Over the weekend I stumbled on this great video that explains what’s actually happening in the economy. Then the Treasury Secretary announces his revised plan, which sounds conceptually like the initial TARP money plan. And like Brad DeLong, I happen to feel that this is the best way forward.
The official jobless rate is 8.1%, which sounds bad. Until you realize that it doesn’t include folks who’ve stopped looking or those who have only found part-time work but want full-time work. Then it’s 14.8%, which gives you an idea of how ugly things are really getting.
Seriously, how low can you go? Collecting money that might not even be legally owed from the next of kin of someone deceased? Even in death we can’t escape our debts anymore. Or at least our families can’t.
Ok, I’ll bite. What’s wrong with some of the earmarks in the spending bill?
For instance, there is $950,000 for the College Ave redesign in New Brunswick. Why is that an issue? Isn’t it the government’s job to spend money on certain public initiatives?
How would you have the government divy up the money that is spent? Instead of politicians, would you have an unelected set of technocrats make the spending decisions deep in government agencies? What should the policy be?
I was sick last week, hence the lack of blogging. I’ll be trying to post a few tidbits here and there this week as I have time.
One item I found fascinating in the wake of the Pentagon’s review of the ban on media access for repatriated soldiers – Britain has a more open, public method you can read about here.