politics

Too big to fail, the failure of “free markets” 4

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Over the past year, we’ve seen a string of banks declared as “too big to fail.” As a result they got hundreds of billions of dollars in essentially no-strings attached bailouts. In return we’ve seen them payout $20 billion in bonuses to executives that helped lead these banks to the verge of collapse. Why has this happened? Precisely because the policies of deregulation happy Republicans allowed them to.

These same “conservatives” like to cite Adam Smith and the idea of laissez faire economics. That is the idea of taking a hands off approach and letting the market find its own way. The problem is that to have a free market as envisioned by Smith, there needs to be enough players on both the supply and demand sides of the market equation to prevent manipulation by individuals. This is where Smith’s ideas have fallen apart in the modern world. Over the course of the twentieth century, corporations have grown progressively larger while the numbers of companies in many business segments has shriveled.

As that has happened, those huge businesses have taken control of the market and made it exceedingly difficult to new players to come in. Without someone to call bullshit, huge financial companies have also created a bogus economy that was built on a web of lies. By largely abandoning anti-trust enforcement over the last several decades we have allowed unprecedented consolidation to occur. The result is that institutions with far too much influence on the overall economy have developed. The combination of these over sized players and excess unchecked greed leads to stupid developments. Ultimately this is unsustainable and we have the situation we see today.

If there is one lesson that we must learn from the events of the past year it is that these huge companies should be broken up and never allowed to consolidate to this degree again. There is no reason why companies should be too large to fail. Some anti-trust regulation is a good thing regardless of what Republicans say. Will we learn this lesson? Unfortunately, probably not.

Will the environment fall victim to the economy? 4

This entry was posted in cars global heating politics and tagged darryl siry economy environment on by

darryl-and-the-teslaMy friend Darryl who recently left his job as the SVP of marketing at Tesla Motors has been doing a lot of blogging in recent weeks, and I find myself strongly agreeing with much of what he says.  I’ve expressed many of the same ideas in my posts on AutoblogGreen and Autoblog, drawing a great deal of derision from some very earnest but in my opinion extremely naive readers.

I’m all for vastly more efficient and cleaner transportation for a number of reasons. I think burning fossil fuels is unsustainable from both an environmental and political/strategic perspective.  Unfortunately for every person who happily rides to work on their bicycle in 10 degree weather, there are hundreds whose focus is much more self-centered.  The reality is people buy the most car they can afford on the day they buy, without regard to future consequences.  In his latest blog post Darryl explains some of the economic theories behind all of this.

When gas is cheap they buy more powerful vehicles and only when fuel prices go up do they buy more efficient vehicles.  People have now become accustomed to better equipped cars and they expect a certain feature level for their dollar. If gas is cheap they will buy a thirstier better equipped vehicle over a more efficient model with fewer features.  The current economic climate will only make things far worse as increasing unemployment makes people reluctant to buy anything.

As much as people want electric vehicles to be mainstream, batteries are simply far too expensive and heavy to be widely used yet.  In light of this in order to make any progress on reducing fossil fuel use and carbon dioxide emissions, we need to take the most cost effective approaches as well as provide incentives and disincentives.

First up for disincentives we must let go of the idea of cheap gas forever.  Gas needs to taxed up to at least $4-5 per gallon. Since this will disproportionately affect lower income people the tax system needs adjustments to compensate. The upper cap on the incredibly regressive payroll taxes needs to be increased  and the first $10-15,000 needs to be exempted.  As long as gas is cheap increasing fuel economy mandates on manufacturers will only kill those companies because no one will want to buy the cars they are forced to build. We must created demand for efficiency through increased fuel prices. The idea of increased fuel taxes is finally gaining some steam at least online including over at Mark’s blog, although politicians still don’t seem too hot on the idea.

Because of the sluggish state of the general economy not much of anything is selling right now anyway. To compensate for that more positive incentives are needed to stimulate demand.  The extra revenue from the fuel tax could be used to fund rebates for more efficient vehicles as well as public transportation.

We also need to acknowledge the work being done by companies like Ford and Honda. A year ago Ford recognized that in order to make any real dent in fuel use and emissions it was critically important to find the most cost effective solutions. While electric vehicles reduce direct emissions to zero, there are still emissions from the power sources if coal or natural gas is the fuel.  The high cost also means that the numbers of such vehicles will remain for low for the foreseeable future meaning the overall effect on emissions will be negligible.

Ford developed turbocharged direct injection engines that they are labeling as EcoBoost. These engines reduce fuel consumption by 15-20 percent and Ford expects to be selling half a million of these engines annually within a couple of years. The extra cost will be far lower in the near term and have more overall impact in the near term while the cost and capacity of batteries is driven down.  Similarly Honda has developed a cost reduced version of its hybrid system for the new Insight that will debut next year.

Ford already has a full hybrid system in the Escape and Fusion, but those vehicles will only sell 50,000 units a year because of the cost.

Even efforts such as Honda’s hybrid and Ford’s EcoBoost won’t make a difference if no one can afford to buy. With the economy in the dumper, people will simply vote with their wallets and keep driving their existing vehicles and use the cheapest energy available. That means concerns about the environment will evaporate just as fast as SUV sales in the past year.

The Detroit News editorial staff needs to share…

This entry was posted in politics on by (updated 5856 days ago)

…whatever it is they are smoking. After reading the first few paragraphs of the Detroit News endorsement of John McCain today, it’s clear, their editorial staff is either completely insane or smoking some really good mind altering drugs. After reading the first two paragraphs you might forgiven for thinking the authors were actually proposing a change from the policies of the last eight years. A statement like “Tyrants emboldened by the often heavy-handed and inept foreign policy of the Bush administration have established rogue regimes in every corner of the world to threaten U.S. interests and security” might point to endorsing a candidate who disagreed with that same ineptitude.

Somehow though they have come to the conclusion that the candidate who has voted with those policies over 90 percent of the time is their choice.  One of my personal favorite statements is “The Republican presidential candidate has the character, pragmatism and independence necessary to lead a united America past our poisonous partisan divisions and into a more civil and productive future.” McCain and his running mate Sarah Palin have run one of the most negative and devisive campaigns since the late Lee Atwater got the first Bush into office.

For what it’s worth, the choice of Palin at least gave them pause. However, the choice of such an ill-prepared and unqualified candidate clearly demonstrates that McCain does not have the judgment needed to lead a country.

Fortunately it appears increasingly likely that the American people will demonstrate more sense than the Detroit News editorial board.

American Homes

This entry was posted in america politics on by (updated 4377 days ago)


Over the course of this year I’ve had the opportunity to do quite a bit of travelling and I’ve been to many parts of this land that I’ve never been to before.  Typically when we do our media drives, two writers will share a car and take turns driving.  From the passenger seat I’ve had the opportunity to take many photos of the roadside views. Some of these drives have been in more affluent areas like Malibu, while others have been in the forgotten parts of America.  The ironic thing about listening to Sarah Palin talk about the “true pro-America” parts of the country over the past week is that when you look at many of these places, they are the ones who have been left behind.

It has always struck me as odd that the Republican party has long espoused policies that are most beneficial to the wealthiest people and biggest companies in America and yet the people who have the least seem to be among the strongest supporters of the party.  In places like North and South Carolina, Virginia and Texas, I’ve seen some of the most profound examples of poverty in America and yet they continue to support politicians who seem hell-bent on keeping them in place.

Taxing health insurance benefits 2

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If Americans are dumb enough to vote for John McCain, they deserve to lose their health insurance. This is not the kind of maverick thinking we need. He wants to tax employer provided health care benefits as income. And then he wants to provide a $5,000 tax credit toward buying your own insurance. That’s money that will go straight to the insurance company and insurance for a family costs an average of $12,000.

Why is NBC trying to panic the American public!

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Yesterday the House of Representatives rightly defeated a bailout package that would have largely let the Wall Street financial speculators off the hook for their idiotic and greedy behavior of the past decade.  This morning on the Today show, the so-called “financial reporters were trying to incite a panic amongst their viewers to try and get them to call their representatives to pass the bill.  Among the items included in a “report” on why this bailout is so important was a mention that interest rates on 30 year fixed rate mortgages had climbed by 0.25 percent over the last six months.  This little tidbit in and of itself is absolutely meaningless.  Fluctuations of a quarter point meant nothing earlier this decade and they don’t mean any more now. What might have provided some context to this argument would have been a mention on what the actual rates are right now for a 30 mortgage, but none was forthcoming.  Based on this you might expect that we were back in the 18 percent days of the early Reagan years.

In fact a quick check online of mortgage interest rates shows a 30 year fixed loan running about 5.8-5.9 percent. That’s less than half a point more than the rate we got when we refinanced in 2002 (5.5 percent). Yes it’s higher but not ridiculously higher.

The report then goes on to ask why we should pay to bail out banks because our neighbors lied on their loan applications.  First of all this is not only irresponsible, it’s also a lie!  The reality is that most people didn’t lie on their loan applications, the banks lied to themselves in ignoring the financial resources of borrowers in making the loans.  Banks loaned people way more money than they could afford to repay based on the false premise that prices would continue to climb and they could dump off the risk on unwitting investors in mortgage backed securities.

Why is NBC so desperate to create a financial panic?  Could it have anything to do with the fact that NBC is owned by General Electric? And the fact that a large unit of that company is GE Capital which is heavily into the leasing and finance business?  What is the likelihood that GE Capital is up to their eyeballs in this fiasco and they are looking for a handout?  I’m guessing its pretty high. I would say that after you call your Representative and Senator and encourage them not to bail out Wall Street, your next call should be to NBC to tell them to stop yelling fire in the crowded theater.

$13.6 Million for 18 days on the job

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This is why no deal should be made to bail out Wall St with some major oversight.  Under no circumstances should Hank Paulsen be given a blank check when you have someone like Alan Fishman can walk away from the biggest bank failure in US history with $13.6 million.  It’s bad enough that he might get that kind of money but Fishman had been CEO of Washington Mutual for only 18 days when it collapsed and was taken over by the FDIC before be turned over to JP Morgan Chase. This sort of profligate pay for executives who do nothing positive for a company must not be allowed to continue. As I said before, every dime taken in profits by executives and traders in this mess should be be paid back to the federal government in return for any kind of bailout.   In addition, executive pay needs to be capped in some way, not just for the financial business, but all businesses.  The tax deductions for executive pay needs to be limited to some reasonable multiple of the average salary of other employees. These obscene numbers must stop!

Arrogance and ignorance are a dangerous combination

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Watching the first debate tonight my first impression is that its good to see a more relaxed format that allows McCain and Obama to go back and forth and respond the other.

More importantly, though it’s clear that McCain is both ignorant and arrogant. The fact that McCain absolutely refused to look at Obama throughout the entire debate was a sign of utter arrogance and perhaps even racism. He seemed to be absolutely seathing with anger through much of the debate. Clearly McCain does not have the temperment to be the leader of anything much less the United States.

Obama on the other hand regularly looked over and spoke directly to his opponent.  This is a thoughtful man who is clearly very intelligent and listens to those he speaking with.  This is man who seems to have the judgment necessary to deal with problems that this country is increasingly facing.

On the subject of the Wall Street bailout McCain unsurprisingly refused to acknowledge that his deregulatory policies were large to blame for this fiasco.  Now he wants to cut another $300 billion in corporate taxes claiming that the US has the one of the highest corporate tax rates at 35 percent. What he doesn’t talk about is that fact that the net tax rate that American corporations pay is among the lowest in the world due to all the loopholes and tax breaks.

Combine all of this with his choice of Sarah Palin as running mate and he has demonstrated that he doesn’t have the judgement needed to be president.

Not one penny!

This entry was posted in politics stupid consumerism and tagged bailout banking crisis financial mortgage on by (updated 5888 days ago)

That’s what the staff of investment banks that invested in risky mortgage securities should get in bonuses.  Before we spend a dime of taxpayer money bailing out these banks because they bet and lost, every penny that has been paid in bonuses to anyone involved in these transactions should be returned to the banks and used to pay off  their debts.  Sure it’s probably only a tiny fraction of what is owed, but if we are going to spend the money it’s the least that they can do.

British bank Barclay’s that agreed to buy the bankrupt Lehman Brothers last week has apparently committed to paying out up to $2.5 billion in bonuses to the top 200 staff at Lehman as part of the acquisition.  I’m sorry but anyone who would pay out that kind of cash to the people that created this mess in the first place does not deserve a bailout.

I say if we are going to spend any taxpayer money, the only thing we should do is buy the foreclosed homes from the banks at current market values minus a discount for our troubles and then sell or rent them back to the occupants at a reasonable price and affordable terms.  This would allow people to potentially keep a roof over their heads, keep homes occupied so that communities aren’t abandoned and allowed to rot and allow the government to eventually recover some of the initial expense.

These terms would of course be substantially less than what the banks are currently owed, but that is simply the price they need to pay for their foolish investments in the first place. I wrote about this more than three years ago and I hate to say it but I was spot on.  This whole mess was easy to see coming and completely avoidable were it not for the greed of the bankers and their confidence that the Republicans would bail them out if they messed up.  They need to pay up now, and anyone who was involved in this should be permanently barred from ever working in the finance market again.  Perhaps if we let the geniuses who created this debacle rot on the vine for once future generations will learn a lesson. Or not.

Forget Sarah for Veep! Palin for President! Michael that is…

This entry was posted in humor politics and tagged mccain michael palin palin president veep on by

Only an desperate idiot with dementia would even consider a domionist, theocratic nut-job like the current governor of Alaska for the second slot on the presidential election ticket.  But since so many Americans seems willing to seriously consider the utterly unqualified Sarah Palin as a viable candidate to step into the White House if and when McCain kicks the bucket, I would like to throw my support behind a Palin would be far better suited to the job.  Plus he probably already knows what the Bush doctrine is.