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Trade War Looms as China Objects to European Union Carbon Fees
Tweet Share on Facebook March 28, 2012 Comment (7)Robert Hahn is director of economics at Oxford's Smith School, chief economist at the Legatum Institute, and a senior fellow at the Georgetown Center for Business and Public Policy. Peter Passell is a senior fellow at the Milken Institute in Santa Monica and the editor of its quarterly economic policy journal, The Milken Institute Review. They co-founded Regulation2point0.org, a web portal on economic regulation.
China’s opposition to European Union rules that will require commercial jets flying European routes to pay carbon emission fees is (in the diplomatic language reserved for such matters) unfortunate. Expressing its opposition by threatening to boycott Airbus, the giant European aircraft manufacturer, is much worse—an early sign of the almost inevitable spillover from climate policy discord to international trade battles that will pit the European Union against its fastest growing customers.
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Healthcare Law Highlights Problems With Regulatory Process
Tweet Share on Facebook March 27, 2012 Comment (1)Jerry Ellig is a senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. Ellig is a cocreator of the Mercatus Center Regulatory Report Card.
While the Supreme Court weighs the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act, Congress is holding hearings on the federal regulatory process. The two topics are more closely related than you might think. The healthcare law required many regulations, and thus far, the major regulations issued to implement the Affordable Care Act serve as ugly poster children for the regulatory reform movement.
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JOBS Act Falls Short on IPO Markets
Tweet Share on Facebook March 26, 2012 Comment (2)Joseph Mason is the Moyse/LBA Chair of Banking at the Ourso School of Business at Louisiana State University and a senior fellow at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
The JOBS Act appears to be a long-overdue Sarbanes–Oxley reform aimed at middle-sized businesses. It needs to be much, much more.
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Retirees the Victims of Federal Reserve’s War on Saving
Tweet Share on Facebook March 26, 2012 Comment (14)James Rickards is a hedge fund manager in New York City and the author of Currency Wars: The Making of the Next Global Crisis from Portfolio/Penguin. Follow him on Twitter: @JamesGRickards.
This week the Economic Policy Subcommittee of the Senate Banking Committee will hold a hearing on the shortfall in retirement savings in America. This shortfall has many causes including inadequate savings, financial mismanagement, unrealistically high projected returns by pension plans, and public policy that is hostile to investment.
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Bank of America Shows Fannie Mae How to Deal With Housing Crisis
Tweet Share on Facebook March 23, 2012 Comment (1)Eileen Appelbaum is a senior economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research.
The decline in house prices as the bubble popped and the air went out of the housing market has devastated families forced out of foreclosed homes and communities with boarded up and deteriorating properties. An obvious solution, with support from both right and left and proposed in legislation introduced by Rep. Raul Grijalva, is to let home owners give up the deed to their homes but continue to live there as renters. With market rents far below the monthly payment on bubble-inflated mortgages, this solution could work for millions of cash-strapped families.
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Immigration Reform Is Key to Job Creation
Tweet Share on Facebook March 23, 2012 Comment (15)David Park is the cofounder and chairman of Jobs Creators Alliance.
As America continues to look for more jobs Washington can't seem to come up with an answer. We've heard solutions from policy wonks, politicians, and academics, but rarely from people who have first-hand experience actually creating jobs. The voice of the small business owner is faintly being heard, but I'm not so sure our friends on Capitol Hill are listening. There is continual talk about destructive regulations and burdensome red tape, but very little discussion over specific policies and regulations that are so burdensome and in need of reform. Well, here's one from a job creator: immigration.
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How Legacy Airlines Can Be Competitive Again
Tweet Share on Facebook March 23, 2012 CommentThomas C. Lawton is a visiting professor at Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business.
The lethal cocktail of economic recession, high oil prices, currency instability, and a drop in demand for expensive seats has hit the international air transport industry hard. Budget carriers aside, airline companies traditionally make most of their money from business and first class passengers, and commercial cargo. Air freight volumes have declined and premium seat occupancy has slumped as the air transport industry has been rocked by corporate cutbacks and a decline in consumer spending. Once dominant companies such as American Airlines have been forced to seek the relative protection of chapter 11 bankruptcy to restructure their costs and debt. This has prompted many to question how certain airlines will survive.
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The Coming Age of the Entrepreneur
Tweet Share on Facebook March 22, 2012 CommentRobert Hahn is director of economics at Oxford's Smith School, chief economist at the Legatum Institute, and a senior fellow at the Georgetown Center for Business and Public Policy. Peter Passell is a senior fellow at the Milken Institute in Santa Monica and the editor of its quarterly economic policy journal, The Milken Institute Review. They co-founded Regulation2point0.org, a web portal on economic regulation.
Is this (in the immortal words of James Rado and Gerome Ragni) the dawning of the Age of Aquarius? No, seriously: Are we 21st century humans about to experience an era of unprecedented growth and increase in well-being?
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Greg Smith, Goldman Sachs, and the Death of Professionalism
Tweet Share on Facebook March 22, 2012 Comment (5)David Brodwin is a cofounder and board member of American Sustainable Business Council.
Last week, when Goldman Sachs's executive director Greg Smith resigned, he blasted his former employer's culture as "toxic and destructive." Goldman "rips off" its clients, Smith declared, allowing "morally bankrupt" people to put the firm's trading profits ahead of their clients' needs. Unless you've been living in a cave since 2008, you have to wonder if Mr. Smith isn't the last one to figure this out.
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Paul Ryan Budget Won't Solve Deficit Crisis
Tweet Share on Facebook March 22, 2012 Comment (8)Chad Stone is chief economist at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
The House will soon pass the budget blueprint of Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan's The Path to Prosperity. Budget hawks like Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, give the Ryan budget their customary salute for its aspirations to cut federal deficits and reduce federal debt (as a share of the economy). But even they recognize that it does not really advance the ball in addressing the nation's fiscal challenges.
