Tag: inflation

–Salary for attending school, III

The debt hawks are to economics as the creationists are to biology.

The following article reinforces the posts, Salary for attending school and Salary for attending school, 2nd paper:
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U.S. goes from leading to lagging in young college graduates

By Daniel de Vise
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, July 22, 2010; 6:07 AM

The United States has fallen from first to 12th in the share of adults ages 25 to 34 with postsecondary degrees, according to a new report from the College Board.

Canada is now the global leader in higher education among young adults, with 55.8 percent of that population holding an associate degree or better as of 2007, the year of the latest international ranking. The United States sits 11 places back, with 40.4 percent of young adults holding postsecondary credentials.

The report, to be presented Thursday to Capitol Hill policymakers, is backed by a commission of highly placed educators who have set a goal for the United States to reclaim world leadership in college completion — and attain a 55 percent completion rate — by 2025.

The campaign mirrors President Obama’s quest to reclaim world leadership in college graduates by 2020, although it gives the country five more years to get there. The Commission on Access, Admissions and Success in Higher Education set its goal in December 2008, seven months before Obama’s American Graduation Initiative.

“I don’t think what we’re saying and what the president’s saying are that different,” said Gaston Caperton, president of the College Board, the New York nonprofit agency responsible for the SAT and AP tests.

The United States ranks somewhat higher, sixth, among all nations when older adults are added to the equation, according to the report, which Caperton said would be the first of many annual reports charting progress toward the 2025 goal.

But the report focuses more heavily on younger adults, who are feared to be the first generation in the modern era that will be less well-educated than their parents.
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Educational attainment has risen gradually among 25- to 34-year-olds in recent years, according to census data, with the share holding associate degrees or better rising from 38.1 percent in 2000 to 41.6 percent in 2008, the latest figure available.

The report is tailored to state leaders and ranks states by college completion among young adults. The District of Columbia ranks higher than any state, with 62.2 percent of 25- to 34-year-olds holding postsecondary degrees. Maryland ranks 12th among states, with a 38.6 percent completion rate; Virginia ranks 17th, with a 36.5 percent rate.

The commission is urging state and national leaders to pursue a 10-part “action agenda,” which recommends such initiatives as universal pre-kindergarten for low-income families, better college counseling and dropout prevention, and streamlined college admissions, all of which might raise college completion rates. The group is led by William E. Kirwan, chancellor of the University System of Maryland.

“We have a real, objective way every year to look at every state and see how they’re doing,” Caperton said, “and we’re doing this with legislators all over the country.”

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
http://www.rodgermitchell.com

No nation can tax itself into prosperity

–Politics vs. people

Mitchell’s laws:
●Those, who do not understand the differences between Monetary Sovereignty and monetary non-sovereignty, do not understand economics.
●The more federal budgets are cut and taxes increased, the weaker an economy becomes. .
●Liberals think the purpose of government is to protect the poor and powerless from the rich and powerful. Conservatives think the purpose of government is to protect the rich and powerful from the poor and powerless.
●The single most important problem in economics is the gap between rich and poor.
●Austerity is the government’s method for widening the gap between rich and poor.
●Until the 99% understand the need for federal deficits, the upper 1% will rule.
●To survive long term, a monetarily non-sovereign government must have a positive balance of payments.
●Everything in economics devolves to motive, and the motive is the Gap.

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Today’s headline: “Fears grow as millions lose jobless benefits”
Body copy: Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, said: “The fastest-growing parts of this Democrat economy aren’t jobs — they’re the crushing burden of the national debt and the size of the federal government.”

The “crushing burden” is not national debt, which crushes no one. The crushing burden is the false belief the national debt is a crushing burden.

As a result of this false belief, millions will lose jobless benefits, taxes will be increased, Medicare doctors will receive less than they should, Social Security payments will begin later, Medicaid payments will be cut, defense spending will be reduced, federal funding of K-12 education and school breakfast programs will be cut, mass transit funding will be cut and federal assistance to the states will be reduced — all because of a myth with no factual support.

So you, dear reader, will suffer a significantly degraded life style, all because the debt hawks say the federal debt is a crushing burden and the debt causes inflation, neither of which is supported by any data.

Go to any debt hawk web site and ask them for data proving the U.S. federal debt is unsustainable or causes inflation. If they answer you at all (unlikely), they merely will give you statistics regarding the size of the debt, but no evidence it has a negative effect on America.

Here are a couple debt hawk sites you can visit:
Concord Coalition
The Cato Insitute
The Heritage Foundation
The Manhattan Institute
The Hoover Institution

Go ahead. Contact any of them. Despite impressive doctoral credentials, and oodles of statistics, they have no evidence to back their claims. Why? No such evidence exists, though massive evidence shows the misnamed “debt” (should be called “net money created”) is necessary for economic growth.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
http://www.rodgermitchell.com

No nation can tax itself into prosperity

–Japan: Debt/GDP = 218%. So?

An alternative to popular faith

In a previous post, I told you the Federal Debt/GDP ratio was an apples/oranges statistic, often quoted, but completely meaningless. (See: Debt/GDP). According to debt hawks and old-line economists, a high ratio portends inflation, recession and any number of other terrible economic outcomes. Of course, there is no evidence for this; it’s just popular faith unsupported by facts.

Read this article:

Associated Press; 6/22/10: TOKYO – “Japan’s economy, the world’s second largest, will expand at a faster pace in the current fiscal year than previously forecast as robust exports to Asia and improving corporate earnings are underpinning a broadening recovery.

“The Cabinet Office said Tuesday that Japan’s gross domestic product will rise 2.6 percent in the year to March 2011. “The upward projection was due to brisk growth in exports, especially to Asia. The forecast was also upbeat thanks to a recovery in capital spending and improving corporate earnings,” said Takashi Hanagaki, an official from the Cabinet Office.

“Earlier in the month, Japan upgraded its economic growth in the January-March quarter to an annualized pace of 5 percent from 4.9 percent in a preliminary report. But the encouraging figures, including Tuesday’s upward GDP revision, are tempered by persistent deflation and other negatives, including a lackluster labor market.

“Japan is also one of the most indebted countries in the world. Its public debt reached 218.6 percent of GDP last year, according to the International Monetary Fund.”

So here is Japan, with its 218% Debt/GDP ratio. It’s growth is anywhere between 2.6% and 5%. It’s large national debt has not caused the inflation debt hawks predict. On the contrary, Japan is fighting deflation. Further, the large national debt has not taken the place of capital spending as debt hawks also predict, but actually has facilitated capital spending as well as earnings.

Those are the facts, all of which will be disregarded by the debt hawks, the traditional economists and the media, who just know in their hearts that debt is bad, facts be damned. In fact, the AP article ended with this amazing sentence:

“Tackling the ballooning national debt is among most pressing tasks for Japan’s new Prime Minster Naoto Kan.”

Wrong. And that is why economics is a religion, not a science.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
http://www.rodgermitchell.com

–Even Paul Volcker doesn’t get it.

An alternative to popular faith

If even Paul Volcker doesn’t get it, how can the man in the street hope to understand — unless the man in the street is willing to look at the facts and Volcker isn’t?

“5/19/2001: STANFORD, California (Reuters) – Europe’s debt crisis shows the risks for the United States if it does not get its budget deficits under control, former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker said on Tuesday. ‘If we need any further illustration of the potential threats to our own economy from uncontrolled borrowing, we have only to look to the struggle to maintain the common European currency, to rebalance the European economy, and to sustain political cohesion of Europe,’ Volcker said.
[…]The U.S. budget deficit hit $1.4 trillion in 2009, roughly 10 percent of the economy. The White House projects the deficit this year will reach $1.6 trillion. The large deficits have evoked comparisons to Greece. But in a speech to the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research in California, Volcker said the United States differs from that country and other small European countries whose credit markets have come under speculative attack. Unlike those countries, the United States benefits from well-established currency and credit markets that are considered safe havens in times of financial turmoil.
[…]’There are serious questions, most immediately about the sustainability of our commitment to growing entitlement programs,’ said Volcker, who heads an outside panel of experts advising Obama on the economy”.

Here is Paul Volcker, who of anyone, should know better, saying the difference between the U.S. and European countries is we have a well-established currency. No, Mr. Volcker, the difference is we are a monetarily sovereign nation and the EU countries are not. And that difference makes all the difference.

Somehow, the fact that we are running trillion-plus deficits, with none of the problems the EU nations are experiencing, doesn’t seem to penetrate Mr. Volcker’s skull. He has the debt hawk’s “It-hasn’t-happened-yet-but-I’m-sure-one-day-it-will” mentality, rather than the scientist’s “It-hasn’t-happened-yet.-I wonder-why” mentality.

Mr. Volcker, the reason “it” (inability to service national debts) happened to Greece, but not to the U.S., is simple: The U.S. has the unlimited ability to pay its bills, merely by crediting creditors’ bank accounts. EU rules prevent Greece from doing this. Either Mr. Volcker truly doesn’t understand the difference, which would be remarkable, or he has been paid to adopt a debt hawk agenda that forces him to close his eyes to basic fact.

Anyone who says Greece’s problems foreshadow similar problems for the U.S. either is ignorant of the facts or a liar.

And by the way, for those debt hawks who keep warning us that deficits cause inflation, we’re running the deficits, but: “5/19/2010: WASHINGTON (AFP) – US consumer prices fell for the first time in 13 months in April, the government said Wednesday as analysts warned of the risk of deflation in the world’s largest economy.” Isn’t it inconvenient the way facts seem to get in the way of wrong opinion?

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
http://www.rodgermitchell.com

No nation can tax itself into prosperity