The carnival in Rio de Janeiro from February 13 through the 17th was one heck of a party. It was celebrated by the locals, plus an estimated one million visitors, complete with fabulous parades, street parties and balls. Brazil is blessed with some great beaches, the most famous of which is Ipanema, thanks to the 1962 bossa nova classic “Girl from Ipanema”.
Economics · Environment/Energy · Featured
Last time we checked on Tesla Motors – as 2014 closed – we noted a growing skepticism largely due to CEO Elon Musk’s consistent habit of overpromising production and results, without delivering.
Featured · Internet/Telecom · Podcast
Titch says the FCC’s grab for regulatory power over such a large sector of the U.S. economy threatens the way the Internet has worked for years, as well as the stability of the rest of the economy.
The cromnibus version of ITFA expires this fall, just in time for the annual budget fights on Capitol Hill. First passed in 1998 as a temporary law, ITFA has been renewed for more seasons than sleeper hit shows like Arrested Development and Invader Zim.
On January 16 The New York Times reported the lies NASA keeps telling about global warming with an article titled “2014 Breaks Heat Record, Challenging Global Warming Skeptics.” We have reached the point where neither a famed government agency nor a famed daily newspaper can be believed simply because both are lying to advance the greatest hoax of the modern era.
The old adage “numbers never lie” is true. Numbers can’t lie, but the people who use them can and very often do. Such is the case with the unemployment rate in Rhode Island.
Economics · Environment/Energy · Featured
If any of my predictions turn out to be true, I will claim bragging rights, but mostly what I intend to do is maintain my personal sense of hope, sensing that more people worldwide are discovering that others share their desire for less corruption and more freedom.
In 1811, British factory workers literally “fought the machine,” protesting against technology under the banner of mythical figurehead King Ludd. Upset about being replaced by more efficient machinery, cost-ineffective factory workers rebelled against the installation of threshing machines and other force-multipliers.
For decades, the quality of life of the incoming generation of Americans has built on and improved on that of the previous generation. According to new data released by the United States Census Bureau, however, that is not the case for the current incoming generation, the Millennials. They have government to blame for their rotten economic conditions.
The U.S. was the world’s number one economy prior to World War II, but it took off bigtime after the war and there has not been a day of my long life in which we were not number one—until now.
Early next year, Gov. Shumlin (D) will unveil a long-awaited financing plan for his proposed single-payer health care system. At least, that’s the expectation. Shumlin has so far defied the law requiring him to explain how Vermont will raise the roughly $2 billion in taxes needed to fund single-payer, blowing through a January 2013 deadline imposed by the legislature.
Budgets/Taxes · Economics · Featured
Of importance to Moore is that people are not paying enough attention to how red states are getting redder (run by Republicans with pro-growth and pro-market oriented policies), while blue states are getting bluer.
Our politicians have placed any number of barriers in the way of prosperity, and one of the most costly has been the Dodd-Frank financial reforms (DF). Congress passed this 2,300-page law in 2010. It has since spawned a massive new regulatory environment with an impact reaching far beyond the nation’s $1.1 trillion financial services industry.
Policy analysts and pundits alike seem to enjoy downplaying the U.S. economy’s recovery since the recession of 2008/9. It is time for them to wake up and smell the roses: The U.S. economy clearly is the dominant economy of the world. The European Union’s death rattle continues, while China is encountering a litany of unforeseen problems.
The North Dakota oil boom is over. At least that was one of the recurring talking points at the North Dakota Petroleum Council’s (NDPC) annual meeting in Dickinson, North Dakota about a month ago. As the oil field has matured, life in the Bakken has started to become “more normal.” This shift has caused policymakers and local residents to change the way they talk about economic growth; as the boom has turned to bustle, the term “boom” has been replaced by “sustained growth.”
America is getting older, as medical science prolongs life expectancy and the fertility rate hovers at or even below the replacement rate. One metric for gauging the nation’s aging is the median age – the age at which one half the population is younger and the other half is older. In 2000, the median age in the United States was 35.3. By 2013, the median age had increased to 37.5.
Forty years ago, on October 9, 1974, the Nobel Prize committee announced that the co-recipient of that year’s award for economics was the Austrian economist, Friedrich A. Hayek. Never was there a more deserving recognition for one of the truly great free market thinkers of modern times.
The doubtful claim that low density US cities impose a cost to the economy of $400 billion is countered by their being the most affluent in the world. Nine of the top 10 cities in GDP per capita are in the US and more than 70% of the top 50. The highest GDP per capita city in the world is one of the least compact, Hartford, with an urban population density among the bottom 10 out of more the than 900 urban areas larger than 500,000 (See here and here).
This has been a week of eco-propaganda on a global scale. On Sunday there were “Climate Marches.” On Tuesday there will be a UN “Climate Summit”, and there will likely be an avalanche of nonsense in the media intended to make us believe we have control, influence, or impact on the climate when it is obvious to the rest of us that we—the human race—have none.
Cities have been pivotal role to improved living standards, because of the opportunities they facilitate. This is particularly evident over the past two centuries, as world urbanization has risen from 3 percent to over 50 percent, and to more than 80 percent in the United States.
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