#herb stein

[gershonposts]

Yellen: A Challenging Decade and a Question for the Future

Yellen: A Challenging Decade and a Question for the Future

I am delighted to address the National Economists Club, and I am also honored on this occasion to be associated with Herb Stein, whose public service and scholarship–characterized by careful analysis, clear-eyed pragmatism, and sharp wit–exemplified the best in our profession. Herb was willing to…

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[horsesintimidateme]

I don’t know what this is, if it’s a mess-up or on purpose.

[moneyfyi]

Wait For The Explosion

Wait For The Explosion

Each year at this time the Financial Post has a series labelled “Junk Science Week.”  As you might expect it deals with unsupported and unsupportable pseudo-science.

Someone should run a similar series for “Junk Financial Advice Week.”

We can prevent or at least minimize harm, but we must work at it.  Science and Finance are both subjects that the average person has but a tiny fraction of the…

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[robertrosenkranz-blog]

Robert Rosenkranz: investor quotes of the day

Herb Stein: “If something can’t go on forever, it will stop”

Rudiger Dornbusch: “In economics things take longer to happen than you think they will, and then they happen faster than you thought they could”

To which Howard Marks appends: “and they go much further than you thought they would”

[structuredpolitics]

Click on title for link to original

In a capitalist society that is running well, older workers are pensioned off by their employers, to be replaced by healthier, more energetic younger workers. This system of "enlightened selfishness" has little to do with altruism. A pension is a bribe, encouraging you to work hard, remain loyal to your employer, and not go out on strike.

Over the past thirty years, the system has broken down with underfunded pension plans, bankruptcy of large employers like Sears, and an increase in jobs without benefits. The result - more older people are forced to work into their 70's, leaving less jobs available  for younger workers.   Since January, most  jobs younger workers are getting are part time.  The situation will get worse as that big blip in the population, the baby boomers reach 65 but continue to work. And adding to senior's economic  stress is the  talk of cutting back on Social Security and Medicare benefits. 

Herb Stein was one of Nixon's economic advisers and the father of comedian Ben Stein. Stein's Law of economics states, "If something cannot go on forever, it will stop." And they say he was an optimist.

[moneyfyi]

Be Somewhere Else

I have great admiration for Richard Feynman. He was a prolific scientist who also had the ability to communicate in ways that non-scientists could understand. I am pretty sure he would have made an interesting dinner guest.

He was remarkably capable and…

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[isomorphismes]

Almost three decades ago, Herbert Stein, the former Chairman of Nixon's Council of Economic Advisors, lamented that the United States had no long-run budget policy—no policy for the size of deficits and for the rate of growth of the public debt over a period of years. He pointed out that Congress makes annual budget decisions that are wholly inconsistent with professed long-term goals, hoping that something will happen before a point of crisis is reached. He might have added that when the crisis does arrive, it is resolved by a combination of hasty, one-off measures; the making of promises that are rarely kept; and the appointment of special commissions whose advice is rarely heeded.

@dolanecon (Ed Dolan)