Celebrating humanity's flourishing through the spread of capitalism and the rule of law
06 Sep 2016 Leave a comment
in economics
Bank of England may be clueless on what next, but its blog Bank Underground keeps giving us food for thought via its posts.
In the recent one, John Lewis looks at this question of how robotics will impact macroeconomics. Will it lead to lower jobs as said and so on. For this, he draws upon years of history where some new technology has replaced an existing one.
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06 Sep 2016 Leave a comment
in economics
Here’s a proposal for a modern corporate tax from Alan Auerbach:
This paper proposes two reforms to the U.S. corporate tax system: first, an immediate deduction for all investments that would replace the current system of depreciation allowances, and second, replacing the current approach to taxing foreign-source income with a system that ignores all transactions except those occurring exclusively in the United States. These changes would eliminate existing incentives to borrow and shift profits abroad while maintaining the corporate tax as a progressive revenue source.
He concludes:
The set of reforms proposed in this paper would produce a streamlined corporate tax by replacing the current system with a much simpler one. It would eliminate the normal returns to capital from the corporate tax base, thereby encouraging investment. It would neutralize existing tax incentives for corporate borrowing, removing a potential source of future economic instability. By limiting the tax base…
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06 Sep 2016 Leave a comment
in economics of regulation, politics - New Zealand, urban economics
06 Sep 2016 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, applied welfare economics, economics of media and culture, labour economics, poverty and inequality Tags: child poverty, family poverty, intergenerational poverty, Tracey Chapman
06 Sep 2016 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, applied welfare economics, economics of regulation, television Tags: rent control, Seinfeld
06 Sep 2016 Leave a comment
From Gelber, Isen, and Song:
We estimate the effect of pension income on earnings by examining the Social Security Notch, which cut lifetime discounted Old Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) benefts by over $6,100 on average for individuals born in 1917 relative to those born in 1916. Using Social Security Administration microdata on the U.S. population by day of birth and a regression discontinuity design, we document that the Notch caused a large increase in elderly earnings. The point estimates show that a $1 increase in OASI benefits causes earnings in the elderly years to decrease by 46 to 61 cents due to an income effect, and the evidence is consistent with the hypothesis that only current (not future) benefits affect earnings. Under further assumptions we rule out more than a small substitution elasticity. Our results suggest that the increase in OASI benefits from 1950 to 1985 can account…
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06 Sep 2016 Leave a comment
in economics of crime, law and economics Tags: Burglary, law and order
People are aware that their house has been invaded in 1/3rd of British burglaries and in a quarter of burglaries, they see the offender. No wonder that burglary and the threat of a burglary are regarded as invasive crimes. We never locked the house when we were young. That changed.
Source: Home Office via What burglars steal – and how they get in | News | theguardian.com.
06 Sep 2016 Leave a comment
in economics, television Tags: Porridge
06 Sep 2016 Leave a comment
in constitutional political economy, politics - New Zealand, Public Choice
The hard left Daily Blog is so detached from power that it has forgotten that an effective opposition can slow governments down, sometimes to a dead stop. Stealing the opposition’s policies is a basic political skill. 
Watching a third term government fight like a cornered animal against an effective opposition in with a good chance of winning the next election is an ugly sight for those who do not like the sight of blood. The current third term government in New Zealand is not particularly tired and certainly is not facing an effective opposition smelling victory at the next election.
This far left blog has little appreciation of the median voter theorem and the propensity of political parties that actually win power to position themselves closely to each other. For that reason, governments are hesitant to adopt policies that take them too far away from what the opposition might do in response and thereby win votes in the next election.
The hard left has little knowledge of this because it really participates in putting up an effective opposition to government policies. Little of what the hard left says appeals to the median voter so a National party government does not have to worry much about what are the hard left says in opposition to its policies. The high left opposing a policy changes few votes.
Housing affordability New Zealand is an obvious example of the power of an effective opposition party. The National party-led government is unwilling to take risks for fear of losing votes to the opposition Labour Party at the next election. New Zealand election is always close because of MMP. Winning margins are one or two seats.
One of the great complaints against the British Labour Party now by ordinary voters including those are never vote for them is that the Tory government faces no effective opposition to their plans and because there is no effective opposition, there is no break on what they could do. They are not challenged; their ideas are not being tested in Parliament and elsewhere and perhaps found wanting.
A leading reason for the mass resignations from the shadow cabinet recently was the lack of an effective opposition to government policies was letting the Tories have a free reign. The first step in slowing the Tories down is having a leader in the opposition who is not widely regarded as a clown.
06 Sep 2016 Leave a comment
in Music Tags: Johnny Cash
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