Reflections From a Murky Pond

The American economy, bogged down in an extended recession, is not walking swiftly down the road to recovery. In point of fact, it seems to be trudging slowly and painfully down the road to recovery with only slow improvements and few jobs for the American people.

This is not surprising since American businesses and corporation are forced to drag the huge, dead weight of government intervention along with them down that road.

The Road To Recovery

One can argue that any specific piece of government intervention into the market is necessary. One cannot, however, rationally dispute that almost all forms of government regulation have a chilling effect upon the economy. One also cannot rationally argue that these prior restraints upon trade have a disproportionate negative effect during times of economic crisis such as America now finds itself in.

To make matters worse, most occurrences of government intervention into the private sphere are politically motivated and the laws, regulations, and “fixes” are neither straightforward or equitable. They are instead laden with handouts to the politicians’ backers and supporters.

It comes down to one’s priorities. If one wants the economy to recover more quickly and robustly, one has to free it from the shackles of government intervention. If one wants to favor other interests or to have a slower growing, managed economy – paying the price in the loss of “booms” in order to avoid “busts” – one can continue on in the manner of the current regime.

Tags: America | Corporations | Economy | Employment | Freedom | Jobs | Oversight | Politics | Recession | Regulation | Unemployment

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 21st, 2012 at 10:41 am and is filed under Politics. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

H.R.10 – the Regulations From the Executive in Need of Scrutiny Act of 2011 (REINS Act) seems to have really set Obama’s teeth on edge in a big way. Before REINS Act has even gone to the Democrat-controlled Senate he’s threatened to veto the bill, which would provide Congressional oversight of the regulations set forth by the various federal bureaus and agencies under the command of the Executive.

Obama has no plans to allow Congress such oversight of his actions.

The House Republican proposal would require Congress to approve any regulation that is estimated to cost the U.S. economy more than $100 million a year, would result in an increase in prices, or have adverse effect on competition or jobs.

All my readers know that I loath Obama but there is no doubt in my mind that he’d be perfectly correct in vetoing the REINS Act if it ever managed to reach his desk. The Executive is not subordinate to the Legislative and this Act seeks to make it so.

Breath. I know it seems profoundly shocking that I agree with Obama on something, especially a contest between him and the GOP, but it does happen upon the rare occasion.

If the REINS Act were to become law, we might well as go ahead and subsume the whole of the Executive into the Legislative because very few, if any at all, federal regulations don’t cost the U.S. economy more than $100 million a year, result in an increase in prices, have adverse effect on competition or jobs, or some combination of the three.

Tags: America | Congress | Economy | Employment | Jobs | Law | Obama | Politics | Regulation | Separation of Powers | US House of Representives

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 6th, 2011 at 2:23 pm and is filed under Politics. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

That’s Obama for you. The boy is almost stereotypical in his refusal to accept any responsibility for failure. So he’s continuing his claims that America lacks jobs because we’re lazy.

The Boy Still Says We’re Lazy

This time Obama is up on his soapbox claiming that Americans have been too lazy when it comes to, “Selling America and trying to attract new businesses into America.”

Truth be told, I’m not sure if Obama really believes that or if he’s just mouthing whatever his campaign managers and handlers are feeding him through the teleprompter. In either case though, it’s a ridiculous and irresponsible statement.

It fits his profile though. The Campaigner-in-Chief can hardly be expected to admit that labor unions, corporate taxes, and costly regulations – and the uncertain future costs caused by ObamaCare – have not only priced America workers off the global market but made America a very business unfriendly locale. After all, he got elected by running a high taxes, high regulation, pro-Union, anti-business ticket.

Tags: America | Economics | Economy | Employment | Globalism | Jobs | Labor | Labor Unions | Obama | Politics | Regulation | Unemployment

This entry was posted on Monday, November 14th, 2011 at 1:08 pm and is filed under Politics. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

As it was, so shall it be. The details and the victims might change, but the song – a dirge for profit and jobs in this case – remains the same.

Government: I’ve Been Working On The Railroad

The Albuquerque Tribune was right on June 14, 1958 when they printed this cartoon and, if they changed the setting to reflect an industry that hadn’t yet been quasi-nationalized, they’d be right again today.

Nothing really changes. Government regulations quickly become archaic and cannot adapt to the changes in the marketplace. Likewise, they normally involve taxes design to fund government programs at the expense of business and those that business employs.

That doesn’t mean that all regulation and taxation is bad but it does mean that Americans must look upon them with jaundiced eyes, full in the knowledge that the agendas of those pushing for these things is likely to be antithetical to the vey foundations of American society and enterprise.

Posted with a grateful H/T to Yesteryear Once More.

Tags: America | Capitalism | Corporations | Economy | Employment | Government | History | Jobs | Politics | Regulation | Taxes | Unemployment

This entry was posted on Saturday, October 8th, 2011 at 8:08 pm and is filed under Politics. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

Dr. Sam Peltzman, a renowned professor of economics from the University of Chicago Business School, espoused a hypothesis which became known as the Peltzman Effect. It dealt with the unintended, negative, and contrariwise effects of safety regulations.

Distilled down to its simplest terms the Peltzman Effect is a theory that claims that the safer people believe they are the more likely they are to engage in risky behavior.

Dr. Peltzman is certainly no crackpot and the Peltzman Effect has been discussed by experts in a variety of fields for years, though the public at large may have remained unaware of it.

The Peltzman Effect is the hypothesized tendency of people to react to a safety regulation by increasing other risky behavior, offsetting some or all of the benefit of the regulation.

— Paul G. Specht
Journal of SH&E Research, Volume 4, Number 3 (2007)

I think this rather prosaic phenomenon is one that Conservatives had long ago internalized, whereas Liberals have yet to grasp it. This causes a fundamental chasm between how the two groups view government involvement in people’s lives.

Dr. Peltzman’s rhetoric on the topic focuses on willful contrarian or reactionary risk taking. This I disagree with. I think the results are largely caused by subconscious false security instead.

It truly simple; every “safety net” that is emplaced results in people feeling more secure, often overly so, and results in them taking greater risks. AIDS relief, TARP’s “Too Big To Fail,” the Auto Bailouts, repeated extensions of unemployment benefits, ObamaCare, Union labor contracts, gated communities, and Peltzman’s favorite, seatbelts & airbags – they all result in the same thing, a reduction in perceived personal risk. They also all result in the unintended secondary or follow-on effect of increased risky behavior by those “protected” by such things.

Sadly, Liberals haven’t internalized Peltzman’s hypothesis and keep expecting regulation of people’s behavior to have positive results in the long run.

Tags: Economy | Employment | Health | Healthcare | Insurance | Peltzman | Politics | Regulation | Risk Aversion | Risk Mitigation | Risk Transference | Safety | Unemployment

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 7th, 2010 at 8:48 am and is filed under Politics, Society. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.