Economist Brian Wesbury explains in the above video why the markets threw a tantrum after the Fed announced Operation Twist last week. To see the video, follow the link in the previous sentence (or just click on the photo) and then press the "play" button on the video entitled "The Fed squashes gold bugs."Mr. Wesbury's analysis is very insightful...
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Operation Twist
Today, the Federal Reserve announced that it will begin increasing its purchases of longer-dated Treasurys in an attempt to lower longer-term interest rates across the board, thus potentially spurring more borrowing. This plan, nicknamed "Operation Twist" because by doing so the Fed is attempting to bend or "twist" the yield curve to their liking,...
Tuesday, September 20, 2011
Want a fair tax system? Get the steamroller!
In all the recent uproar about taxes and people paying a "fair share," nobody is talking about Alvin Rabushka, and we think that is a tremendous oversight.Dr. Rabushka is a political scientist and the David and Joan Traitel Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institute at Stanford University. Along with economist Robert Hall, he is the author of numerous...
Monday, September 12, 2011
We don't need to stimulate consumption
Last week, President Obama rolled out the framework for his long-anticipated economic recovery and employment-improvement plan. Details of the plan are being sent to Congress today for their inspection. Mr. Obama says that the only reason anyone could be against this plan would be "political games," but from what we have seen of the plan so far,...
Wednesday, September 07, 2011
The lessons of Switzerland
Earlier this week, the central bank of Switzerland (the Swiss National Bank) announced that it will enact a policy of buying euros in order to ensure that the Swiss franc does not continue to strengthen against the foundering euro. They set a target of requiring that the euro retain a value equal to at least F1.20 per euro.Without this intervention,...
Friday, September 02, 2011
The Solyndra bankruptcy
A couple days ago, on August 31, tubular solar-cell company Solyndra filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. This fact is notable for a few reasons, most prominent among them being the fact that the company received a $535 million loan guaranteed by the US government, which guaranteed the loan in order to promote the solar industry.
Because...
