This is illuminating to say the least. The Washington Post is reporting on spending under Bush vs Obama. Keep in mind that the Post has been called “Pravda on the Potomac”, so it comes with a healthy pinch of liberal bias. My view is that the budget culture in Washington is broken because a new budget […]
Presh Talwalkar has an elegant explanation on why competing entities in an environment where demand is linearly distributed (like two burger stands on a beach) tend to cluster in the center of demand. The intuitive explanation is this: Imagine two burger stands on a straight beach a mile long with the beach crowd evenly distributed along its […]
Keith Hennessey does a spectacular job of explaining the complicated process of arriving at the federal budget and where it is currently stuck in this week’s Econtalk. He also breaks down who has the power to move things forward right now. It’s so good I was tempted to transcribe selected bits here, but I just […]
July 27, 2011 | Economics | No comments
Got another call from the Obama campaign today who I spent a lot of time and energy supporting last election. I don’t support either party currently because I’ve evolved into an economic conservative but still socially liberal which leaves me stuck with no party to support. So just for the hell of it I tried […]
Yesterday FT.com’s Alphaville posted a graph showing that the US treasuries CDS graph had inverted for the first time ever. What that means is that the cost to insure against default on 1 year US Treasury Notes costs more than it does to insure a 5 year note. This goes contrary to economic liquidity […]
July 27, 2011 | Economics | No comments
Here’s a little reminder that sovereign debt is unsecured. Greece just defaulted. And for some reason only Reuters are calling it like it is. Expect fireworks tomorrow. Here’s the story: http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2011/07/21/greece-defaults/
July 21, 2011 | Economics | No comments
My new favorite economist Tim Harford did a great TED talk recently chatting about our assumption that an expert approach is needed to problem solving. He argues that instead we should rely more on trial and error, a method that has proven very effective both in nature and business. If the loading animation won’t […]
July 18, 2011 | Business, Economics, Startup Hacks, Startups | No comments
David Skeel of UPenn’s law school talks with Russ Roberts on econtalk about the mechanics of bankruptcy law and whether the government should have bailed out the auto industry. Bear in mind you’re getting the Hayekian view on Russ’s show (to which I subscribe). For the Keynsian argument, check out NPR’s Planet Money blog and […]
July 6, 2011 | Economics | No comments
I’ve had this blog entry saved as draft for a month, and Tom Buck’s post earlier today titled “Failure: Building a $50/month web app” inspired me to post this. He remarks in his post “My mistake quickly became obvious: I had built a tool for an audience that didn’t like to spend money.”. Here’s my […]
Money talks. Or, in this case it doesn’t. Have you noticed that the vast majority of published ideas will not increase your business or personal revenue? If someone has a truly great idea for increasing earnings or creating new revenue out of thin air, they will implement or trade it themselves and will never share. At […]