Exxon Valdez South? “Chutzpah” – standard definition: killing your parents, then throwing yourself upon the mercy of the court because you’re an orphan. “Chutzpah” – oil company version: negligently spilling millions of barrels of crude into the Gulf of Mexico, then raising prices at the pump because of the resulting shortage. Other random thoughts about...Read More
The Too-Big-To-Fail Debate Advocates for cutting so-called “too big to fail” financial institutions down to (less threatening) size — I’m one of them — have rightly focused on the systemic risk such entities pose; the unfair, distorting effects on competition such a policy causes, due to the implicit federal guaranties backing TBTF companies (which drives...Read More
The Search for New Currencies Although G.D.P. numbers still aren’t perfect ” they are subject to periodic revisions, for example ” the basic problem has been largely solved. –Robert Shiller, “A Way to Share in a Nation’s Growth“; The New York Times (12/26/2009) In a piece in today’s New York Times, Robert Shiller — that...Read More