when should the Administration take responsibility for its actions rather than continuing to blame Bush? Can we really blame the bomb in Times Square, the rig explosion in the Gulf, and the slow economic expansion on Bush?
Unlike Times Square, 9/11 was unexpected, hurricane Katrina was an act of God, rather than poor regulation or negligence, and this is the Obama economic "expansion."
When a ship explodes under the captain's watch, should the prior captain be blamed? The disasters happened under Obama, and ultimately they're his responsibility.
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Michael: All degrees only have the relative value of what the owner chooses to do with it. Some choose to frame it and hang it, others choose to use the degree to open doors. A degree is a tool, depends what one does with that tool.
Can we really blame the bomb in Times Square, the rig explosion in the Gulf, and the slow economic expansion on Bush?
Are any of those things an Obama adinistratin ACTION?
Aren't most of the homeland securty boots on the ground still the same as ever and still doing the best job they can?
Is lax inspection a NEW condition? Are we opposed to more government regulation unless we can pin lack thereof on the opposing party? It's not like Obama didn't have a full plate on day one: making oil well inspection a priority now seems like a case of 20-20 hindsight. Given that one person can only do so much, what other priority would you have him pass on?
Who says this economic expansion is slow? We took an enormous hit: it takes tme to turn that around.
Sure 9/11 was unexpected, but the fact is that attack by aircraft had been previously considered as a potential threat.
I don't think hurricane Katrina has anything to do with this argument: it is a red herring to divert attention away from other regulatory failures that did occur previously - in both flavors of administration.
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Before a ship captain takes command of the ship, or before he takes the watch there is a long period of handoff and inspection to ensure that he doesn;t just come on deck, have the previous watch officer say "You have the Con" and bang into an iceberg.
Your analogy of the ship captain strikes me as a false analogy.
Not defending Obama or the administration, just don't think your argument is strong.
Besides, we are where we are, the important thing is what do we do NEXT.
I'm amazed it's that high!
Where's the data?
@ Anon 5/20/2010 8:41 AM, stop pretending, you are defending Obama.
Here's a news flash, increasing government regulation and taxes is the worst solution to an economic downturn. That's why this recovery is so weak. Do you actually know any business owners or executives? I doubt it. Because if you did you'd know how hard it is for them to plan even the next year. The rules keep changing on them.
You want to talk about "what do we do NEXT." Well where were you last year when the NEXT was increased taxes, a pay czar, health care "reform", wasteful spending, bailouts for the UAW, bailouts for irresponsible homeowners, unlimited backing of Fannie and Freddie, cash for clunkers, the "stimulus", credit card "reform", and all kinds of regulations that helped no one except the new government employees that have to be hired.
The NEXT we see now is cap and trade with a new name, financial regulation, maybe a VAT, bashing of energy companies with new regulation sure to come, and never ending attempts to control things the government should never touch.
You want to pretend everything was on autopilot for the last year and a half, but in fact it was a string of stupid regulatory and fiscal moves that have kept tripping up the recovery.
Can you name one business friendly move from the last year?
That's true. I do believe on that fact.
"Are any of those things an Obama adinistratin ACTION?"...
Why yes we can!
AP IMPACT: Fed'l inspections on rig not as claimed
"Who says this economic expansion is slow? We took an enormous hit: it takes tme to turn that around"...
Slow?!?!
Heck! Its going backwards if the clown defiling the Oval Office today gets his way...
Only VAT Can Fund Leftist Welfare State
i would think that the jobless claims number and philly index are the more interesting facts today.
why the embargo on bad news dr perry? you certainly like to foreground these measures when they look positive. why not provide some balanced coverage when they drop?
"Initial claims for unemployment benefits shot up by 25,000 to 471,000 last week. Economists had expected claims to drop to 440,000.
"This is horrible," Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics, wrote in a note to clients. "The Labor Dept told the press that there are no special factors lifting claims, so we are left with the uncomfortable possibility that the trend in claims has not only stopped falling, but may be turning higher."
Meanwhile, the Philadelphia Fed reported its gauge of regional manufacturing activity dropped to 21.4 in April, slightly more than expected. And leading indicators fell 0.1 percent in April, the first decline in a year.
Dr. Perry,
Totally off topic, but...
As a musician, what's your reaction to this?
http://sbvor.blogspot.com/2010/05/crooked-still-come-on-in-my-kitchen.html
One in fifteen citizens of the world has a college degree? The term college needs to be defined to convince me; unless institutions such as Evergreen Beauty and Barber College qualify under this factoid.
How many of those people have multiple degrees? The number of people with degrees is probably lower than assumed.
Juandos:
Wanna bet the beaurocrat who was supposed to inspect that rig is the same person that had the same job under Bush?
Yes, the inspection system failed, as others have before it. It needs to be improved. That improvement is likely to happen under whichever flavor of adminsistration gets stuck with an accidental disaster.
Have a (new kind of) failure. Find the ROOT CAUSE and fix it, then move on. It seems unlikely to me that the ROOT CAUSE has anything to do with the administration in power.
Anon, 10:33
I'm not defending anybody, I just thought PT's arguments were weak.
You introduce new arguments, but you said nothing to convince me that PT is correct.
As for regulation, isn't it PT's argument that the Obama administration did nt do ENOUGH government intervention? (Drilling inspections, homeland security, and stmulating the ecoonomy?
===========================
Yes, I own my own business, work at the executive staff level in another, and have a number of friends and associates who are business owners / entrepreneurs.
I also tried to raise money to start a business, but couldn't get it off the ground. Needed $20 million to start and only raised $10 million before 9/11 related events killed it. As you point out, the rules suddently changed.
Heck! Its going backwards if the clown defiling the Oval Office today gets his way...
It doesn't seem that Mark Perry thinks it is going backwards.
Bureaucrat. Jeez, I do know better than beaurocrat.....
anon 1.32-
MP believes this is a V shaped recovery.
many of us, (including me and juandos) disagree and see both a tepid dead cat bounce recovery and some real trouble ahead.
Anon says: "Are any of those things an Obama adinistratin ACTION?"
Yes, incompetence, negligence, etc. are actions. What if the bomb in Times Square went off? Also, what about the mining disaster? If there's a depression, why not blame Bush?
The policy seems to be if it's bad, blame business or Bush. If it's good, praise government or Obama.
Your statements are illogical and predictable, e.g. "Sure 9/11 was unexpected, but the fact is that attack by aircraft had been previously considered as a potential threat."
Anon says: "Wanna bet the beaurocrat who was supposed to inspect that rig is the same person that had the same job under Bush?"
Well, if it was, it didn't blow up when Bush was his boss, did it?
.
Who says economic expansion is slow. We took an enormous hit it takes time to turn that around .
YES-YES-YES-YES-YES-YES-YES-YES-YES-YES
Forget the rest its history.Look ahead!
It's going to take time for helicopter bens enema to work!
@ Anon 5/20/2010 1:31 PM,
I didn't raise a new topic. You're the one who said these things:
"Are any of those things an Obama adinistratin ACTION?"
"Who says this economic expansion is slow? We took an enormous hit: it takes tme to turn that around."
"Besides, we are where we are, the important thing is what do we do NEXT."
Why are you so stuck on 9/11 which was almost 9 years ago if you want to talk about what happens next? Did Bush put in new analysts at the CIA before 9/11? No, they were the same ones there just as it was the same federal employees overseeing the oil rigs.
It is a ridiculously anemic recovery and you can pretend that all the legislative action of the last year didn't matter, but if you don't believe that, you sure don't deal with business owners and executives.
Well, if it was, it didn't blow up when Bush was his boss, did it?
Exactly. And the fact that it did not blow up on the bush watch was nor more an ACTION of the Bush administrtion than the fact that it did blow up on the Obama watch was an ACTION of th Obama adminsistration.
Did someone in the Obama adminsitration DO SOMETHING that caused that thing to blow up? did someone in the Bush adminsitration DO SOMETHING that caused it not to blow up?
I didn't raise a new topic. You're the one who said these things:
"Are any of those things an Obama adinistratin ACTION?"
"Who says this economic expansion is slow? We took an enormous hit: it takes tme to turn that around."
"Besides, we are where we are, the important thing is what do we do NEXT."
You have a problem with continuity.
I brought up those topics in response to a previous comment that made arguments I thought wee weak, including one about 9/11.
In your response of 10:33 you brought up an entirely different set of complaints which had nothing to do with the original post by PT or my response.
Among them was that increasing regulation and taxes is not a good thing for the downturn, my (assumed) business resume. That was followed with a whole paragragraph litanyof complaints that (pay Czar) etc. which had nothing to do with the original arguments.
I think it is you who do not understand business, otherwise you would realize that the economy has momentum, and turning it around is lik steeringa supertanker with an oar. It can be done, but it takes time.
As for the rest of your complaints, my business has not been hit by tax increases, but it has benefited from stimulus spending. what you say is all good theory, but i don't see it happening in practice.
Try going out in the real world and doing something, rather than blaming your failure on someone else. I'm not here to argue liberal or conservative economics, I could care less. But I will point out bad arguments when I see them.
Changing the subject as you did, is bad argumentation. Excessive confrontation is ba argumentation, too.
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