Economics

Honduras ‘no longer functioning’ after plunging over fiscal cliff

"Street surveillance cameras in one of the world's most dangerous cities were turned off last week because Honduras' government hasn't paid millions of dollars it owes. The operator that runs them is now threatening to suspend police radio service as well. Teachers have been demonstrating almost every day because they haven't been paid in six months, while doctors complain about the shortage of essential medicines, gauze, needles and latex gloves. Honduras is also grappling with $5 billion in foreign debt, a figure equivalent to last year's entire government budget." Continue reading →

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Detlev Schlichter: ‘Positive Money’ and the fallacy of the need for a state money producer

"Every injection of new money into the economy, regardless by whom, has to occur at a specific point from where the new money will disperse through a number of transactions. This process must always – from the point of view of a smoothly functioning, uninhibited market economy – lead to disruptions. It can never be neutral and it can certainly never enhance the functioning of the economy, or lead to a better plan-coordination between economic actors. Money injections always lead to arbitrary changes in relative prices, reallocations of resources and redistribution of wealth and income, without ever enhancing the wealth-generating properties of the economy overall." Continue reading →

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‘Wall St.’ flees NY for tax-free Florida

"The city’s hedge-fund executives are flying south — and it’s not for vacation. An increasing number of financial firms, especially private equity and hedge funds, are fed up with New York’s sky-high city and state tax rates and are relocating to the business-friendly climate in Florida’s Palm Beach County. And they’re being welcomed with open arms — officials in Palm Beach recently opened an entire office dedicated to luring finance hot shots down south. There are other perks, too — like the fact that it was 77 degrees and sunny there yesterday." Continue reading →

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Dealers hijack Seattle’s gun buyback with makeshift gun show

"Following the mass shooting at an elementary school in Connecticut last month, Seattle raised $120,000 to hold the first gun buyback effort in 20 years at a downtown parking lot on Saturday. The plan was to trade gift cards for guns that would later be destroyed, but a number of dealers set up a mini-gun show just a block away in a effort to buy up the guns and keep them in circulation. 'I pay cash, I don’t give Amazon gift cards,' one dealer told a gun seller in video captured by KING. 'It’s a historical firearm, I would hate to see it get destroyed,' a buyer remarked to another gun owner. 'I’ll give you $100 cash for it.'" Continue reading →

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Two Cheers for the Coming Collapse of the U.S. Economy!

"'At some point, holders of Treasury securities are going to recognize that these unfunded liabilities are going to affect the fiscal capabilities of the government and then you're going to have the same situation that happened in Greece happening in the U.S.,' says Jeffrey Rogers Hummel, who is a professor of economics at San Jose State University and the author of a recent paper on the consequences of a U.S. government default. 'In the short run it's going to be painful, but in the long run it'll be a good thing.'" Continue reading →

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Obamacare Layoffs Begin In Health Care Services; Insurers, Hospitals Set To Profit

"It looks like Obamacare is having some negative effects on the industry it was intended to help. Dr. Nick Turkal, CEO of Wisconsin-based non-profit health care provider Aurora Health Care, announced job cuts due to Obamacare. Orlando Health, a Florida network of community and specialty hospitals, said it would be laying off 400 employees due to new Obamacare costs. Likewise, small medical device company ADM Tronics says Obamacare will mean the company will have to lay off employees for the first time in over a decade. Hospitals and insurance companies alike are expected to receive a large influx in payments due to the new health law." Continue reading →

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Confused professors shocked schools are cutting their hours to avoid Obamacare penalties

"Robert Balla, an adjunct professor of English at Stark State College, in North Canton, Ohio received a letter in which he was told that 'in order to avoid penalties under the Affordable Care Act…employees with part-time or adjunct status will not be assigned more than an average of 29 hours per week.' He told the Journal that the move cut his $40,000 salary by about $2,000 and that he cannot afford health insurance. 'I think it goes against the spirit of the [health-care] law,' Mr. Balla said. 'In education, we’re working for the public good, we are public employees at a public institution; we should be the first ones to uphold the law, to set the example.'" Continue reading →

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Peter Schiff on Politics, Precious Metals and President Obama’s Second Term

"Daily Bell: Talk about your father, who is now in jail as a tax protestor. How is he doing? Peter Schiff: He's hanging in there. He's 84. He turns 85 next month. I think he's a political prisoner. He's in jail not because he really violated the law but because he represented a threat to the government's illegal collection of income taxes. So I think it's very unfortunate that my father is in jail and I think it says a lot about the character of our country when we can have a political prisoner." Continue reading →

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