To blame "deregulation" for the years-long borrowing & spending spree and the unavoidable correction? That is like blaming the candy shop for your binge and stomach ache. If you cannot handle freedom, why not move to a country where there is none?

In theory, Social Democracy should be vastly inferior to the classic American small-government model. The reason is that even your best friend has your interests less at heart than yourself, how much less an underpaid and frustrated bureaucrat in some cubicle far from your home. Even if by some divine intervention the bureaucrat - and the ( Read more... )

Hawaii is far from an economic paradise (Los Angeles Times ( Read more... )

'Cadillac' tax isn't a tax -- it's a plan to finance real health reform (Washington Post/Jonathan Gruber ( Read more... )

Mobile Phone Cancellation Fees Help the Poor, Verizon Tells Feds (Wired)

I suspect the title is angled for maximum irony. The actual article is slightly more balanced, if it is possible to say anything balanced about the sorry state of the cell market in the US.

The whole "climate policy" debate thing is like a farce to me. NOW this is all the rage, when it is too late. Pretty soon we will all be carbon neutral, because there won't be enough affordable carbon left to burn. I'd say 2020, but perhaps it will be 2030. In any case, this debate should have been 30 years ago to have any meaning ( Read more... )

The Era of the Electric Vehicle Started Now (Discovery News ( Read more... )

I think the US government would have become more popular in the short run if it made the economy (and mainly employment) its only priority until it was, like, fixed. Not that they would not have to make various decisions about other things that come up - things always come up. But not pushing anything else, not starting to talk about anything ( Read more... )

9.8% unemployment in September (DailyMail blogs)
The biting sarcasm at the beginning is just the blogger's personal opinion (I got the link from a very conservative friend) but most of the text and all of the numbers seem to be right. The labor market is behaving opposite of what the White House predicted when preparing the stimulus plan.

( It's all downhill from here... )

China becomes main producer of solar panels - by using cheap coal power for their factories.