Asymptosis: Always Approaching

Author: Asymptosis

  • Gretchen Morgenson Underdoes Herself

    In today’s column, one the our best watchdogging financial journalists takes an odd analytical tack–toward not terribly important news. She gets all excited about the returns calculator provided by FINRA (Financial Industry Regulatory Authority)–as she should. It has a database of the funds, so you can easily pull post-fee returns comparisons and graphs for different…

  • Is Fiscal Stimulus Just Stupid?

    Greg Mankiw uses rhetorical questions to argue that the government should not be using fiscal stimulus to prevent a recession. He asks (in my words): If monetary policy is the strongest lever, and if fiscal stimulus limits the Fed’s monetary options–ties their hands–why are we considering fiscal stimulus? But he’s posing it as a zero-sum…

  • Mankiw Goes Off the Cuff

    Greg Mankiw is a widely and justifiably respected economist. But sometimes in his blog he prattles on just like the rest of us, absent the empirics that he should be bringing to the party. So here. He ridicules the CBO for even bothering to analyze a temporary increase in food stamp benefits to effect short-term…

  • Warren Buffett: Estate Tax Good

    Buffett testified to Congress on Monday. Why isn’t the blogosphere talking about this? Short story, Buffett is foursquare behind the estate tax. He points out that the basis step-up at death (cap gains taxes just go away) is a huge gift to survivors, 99.5% of whom pay no estate taxes. “If people insist on renaming…

  • Tax the Rich! And make us all richer?

    Lane Kenworthy takes up the tax-rates-on-the-rich-versus-GDP-growth discussion (hat tip to Free Exchange for the pointer). His key point: more important than top marginal rate, is the effective rate that top earners pay. The post is also quite interesting in concentrating on  the GDP-growth effect of taxes on the top 1% of earners. Unfortunately this chart…

  • The Economist’s New Gilded Age

    Since The Economist chose not to publish my incredibly cogent response to a recent “Economics Focus” column, I’ll share it with them (and you) here: The new (improved) Gilded Age Dec 19th 2007 The very rich are not that different from you and me; or less different, perhaps, than they used to be The article…

  • Pinker on Morality: Libs and Cons

    The NYT Magazine‘s cover story this week is “The Moral Instinct” by Steven Pinker. (Full disclosure: He’s my idol; I am such a groupie for this guy.) Here’s one of the things I like about the article: He cites five “spheres” of morality devised by psychologist Jonathan Haidt: not harming, fairness, loyalty, respect for authority,…

  • Nature: Good?

    Megan McArdle nicely skewers the Naturalistic Fallacy today, responding to an article in Reason, quoting Lew Rockwell: Reason quoting Rockwell: “Wishing to associate with members of one’s own race, nationality, religion, class, sex, or even political party is a natural and normal human impulse.” Megan: Anyone who has ever observed a two-year-old knows that lying,…

  • Government: BAD? — Part 4: Higher Taxes, More Prosperity

    This one came as quite a surprise even to me. In general, among developed countries, those with higher taxes over the last thirty years have higher GDP per capita today than lower-taxing countries. I think the graph speaks for itself. Related posts: Government: BAD? — Part 3: Taxes and GDP Growth Supply Side: Are We…

  • Government: BAD? — Part 3: Taxes and GDP Growth

    Do higher taxes result in slower growth? That’s the basic assertion made by tax-cut advocates. If we lower taxes, we’ll grow faster and all boats–rich and poor–will rise. It’s a great idea. Too bad it’s not true. Few will disagree that in the short term (generally), tax increases impede growth. But over the long term…

  • Government: BAD? — Part 2: American Prosperity

    Update: For those who prefer the (in this case unequivocal) aggregate opinions of economists and econometricians who have studied this subject, I recommend this review of those experts’ efforts. Their conclusions resoundingly debunk the faith-based spending-and-taxes-kill-growth belief system (even as some of those experts continue to cling to it in direct contradiction of their own…

  • Government: BAD? — Part 1 of a Series

    Are government, taxes, and spending really such irredeemably bad things?

  • “You Deserve It”

    I’m one of the lucky ones, even by American standards. My business partner and I built a company in the ’90s that created and ran professional conferences covering web design, web marketing, web advertising, and other frenzied subjects of the day.  We were selling Levis to the gold miners. And we were lucky enough to…

  • Social Security “Risk”: What’s Really True?

    Is equity investment of Social Security funds in private/personal accounts "risky"? Or will it save the system? What should true conservatives be in favor of? Many of the arguments on both sides are based on wrong assumptions or form specious conclusions.The first question, on equity investments: Would long-term, well-diversified equity investments provide higher returns than…

  • Should conservatives care about conservation? Reading Lomborg

    Should true conservatives be worried about conservation? Is the concern about consuming and contaminating our natural resources a bunch of ill-informed liberal vaporing, unsupported by fact? My ex-business partner–a Republican who votes Democratic on occasion–has taken me to task on this point (not for the first time). He points to Bjorn Lumborg’s book, The Skeptical…

  • Seymour Hersh on “Insurgency”

    I’m not the only one who thinks this word is huge piece of deceptive and delusional spin. Seymour Hersh isn’t worrying about dictionary definitions, though: I think there’s a way out of it, maybe. I can tell you one thing. Let’s all forget this word "insurgency". It’s one of the most misleading words of all.…

  • U.S. Intelligence Report: Iraq is Making the World More Dangerous

    The National Intelligence Council* just issued Mapping the Global Future: Report of the National Intelligence Council’s 2020 Project. Significant among its findings: Iraq is a training ground for terrorists. "The al-Qa’ida membership that was distinguished by having trained in Afghanistan will gradually dissipate, to be replaced in part by the dispersion of the experienced survivors…

  • Social Security: Sham “Risk” Arguments

    I hate it when people who I agree with use stupid arguments to support their (our) positions. It sets us up as straw-men that our rhetorical opponents can swat at will. The AARP’s ads about Social Security privatization fall right into that trap. Their position? Privatized funds invested in the market are like gambling. "If…

  • Insurgents surging in from inside and outside

    It seems that the military is pretty unclear on what an "insurgent" is, as well. As reported in the VOA News (that’s Voice of America) on Dec. 16, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, General George Casey expressed " concern that insurgents are still infiltrating into Iraq from across its border with Syria. General…

  • Know your enemy: is Al Quaeda: “coming” or “flooding” into Iraq?

    In his testimony on January 7, Attorney General hopeful Alberto Gonzales said, "We had members of Al Qaeda, intent on killing Americans, flooding into or coming into Iraq." Which is it? Coming or flooding? Does he know? Does anyone know, either in or outside of the (American or Iraqui) administration? Is the press asking? Nobody…

  • Admitting I’m Wrong: “Insurgents”

    If there’s one thing I admire, it’s people who are willing to acknowledge when they’re wrong. In that spirit, I must concede my sister’s point: "Insurgent" comes from roots meaning "rising up," not my assumed meaning of "surging in." Dictionary.com definitions for "insurgent" So, it’s a perfectly accurate word to describe the anti-American (and quite…