Tag Archives: Taxes/regulation

The D Word Yes, depression, and not the psychological type, although the economic type leads to the psychological type, whether ot not it is the other  way around (see Keynes’ “animal spirits). I often make fun of Robert J. Samuelson in the Washington Post, but in Washington Post today he raised the possibility that we are going into a depression, not just a bad recession.  On TV this evening I heard Austen Goolsby throw it out as well.  I suspect we...

The Mankiw CV Plan Greg Mankiw has posted a suggestion for delivering money to people that targets the benefit to those who need it the most.  The idea is clever: 1. Pay people the benefit B.  (This could be spread over many weeks or months.)  Everyone gets the same B. 2. Next year at tax time, compute the ratio r Y(2020)/Y(2019), the ratio of each filer’s 2020 income, net of B, to their 2019 income and capped at 1.  Impose a surcharge of rB on tax...

Coronavirus dashboard for March 26: southern “red” States resist effective measures Here is the update through yesterday (March 25) In order to succeed in containing the pandemic, I believe that the US needs at least 2 weeks of China (nearly complete lockdown) followed by at least a month of South Korea (very aggressive and widespread testing). At minimum, that means at least 50% of the US population under lockdown and a ratio of 15:1 in tests to...

Congress and the Fed Could Ensure Universal Protection During the Pandemic No matter how well or poorly the federal government addresses the overall economic crisis, millions of vulnerable people will be left unprotected.  Homeless people, incarcerated people, immigrants, people in fringe, off-the-books employment like day labor—unless steps are taken that specifically target them, they are staring into the abyss. This is fundamentally a local problem. ...

AFL-CIO has a Plan From the AFL-CIO website: PRIORITIES OF THE LABOR MOVEMENT TO ADDRESS THE CORONAVIRUS: PROTECT FRONT-LINE WORKERS Streamline approaches for allocating and distributing personal protective equipment to working people in greatest need. Issue a workplace safety standard to protect front-line workers and other at-risk workers from infectious diseases. Provide workplace controls, protocols, training and personal protective equipment....

For a Universal Debt and Rental Moratorium Incomes are collapsing throughout the economy, and both businesses and individuals face a crisis in meeting fixed payments they can’t control.  The most direct step we can take is to temporarily suspend these payment obligations. Suppose the government were to announce that, starting immediately, all stipulated debt and real estate rental payments were to be suspended for all borrowers and renters.  This...

Coronavirus dashboard for March 22 This is a new daily or nearly daily update I hope to post, including the most important metrics to show how controlled – or out of control – the cononavirus pandemic is. Hopefully the numbers will move ever closer to the tipping point where the epidemic is under control.In order to bring this pandemic under control, and prevent both health and economic catastrophes, in my opinion the US needs 2 weeks of China (total...

Patient privacy prevents precise calculation of the fraction of Covid 19 patients in the USA being treated with Hydroxychloroquine or Chloroquine. However, Hospitals are purchasing hugely increased amounts Christopher Rowland reports. Data gathered in the first 17 days of March by Premier Inc., a large group purchasing organization for 4,000 U.S. hospitals, showed a 300 percent week-over-week increase in orders of chloroquine and a 70 percent...

Some Ideas for Pandeminomics The starting point for all of what follows is that government, if it has the will to act, is currently in the driver’s seat.  Much of the private sector is facing a terrifying confluence of crunches: supply breakdowns, demand falling off a cliff for many goods and services, and a looming shortfall of liquidity to service debt.  A wide swath of business is on the ropes and needs a rescue from government.  This puts the power...

The Coronavirus Recession has begun This morning we got two reports that confirm the beginning of the Coronavirus Recession: initial jobless claims and the Philadelphia Fed manufacturing index. Initial claims rose to 281,000 one week ago. They are now 15% higher than their low last April, as well as almost 15% higher preliminarily on a monthly basis than last March, and the 4 week moving average is just shy of 5% higher than one year ago.  This meets two...