Yahoo- June 20, 2008 Like rats leaving a sinking ship, top execs are abandoning Yahoo! in droves. In the great debate over whether well compensated managers, loaded to the gills with stock options, actually add value or are simply lucky, the inability of Yahoo!'s execs, and President Susan Decker in particular, to generate organic growth or organize a sale, is an exhibit for the prosecution. (Exhibit B would be eBay, which has not created any shareholder value since 1999, although I'm sure Meg has drawn a salary in.http://www.winterspeak.com/2008/06/yahoo.html Excellent graph- June 12, 2008 Blogger sucks and once again, has broken its picture posting ability. Here's the linkSource: Thomas Picketty and Emmanuel Saez, via WSJI love this graph. Next time folks talk about "taxing the rich", ask where "the rich" start. The top 10%-1% have seen almost flat income growth (1%-2%) over the past 6 years. So, up to $190K, no improvement.From the top 1%-0.01% it's better, 7%-8.5% income growth. We're now at the $2.5M mark though. All the serious growth has been at the higher than 0.01%...http://www.winterspeak.com/2008/06/excellent-graph.html Macro makes no sense- June 12, 2008 One area of economics that U Chicago shed no light on for me was macroeconomics, and monetary policy, which is ironic since it's the home of Milton Friedman who founded Monetarism. I don't think Megan understands it all that well either in this post1. It would involve a massive, massive credit contraction. Hello, Great Depression.2. Actually matching pool credit to particular loans would be a much more expensive business than the current banking system.3. The expansion of credit has...http://www.winterspeak.com/2008/06/macro-makes-no-sense.html The last financial crises of the 19th century- June 11, 2008 Brad DeLong has a reasonable capsule summary of the current financial crises, which he calls the last financial crises of the 19th century. It's true, this crises has its roots in Greenspan's excessive interest rate cuts after the .com bubble popped, but that happened in 2000, which would make it the twentieth century, noTwo slides I'll point you to. The first is what Brad calls a "liquidity tsunami". As this blog has pointed out, "increasing liquidity" -- which means the government printing...http://www.winterspeak.com/2008/06/last-financial-crises-of-19th-century.html Financial regulation- June 10, 2008 Megan has an excellent post asking exactly what financial regulation should be enacted given the problems the US has had with the mortgage market, commodities mortgage, credit derivative market, prime broker market, etc. She correctly identifies the key issueIf you borrow short and lend long--and all banking is some variant on this--you will at least occasionally be caught out. There's no real evidence that the problem in the housing market was supply-side, rather than demand-side, fraud. Bear..http://www.winterspeak.com/2008/06/financial-regulation.html Small violins- June 10, 2008 Angry Bear has a "soak the rich" post arguing that it's OK to raise taxes on "the rich" since they've made off like bandits during the last 10 years, while salaries elsewhere have stagnated or fallen (if one ignores healthcare). His target is a $300Kyear doctor, with $160K in debt from med school, saving for his kids education, and not looking forward to higher tax rates.The thing is that $300Kyear puts one in about the 3% income percentile, and that group has experienced wage stagnation just...http://www.winterspeak.com/2008/06/small-violins.html If your Momma says you're ugly...- June 6, 2008 Ed Glaeser, an academic at Harvard, is conflicted about Boston's City Hall. On the one hand, the building is hideously ugly and hated by the People. It also works poorly, and is hated by its Boston city government inhabitants. It is surrounded by a anti-human wasteland, rendering a huge swathe of prime downtown realestate uninhabitable, making it wasteful as well.On the other hand academic architects like it. Glaeser himself says it "sears his soul", although I've found that it turns my...http://www.winterspeak.com/2008/06/if-your-momma-says-youre-ugly.html Almost there...- June 3, 2008 Bruce Webb lays out some clear, but little known, facts about Reactionary politics:When we talk about a Reactionary today we generally mean nothing more than 'very Conservative'. But the term has a specific historical reference, it describes those who lined up behind the forces of Reaction in the years on either side of the nineteenth century. This Reaction was to specific events, notably the American and French Revolutions which were perceived, and rightly, as being systemic risks to the...http://www.winterspeak.com/2008/06/almost-there.html Gang up on Mankiw- June 3, 2008 Greg Mankiw got his spot in the Gray Lady's son by making an impish call to reduce the corporate income tax. He suggested paying for this tax cut by increasing the gasoline tax, thus striking a blow for environmental crusaders at the same time.Steve Waldman takes issue with Greg saying that a gas tax is insufficiently progressive, and questions whether the US has the wisdom to deploy cheaper capital wisely.I think that Steve should extend his compassion to polar bears, but am intrigued by his...http://www.winterspeak.com/2008/06/gang-up-on-mankiw.html |