Posts Tagged ‘Paul Krugman’
Thanks to Wikicommons.
It seems we humans are doomed.
Movies and TV would have you believe that robots will destroy us in a reign of destruction.
We’ve already seen this recently in the computer Watson’s victory on Jeopardy against human champions.Computer brains are better than our brains.
Computers and robots are also regarded as the enemy of the blue collar worker. Why have humans build cars when robots do it faster? Right?
Well, Paul Krugman notes that computers threaten more jobs as
any routine task — a category that includes many white-collar, non-manual jobs — is in the firing line.
What makes this news so bad as Krugman notes is that
It’s no longer true that having a college degree guarantees that you’ll get a good job, and it’s becoming less true with each passing decade.
Over at Free Exchange, R.A., questions the gloom and doom noting that
As far as I know, people currently represent 100% of final demand; machines aren’t yet out there purchasing goods for their own consumption. Without people there is no economy
Of course, being a good dismal scientist, the post goes on to note that unemployment is still an issue but it may be the governments, rather than the robots, fault.
So the good news, robots may not be the enemy (until they start to eat us). The bad news, unemployment is still a real issue no matter its cause.
Thanks to Wikicommons.
Time to Break out the Champagne Club soda!!
A health care bill is close to making its way out of the Senate (despite the Republicans best efforts to stop it).
President Obama expressed his happiness calling the possible law
a big victory for the American people.
Republicans (of course) are unhappy about this bill.
Should we, the American People, be celebrating this current policy?
Nobel Laureate Paul Krugman thinks that this health care reform will provide long term cost reductions despite the laws initial costs. Check out his nifty graph below:
Thanks to Paul Krugman
Not everyone agrees.
Our free market friends at Reason Magazine note, in the video below, that this health care bill may cost more and do more than anyone anticipated.
Of course it’s not just the Government’s expenses that people are debating. …read more.
Thanks to the AP and Philly.com
We at US Democrazy partied hard this weekend. No, we weren’t indulging in festive Halloween high-jinx! We learned THE RECESSION IS OVER! Yeah BABY!
Just check out these headlines:
- Ford Posts an Unexpected Profit of $997 Million (New York Times)
- 3 strong economic reports lift recovery hopes (The Associated Press)
- Manufacturing boosts global recovery (The Financial Times)
Everything is looking great, right? Time to Party!
But, then today… we woke up with a pounding headache. It wasn’t a hangover, it was some gloomy economists who ruined our party mood.
Thanks to Wikicommons and GIMP.
Ever since H1N1, we at USDemocrazy have been feeling a little sick. Don’t worry it’s not the flu, rather the doctor’s bill that came in after our check-up. (We didn’t think so many zeros could fit in one line…)
Luckily, Dr. Obama has a cure for what ails us. The President, working with hospitals, drug companies and doctors, has come up with a plan to save TWO TRILLION DOLLARS over the next decade on health care costs.
But right now, the details are as skimpy as a hospital robe.
Don’t worry… that robe reveals enough information to raise eyebrows.
Those opposed are gearing up for an all-out political brawl. They are particularly riled by the high initial costs to implement the plan. (Apparently you’ve got to spend money to save it.)
But it’s not that all of Obama’s critics are up in arms. Paul Krugman (a Nobel Prize winner in Economics) is both optimistic and skeptical. He points out,
Remember that what the rest of us call health care costs, they call income.
By “they,” he means the health care industry.
Matthew Yglesias, is a little more hopeful…
Whatever kind of backstabbing these industry groups may or may not do in the future, they won’t be able to take back the fact that once upon a time they stood beside the White House in agreeing that it’s possible to achieve massive cost-savings without compromising patient care.
But don’t take their words on it. For great coverage of the blogosphere’s take, check out Andrew Sullivan’s overview, here and here.
So should we be excited about this proposal? Or are there better ideas? (Don’t look at us, our thoughts are as skimpy as a hospital robe too…)
When we at USDemocrazy heard about a upsurge in teaparties around the nation, we were delighted!
We love tea! Lipton tea, green tea… oh, hold on. Not that kind of tea party you say? Oh dear…
Well, apparently these tea parties are protest parties. Angry citizens lined up on good ol’ tax day, coast to coast, to convey their dismay over the Obama administration’s stimulus plan. The NYT tells us here, that…
On a day when the government deadline for filing income tax returns offered some Americans a timely excuse to vent their frustrations over the sagging economy and ride a metaphor two centuries in the making, 773 Tax Day tea parties were scheduled in cities from Boston to Washington, East Hampton, N.Y., to Yakima, Wash., to protest government spending — namely the Obama administration’s $787 billion stimulus package and $3 trillion budget.
Uh, huh. So… a bunch of people dressing up in 18th century garb talking about the politics of today. Sounds kind of curious. So what are the pundits making of the Tax Day Protests?
Glenn Harlan Reynolds at the WSJ says here that the impact is somewhat unique, as it involves “ordinary folks.”
So who’s behind the Tax Day tea parties? Ordinary folks who are using the power of the Internet to organize. For a number of years, techno-geeks have been organizing “flash crowds” — groups of people, coordinated by text or cellphone, who converge on a particular location and then do something silly, like the pillow fights that popped up in 50 cities earlier this month.
Speaking of pillow fights… Paul Krugman at the NYT takes a bash at the Republican Party, saying here that…
Republicans have become embarrassing to watch. And it doesn’t feel right to make fun of crazy people. Better, perhaps, to focus on the real policy debates, which are all among Democrats.
Even though the protests are pretty wide spread, The Caucus politics blog at the NYT says that Obama has nothing to fear from the tee’d-off Tea Bag demonstrations. In fact, the Caucus says Tea Parties? Obama Passes the Sugar.
This is all pretty crazy stuff. We here at USDemocrazy want to know what YOU think about all this. In the mean time, we’ve put the kettle on for some Earl Gray…
After feverishly analyzing a mountain of brain-numbing economic bad news, the crack “Recession Rangers” here at USDemocrazy have come to a startling conclusion: There is a mountain of brain-numbing economic bad news out there.
Thank goodness for us, there are smart guys like Treasury secretary Tim Geithner out there doing something about that mountain.
Yesterday, he unveiled chapter 2,1654, 765a of the Obama economic rescue plan and it looks… well… kind of good! (So we are told.)
The plan has something to do with buying “toxic assets” using both private and public funds… The brainy folks at the Wall Street Journal explain how to kick these assets here.
So will Treasury Tim’s plan work?
The Daily Beast has put together a neat little page here where some very smart guys debate this point. (One pundit, Paul Krugman should not be allowed in any room that contains both Mr. Geithner and any sharp objects or staplers).
Apparently Geithner has more rescue tricks up his sleeve. He has also asked Congress for new powers. (We immediately thought of laser vision and the ability to apparate…). Rather boringly, he is only asking for new powers to regulate “non-bank financial institutions.” According to this Washington Post article, those new powers are actually quite important. The guys at Politico also weigh in on the same subject here.
So Mr. Geithner attacking the mountain of bad news with gusto. As The Economist points out (here), Mr. Geithner is using his marbles to play for all the marbles!
