Some Certainty About Uncertainty
A recent story by McClatchy Newspapers reported on how the fundamental economic problems facing American small businesses is not “uncertainty” about governmental policies and taxes, but rather other factors like poor sales.
McClatchy reached out to owners of small businesses, many of them mom-and-pop operations, to find out whether they indeed were being choked by regulation, whether uncertainty over taxes affected their hiring plans and whether the health care overhaul was helping or hurting their business.
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Their response was surprising.
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None of the business owners complained about regulation in their particular industries, and most seemed to welcome it. Some pointed to the lack of regulation in mortgage lending as a principal cause of the financial crisis that brought about the Great Recession of 2007-09 and its grim aftermath.
Around The Dial – September 7, 2011
Economic policy reports, blog postings, and media stories of interest:
- The Charlotte Observer reports on falling interest in home ownership.
- Robert Reich describes “the limping middle class.”
- Paul Krugman notes “the fatal distraction” of policymakers.
- Naked Capitalism offers a case study of “the decline of manufacturing.”
- The News & Observer traces the decline in workplace safety enforcement.
The Controversial “Georgia Works” Program
Last week, Morning Edition, a program of National Public Radio, reported on “Georgia Works,” a controversial program for unemployed workers developed by the State of Georgia. The story explains how the program works and how its results appear mixed at best.
Riding The Wayback Machine
Paul Krugman reminisces about the economic and social policy debates of the 1980s.
If you’re an intellectual of a certain age, you remember that in the 80s and maybe a bit of a way into the 90s it was common on the right to see American society as being in a process of catastrophic moral decline, descending into social anarchy. Crime would continue to rise, chaos would continue to spread, until and unless we returned to the Victorian virtues — and more specifically, to Dickensian social policies, in which only the deserving poor — as so designated by faith-based charities — received help. That, by the way, was the meaning of “compassionate conservatism”, which was about dismantling the welfare state in favor of private charity.
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But then, in the 90s, a funny thing happened: in many ways, American society began healing. True, out-of-wedlock births continued to rise, although at a much slower pace. But crime plunged, and in general our society began to look a lot more functional. If you remember what New York was like in the Bonfire of the Vanities days, and you walk the city now, the transformation is awesome — and somehow that happened despite Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid.
Around The Dial – September 6, 2011
Economic policy reports, blog postings, and media stories of interest:
- Simon Johnson poses three questions to the financial stability oversight council.
- Jared Bernstein argues that deregulation isn’t a jobs program.
- Martin Wolf explains why Britain “must escape its longest depression.”
- Nassim Taleb and Mark Spitznagel describe “the great bank robbery.”
- The News & Record reports on rising food stamp caseloads.
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