ABC7 News has found them and tweted out the above picture.
Tuesday, February 2, 2016
This is Where San Francisco Has Hid a Bunch of the Homeless During Super Bowl 50
ABC7 News has found them and tweted out the above picture.
Job Seekers to Employers: Pay My Student Loans, Keep Your Paid Vacation
90% of respondents with debt said they think companies should offer student loan repayment as part of their benefits package, according to a survey of more than 5,000 job seekers by Beyond, a job search and application site. And one in 10 job seekers with debt ranked student loan repayment higher than paid vacation when asked what they thought was the “most important” company benefit.
40 million Americans hold $1.3 trillion in student loan deb. Right now just 3% of companies provide student loan repayment benefits, according to a 2015 survey of employers from the Society for Human Resource Management.
Tax and accounting giant PricewaterhouseCoopers announced last year that it would offer employees up to $1,200 a year for six years to put toward paying off their student loans. Investment firm, Natixis followed suit, announcing in December that it would give employees a total of $10,000 over the course of their career to help pay off their loans. Startups are even popping up to help employers better manage the perk.
Of course, all employees are paid based on their marginal value product, so this type of perk is somewhat gimmicky. The more money a firm devotes to loan repayment, the less money is available for other forms of compensation---like cash!
And here is the kicker, Unlike health insurance and 401(k) contributions there’s currently no preferential tax treatment for student loan help. That means borrowers would have to pay taxes on the perkt just like they would any other income.
Perhaps a savvy politician can propose to make such a benefit tax free.
Tax breaks are almost always good---especially when broad-based.
The Fed Wants to Test How Banks Would Handle Negative Interest Rates
In its annual stress test for 2016, the Fed said it will assess the resilience of big banks to a number of possible situations, including one where the rate on the three-month U.S. Treasury bill stays below zero for a prolonged period, reports Bloomberg.
"The severely adverse scenario is characterized by a severe global recession, accompanied by a period of heightened corporate financial stress and negative yields for short-term U.S. Treasury securities," the central bank said in announcing the stress tests last week.
In the simulation, the unemployment rate doubles to 10 percent, the same level it reached in the aftermath of the last financial crisis.
"This scenario does not represent a forecast of the Federal Reserve," the central bank said.
-RW
"The severely adverse scenario is characterized by a severe global recession, accompanied by a period of heightened corporate financial stress and negative yields for short-term U.S. Treasury securities," the central bank said in announcing the stress tests last week.
In the simulation, the unemployment rate doubles to 10 percent, the same level it reached in the aftermath of the last financial crisis.
"This scenario does not represent a forecast of the Federal Reserve," the central bank said.
-RW
San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank Explains Anti-Ted Cruz Tweet
A spokesman for the San Francisco Federal Reserve has emailed me to explain the anti-Ted Cruz tweet (This is What the "Politically Neutral" Fed Tweeted Out Last Night After Ted Cruz Won in Iowa.) :
Hey Robert, here’s you go:
It was an accidental post on the part of Bank employee, not an official statement by the Bank. Once the employee realized the mistake they immediately deleted their post and reported it to the Bank. We have taken steps to ensure this won't happen again.
-RW
Thank You Janet Yellen: Hotel Space Still Available in SF for Super Bowl; Weekend Suite for $1 Million
Fairmont suite available for $1M during #SB50 weekend. https://t.co/ho5MuCjxbY PHOTOS: https://t.co/o7eHHd4ecz pic.twitter.com/1i29so5xbe— ABC7 News (@abc7newsBayArea) February 2, 2016
According to ABC 7, normally, the suite goes for for $18,000 a night. This weekend's million dollar price includes 22 Super Bowl tickets in a gold suite at Levi's stadium. You get a luxury ride to the game with private chef and bartender on board. Tickets to V.I.P. parties, and this includes a $150,000 charity donation. Also, four nights in the suite.
This is the hotel Obama generally stays at on his fairly frequent trips to the city.
He usually blocks off an early morning hour-long gym workout when he stays at the hotel, when no one else is allowed to use the gym, but on his last stay, he was an hour late, so he just worked out with others who were at the gym.
-RW
HOT Top US Banksters Holding Secret Summits
Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, and Warren Buffett have convened sessions with the heads of BlackRock, Fidelity, Vanguard and Capital Groups, FT is reporting.
The group is discussing a statement of best practice on corporate governance. Discussions have focused on issues such as the role of board directors, executive compensation, board tenure and shareholder rights, all of which have been flashpoints at U.S. annual meetings.
The focus of the group in the big picture of things in the financial sector appears fairly innocuous, but when guys like this get together, when you have a crony activist government, it is always dangerous.
-RW
This is What the "Politically Neutral" Fed Tweeted Out Last Night After Ted Cruz Won in Iowa...
...It has been since taken down.
Cruz, of course, has anti-Fed leanings.
(ht Koz Finance)
UPDATE
San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank Explains Anti-Ted Cruz Tweet
Cruz, of course, has anti-Fed leanings.
(ht Koz Finance)
UPDATE
San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank Explains Anti-Ted Cruz Tweet
Monday, February 1, 2016
Aggressive Entrepreneurship: College Student in Boston is in Trouble After Trying to Airbnb His Dorm
A Boston-area college student has gotten into hot water with his school for trying to rent out his dorm room on the online home-sharing service Airbnb.
The student listed his dorm room at Emerson College in downtown Boston on the site last month, according to a petition on the website Change.Org titled "Free Jack Worth," which is asking the school to drop disciplinary proceedings against him.
"There is nothing criminal with providing cheap housing to travelers," said a supporter and fellow student, Ari Howorth, on the petition.
Worth had already faced $150 in fines and could be dismissed from the school as a result of pending misconduct charges.
-RW
The student listed his dorm room at Emerson College in downtown Boston on the site last month, according to a petition on the website Change.Org titled "Free Jack Worth," which is asking the school to drop disciplinary proceedings against him.
"There is nothing criminal with providing cheap housing to travelers," said a supporter and fellow student, Ari Howorth, on the petition.
Worth had already faced $150 in fines and could be dismissed from the school as a result of pending misconduct charges.
-RW
Walter Block on the Minimum Wage and Price Inflation
Prof. Walter Block replies to two inquiries in economics:
Q.If the minimum wage goes up, fewer people will be hired.I have understood that for a while...
And the left seem to call for a really high minimum wage but it seems to me that if say minimum wage was £15:
1 essential items would stay the same price
2 some non essential items might become too expensive for people on welfare
3 the £15 might then become the new bread line and the left might push for £20 an hour
Do you see these points as logical? Am I getting it? Thanks for reading
WB: People ignorant of economics think that the minimum wage is like a floor; raise it, and everyone gets paid more. If so, why not raise it to $1 million per hour, and we could cure poverty with one stroke of the legislative pen. No, the minimum wage is not like a floor. It is akin to a high jump bar, or a hurdle: it creates unemployment for all those unable to jump over it. If it is set at, say, $10 per hour, then all those with productivity below that level will tend to be unemployed. If
raised to $15, then all those whose productivity is between $10 and $15 will also lose their jobs. The only just and economical policy is to repeal this vicious law that attacks the unskilled.
If it is so bad, why do we have this law? Who benefits from it? Mainly unions. Organized labor is always in competition with the unskilled. There is no better way to eliminate this competition than by pricing the unskilled out of a job: the minimum wage law. There are dozens of excellent essays on this subject. Go to Mises.org, and search for “minimum wage.
Q. I watched your debate on the minimum wage law with the Law Professor Bill Quigley. At first I considered it would be a better debate if he were also an economist. I watched anyway and it became one of those situations where I was often stunned by his approach. It was an economic question and to argue it with morals and ethics and not economics just seemed to... Well I suppose it demonstrates the academic view of the simplistic left wing do gooder approach that we see in everyday life and from ill informed politicians that throw out slogans like "we must look after the most desperate in our society." Maybe this should be called "the undeniable positive" where a proponent of a political agenda uses it to try and outflank an opponent. If on a political panel show for example if one politician uses an undeniable positive their opponent is automatically bad if they don't agree! It's then hard to explain logic (that people are often inept at understanding anyway) after such a political tactic. Not that the politicians I see on tv mostly would really know much about the logic of economics anyway... They just seem to throw out buzz words / slogans.
I realized from a question you took at the end of that debate that inflation is caused by central banks. I knew this of course but I forgot the central logic. But I guess you are saying the ultimate rule of the central bank controlling inflation supersedes the market? And minimum wage law causes more unemployment than there otherwise would have been... This is always the rule and inflation is another matter mostly.
Funny how ages ago in my taxi I worked out that minimum wage increases would cause less people to hire... Just thinking about it in my head... Now with some refinement from your online talks I can articulate that much better.
WB:Thanks for your kind comments. I was delighted to debate Loyola law professor Bill Quigley on the minimum wage law. His views are emblematic of what most people think. I couldn’t get a Loyola economist to debate me on this issue since all five of us (Bill Barnett, Stuart Wood, John Levendis and Leo Krasnozhon) are staunch free enterprisers and would fully agree with me that the minimum wage is a horrid law, one that unemploys the unskilled. As for inflation, roughly speaking, it is a matter of how much money there is in the economy versus the quantity of goods and services. The latter change very slowly compared to the former, under central banking, so inflation is virtually always and ever a monetary phenomenon
Q.If the minimum wage goes up, fewer people will be hired.I have understood that for a while...
And the left seem to call for a really high minimum wage but it seems to me that if say minimum wage was £15:
1 essential items would stay the same price
2 some non essential items might become too expensive for people on welfare
3 the £15 might then become the new bread line and the left might push for £20 an hour
Do you see these points as logical? Am I getting it? Thanks for reading
WB: People ignorant of economics think that the minimum wage is like a floor; raise it, and everyone gets paid more. If so, why not raise it to $1 million per hour, and we could cure poverty with one stroke of the legislative pen. No, the minimum wage is not like a floor. It is akin to a high jump bar, or a hurdle: it creates unemployment for all those unable to jump over it. If it is set at, say, $10 per hour, then all those with productivity below that level will tend to be unemployed. If
raised to $15, then all those whose productivity is between $10 and $15 will also lose their jobs. The only just and economical policy is to repeal this vicious law that attacks the unskilled.
If it is so bad, why do we have this law? Who benefits from it? Mainly unions. Organized labor is always in competition with the unskilled. There is no better way to eliminate this competition than by pricing the unskilled out of a job: the minimum wage law. There are dozens of excellent essays on this subject. Go to Mises.org, and search for “minimum wage.
Q. I watched your debate on the minimum wage law with the Law Professor Bill Quigley. At first I considered it would be a better debate if he were also an economist. I watched anyway and it became one of those situations where I was often stunned by his approach. It was an economic question and to argue it with morals and ethics and not economics just seemed to... Well I suppose it demonstrates the academic view of the simplistic left wing do gooder approach that we see in everyday life and from ill informed politicians that throw out slogans like "we must look after the most desperate in our society." Maybe this should be called "the undeniable positive" where a proponent of a political agenda uses it to try and outflank an opponent. If on a political panel show for example if one politician uses an undeniable positive their opponent is automatically bad if they don't agree! It's then hard to explain logic (that people are often inept at understanding anyway) after such a political tactic. Not that the politicians I see on tv mostly would really know much about the logic of economics anyway... They just seem to throw out buzz words / slogans.
I realized from a question you took at the end of that debate that inflation is caused by central banks. I knew this of course but I forgot the central logic. But I guess you are saying the ultimate rule of the central bank controlling inflation supersedes the market? And minimum wage law causes more unemployment than there otherwise would have been... This is always the rule and inflation is another matter mostly.
Funny how ages ago in my taxi I worked out that minimum wage increases would cause less people to hire... Just thinking about it in my head... Now with some refinement from your online talks I can articulate that much better.
WB:Thanks for your kind comments. I was delighted to debate Loyola law professor Bill Quigley on the minimum wage law. His views are emblematic of what most people think. I couldn’t get a Loyola economist to debate me on this issue since all five of us (Bill Barnett, Stuart Wood, John Levendis and Leo Krasnozhon) are staunch free enterprisers and would fully agree with me that the minimum wage is a horrid law, one that unemploys the unskilled. As for inflation, roughly speaking, it is a matter of how much money there is in the economy versus the quantity of goods and services. The latter change very slowly compared to the former, under central banking, so inflation is virtually always and ever a monetary phenomenon
Nudging is the New Soft Tyranny
Richard Ebeling emails:
Dear Bob,
I have a new article on the “EpicTimes” news and commentary website on, “Individual Rights Must Be Preserved Without Interference from the Government.”
The fundamental issue facing society is that of the freedom of the individual versus political paternalism. Shall the individual be free to peacefully and honestly live his life as he chooses including interacting with others for mutual betterment, or shall the government presume to control and command in both great ways and small how he lives, acts and associates with others?
While “freedom” is touted on both the “left” and the “right,” in fact both “progressives” and too many political conservatives wish to use the government in various ways to make us live, act and interact with others in ways that they consider better or superior to our own choices and decisions in these matters.
The new term for such government meddling is called “nudging,” moving people in directions the intervening “experts” believe we should be pushed towards. Governments may not brutally command behavior like in the totalitarian states of the recent past. But they manipulate the trade-offs and incentives through fiscal and regulatory policy to “influence” our decisions, thus rigging the outcomes while all the time saying people are “free” to guide their own life.
This is the new “soft” tyranny that continues to threaten not just our freedom but also our failure to realize and appreciate just how controlled and manipulated we really are.
http://www.epictimes.com/richardebeling/2016/01/individual-rights-must-be-preserved-without-interference-from-the-government/
Best,
Richard
Dear Bob,
I have a new article on the “EpicTimes” news and commentary website on, “Individual Rights Must Be Preserved Without Interference from the Government.”
The fundamental issue facing society is that of the freedom of the individual versus political paternalism. Shall the individual be free to peacefully and honestly live his life as he chooses including interacting with others for mutual betterment, or shall the government presume to control and command in both great ways and small how he lives, acts and associates with others?
While “freedom” is touted on both the “left” and the “right,” in fact both “progressives” and too many political conservatives wish to use the government in various ways to make us live, act and interact with others in ways that they consider better or superior to our own choices and decisions in these matters.
The new term for such government meddling is called “nudging,” moving people in directions the intervening “experts” believe we should be pushed towards. Governments may not brutally command behavior like in the totalitarian states of the recent past. But they manipulate the trade-offs and incentives through fiscal and regulatory policy to “influence” our decisions, thus rigging the outcomes while all the time saying people are “free” to guide their own life.
This is the new “soft” tyranny that continues to threaten not just our freedom but also our failure to realize and appreciate just how controlled and manipulated we really are.
http://www.epictimes.com/richardebeling/2016/01/individual-rights-must-be-preserved-without-interference-from-the-government/
Best,
Richard
GALLUP: U.S. Well-Being
The Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index score for the nation and for each state comprises metrics affecting overall well-being and each of the five elements of well-being:
Purpose: liking what you do each day and being motivated to achieve your goals
Social: having supportive relationships and love in your life
Financial: managing your economic life to reduce stress and increase security
Community: liking where you live, feeling safe and having pride in your community
Physical: having good health and enough energy to get things done daily
Purpose: liking what you do each day and being motivated to achieve your goals
Social: having supportive relationships and love in your life
Financial: managing your economic life to reduce stress and increase security
Community: liking where you live, feeling safe and having pride in your community
Physical: having good health and enough energy to get things done daily
U.S. Declines in "Index of Economic Freedom"
The Heritage Foundation has released the 2016 Index of Economic Freedom. This year’s Index shows that the United States, once again, finds itself outside the top 10 free economies of the world -- tying its all-time low score.
The complete top 10 rankings can be seen below along with other key facts relating to the Index:
· The U.S. fell in rank to a second-tier "mostly free" economy in 2010.
· The U.S. has declined in status 8 of the last 10 years.
· The U.S. economy continues to underperform despite a private sector-led energy boom that has made the U.S. the world's largest producer of oil and natural gas.
· The Index scores 178 countries and only 5 earned "free" economic status this year.
· 4 of the world's top 10 economies are located in the Asia-Pacific region.
What's the Matter With San Francisco? (A Lefty Gets It)
By Gabriel Metcalf
I moved to San Francisco for its radical politics. Lots of people did, for generations. Maybe it was like moving to Los Angeles if you longed to be a movie star: If you wanted to be part of the grand project of reconstructing the American Left in the petri dish of a single city, San Francisco beckoned.
The quirky, counter-cultural San Francisco so many of us fell in love with is almost gone now, destroyed by high housing costs. We’ve lost not only the politics, but all kinds of cultural experimentation that just doesn’t thrive in places that are expensive.
We are watching the old San Francisco slip away before our eyes. Every time a housing unit becomes vacant, it goes on the market at a price so high that no organizer, writer, teacher, activist or artist could dream of affording it. Trying things that don’t have monetary potential just isn’t possible anymore.
How did we get here?
There are lots of reasons San Francisco became so progressive in the first place. The city had a radical labor movement going back to the 19th century. It nurtured a literary and artistic bohemia. It was tolerant of kooks and outcasts. Its various racial and ethnic groups figured out how to get along. In the 1970s, the embrace of identity politics grew to incorporate gays and lesbians, and the city reveled in its diversity, with groups claiming distinct neighborhoods as their own in a modern twist on the tradition of ethnic urban enclaves.
At its apex, progressive San Francisco accomplished amazing things. It invented new models of delivering affordable housing and health care. It invested deeply in public space, from parks to bike lanes. It adopted a transit-first policy. It pioneered all kinds of equal rights for the LGBTQ community. It did its best to create a high-tax, high-service public sector that could generate the funds to provide a more generous social safety net, at a time when the national government was moving in the other direction. At times, it felt like San Francisco was working toward a form of social democracy in one city, proving to the rest of the country that a more European-style economic model could thrive within the confines of the United States.
It was also a haven for people from all over the world: Refugees from Central American wars, migrants from Asia and Latin America in search of a better life, gays and lesbians from across the country. A large chunk of the population moved here as adults; San Francisco was a consciously chosen destination.
But progressive San Francisco had a fatal, Shakespearean flaw that would prove to be its undoing: It decided early on to be against new buildings. It decided that new development, with the exception of publicly subsidized affordable housing, was not welcome.
EVIL "Bring On the Cashless Future"
By Robert Wenzel
The evils of ecurrencies are now being exposed with greater frequency.
The latest establishment bankster-friendly operation to sing praises for digital currencies is Bloomberg News. In an editorial, Bloomberg writes:
The capability to track all transactions makes ecurrency advocacy perhaps the most dangerous monster economic proposal being advanced today by statist economists. It is more dangerous than Keynesianism. It is more dangerous than the Fed itself.
The justifiable hate for government produced paper money should not result in a knee jerk embrace of blockchain digital currencies. Blockchain digital currencies have the capability of providing all the evils of a government controlled paper currency with the added evil of government trackability.
The love affair with blockchain digital currencies by some free market advocates must stop now. It is a trap. It is the road to government control of life on an unprecedented scale.
Robert Wenzel is Editor & Publisher at EconomicPolicyJournal.com and at Target Liberty. He is also author of The Fed Flunks: My Speech at the New York Federal Reserve Bank. Follow him on twitter:@wenzeleconomics
The evils of ecurrencies are now being exposed with greater frequency.
The latest establishment bankster-friendly operation to sing praises for digital currencies is Bloomberg News. In an editorial, Bloomberg writes:
Cash had a pretty good run for 4,000 years or so. These days, though, notes and coins increasingly seem declasse: They're dirty and dangerous, unwieldy and expensive, antiquated and so very analog.Bloomberg understands how traceable ecurrencies are and so brings out the phony protection against government tracking: court order "protection."
Sensing this dissatisfaction, entrepreneurs have introduced hundreds of digital currencies in the past few years, of which bitcoin is only the most famous. Now governments want in: The People's Bank of China says it intends to issue a digital currency of its own. Central banks in Ecuador, the Philippines, the U.K. and Canada are mulling similar ideas. At least one company has sprung up to help them along.
Much depends on the details, of course. But this is a welcome trend. In theory, digital legal tender could combine the inventiveness of private virtual currencies with the stability of a government mint....
For governments and their taxpayers, potential advantages abound. Issuing digital currency would be cheaper than printing bills and minting coins. It could improve statistical indicators, such as inflation and gross domestic product. Traceable transactions could help inhibit terrorist financing, money laundering, fraud, tax evasion and corruption.
[Y]ou don't have to be paranoid to worry about Big Brother tracking your financial life.
Governments must be alert to these problems -- because the key to getting people to adopt such a system is trust. A rule that a person's transaction history could be accessed only with a court order, for instance, might alleviate privacy concerns.
The capability to track all transactions makes ecurrency advocacy perhaps the most dangerous monster economic proposal being advanced today by statist economists. It is more dangerous than Keynesianism. It is more dangerous than the Fed itself.
The justifiable hate for government produced paper money should not result in a knee jerk embrace of blockchain digital currencies. Blockchain digital currencies have the capability of providing all the evils of a government controlled paper currency with the added evil of government trackability.
The love affair with blockchain digital currencies by some free market advocates must stop now. It is a trap. It is the road to government control of life on an unprecedented scale.
Robert Wenzel is Editor & Publisher at EconomicPolicyJournal.com and at Target Liberty. He is also author of The Fed Flunks: My Speech at the New York Federal Reserve Bank. Follow him on twitter:@wenzeleconomics
Should Gold Be Linked with the Blockchain?
Thorsten Polleit has written a fascinating essay, How the Blockchain and Gold Can Work Together.
In it he discusses “colored bitcoin” by which he means a situation where "You would buy, say, physical gold at a gold shop. The latter then issues a colored bitcoin, which represents the ownership of physical gold. The colored bitcoin is, economically speaking, a gold substitute (a money substitute, fully backed by physical gold). It can be used for making purchases and, upon the wish of its owner, it can be redeemed into physical gold at the gold shop at any time."
But what he does not do is discuss the elephant in the blockchain, that is, the fact that all transactions will be visible as part of the blockchain, which makes such transactions highly traceable.
There is an old Swiss proverb, "Gold has no smell." It can mean a couple of things, but one meaning is that gold can not be traced. It is one of the great beauties of gold, silver and a characteristic that even paper money has (Though paper money has other defects that gold and silver don't).
Linking gold with a blockchain creates an odor that can not be washed away.
The Australian Financial Review recently explained why governments and banksters are taking a liking to the blockchain:
Mixing gold and the blockcahin is a very bad idea.
-RW
In it he discusses “colored bitcoin” by which he means a situation where "You would buy, say, physical gold at a gold shop. The latter then issues a colored bitcoin, which represents the ownership of physical gold. The colored bitcoin is, economically speaking, a gold substitute (a money substitute, fully backed by physical gold). It can be used for making purchases and, upon the wish of its owner, it can be redeemed into physical gold at the gold shop at any time."
But what he does not do is discuss the elephant in the blockchain, that is, the fact that all transactions will be visible as part of the blockchain, which makes such transactions highly traceable.
There is an old Swiss proverb, "Gold has no smell." It can mean a couple of things, but one meaning is that gold can not be traced. It is one of the great beauties of gold, silver and a characteristic that even paper money has (Though paper money has other defects that gold and silver don't).
Linking gold with a blockchain creates an odor that can not be washed away.
The Australian Financial Review recently explained why governments and banksters are taking a liking to the blockchain:
This technology is offering regulators a bird's-eye view into activity in certain markets that they never had before. As such, distributed-ledger technology is actually an enhancement to transparency, rather than a mechanism for bypassing it.When the next FDR comes along who decides to confiscate gold, do you want to be holding physical gold or a "colored bitcoin" that is on a distributed-ledger that the next FDR can easily see?
Mixing gold and the blockcahin is a very bad idea.
-RW
Private Security on the High Seas
The Economist reports. My bold:
The Seaman Guard Ohio was a “floating armoury”, a ship that loiters semi-permanently in international waters, acting as a hotel and base for private security guards hired to protect ships from Somali pirates. They are typically stationed in waters off Sudan, Sri Lanka or the United Arab Emirates, waiting for their customers—merchant ships in need of protection—to pass by.
Guards hop aboard a client’s ship with their guns, then ride it through the piracy “high risk area” (HRA). Since armed guards first started protecting ships against Somali pirates about a decade ago, no ship with them aboard has been successfully hijacked. Now about 40% of ships rounding the Horn of Africa carry armed guards, according to IHS Jane’s, a research company.
Once the ship has passed back into safe waters the guards disembark to another armoury. Then they fly home or jump aboard the next ship going the other way. This arrangement keeps guns out at sea, avoiding bothersome and inconsistent national laws.
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