Tag: news

Back around the turn of the century, when the common European currency was introduced, there was much hope and excitement about the future. It worked… for about 7 years. Unfortunately since 2007 things haven’t gone according to plan and now the continent is paying for the drunken sailor debt sins of its member countries as it slowly and painfully tries to grow into a balance sheet that is massively overlevered. Unfortunately, the future is just as bleak, at least according to Socgen (which incidentally has been quite bullish on the world economy in general) who in its most recent report predicts that Europe is only half way through its lost decade of 2007-2018. As the GDP per capita chart below shows, any Europeans (presumably of the unemployed kind) hoping for a quick rebound from the moribund economy of the past five years has at least this much longer to wait. Oh and for Greeks looking at the chart below and wondering “what went wrong?“… the answer is pretty much everything.

From SocGen:

Summer optimism on euro area recovery has faded to grey winter skies. Looking ahead we see continue weak growth in the region with a very gradual recovery only. For the 2007 to 2018, we expect GDP per capita to be essentially flat, marking a lost decade of growth for the region. We blame much of this weak performance on a slow policy response in tackling both the sovereign and banking crisis, and the still too slow pace of structural reform. The fear is now that the euro area is on the verge of deflation. The ECB toolbox is not empty, but in our central scenario of low inflation (and not outright deflation) we see an additional LTRO and extension of unlimited liquidity. The risk is that the euro will stay stronger for longer adding, to deflationary pressures.

 

Several headwinds remain for the euro area:

 

1. Private-sector deleveraging: Although progressing, private sector deleveraging remains a headwind for several member states, including Spain. Furthermore, as discussed in Box 10, Banking Union needs fast track politics, financial fragmentation has come with a high price tag for the periphery.

 

2. Softer, but still in austerity mode: The drag from fiscal policy has eased allowing exit from recession, but a long road of fiscal consolidation still lies ahead. The 22 November Eurogroup was clear: deficit/debt reduction and structural reform remain the prescribed policies. Italy and Spain, moreover, were noted by the Eurogroup as at “risk of noncompliance” on their 2014 deficit targets and have already promised that extra measures are in the pipeline. That these measures are in fact delivered is one of the key assumptions behind our below-consensus 2014 forecasts.

 

3. Still-high policy uncertainty: As discussed in Anchor Theme 3, policy uncertainty remains fairly high for the euro area and our baseline assumption is that this will be the case in much of 2014, easing only very gradually medium-term.

 

4. Slow progress on reform: Key to the medium-term outlook is continued progress on structural reform – at both the national and euro area levels. We assume that progress will continue, but only at a slow pace.

Of course, if BNP is right, and the ECB somehow manages to pull off a QE over the ever louder complaints of Germany, the matrix above will change: there will be a quick and brief boost some time in 2014, followed by an even quicker final tumble into the abyss.

Finally, it goes without saying that applying fundamentally-driven growth forecasts to a new centrally-planned normal will fail, and the final outcome in 5 or so years will be anything but. One thing we are certain of: that 216.1 indexed GDP per Capita forecast for China… we’ll take the under any day, or else based on our simple calculations, China alone will have about 2-3 times more debt in 2018 than the rest of the world alone.

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/5eReFvZS5N4/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Back around the turn of the century, when the common European currency was introduced, there was much hope and excitement about the future. It worked… for about 7 years. Unfortunately since 2007 things haven’t gone according to plan and now the continent is paying for the drunken sailor debt sins of its member countries as it slowly and painfully tries to grow into a balance sheet that is massively overlevered. Unfortunately, the future is just as bleak, at least according to Socgen (which incidentally has been quite bullish on the world economy in general) who in its most recent report predicts that Europe is only half way through its lost decade of 2007-2018. As the GDP per capita chart below shows, any Europeans (presumably of the unemployed kind) hoping for a quick rebound from the moribund economy of the past five years has at least this much longer to wait. Oh and for Greeks looking at the chart below and wondering “what went wrong?“… the answer is pretty much everything.

From SocGen:

Summer optimism on euro area recovery has faded to grey winter skies. Looking ahead we see continue weak growth in the region with a very gradual recovery only. For the 2007 to 2018, we expect GDP per capita to be essentially flat, marking a lost decade of growth for the region. We blame much of this weak performance on a slow policy response in tackling both the sovereign and banking crisis, and the still too slow pace of structural reform. The fear is now that the euro area is on the verge of deflation. The ECB toolbox is not empty, but in our central scenario of low inflation (and not outright deflation) we see an additional LTRO and extension of unlimited liquidity. The risk is that the euro will stay stronger for longer adding, to deflationary pressures.

 

Several headwinds remain for the euro area:

 

1. Private-sector deleveraging: Although progressing, private sector deleveraging remains a headwind for several member states, including Spain. Furthermore, as discussed in Box 10, Banking Union needs fast track politics, financial fragmentation has come with a high price tag for the periphery.

 

2. Softer, but still in austerity mode: The drag from fiscal policy has eased allowing exit from recession, but a long road of fiscal consolidation still lies ahead. The 22 November Eurogroup was clear: deficit/debt reduction and structural reform remain the prescribed policies. Italy and Spain, moreover, were noted by the Eurogroup as at “risk of noncompliance” on their 2014 deficit targets and have already promised that extra measures are in the pipeline. That these measures are in fact delivered is one of the key assumptions behind our below-consensus 2014 forecasts.

 

3. Still-high policy uncertainty: As discussed in Anchor Theme 3, policy uncertainty remains fairly high for the euro area and our baseline assumption is that this will be the case in much of 2014, easing only very gradually medium-term.

 

4. Slow progress on reform: Key to the medium-term outlook is continued progress on structural reform – at both the national and euro area levels. We assume that progress will continue, but only at a slow pace.

Of course, if BNP is right, and the ECB somehow manages to pull off a QE over the ever louder complaints of Germany, the matrix above will change: there will be a quick and brief boost some time in 2014, followed by an even quicker final tumble into the abyss.

Finally, it goes without saying that applying fundamentally-driven growth forecasts to a new centrally-planned normal will fail, and the final outcome in 5 or so years will be anything but. One thing we are certain of: that 216.1 indexed GDP per Capita forecast for China… we’ll take the under any day, or else based on our simple calculations, China alone will have about 2-3 times more debt in 2018 than the rest of the world alone.

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/5eReFvZS5N4/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Originally posted at Monty Pelerin's World,

“Capitalism is not things; it is a mentality.”

So stated Ludwig von Mises in a talk in mid 1952 in a series of lectures entitled Marxism Unmasked which he gave at the San Francisco library.

Mises provided examples that illustrated this mentality or its lack. One pertained to India (my emboldening):

Nehru [Jawajarlal Nehru, 1889 – 1964] has been quoted as saying ”We want to give every encouragement to private industry.We won’t expropriate private businesses for at least ten years — perhaps not even that soon.”

 

You cannot expect people to invest if you tell them that you will expropriate some time in the future. Therefore, conditions are much worse now than when the British were there. Then you could still hope that the British would remain and that they would not expropriate your business.

Nehru had little understanding of capitalism and its requisites. He liked the things it made possible, but not the conditions necessary for their achievement. Barack Obama, at least in this respect, is a modern-day version of Nehru.

The Other “Isms”

Marxism, Socialism, Facism and virtually all other isms except capitalism are anti-economic.

Economics does not have all the answers, nor is economics a precise science. Those who pretend otherwise are generally responsible for the quackery that is passed off as economics. Economics is about human behavior. It is a positive approach to dealing with the human condition.

Isms are normative. They imagine human behavior in some ideal sense, according to some dreamer-in-chief. Behavior modification is always necessary in order to move to this “perfect” condition. The premise that it would be a better world if only people behaved differently underlies every one of the isms.

Economics, to the extent that it is science,  is “wertfrei.” Its purpose is to understand and explain human behavior. A narrower purpose, one that has captured the profession, is how human behavior impacts markets and market transactions. Economics should not not try to effect human behavior, but to explain it. It does, however understand how incentives and disincentives affect behavior.

All political visions involve the improvement of man and/or society by changing the nature of man. Social planners want to “improve” and “perfect” matters according to their ideas of what these terms imply. Little commonality exists regarding utopian visions. One commonality between these utopian ideas does exist — the universal failure of all such schemes.

There is no better way to understand the wisdom “the perfect is the enemy of the good” than to study the historical wreckage that has resulted from trying to “perfect” society. 

Every scheme requires the use of force to make people change behavior to something they otherwise would not do. The force, misery and deaths associated with these schemes exceed those from wars. Stalin, Hitler, Mao were leaders in the death count, but there were numerous others whose names are less known. Their methods and devastation were comparable.

Barack Obama and The “Isms”

President Barack Obama is not a capitalist. That is obvious. What “ism” best describes him is not.

Most people probably do not think Barack Obama is a Marxist. Barack Obama does not speak of himself as a Marxist, but he was, based on what little is known of his early life. His parents, grandparents, mentors and friends believed in Marxism. Barack has admitted to choosing his friends on that basis. 

I suspect Obama is a Marxist, but will not use such an unacceptable term to describe himself. In politics appearance is what matters and words are charged. “Liberalism” (a co-opted term) is less damaging than Marxism, but it has become so stigmatized that political marketeers have switched to the less known and as yet not fully discredited term “progressive.” 

To political opponents, a progressive is an extreme leftist or perhaps even a Marxist. But labels are meaningless. Deeds, not marketing tags, are what matter. On that basis, Obama appears to be very close to a Marxist. The argument is moot, however. Does it matter whether Nehru was Marxist or merely a Socialist? To quote one of the next presidential aspirants, “at this point, what difference does it make?”

Obama’s Nehru Moment

Barack Obama’s concept of capitalism is similar to Nehru’s. He doesn’t understand capitalism. He believes it is physical things like machines, tools, factories and wealth. These result from capitalism, but capitalism depends on freedom and individuals pursuing their own interests. If you remove these conditions, the machines, tools, factories and wealth diminish or vanish.

Nehru talked about expropriation. Obama talked about “sharing the wealth” with Joe the Plumber:

And I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.

The difference between expropriation and “sharing the wealth” is measured in degrees. Nehru was willing to confiscate everything, at least with respect to foreign investment, and foolish enough to announce it. Obama unwittingly expressed his intended predation, although did not define it. He clearly communicated his willingness to confiscate more (in the form of taxes) than was currently being confiscated. He didn’t limit the confiscation to foreigners. Nor did he specify the amount.

Confiscation need not be total to destroy an economy.

The Incorrect Assumption

Capitalism, as Mises pointed out, is a state of mind and an environment that allows men to pursue their own self-interest and betterment. This environment is responsible for the growth in per capita income and wealth that characterizes capitalist countries.

Statists (and many non-Statists) suffer from an erroneous assumption that an economy performs two functions — production and distribution. Pedagogically, that is true although the two functions are not independent of one another. Assuming this independence does great damage.

The production of wealth and the distribution of wealth are are interdependent. The idea that you can alter the distribution of wealth and not affect its production is naive and wrong.

Work, by definition, is not something enjoyed. That is why people must be paid in order to engage in it. When the rewards for working are reduced, you get less work and output. Raising taxes in order to “redistribute the wealth” is the same as cutting wages or income for productive activity. It is an expropriation in the same sense (although not total) as Nehru proposed in India. It has the same effects. It reduces effort and output. It causes decisions to not be made. A country is made poorer than it otherwise would be by its mere suggestion.

Government cannot change the distribution of wealth without impacting the production of it. This simple fact is either unknown or ignored by the Obama Administration. Everything don
e by Obama produces adverse effects on the standard of living in this country. More regulation raises costs and reduces incentives for producers. Forced medical care raises the costs and lowers the wages of workers. Deficit spending necessitates higher future taxes which means lower returns on investments and investments not made.

The consequences should be obvious and play out in our economy:

• There is no economic recovery.
• Businesses, especially small ones, have laid off employees or reduced their positions to part-time in order to avoid the onerous costs of ObamaCare.
• Labor participation rates are disgracefully low.
• Un-doctored unemployment statistics are in double-digits.
• Business expansion is deferred or canceled in light of the uncertainty regarding future regulations and tax rates.
• More people are dependents of the government than ever before.
• Government is bankrupting itself in an effort to hide these effects.

This partial list could be greatly expanded, but there is no need to go on.

The policies of our version of President Nehru have effectively expropriated our future and the future of our children.

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/a0BOXqbyc2s/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Originally posted at Monty Pelerin's World,

“Capitalism is not things; it is a mentality.”

So stated Ludwig von Mises in a talk in mid 1952 in a series of lectures entitled Marxism Unmasked which he gave at the San Francisco library.

Mises provided examples that illustrated this mentality or its lack. One pertained to India (my emboldening):

Nehru [Jawajarlal Nehru, 1889 – 1964] has been quoted as saying ”We want to give every encouragement to private industry.We won’t expropriate private businesses for at least ten years — perhaps not even that soon.”

 

You cannot expect people to invest if you tell them that you will expropriate some time in the future. Therefore, conditions are much worse now than when the British were there. Then you could still hope that the British would remain and that they would not expropriate your business.

Nehru had little understanding of capitalism and its requisites. He liked the things it made possible, but not the conditions necessary for their achievement. Barack Obama, at least in this respect, is a modern-day version of Nehru.

The Other “Isms”

Marxism, Socialism, Facism and virtually all other isms except capitalism are anti-economic.

Economics does not have all the answers, nor is economics a precise science. Those who pretend otherwise are generally responsible for the quackery that is passed off as economics. Economics is about human behavior. It is a positive approach to dealing with the human condition.

Isms are normative. They imagine human behavior in some ideal sense, according to some dreamer-in-chief. Behavior modification is always necessary in order to move to this “perfect” condition. The premise that it would be a better world if only people behaved differently underlies every one of the isms.

Economics, to the extent that it is science,  is “wertfrei.” Its purpose is to understand and explain human behavior. A narrower purpose, one that has captured the profession, is how human behavior impacts markets and market transactions. Economics should not not try to effect human behavior, but to explain it. It does, however understand how incentives and disincentives affect behavior.

All political visions involve the improvement of man and/or society by changing the nature of man. Social planners want to “improve” and “perfect” matters according to their ideas of what these terms imply. Little commonality exists regarding utopian visions. One commonality between these utopian ideas does exist — the universal failure of all such schemes.

There is no better way to understand the wisdom “the perfect is the enemy of the good” than to study the historical wreckage that has resulted from trying to “perfect” society. 

Every scheme requires the use of force to make people change behavior to something they otherwise would not do. The force, misery and deaths associated with these schemes exceed those from wars. Stalin, Hitler, Mao were leaders in the death count, but there were numerous others whose names are less known. Their methods and devastation were comparable.

Barack Obama and The “Isms”

President Barack Obama is not a capitalist. That is obvious. What “ism” best describes him is not.

Most people probably do not think Barack Obama is a Marxist. Barack Obama does not speak of himself as a Marxist, but he was, based on what little is known of his early life. His parents, grandparents, mentors and friends believed in Marxism. Barack has admitted to choosing his friends on that basis. 

I suspect Obama is a Marxist, but will not use such an unacceptable term to describe himself. In politics appearance is what matters and words are charged. “Liberalism” (a co-opted term) is less damaging than Marxism, but it has become so stigmatized that political marketeers have switched to the less known and as yet not fully discredited term “progressive.” 

To political opponents, a progressive is an extreme leftist or perhaps even a Marxist. But labels are meaningless. Deeds, not marketing tags, are what matter. On that basis, Obama appears to be very close to a Marxist. The argument is moot, however. Does it matter whether Nehru was Marxist or merely a Socialist? To quote one of the next presidential aspirants, “at this point, what difference does it make?”

Obama’s Nehru Moment

Barack Obama’s concept of capitalism is similar to Nehru’s. He doesn’t understand capitalism. He believes it is physical things like machines, tools, factories and wealth. These result from capitalism, but capitalism depends on freedom and individuals pursuing their own interests. If you remove these conditions, the machines, tools, factories and wealth diminish or vanish.

Nehru talked about expropriation. Obama talked about “sharing the wealth” with Joe the Plumber:

And I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.

The difference between expropriation and “sharing the wealth” is measured in degrees. Nehru was willing to confiscate everything, at least with respect to foreign investment, and foolish enough to announce it. Obama unwittingly expressed his intended predation, although did not define it. He clearly communicated his willingness to confiscate more (in the form of taxes) than was currently being confiscated. He didn’t limit the confiscation to foreigners. Nor did he specify the amount.

Confiscation need not be total to destroy an economy.

The Incorrect Assumption

Capitalism, as Mises pointed out, is a state of mind and an environment that allows men to pursue their own self-interest and betterment. This environment is responsible for the growth in per capita income and wealth that characterizes capitalist countries.

Statists (and many non-Statists) suffer from an erroneous assumption that an economy performs two functions — production and distribution. Pedagogically, that is true although the two functions are not independent of one another. Assuming this independence does great damage.

The production of wealth and the distribution of wealth are are interdependent. The idea that you can alter the distribution of wealth and not affect its production is naive and wrong.

Work, by definition, is not something enjoyed. That is why people must be paid in order to engage in it. When the rewards for working are reduced, you get less work and output. Raising taxes in order to “redistribute the wealth” is the same as cutting wages or income for productive activity. It is an expropriation in the same sense (although not total) as Nehru proposed in India. It has the same effects. It reduces effort and output. It causes decisions to not be made. A country is made poorer than it otherwise would be by its mere suggestion.

Government cannot change the distribution of wealth without impacting the production of it. This simple fact is either unknown or ignored by the Obama Administration. Everything done by Obama produces adverse effects on the standard of living in this country. More regulation raises costs and reduces incentives for producers. Forced medical care raises the costs and lowers the wages of workers. Deficit spending necessitates higher future taxes which means lower returns on investments and investments not made.

The consequences should be obvious and play out in our economy:

• There is no economic recovery.
• Businesses, especially small ones, have laid off employees or reduced their positions to part-time in order to avoid the onerous costs of ObamaCare.
• Labor participation rates are disgracefully low.
• Un-doctored unemployment statistics are in double-digits.
• Business expansion is deferred or canceled in light of the uncertainty regarding future regulations and tax rates.
• More people are dependents of the government than ever before.
• Government is bankrupting itself in an effort to hide these effects.

This partial list could be greatly expanded, but there is no need to go on.

The policies of our version of President Nehru have effectively expropriated our future and the future of our children.

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/a0BOXqbyc2s/story01.htm Tyler Durden

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/FQBrWISXrmc/story01.htm williambanzai7