Category: economics

Alan Grayson: Walmart is ‘the largest recipient of public aid in the country’

Alan Grayson: Walmart is ‘the largest recipient of public aid in the country’

“The taxpayer pays for the earned income credit,” he said. “The taxpayer pays for Medicaid. The taxpayer pays for unemployment insurance when they cut hours down. And the taxpayer pays for other forms of public assistance like food stamps. I think the taxpayer is getting fed up of paying these things when, in fact, Walmart could give every employee its got, even the CEO, a 30 percent raise and still be profitable.”

How Costco Became the Anti-Wal-Mart

How Costco Became the Anti-Wal-Mart

Costco’s average pay, for example, is $17 an hour, 42 percent higher than its fiercest rival, Sam’s Club. And Costco’s health plan makes those at many other retailers look Scroogish. One analyst, Bill Dreher of Deutsche Bank, complained last year that at Costco “it’s better to be an employee or a customer than a shareholder.” Mr. Sinegal begs to differ. He rejects Wall Street’s assumption that to succeed in discount retailing, companies must pay poorly and skimp on benefits, or must ratchet up prices to meet Wall Street’s profit demands. Good wages and benefits are why Costco has extremely low rates of turnover and theft by employees, he said. And Costco’s customers, who are more affluent than other warehouse store shoppers, stay loyal because they like that low prices do not come at the workers’ expense. “This is not altruistic,” he said. “This is good business.”

Only 3% of the very rich are entrepreneurs

Only 3% of the very rich are entrepreneurs

According to both Marketwatch and economist Edward Wolff, over 90 percent of the assets owned by millionaires are held in a combination of low-risk investments (bonds and cash), personal business accounts, the stock market, and real estate. Only 3.6 percent of taxpayers in the top .1% were classified as entrepreneurs based on 2004 tax returns. A 2009 Kauffman Foundation study found that the great majority of entrepreneurs come from middle-class backgrounds, with less than 1 percent of all entrepreneurs coming from very rich or very poor backgrounds

As someone who spent a few years working on a portfolio management system used to manage risk for high net worth clients, this doesn’t surprise me.

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Recent events have also demonstrated clearly what was already apparent to careful observers: the deficit-scold movement was never really about the deficit. Instead, it was about using deficit fears to shred the social safety net. And letting that happen wouldn’t just be bad policy; it would be a betrayal of the Americans who just re-elected… Continue reading Untitled

Blaming China Masks our Real Economic Problems

Blaming China Masks our Real Economic Problems

For the most part, the response of economists to the candidates’ exchange over trade was highly negative. Economists are strong advocates of open, unimpeded trade between nations, and with all that economists have done to promote the idea that specialization and trade is mutually beneficial – an argument with the public that has persisted for hundreds of years how could the candidates regress into this primitive mercantile thinking?

Worth a read.

The austerity party: At 2012 Convention, Democrats reposition themselves as the party of deficit reduction.

The austerity party: At 2012 Convention, Democrats reposition themselves as the party of deficit reduction.

I couldn’t help but notice something—in their rote lines, Democrats are embracing the role of the party of fiscal austerity.

But that is not going to effect GOP tax and spend talking points in the least. So why do it?

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anyone who believes that the gold standard era was marked by price stability, or for that matter any kind of stability, just hasn’t looked at the evidence. The fact is that prices have been far more stable under that dangerous inflationist Ben Bernanke than they ever were when gold ruled. Golden Instability – NYTimes.com