link: http://bit.ly/1ISr0uz
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- China, as well as other countries including Russia, desperately want to reduce their dependence on the dollar. http://bit.ly/2y4vbEo
- http://bit.ly/1grU8wm
- Too bad you can't short the Atlanta Fed's Q1 GDP forecast. It started at 5.4%, then dropped to 4% a week later, and today its down to 3.2% That's a 40% drop in about 2 weeks. I wonder how many more weeks it will take for the number to fall below 2%?
- SEP Commentary "The Investment Game is not so much about holding a good Hand as playing a bad Hand well" published. http://bit.ly/1MY9KUc
- Where do you see and hear the most advertisements for gold and silver? Fox News and conservative talk radio. In other words, Trump voters buy gold – at least when Democrats are in office. http://bit.ly/2FF6Q78
- The amount of silver flowing in Swiss wastewater comes in at about 3,000 kilograms every year. http://bit.ly/2gCWjPO
- This budget deal is a disaster. It ads 400 billion to the debt over the next 2 years. The 80 billion in disaster relief is one time (until the next disaster), but the 160 billion in spending will recur every year. Over 10 years that adds another 1.6 trillion to the national debt.
- The mere possibility of a tiny rate hike is all it takes to collapse these markets. Schiff Radio: https://t.co/smYggxSEN0
- Given how large past #Republican deficits have been relative to the initial rosy projections when the goal was to balance in 10 years, imagine how much further off the mark #Trump's deficits will be when even the pretense of eventual balance has been dropped!
- Hope springs eternal. After having initially forecast 2017 Q4 #GDP growth at 4.5%, only to see it come in at just 2.6% (likely to be revised lower next month), the Atlanta Fed's initial read on 2018 Q1 GDP is 4.2%. Let the GDP limbo begin.
Sunday, August 2, 2015
Is social welfare increased (using Rothbard's demonstrated preference criterion) when I pay a ransom to free a hostage?
From Rothbard's essay on the subject to remind everyone of the details... >Now what happens when the State, or a criminal, uses violence to interfere with exchanges on the market? Suppose that the government prohibits A and B from making an exchange they are willing to make. It is clear that the utilities of both A and B have been lowered, for they are prevented by threat of violence from making an exchange that they otherwise would have made. Clearly we can't say that paying a ransom is one's demonstrated preference, because it is an action motivated by coercion. So how do you argue that individuals should be allowed to pay ransoms? If you say "it's their utility-maximising choice under the circumstances", I could easily reply that paying one's taxes similarly increases utility. I could say it is a Pareto improvement to let people pay ransoms, but not sure how to put it into Rothbard's language. I don't think he would say social welfare is increased by government allowing individuals to pay ransoms, because all it is doing is enabling B to rob A. But then A would prefer to be robbed than see C be killed...