Asymptosis: Always Approaching

Author: Asymptosis

  • Do Voters Prefer Death or Taxes?

    Today's NYT/CBS poll gives the answer: Taxes. 67% of voters think it's "more important to provide health care coverage for all Americans" than to "hold down taxes." Related posts: Tea Partiers: Old, White, Rich, Educated Men Business Roundtable Proposes Obamacare to Restore American Competitiveness ‘Pubs Love Catastrophic Coverage. Too Bad the Free Market Doesn’t Provide…

  • The Mankiw Distortion Field: This Time, Corporate Taxes

    I think we can assume that Greg Mankiw knows the difference between tax rates and effective tax rates–after all the deductions, exemptions, etc. And he surely knows that effective tax rates are what actually matter when it comes to impact, income, and incentives. But still, he posts this graph as if it was actually representative…

  • Why Friday Night?

    I've searched all over but haven't found any discussion of why they announced Biden on friday night/saturday morning. The exception: some wildly worded Aha! comments on right-wing blogs saying that the Obama team was forced into the announcement by a leak. (The leak, presumably, being secret service arriving at Biden's place?) It's common wisdom that…

  • Great Minds Think Alike: Obama on “Conservatives”

    I say somewhat presumptuously, even audaciously. Andrew Sullivan points out: Obama in Time: I was always suspicious of dogma, and the excesses of the left and the right. One of my greatest criticisms of the Republican Party over the last 20 years is that it's not particularly conservative. I can read conservatives from an earlier…

  • McCain’s Tax Plan: You Call That “Conservative”?

    I pointed out recently the horrific rise in the federal debt caused by the much-ballyhooed Reagan Revolution (with only a brief respite under Clinton)–a debt built on the apparent belief among so-called conservatives that we can borrow and spend our way to prosperity. It went from 34% of GDP in 1980 to nearly 70% today.…

  • US Corporate Taxes: How Do They Compare?

    Paul Krugman points us to a CBO comparative study (PDF) of corporate taxes in developed countries. Short story: ours are pretty much in the same ballpark as other prosperous countries, by various measures. Ours tend to incentivize investments funded by debt, as opposed to equity. Nothing to see here, folks. Move along. One table I…

  • Gore: Subsidizing Dirty Energy?

    It's true, this idea came along as Will Wilkinson was rather frantically back- or re-pedaling from a previous everything's-going-so-WELL post of his, said pedaling being necessary because Felix Salmon pointed out that the original post made no sense at all: Will’s argument, it seems to me, seems to rely on the peculiar idea that we’ll…

  • Oh Crap I Can’t Resist: Obama’s VP Will Be…

    Clark. Because, the following seems very odd to me. According to Steve Clemons at The Washington Note, the Obama campaign is either ignoring Clark or actively putting him at arm's length–he's supposedly not even attending the convention. Odd because: Clark's clearly a Very Big Democratic Asset, and what Obama describes as one "inartful" comment doesn't…

  • Maybe Obama’s Not So Bad…

    My wonderful friend and former business partner Steve allows as how maybe Obama isn't going to drive our economy into extinction after all. His route to that revelation, via a Mankiw post, puts aside that sage's other comment in the post: [Obama quote:] Over the past decade, we've seen…hefty corporate profits, but a shrinking share…

  • Immigrants: Pay for My Retirement! Please?

    Everyone agrees: the problem with Social Security is that we’re going to have (already have?) too many old people and not enough young people. Since killing off old people like me is not an option, what we need is more hardworking young people. Americans aren’t putting their shoulders to the wheel by creating more little…

  • Bush Promotes Private Sector: Cancels Shuttle for Football Fans

    Seattle's Metro used to have a shuttle to get people to Seahawks games. Not any more. (Seattle P-I.) the Bush administration began requiring public transit agencies such as Metro to step aside when private operators say they want to provide service. Starline Luxury Coaches of Seattle has done so this year. The Seahawks rejected Starline's…

  • Taxes: Obama vs. McCain

    Here’s the best laid-out presentation I've seen, from the Washington Post. Sort of speaks for itself. Hat tip to Monte Asbury. Related posts: Embarrassed Republicans Admit They’ve Been Thinking Of Eisenhower Whole Time They’ve Been Praising Reagan The Macroeconomics of Chinese Kleptocracy Who Owns Congress? A Campaign Cash Seating Chart Clear-Eyed Sowellian “Realists” Hyperventilating. Again.…

  • The Best Path to Prosperity?

    Between 1970 and 2000, GDP per person rose by 64% in the United States and by 60% in France. In America, this came about because productivity per worker rose by 38% and hours worked per worker rose by 26%. In France, it came about because productivity rose by 83% while hours worked fell by 23%.…

  • Who’s Fiscally Responsible?

    This is old news, but here are the latest figures. Federal Debt: 1940–2019: (Updated 1/31/2010) Yet another of those telling inflection points in 1980. (With a brief respite in the late nineties.) The red line–Gross Debt–is the scary (and actual) one; it includes loans from government trust funds (mainly Social Security) that will have to…

  • Regulating the Ratings Agencies: Low-Hanging Fruit?

    Among all the furious post-almost-apocalyptic discussions of financial industry regulation (i.e. here, here, here, here, and here), I'm stunned how rarely people mention the single biggest leverage point: regulation of ratings agencies. If Moody's et al had rated mortgage-backed securities properly, we simply wouldn't be in the fix we're in now. Those securities would have…

  • Another Free-Market Straw Man

    I get so tired of reading these pointless free-market commentaries that do nothing but state the obvious and grind the axe. Today's find: William Easterly's Financial Times article, "Trust the development experts – all 7bn of them." Easterly ridicules a recent (rather impressive, though judicious and occasionally mealy-mouthed) World Bank report on development, arguing that…

  • Manzi (and Me) on Equality and Prosperity

    Jim Manzi was nice enough to drop me a note in response to one of my comments, and he pointed me to his National Review piece, “A more equal capitalism: preserving the free-market consensus.” I ended up writing some lengthy responses, and not being one to waste perfectly good copy, I decided to post them…

  • White Married Christians: The Decline and Fall of the GOP

    The most compelling demographic analysis I've seen lately: Alan Abramowitz's "The Incredible Shrinking Republican Base" on Real Clear Politics. Short story: White Married Christians–the combined demographic–is and has been the base of Republicans' victories. Ignore income. Ignore gender. Ignore age. If you're white, married, and Christian, the odds are six or seven in ten that…

  • Pubs and Dems: Brands and Beliefs

    There's a pretty stunning new NPR poll out (PDF) (conducted by one Republican and one Democrat) showing that Pubs actually prefer Democratic policies by wide margins. This is Very Good News. But what's amazing is how brainwashed Pubs are by party affiliation, compared to Dems. If their beliefs aren't validated by Herr Comrade Party Leader,…

  • McCain on a Roll? Not.

    Since emerging as the presumptive Republican nominee, John McCain's primary results have been tepid by any measure. 5/27-ID    70%5/20-OR    855/20-KY    725/13-WV    765/6-IN    785/6-NC    744/22-PA    734/11-MS    79 Compare George Bush's primary results after sealing the nomination–consistently in the high 90s. McCain has broken 80% exactly once, and his latest–70% in Idaho–is his lowest number yet. If…

  • Choosing a VP For All the Right Reason

    Speaking of who Obama should choose as a running mate, David Brooks thinks "He should be thinking about who can help him govern successfully so he can get re-elected." This reminds me of a scene from The West Wing. Jed Bartlett is trying to decide whether to run again with John Hoynes, with whom he…