Must Reads For The Week 9/3/16

Posted September 3, 2016 by austrianaddict
Categories: Must Reads For The Week
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ECONOMICS

Hurricane: Florida AG To Prosecute “Price Gougers”, by Tho Bishop, at mises.org. Increased demand for scarce resources means prices will go up. Higher prices tell consumers to demand less, and producers to supply more. Scarce resources will be sent to Florida where they are needed the most because of the high prices. And people in Florida will only purchase what they need of these scarce resources at these higher prices. Prices ration scarce resources.

DC’s Minimum Wage Hike Results In 1400 Restaurant Jobs Lost In 1st 6 Months of 2016 – Biggest Drop In 15 Years, at ecocnomicpolicyjournal.com. How many times does the disastrous  results of increasing the minimum wage have to be seen before people and politicians understand that wages are set by supply and demand? Paying labor more than what it produces means that labor will eventually be priced out of the market.

Free Trade Wins: The TTIP Is In Trouble, by Mark Thornton, at mises.org. Hillary and Trump don’t understand that trade deals made by politicians only benefit crony corporations at the expense of consumers. Here is a great trade deal: Individuals in our country can trade with individuals in other countries without interference from Government rules and regulations.

The Right Lessons From Obamacare’s Meltdown, by Ron Paul, at mises.org. Don’t blame the free market for the results of Government intervention.

As Predicted, Obamacare Is Absolutely Killing The Middle Class, at zerohedge.com. We were promised that health insurance payments would decrease, but they have exploded. These higher premiums hurt the middle class the most. Wealthy people can afford the increase, and poor people will get taken care of with our tax dollars.

Venezuela’s Latest Response To Food Shortages: Ban Lines Outside Bakeries, at zerohedge.com. The old saying in the former Soviet Union was, “If you see a line starting to form, get in it!” Lines are a way to ration scarce resources in socialist economies. In Venezuela The National Superintendency of Fair Prices (that sounds like wonderful agency) is going to fine bakeries that let lines stretch out their front doors. They say the lines are forming because their political opposition is trying to win the propaganda war. Propaganda doesn’t keep food off of store shelves or stock the shelves with food. Individuals cooperating in free markets bring food to store shelves.

The Happy Reality That Sports Stars Get Paid More Than School Teachers, at economicpolicyjournal.com. You pay a higher price for scarce talent. Excerpt from the article: “So let me ask: would you prefer to live in a world in which the number of people who can skillfully fight fires and teach children is large but the number of people who can skillfully play sports and act is very tiny, or in a world in which the number of people who can skillfully fight fires and teach children is very tiny but the number of people who can skillfully play sports and act is large?”

Demographic HomeMageddon Underway….Will Last Until 2035, at zerohedge.com. Free markets will deal with the demographic shift in the population of the US. Government intervention into the economic realities created by demographics, will turn these realities into real problems.

OUR RULING ARISTOCRACY SHOWS DISDAIN FOR THE BENIGHTED MASSES

The Dog Ate My Homework Excuse.

Hillary Told FBI She Thought Classified “C” Markings Were Just “Alphabetical Paragraph” Markings, at targetliberty.com. This from the smartest women in the world? This is a whopper of a lie.

FBI Reveals Hillary Could Not Recall Briefings Due To Concussion,Clot, at zerohedge.com. I’ve learned from the Clintons to never say ‘you can’t remember’. Always say ‘you can’t recall’. I guess saying ‘you can’t recall’ is a way to legally get around perjury?

Yeah That’s Really Funny.

Mark Toner, deputy spokesman for the State Department, as well as the reporters at the press conference show who they really are in this exchange. Someone should have called them out on this. You didn’t get away with this s#!+ where I grew up.

 

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Reaction To EpiPens Increased Price, Reveals Our Economic Ignorance.

Posted September 1, 2016 by austrianaddict
Categories: Econ. 101
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

SAINT LOUIS, UNITED STATES - AUGUST 25, 2016: Two EpiPen auto-injectors used for treatment of allergic reactions.

The angst over the recent price increase of the product EpiPen, reveals our economic ignorance. This economic ignorance in and of itself wouldn’t be a problem in a free market capitalist system. Unfortunately we live in a crony capitalist economic system, where more and more economic decisions are being made through the political process. Businesses are being forced to obey interventionist laws passed by Congress, on the one hand, and cave in to political shaming by ignorant consumers and politicians on the other.

When this point is reached, companies are incentivized to put their resources toward lobbying Congress to pass laws that favor these incumbent businesses. They also donate money to politicians and political parties which is like paying protection money to the mob.

All of these resources could have been used to satisfy consumer demand. But these companies have decided that these resources can best serve their interest if they are invested in lobbying government. This is not how free market capitalism works. This is how crony capitalism works.

The EpiPen kerfuffle is an example of how our economic ignorance has allowed politicians to place the blame for the price increase on Mylan, the producer of EpiPen. The blame should be placed on the very politicians who are doing the finger-pointing. Government intervention into the healthcare market over the last 75 years, culminating in The Affordable Care Act (aka. Obamacare), is what has caused prices to skyrocket. Let’s take a look.

ECONOMICS 101

EpiPen is a product that delivers a life saving dose of epinephrine to individuals who have severe allergic reactions to food, insect stings, and medicines. Lets look at the economic reality of how EpiPen magically appears to perform its life saving task.

As much as people want to think that healthcare is a right, they are literally dead wrong. Healthcare in general and EpiPen in particular, is an economic good. This means it is subject to the first rule of economics which is scarcity.  EpiPen just doesn’t appear out of thin air as if we lived in the Garden of Eden. In the real world, someone has to produce this product, and you don’t have a right to take what a person produces.

The people who produce this product have to be compensated for the cost of production plus a profit. If they can’t make a profit, they would cut their losses and stop producing the product. This is why prices are so important in a free market economy. Prices send information through the production process. Government intervention increases the cost of production, which in turn sends false information through the pricing system.

CENTRALLY PLANNED HEALTHCARE

The Healthcare system was one of the most regulated industries before the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) was passed six years ago. There is no true price discovery in our current healthcare system. This means information about which healthcare goods and services should be produced and in what quantity they should be produced doesn’t exist.

When third-party pays, whether it’s an insurance company or Government, prices are distorted. If you add the fact that insurance companies have to abide by the rules set by Government it is worse. Take a quick glance at this article, EpiPen Price: What To Know, at webmd.com, to see how much Government intervention there is in the healthcare system. Government intervention is essentially an attempt at price-fixing. Price fixing distorts the information sent through the market.

Government has created the monopoly position that Mylan holds with EpiPen. Government regulations have made it more difficult for competitors to enter the market and produce an EpiPen like product. Scan this short article, Why The EpiPen Has A Monopoly (Hint It Is Not Runaway Capitalism), at thelibertarianrepublic.com, to see how Government planners created the monopoly position for Mylan that allows the price to soar.

Supply and demand chart drawn on a blackboard.

SUPPLY AND DEMAND RULE THE DAY. EVEN IN A HAMPERED MARKET.

At a lower price more is demanded and less is produced. At a higher price more is produced and less is demanded. This is the law of supply and demand.

Government had artificially lowered the price, that people were paying for EpiPen, through Insurance mandates and Government subsidies. Because of the artificially low price, demand increased. When Auvi-Q, one of the other two producers of automatic injection devices for epinephrine, was taken off the market by regulators in October of 2015, overall supply was reduced. What happens when demand is increasing and supply is decreasing? The price has to go up to ration the scarce resource. Is this a good thing? It is neither good nor bad. It is just the reality of prices. Prices discovered through free markets not only coordinate supply and demand. Free market prices also reveal the scarcity that exists. But free market prices don’t create the scarcity.

Let’s look at the price of oil to understand what would happen if there were free markets in the healthcare system. When the price of oil was around $120 dollars a barrel, there was talk of oil going to $200 a barrel. But what happened. People started using less, demand started to decrease. At these higher prices fracking became economically viable. The supply of oil started to increase. Frackers started to find more productive methods of extracting oil from the ground. As supply increased and demand decreased the price of oil started to decrease. Because of these more productive methods, fracking wells could keep supplying oil at lower and lower prices. Because supply remains high and demand has just marginally increased, the price has remained low.

Even though Obama’s EPA took government land off-line for fracking, that didn’t keep fracking from happening on privately owned land. The free market pricing system worked to supply more oil to the market at a lower price. Bureaucrats in Government didn’t do this, free markets did. What does this have to do with the price of EpiPen?

In a free market the rise in the price of EpiPen would do two things. People would start using less. And companies would start supplying more. The price would eventually go down.

Because of Government intervention their won’t be new suppliers even at the higher price. They are being restricted from entry into the market by Government rules. Supply won’t increase like supply increased in the oil sector.

If Government and insurance companies subsidize the purchase of EpiPen, and Mylan gets bullied into lowering prices, their will be no true price discovery. False information about production and consumption will be sent through the hampered market. Their will be over consumption and under production of EpiPen. The more the planners plan the more their plans will not work.

CONCLUSION

Central planners, and people who vote for central planning, think that whatever is decreed, will happen. Unfortunately for them economic laws are more powerful than central planners mandates. Unless more companies are allowed to supply EpiPens, the artificially created shortage will continue. If the price is artificially kept below what it would be in a free market, demand will remain high. High demand and short supply means EpiPen will have to be rationed by bureaucrats in Government instead of by prices in a free market. Look at the waiting lines in Venezuela if you want to see what rationing by Government looks like.

The answer? Get rid of Government regulations and let free market prices work. Until people gain understanding about free markets, they will continue to get fooled by slick politicians, and we will remain in this political quagmire.

 

Related Article – The Economics of Healthcare vs. The Right to Healthcare, at austrianaddict.com.

Related Article – Lets Look At Government Run Healthcare, at austrianaddict.com.

Related Article – The Reality Of Obamacare, at austrianaddict.com.

Related Article – Gruber Tells The Truth About Obamacare, at austrianaddict.com.

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Must Reads For The Week 8/27/16

Posted August 26, 2016 by austrianaddict
Categories: Must Reads For The Week
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Louisiana, Private Disaster Relief Outperforms Government, at valuewalk.com. People with privately owned boats calling themselves the Cajun Navy rescued people from the recent flooding in Baton Rouge. They used phone apps and Facebook to find people needing help. What was Louisiana’s State government response? Louisiana Lawmaker Wants To Subject The Cajun Navy To Government Red Tape, Regulations, And Fees, at carpediemblog. Does this surprise anyone? Although the State Senator clarified his original statement, we all know that government intervention starts with good intentions and ends up with bad consequences. How did the Federal Government respond to the crisis? The Obama Administration Gives Louisiana Flood Victims An Anti-Discrimination Lecture, at thehayride.com. The Justice Departments guidance “highlights the importance of complying with nondiscrimination requirements of civil rights statutes, addressing the needs of the whole community, and ensuring equal opportunity to access recovery efforts..” This kind of nonsense is more important to bureaucrats than actually doing the hard work of helping with the recovery. Hey! Here’s the best policy for Government. Get out-of-the-way. Quit making it harder for the people who are actually getting something done.

Massachusetts To Tax Ride-Sharing Apps, Give The Money To Taxis, at reuters.com. This is an example of government officials trying to overturn the decisions made freely by millions of consumers in the market. Bureaucrats only like free market results when these results agree with what the bureaucrats think the results should be. Massachusetts is going to levy a 20 cents tax on each ride given by Uber Lyft and other ride-sharing apps. 5 cents will go to the taxi industry as a subsidy. Excerpt from the article: “The law says the money will help taxi businesses to adopt “New technologies and advanced service, safety and operational capabilities” and to support workforce development.” In order to compete with the new ride-sharing technology, wouldn’t you think the taxi industry should have been doing this already? Is the taxi cartel like the post office? With Uber and Lyft playing the role of FedEx and UPS. If they can’t compete without taxpayer-funded subsidies, either get better or go out of business. To all the young people who think socialism is a great idea. What do you think of this socialist central planning scheme?

Clinton Foundation To Restrict Foreign Donations If Hillary Gets Elected, at washingtonpost.com. Why would it be bad to accept foreign money if you’re the President, but fine to accept it when you’re the Secretary of State? This is like closing the barn door after the horse has gotten out. Since the Clinton Foundation is a money laundering operation, don’t you think the foundation will find ways to launder this foreign money even if Hillary wins?

I Thought Charities Were Supposed To Give, at theburningplatform.com. The Clinton Foundation takes in $177 million of which $135 million is cash contributions. They give out a little over $5 million in grants, assistance, and gifts. That’s 2.9% of what they take in. Look at all the other expenses. Whose pockets are getting lined with the rest of the money?

FBI Admits Clinton Used Software Designed To Prevent Recovery And Hide Traces Of Deleted EMails, at zerohedge.com. FBI says Clinton used BleachBit to erase the emails on her private server. From the article: “BleachBit (click here) is software designed to help the user delete files in a way to ‘prevent recovery’ and ‘hide traces of files deleted’.” Remember, she just wanted to get rid of yoga classes and wedding plans.

Rigged: Virginia Governor And Clinton Crony Terry McAuliffe, Restores Voting Rights To 13,000 Felons, at tammybruce.com. McAuliffe originally tried to restore voting rights to over 200,000 felons. This attempt was shot down last month by the state supreme court. But like the Terminator he is back. Do you think that McAuliffe would be this persistent in his efforts to “right a perceived wrong” if this bloc of voters voted for Republicans?

Top 25 Corporate Pension Plans Alone Are Underfunded By Over $225 Billion, at zerohedge.com. Add this to the insolvency of social security and you tell me; who is going to pay for the over consumption of the last 15 years that was caused by money printing? That’s right the people who produced real value during that time period.

State University Now Offers ‘Stop White People’ Training, at zerohedge.com. Excerpt from the article: “They state their purpose is to “help others take the next step in understanding diversity, privilege, and the society we function within,” Presumably the “white” society they plan to “stop” at the event.” No comment necessary!

Heroic University Of Chicago To Incoming Students: We Do Not Support Safe Spaces And Trigger Warnings, at targetliberty.com. Excerpt from the article: “Our commitment to academic freedom means that we do not support so-called ‘trigger warnings,’ we do not cancel invited speakers because their topics might prove controversial, and we do not condone the creation  of intellectual ‘safe spaces’ where individuals can retreat from ideas and perspectives at odds with their own.” At last some sanity in this world! Do you think the University found courage because alumni said they would not donate anymore if the university went down the trigger warning road? I’m just asking. I don’t know.

Obama Energy Secretary: Fracking Is Good For The Environment, by Bre Payton, at thefederalist.com. The crazy environmentalists have to be going out of their minds over this. Natural gas from fracking is replacing coal in the production of electricity. ‘Greenhouse gas emissions’ have been reduced by 20%. Environmentalists should be thrilled. The free market is reducing CO2 levels. Here is their conundrum.  They hate fossil fuels and free markets but they love lower CO2 levels. If their green energy policies can’t get credit for the drop in CO2 emission, they would prefer not talking about the emissions dropping at all.

As Predicted Obamacare Is Killing The Middle Class, at zerohedge.com. Remember what we said last week. Obamacare is working exactly as planned. It was supposed to fail. It was intended to be the next step toward a government run single payer healthcare system.

CARTOONS: For more from  theburningplatform.com. (click here)

Political Cartoons by Henry Payne

Political Cartoons by Chip Bok

Political Cartoons by Henry Payne

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Olympic Observations From The Margin

Posted August 23, 2016 by austrianaddict
Categories: Miscellaneous, Observations From The Margin
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SAO PAULO, BRAZIL - CIRCA MARCH 2015: Flag with Rio 2016 Olympic Games

-My first memory of the Olympics was the 68 summer games in Mexico City. The 100, 200, and 400 meter world records were set at these Olympics. Americans won 7 of the 9 possible medals in these three events. It was also the Olympics where Bob Beamon set his other worldly world record in the long jump. I was hooked on track and field and the Olympics from that point on. I like the Olympics for a few reasons. 1)I like to see individuals who win because they are far superior to their competition. 2)I like to see an underdog win. 3)I like to see an individual crush a world record. These Olympics had all three.

-Michael Phelps, Usain Bolt, Katie Ledecky, and Simone Biles were the stars of these Olympics. They dominate their sports. They far exceed their fellow competitors best efforts. It is mind-blowing to watch them perform. Not only do these four athletes know they are going to win, their competitors know it. Winning is one thing, Winning when it is expected is difficult. But winning while making it look so effortless is what puts these four in a special category. Every time I watched them all I could think is, “The people they’re competing against are the best in the world. You can’t be consistently that much better than them.” I enjoy seeing greatness perform in their given fields. These four gave me great joy.

-One of the underdogs that caught my eye were Maya Dirado. She beat heavy favorite Katinka Hosszu, of Hungry, in the 200 backstroke. Hosszu had a big lead in the last 50 meters but Dirado caught her in the last 10 meters and out touched her to win by .06 of a second. She was in disbelief when she saw that she had won (click here to watch). (Click here to see interview). The other underdog who stood out was Matt Centrowitz. The US hadn’t won a 1500 meter gold medal since 1908. Centrowitz had the lead in the last lap and wouldn’t allow anyone to pass him. He held off the rest of the field down the stretch to become the first American to win the 1500 in over 100 years. The reaction of his dad and family was great (click here to watch). (Click here to see reaction).

-For me, the performance of the Olympics was Wayde Van NieKerk from South Africa beating the past two Olympic 400 meter champions and crushing the world record in the process. Michael Johnson’s world record of 43.18 hadn’t been challenged since he set it in 1999. Van NieKerk won the 400 at the world championships last year so he was one of the pre-race favorites along with James and Merritt. He didn’t tie up in the final 100 meters, like the other two, and flew to the world record. (Click here to watch the race). If you want to see Van NieKerk’s and Johnson’s world records side by side, (Click here to watch the video).

-You have to like a guy like Irish boxer Michael Conlan for calling out the power elites in his sport like he did in Rio. After losing to a Russian boxer that Conlan apparently beat up badly, (Click Here) The Irate Irish Boxer Flips Middle Finger To Judges After Controversial Loss. Not only did he flip off the judges, he ripped the Amateur Boxing Association in his interviews. He also made a tweet toward Putin that asked “how much did they charge you bro“. Watch the videos in the article above. He didn’t cry or whine, he blew up. He wanted a big piece of everybody involved, and he wanted it right now.

-Conlan must have been correct in his assessment of the judging, because (Click Here) Boxing Judges Were Sent Home From Olympics After Controversial Decisions. Even though the Amateur Boxing Association wouldn’t say there was a fix, their actions spoke clearly.

-World record holder and defending Olympic Pole vault champ, Renaud Lavillenie of France, was booed (click here) on his final attempt to surpass home crowd favorite Thiago Braz da Silva of Brazil who was leading the Pole vault final in Rio. How Lavillenie reacted to the booing belied the mentality of a world record holder. He cried and whined like a wussy. If Lavillenie wants to hear booing, he should try to make a foul shot, up one with 30 seconds left in the game to Duke at Cameron Indoor. Here is what bronze medalist American Sam Kendricks had to say about the crowd,”Brazil is an emotional place, a place that has a culture around football (soccer), it’s not necessarily against the other man. I took it with a grain of salt that they were booing.” You have to be mentally tough to break a world record and win an Olympic gold medal. I can’t believe he reacted the way he did. How would Michael Conlan have reacted?

-The two most impressive things about Usain Bolt are: 1) His world records in the 100 (9:58) and 200 (19:19). I can’t see either of these times being broken for a generation (25 years) or maybe longer. Although I thought Michael Johnson’s 200 world record would last the rest of my lifetime. 2) The distance between him and the second place finisher. Olympic sprints are won by inches of feet. He has won Olympic sprints by margins that might as well be miles. That consistent domination sets him apart from other Olympic sprint champions.

-Lets end with this article, 28 Incredible Facts About Michael Phelps’ 28 Olympic Medals (click here). It is hard to wrap your head around 23 gold medals, and 28 total. No one will ever match this total. The only person who could match this record would be another swimmer from the US. A swimmer, because they can swim multiple individual events. An US swimmer, because the US always medals in the three relays. I can’t think of another sport that provides the number of events that would allow someone to approach this number. Phelps swam in 30 Olympic finals to win 28 medals. No one will ever compete in 28 Olympic finals which would be the minimum to tie Phelps total. Here is a fact from the article the will give you a better understanding just how many medals Phelps has won. From the article: “If Katie Ledecky stayed at her current medal rate she wouldn’t pass Phelps Until the 2036 Olympics. She would be 39 years old“. We are lucky to have seen the greatest swimmer, and Olympic medal winner, of all time. I say we’re lucky because we wouldn’t have seen this greatness if he had chosen lacrosse or hockey over swimming. Choices have consequences.

 

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Must Reads For The Week 8/20/16

Posted August 20, 2016 by austrianaddict
Categories: Must Reads For The Week
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Old Lies, by Thomas Sowell, at jewishworldreview.com. Excerpt from the article: “Too many people in the media and in academia abandon their roles as conduits for facts and take on the role of filterers of facts to promote social and political agendas.”

Is Free Trade Causing Job Loss?, by Walter E. Williams, at jewishworldreview.com. Excerpt from the article: “While job loss can be traumatic for the individual who loses his jib, for the nation job loss often indicates economic progress. In 1790, farmers were 90 percent of the U.S. labor force. By 1900, about 41 percent of our labor force was employed in agriculture. Today, less than 3 percent of Americans are employed in agriculture. What would Trump or Hillary have done in the face of this precipitous loss of agricultural jobs? They might have outlawed all of the technological advances in science and machinery that have made our farmers the world’s most productive and capable of producing the world’s cheapest food.”

Aetna Joins Other Major Insurers In Pulling Back From Obamacare, by Alison Kodjak, at npr.org. Obamacare is working exactly as it was planned. It was supposed to be the next step toward a Government single payer system. This is where it is headed.

A Primer On Seattle’s New First Come First Served Renters Laws, at seattletimes.com. My friend has many rental houses. I told him about this law in Seattle. He said he never rents to the first people who apply. They are usually  jumping from rental house to rental house because they are bad tenants. This law is a violation of an individual’s property rights. Remember the baker who wouldn’t make a wedding cake for a gay wedding. He was forced to either sell his property (the wedding cake) or get fined. He lost his business. Oh I forgot, that can’t happen in Amerika!

Thank God Nobody Died From This Texas Women’s Illegal Tamales, by Scott Shackford, at reason.com. Once again our public servants have to get involved in voluntary exchanges. If this lady produces food that people don’t want, or if someone gets sick from her food, she will go out of business. It’s that simple.

Shoplifting Runs Rampant In California After Rule Change, at zerohedge.com. Unintended consequences can be predicted if some basic economic principles are understood. When the costs of getting caught stealing are lowered, more stealing will take place.

Six Weeks Later, L.A. Sheriff’s Department Admits They Killed An Innocent Man In A SWAT Raid, by Eric Gohem, at reason.com. I think this kind of policing is out of control. An armored vehicle, and flash bang grenades are a bit much. If you add the fact that they didn’t admit they where wrong for six weeks. Well. These kinds of stories are why people don’t trust police. If both sides continue to escalate, this won’t end well.

“Homesick” Clock Boy Family Returns To U.S. Promptly Files $10m Federal Lawsuit, at tammybruce.com. Does the family of the boy who was suspended from school for biting his pop tart in a way that made it look like a gun have cause to sue? Only if he is a member of one of the lefts protected groups.

Feds Holding Summits For Lesbian Farmers, by Elizabeth Harrington, at freebeacon.com. Excerpt from the article: “The agency says it wants to change the perception of what it means to be a farmer in America away from white rich male.” I know a lot of farmers. They are not “rich”! Farming is a way of life. For some reason I don’t think lesbians will be falling over each other to become farmers. If individual lesbians decide to become farmers, great, have at it. If your good, you will make it on what you produce and no other reason, which is as it should be. Why is this the government’s business in the first place? Because Government has to expand it’s influence into everything.

Here is the Department of Agriculture’s Document (click here) on this subject. Please look at this document. Where do you get people who make up sh!t like this. Think of all the bureaucrats, in all the government agencies, who use their time to produce rules like this. It is mind boggling.

Hillary Clinton’s On Sexual Assault Issues, Crusader or Hypocrite, at targetliberty.com. The Factual Feminist.

Hillary Scrubs Sexual Assault Pledge After Allegations Against Bill Resurface, at targetliberty.com. Hillary has painted herself into a lot of corners over her career. Unfortunately the mainstream media always lets her out of these corners.

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Lochte Is Not A World Class Liar, Just As Hillary Is Not A World Class Swimmer.

Posted August 18, 2016 by austrianaddict
Categories: Miscellaneous
Tags: , , , , , , ,

VANCOUVER, BC, CANADA - NOVEMBER 11: Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Games Rings shine on November 11, 2009 at Burrard Inlet, Vancouver, BC.

Never attempt feats of Olympian proportion outside your area of expertise.

Just as swimming is a specialized skill, so too is lying.

If anyone should know this it is Ryan Lochte. He has trained for years to become one of the most decorated swimmers in Olympic history. As a youngster he perfected each swimming stroke through constant repetitions. These strokes became second nature to him, almost a part of his DNA.

If lying was an Olympic sport, Ryan Lochte wouldn’t have made the US team. Heck, he wouldn’t have even performed the Olympic qualifying standard.

Of course if lying was an Olympic sport, Hillary would be equivalent to a Michael Phelps type of performer. She has perfected the art of lying through constant repetitions over her career. It has become second nature to her, almost a part of her DNA.

Lochte made the mistake of trying to tell a whopper of a lie at the Olympics where there would be great media scrutiny. This would be like Hillary trying to swim against Lochte and Phelps in the Olympic 200 IM finals.

In other words, “Don’t try this at home, leave it to the professionals.”

Lets look at Lochte’s attempt at lying.

What an amateurish attempt.

Lets look at a real professional.

 

Lets try to help Lochte craft his lie in true Clintonesque fashion.

Let’s try something like this: “We were out late celebrating after the swimming competition was completed. One of our guys had a little too much to drink. I was the designated driver so I wasn’t drinking. We stopped at the gas station to use the bathroom because he was feeling sick. As we entered the bathroom he started to fall. We tried to catch him but we fell on the sink knocking it loose as well as knocking the soap dispenser off the wall. We tried to pay for the damage, but the Security guard tried to make the situation into something much bigger than what it was. The Security guard acted stupidly.”

What do you think?

WHEN YOUR STORY IS CHALLENGED, WHAT DO YOU DO?

Here is what we’ve learned from Hillary.

1)Stick with your story no matter what.

2)After a week say this is old news, we have to move on.

3)Say it was a mistake and nothing intentional when the lie starts to show cracks.

4)And finally say “What Difference at this point does it make?”

 

WATCH SOME MORE GOLD MEDAL PERFORMANCES BY HILLARY.

 

Related Article – Hillary And Benghazi: Call In The Cleaners, at austrianaddict.com.

Related Article – Why Do We Give Political Power To The Economically Ignorant? at austrianaddict.com.

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Senator Schumer: Olympians Shouldn’t Be Taxed For Winning Gold.

Posted August 17, 2016 by austrianaddict
Categories: Government and Politics, Miscellaneous
Tags: , , , , , , ,

RIO DE JANEIRO - FEBRUARY 3, 2016: Large gold medal featuring 2016 Olympics message with Olympic rings sits on American flag background.

I heard Senator Schumer had said this a week ago. Since Schumer never met a tax he didn’t like, I had to go to his website (click here for press release) to get the scoop. Here is what I learned.

Senator Schumer is urging the House to pass legislation which would prevent the winnings of Olympic medalists from being taxed. Schumer, of course, was instrumental in getting this bipartisan bill passed in the Senate.

The US Olympic Committee pays medal winners $25,000 for gold, $15,000 for silver, and $10,000 for bronze. Since this is considered income, it is taxed accordingly. Schumer wants to exempt the value of the medals as well as the prize winnings from being taxed by the IRS.

Schumer said: “it is unfair to tax the winnings of these medalists who work hard year-round to represent their country on the world stage and achieve victory“.

Here are a few observations.

-Bringing this bill up during the Olympics is purely political. Schumer could have pursued this legislation months or years ago if he was truly concerned about these athletes. This kind of grandstanding is why I hate politics.

-Hard work should be rewarded??? This big government central planner has never believed this. He wants to punish individuals who have succeeded in our free market system. He believes successful people cheated or gamed the system to acquire what they have produced. It is almost impossible to make a hard working person a ward of the State. As we know making individuals wards of the State is how the establishment stays in power.

– Schumer sees achievers in the same light as Obama sees them. It can be summed up in one phrase: “you didn’t build that”. Here is what Obama said: “...look, if you’ve been successful, you didn’t get there on your own….I’m always struck by people who think……It must be because I worked harder than everybody else. Let me tell you something – there are a whole lot of hard working people out there. If you were successful…..if you’ve got a business – you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.”

-If Schumer was true to his socialist central planning roots, he would have passed legislation that redistributed the medalist winnings among the non medal winning US Olympians. “There where a whole lot of hard working non medalists out there”? Is it “fair” that these medalists, because of the genetic lottery, where blessed with more talent than the other Olympians? Is it fair that Phelps, Biles, or Ledecky dominate their competition? Not in the eyes of people who are believers in social justice.

-Normally people like Schumer would hate people who far exceed their piers. So why is it different in this case. The reason Schumer is not treating the Olympic medalists like he would treat you or me is precisely because they are the elites of their sports. Since he is a member of the Government elites, he feels a kinship with these elite athletes. The elite should not have to be encumbered by the same rules the masses have to follow.

CONCLUSION

The above thoughts are a part of Schumer’s DNA. They all play a part in the decisions he makes everyday. If he was a plumber or an electrician, his world view wouldn’t affect the rest of us. Unfortunately, since he is a US Senator, it does.

I loathe grandstanding politicians, and central planning socialist elites!

 

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Must Reads For The Week 8/13/16

Posted August 13, 2016 by austrianaddict
Categories: Must Reads For The Week
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

HILLARY + TRUMP = ECONOMIC IGNORANCE

Donald Trump Turns To Herbert Hoover Economics, at economicpolicyjournal.com. Mr. Trump wants to “prime the pump with more spending and debt.” Spending financed by debt, both public and private, is what got us here in the first place. In the last 10 years the Fed printed over $4 trillion, and the Government took on $10 trillion in new debt. That’s enough pump priming don’t you think? The Keynsian Economic well has dry up. The simple answer is to allow free markets to work unencumbered by Government spending and Fed monetary expansion. Unfortunately nothing is simple when politicians and bureaucrats are involved in the decision making.

Hillary Clinton’s 5 Ideas To Fix The US Economy, at money.cnn.com. How does this sound. 1) Government spending on infrastructure, 2) debt free college, 3) “encourage” (force) companies to share profits with employees, 4) make the rich pay more in taxes, 5) raise the minimum wage. This is simply more spending and debt wrapped up in Christmas paper with a bow on top.

ECONOMIC REALITY

Bankster Flips Out: Says Japan’s Government Isn’t Doing Enough Keynsian Spending, at economicpolicyjournal.com. Decades of Keynsian stimulus by the Japanese Government isn’t enough? It is always the same answer to every economic problem more spending.

What Should The US Do If Other Countries Use Tariffs And Use Other Methods To Distort Trade, at economicpolicyjournal.com. Government intervention with free trade through tariffs, subsidies, and regulations harms the economy of the country that implements these policies. If other countries want to harm their economies with these policies; Why would we respond to such stupidity by implementing the same policies?

The Minimum Wage: Taking Away The Right To Work, by Roy Cordato, at mises.org. How many times does it have to be said: when a wage is set above what a particular job produces, that job will go away. Why do you think the number of private sector union workers has declined from 35% of the private sector work force, to just over 6% of the private sector work force since the 50’s. Unions priced themselves out of the market and the jobs went away. When it comes to raising the minimum wage, it is our benevolent politicians who are pricing low skill workers out of the work place. Political rhetoric is seen, workers losing their jobs are unseen.

Latest Jobs Data: The Worst expansion In 30 Years Continues, by Ryan McMaken, at mises.org.  All the stimulus spending by government and the money printing by the Fed hasn’t worked as the planners planned. Until these two activities are stopped. This is the new normal.

Will The Bubble Pop Even If The Fed Never Raises Interest Rates, by Brendan Brown, at mises.org. We are in new territory. Does anyone know how this will end? No. But it will end with a lot of pain. All we know is, at some point the activities brought about by low interest rates and printed money will have to be liquidated.

Consumer Optimism Is Not The Key To Economic Growth, by Frank Shostak, at mises.org. As we have asked before; What Comes First, Production or Consumption? You can’t consume what isn’t produced. Stimulating spending puts the cart before the horse. As Mr. Schostak says, “Demand is limited by prior production. To put it differently, his demand if fully covered (i.e., funded by the bread that he has produced). demand therefore, cannot stand by itself and be independent: it is limited by prior production….”. Interest rates coordinate production across time. Interest rates set artificially by government send false information through process of production. As a result production and consumption are mismatched. This is where we are after a decade of the Fed’s monetary manipulation.

Venezuela Has But One Choice: Capitalism or Chaos, by Carmen Elena Dorobat, at mises.org. Here is a quote by Ludwig von Mises which sums up what every article in this post: “THE ISSUE IS ALWAYS THE SAME: THE GOVERNMENT OR THE MARKET. THERE IS NO THIRD SOLUTION.”

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Must Reads For The Week 8/5/16

Posted August 5, 2016 by austrianaddict
Categories: Must Reads For The Week
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Obama: Why We Paid Iran $400 Million In Cash, at economicpolicyjournal.com. Why am I letting this bother me? This is standard operating procedure for all administrations in general, and this administration in particular. First; was this a ransom for the hostages? Let’s answer a question with a question. Would Iran give back hostages unless they received something in return? The administration gave 5 Gitmo prisoners for Bergdahl. Was this exchange a ransom for a hostage?

This fudging of the truth (aka lie) isn’t what set me off. It’s this comment from his press conference. (Click on above article to watch what the President said, if you want to.) Besides telling everyone, “These aren’t the droids you’re looking for“, here is what he said. “…the US government paid Iran in cash because the government has been so strict with sanctions they did not have a banking relationship with Iran, that we couldn’t send them a check. And we could not wire them the money…. It is not clear to me why cash as opposed to a check or a wire transfer has made this into a news story.”

Let’s throw the BS flag, go to the replay official, and look at it. 1) I thought the Iranian deal made sanctions null and void. 2) You or I could probably set up a bank account right now using our smart phones. 3) Mr. President have you ever used an executive order to circumvent the law? 4) You or I couldn’t withdraw $10k from our accounts without scrutiny from government. 5) If we did have $10k cash on us, we would have it stolen by government officials under civil asset forfeiture laws. 6) Ever heard of the war on cash? One of the reasons governments wants to do away with cash is because “cash makes it easier for criminals and TERRORISTS to do business”. Cash transactions can’t be traced. Do you think Iran deposited this cash in the ” National Bank of Iran”, showing up on the credit side of the ledger? The biggest State sponsors of terrorism gets $400 million in cash! What could possibly go wrong?

Venezuela’s Economic Collapse Is So Bad People Are Slaughtering And Eating Zoo Animals, at zerohedge.com. Everything happens on the margin. Prices originally rationed food. Then lines rationed food. People on the margin have now decided that standing in line for 12 hours with no guarantee of getting any food isn’t worth it. The new marginal activity to get food is to slaughter zoo animals and eat them. What could the next marginal activity be in this socialist utopia?

Student Body Vice President Suspended For Tweeting, #Forget Black Lives Matters, More Like All Lives Matter, After Dallas Cops Shot, at zerohedge.com. Why do we tolerate the intolerance of the left? Who is the bully here?

“We Have Lost Our Way….Someone Has To Stand up For The Truth“, at zerohedge.com. The answer to all of our problems is individual liberty. Government shackles on Individual liberty have to be taken off and clamped on our government.

Racial Discipline Quotas Create Chaos In St. Paul Schools, at thefederalist.com. Parents have to take back schools from their anointed betters who have pushed this kind of lunacy. It won’t be changed unless parents say ‘enough is enough’.

Shocking Undercover Videos Reveal Just How Easy It Is To Commit Voter Fraud, at zerohedge.com. Which party wrote the book on voter fraud?

New UN Report: Tax Meat Until It Is Too Expensive To Eat, at economicpolicyjournal.com. And I thought Socialists didn’t understand the economic principles of supply and demand. When you raise the price of a good, less of that good will be consumed. The UN wants to reduce the consumption of meat, because the production of meat causes “Global Warming”. I’d rather be hot while eating a medium rare steak, than cool while eating a tofu burger.

Concealed Carry Saves Cop Pinned By Meth Addict, at thefederalist.com. The citizen showed poise and restrained in the use of his gun. This perp would have been shot by most cops.

Switzerland, Land Of Peace, Sees Gun Sales Soar After Terror Attacks, at usatoday. And it is not because the Swiss President is talking about gun control. Gun sales go up in America after a mass shooting because our President starts talking about “common sense gun control laws”. The Swiss want to protect themselves from terrorists, while Americans want to protect themselves from our elected tyrants.

The FDA’s Insane Definition Of ‘Tobacco Product’ Drives Vaping Innovation, at reason.com. Another example of a government agency, namely the FDA, grabbing power by making law. Legislating is supposed to be the job of congress. They abdicated this right decades ago. The good news is Americans always try to get around every law the government passes. Americans ‘don’t tread on me’ attitude is part of the DNA we inherited from our founding fathers.

Obama To Bulldoze Chicago Lakefront For Presidential Library, Environmentalist Silent, at tammybruce.com. Is Obama going to get an ‘environmental impact statement’ to build this library? Let’s see! The IRS and the Tea Party groups. The FBI and Hillary’s EMail server. The EPA and Obama’s library. “I report, you decide”.

A Women Ran For President In 1872, at targetliberty.com. Talk about your glass ceilings! This was before women had the right to vote. I guess Hillary isn’t going to make history.

Father Of Benghazi Victim: Hillary Lied To Me And The American People.

Who do you believe? The father of a Navy Seal, who happens to have contemporaneous notes about what Hillary said to him; Or Hillary, who was called a liar about her EMails by FBI director Comey,  and actually convicted herself with her own previous statements?

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Lets Look At Government Run Health Care

Posted August 4, 2016 by austrianaddict
Categories: Econ. 101, Government and Politics
Tags: , , , , , , ,

doctor with stethoscope isolated on white background

In this article from economicpolicyjournal titled, An Obamacare Designer Confesses: “How I Was Wrong About Obamacare”, we get to look into the mind of a bureaucratic central planner. Dr. Bob Kocher advised the President on Obamacare. In the article he said, “I was deeply committed to developing the best health-care reform we could to expand coverage, improve quality and bring down costs.”

Central planners think they can ignore the laws of economics by simple decree. Economic forces don’t listen to planners. These forces are consistently working trying to correct the plans of planners. How could the Dr. think you could expand coverage, improve quality and bring down costs? Increasing demand without increasing supply makes it impossible to lower costs. It’s simple economics.

THE ANSWER IS MORE CENTRAL PLANNING

Excerpt from the article: “Dr. Kocher, admits that he and the other central planners did not understand the market correctly. Despite Obamacare doing everything possible to push medical care in the direction of mega-operations, the small operators have proven to be most efficient and with the best quality service.”

So what is Dr. Kocher’s remedy to the problem? More central planning of the sector that is working. Excerpt from the article: “The man doesn’t get it. The hampered by regulation free market out did his planned medical care but instead of rejecting central planning of healthcare altogether and allow care to develop on its own on a free market, he wants to use a failed methodology, central planning, and apply it to the one sector that is succeeding because it has been free of such planning, with all sorts of new micromanaging of small providers.”

The Doctor is essentially telling his patient, the remedy for your concussion is to allow yourself to get hit in the head harder.

ANOTHER ONE BITES THE DUST

Who would have thought that when health insurance companies started to sell a product that was not insurance they would go bust? Obamacare wasn’t meant to succeed, it was meant to fail. Politicians figured insurance companies would get blamed which would pave the way for a Government single payer healthcare system.

In this article, Aetna Latest Insurer To Question Obamacare’s Future, we see the consequences of calling something insurance when it isn’t. Aetna will show a $3oo million loss this year on its Obamacare business. Economics tells us losses are bad and profits are good. These sustained losses tell the business owner his business isn’t viable. He should cut his losses and move on to something else. Profits tell the business owner that people value his activity and it should be continued.

Health insurance companies loosing money in Obamacare means the activity should be discontinued in order to stop wasting of resources. It’s that simple.

LETS LOOK AT THE CENTRALLY PLANNED V.A. HEALTHCARE  SYSTEM

Two years ago Obama got rid of General Eric Shinseky as Secretary of Veterans Affairs. Bob McDonald replaced him. Problem solved, let’s move on to the next problem. Unfortunately they didn’t change the incentives the new Secretary had to make decisions under. If incentives didn’t change, the results won’t change.

Read this article titled, V.A. Spent Millions On Costly Art As Veterans Waited For Care. This headline doesn’t surprise us because we understand “incentives matter”. The underlying incentive for every government agency is to expand its power. Government agencies shouldn’t be judge by the goals they wish to achieve. They have to be judged by the results they produce.

When Senator Joni Ernst offered an amendment to the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs and Related Agencies Appropriations Act (this makes a terrible acronym MCAVARAAA) to specifically prohibit funding for art work (click on article here), it wasn’t even taken up, let alone adopted. This went down to defeat with a Republican controlled Senate!

The V.A. is an example of government run healthcare that has been around longer than Obamacare. If our Republican politicians won’t even change the incentives for something this obvious, what makes us think they will change or repeal Obamcare if they control the House, the Senate and the Presidency?

 

Related Article – Incentives Matter, at austrianaddict.com.

Related Article – The Economics of Healthcare vs. The Right to Healthcare, at austrianaddict.com.

Related Article – The Reality Of Obamacare, Socialism in Installments,  at austrianaddict.com.

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