"The forces of the market are just that: They are forces; they are like the wind and the tides; they are things that if you want to try to ignore them, you ignore them at your peril, and ... if you find a way of ordering your life that is compatible with these forces, indeed which harnesses these forces to the benefit of your society, that's the way to go." -- Arnold Harberger, University of Chicago Economist
"Shakespeare, Mr. “I can raise no money by vile means” [“Julius Caesar”], was in fact a tax dodger, a grain hoarder and a determined debt collector [“Neither a borrower nor a lender be” -- “Hamlet”].
"Nowadays, we’d call him a profiteer and a scofflaw. In Tudor England, where he was investigated for his laconic tax observances and once prosecuted for his hoarding practices, it’s a surprise that he didn’t end up swinging from a gibbet “for daws to peck at” [“Othello”]. No wonder he vigorously wrote, in “Henry VI part 2,” “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.”
"Researchers turned up archival evidence that for a decade and a half – including some very hungry years for England -- Shakespeare “purchased and stored grain, malt and barley for resale at inflated prices to his neighbors and local tradesmen.” When they couldn’t or wouldn’t pay, Shakespeare went after them full-throatedly, and the profits he did make he used “to further his own money-lending activities.”
"Not all of this is new, but Jayne Archer, one of the researchers, suspects that the fact that so little of this information has made its way into Shakespeare’s public profile may be laid to “willful ignorance on behalf of critics and scholars who … cannot countenance the idea of a creative genius also being motivated by self-interest.”
"There’s evidence that the memorial raised up to him in his hometown not long after his death originally showed him with an image with which his neighbors associated him: a bag of grain, not the writerly accouterments of quill and parchment added later. Four hundred years later, the tourists still make pilgrimages to Stratford because, face it, who’s going to go home with souvenir paperweights and china thimbles commemorating the Tudor equivalent of a commodities trader?
"Central Florida News 13 reports that the ambulance was purchased after emergency responders had to transport at least two dozen patients who weighed more than 500 pounds last year.
“With some of these morbidly obese patients, we have to send more firefighters just to lift and to move the patient. So once they’re in and we get them to the hospital, someone has to be at the hospital to unload them,” one Orange County fire official told News 13. “That’s pulling a lot of resources from emergency calls just to do that.”
"Orange County paid $23,000 alone for the lift gate and stretcher and the stretcher is 10 inches wider than the average one.
“In the past you’d have to get five, six, seven firefighters to physically lift the patient in. It increases the chance that something could happen to the patient,” a fire official told News 13. “It also greatly increases the chance that something could happen with back injuries within fire services.”
"British mattress manufacturer Savoir Beds this week is launching a limited edition "Royal Bed" with a $175,000 price tag at Kensington Palace in London. Savoir describes its mattress as "an investment" in your well being – presumably since "buying" a $175,000 mattress would just seem ridiculous.
"Ultimately, a "great night's sleep" is what it's all about, said Savoir Beds' managing director Alistair Hughes. "It's an investment that pays off every morning of your life."
"Each mattress will require more than 700 hours of labor. It will contain "masses and masses" of curled Latin American horse tail, "mountains" of pure Mongolian cashmere, and enough specially woven silk to be strung from New York to Miami and almost halfway back again (more than 1,600 miles worth).
"Only 60 of the beds will be made."
"The mattress is fully customizable in size and support – each side of the bed can be made with a different firmness to make both you and your significant other as comfortable as possible.
"Of course it's a massive amount of money and it will only appeal to the very lucky and very wealthy," Hughes acknowledged. But "if you're buying Gucci handbags, a suit from Saville Row or a Rolls Royce, you're looking for the best. And you spend a third of your life in bed."
"And consider this: the bed, mattress and box spring are guaranteed to last at least 25 years (although you'll have to replace the topper every 5-7 years for $5,000-$10,000).
If you divide $175,000 by 365 nights for 25 years, it comes out to less than $20 per night.
Sounds completely reasonable.
"My kind of Tory party would make no secret of its belief in individual freedom and individual prosperity, in the maintenance of law and order, in the wide distribution of private property, in rewards for energy, skill and thrift, in diversity of choice, in the preservation of local rights in local communities.
"Size is not all, any more than economic growth is all. Even efficiency is not enough. People come first—their needs, their hopes, their choice, their values and ideals. We have to understand these first—to be seen to be listening with sympathy and concern. It is important to be able to lead, certainly. But you cannot for long lead people where they do not want to go."
"Nike is selling LeBron James' newest sneaker for over $300. According the Wall Street Journal, LeBron's next shoe, the "LeBron X" will cost around $315. The shoe debuted at the 2012 Olympic gold-medal game between Spain and the United States.
This will be LeBron's 10th shoe release. His first shoe was released in 2003. It was called the Nike Zoom Generation and cost around $110. Nike told the Journal that it is passing along price increases because of the increased cost of materials like cotton.
"Civilization can only advance when individuals are both encouraged and rewarded for excellence. The men and women who designed, built, and succeeded in placing the new SUV-sized rover on Mars receive and deserve our acclaim. The late Steve Jobs is widely admired for creating the world's most valuable company and for being a genius in product innovation and marketing. Thomas Edison was even more innovative a century earlier — the light bulb, the phonograph, the electrical generation and distribution system, etc. — and he also built one of the world's largest companies, General Electric.
The good side of humanity is revealed when we praise and reward such people. The bad side of humanity is shown by those who wish to punish success. According to legend, Ivan the Terrible was so impressed by the stellar achievement of the architect he had commissioned to design St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow that he had him blinded so no other ruler could hire him to produce an equal or greater feat.
The modern day equivalents of Ivan the Terrible are those who pander to the envious and jealous by demanding higher and higher tax rates on the successful. They seek to punish success with the childish demand that they "give back." We pay our successful athletes and musicians a great deal of money because their performances "give" us great pleasure. Sam Walton made tens of billions of dollars because he developed and "gave" us a superior marketing and distribution system that enabled all of us to buy tens of thousands of products at lower prices. Those "evil" real estate developers are the ones who take great risks to build hugely expensive buildings and hire great architects who "give" the rest of us the profile and structures of the cities where we live and work.
We want an economy that produces many well-paying jobs. These are produced by entrepreneurs and businessmen, many of whom have spent considerable time developing their skills, learning from their own mistakes, and often risking their own money. Every job they create is "giving" something to those who are not as equally ambitious, talented, resourceful, hard working or skilled. Why then should the job creators be expected to "give" even more?"
"LITTLE HAVANA (CBS4) – Hundreds of South Floridians lined up in Little Havana overnight for a chance to feed their families this holiday.
As part of the Latin Chamber of Commerce’s annual holiday basket giveaway, representatives from the organization handed out food vouchers on Flagler Street between 14th and 15th Avenues in Little Havana.
Some people began to line up last Friday. Many of those who waited in line for hours were either unemployed or they live on a fixed income and can’t afford any extras.
“It’s very, very hard,” said Mosas Hernandez. “We need something free because right now, I lost my job, I need to pay my rent, so believe me it’s very hard.”
The line wrapped around the block outside the voucher distribution location. Concerned about safety, the City of Miami Police Department was in attendance to keep order and look after the sick and elderly.
**
Those who received a voucher Wednesday will have to return on December 14th and exchange it for bags of food. Each voucher can be redeemed for five bags of groceries worth $120. They are filled with pork, rice, beans, milk, bread and other delicious items which are often used in a traditional Noche Buena dinner.
This is the 26th year the Latin American Chamber of Commerce has given Christmas food away. It began with a holiday gift bag for just ten families. The organization now provides families with food bags, truckloads of food that are donated by several companies.
Perhaps no one symbolized the change in economic fortunes more than Angela Llamas who, with her friends and family, stood in line for more than 24 hours.
The Chamber finished giving away all 3,000 vouchers in two hours. Even so, the line of people continued to snake around the block leading organizers to conclude they could have given away twice as many vouchers this year, because the need is that great.
QUESTIONS:
Let's assume that you believe it's a good idea to help the poor.
1. Using economic analysis to support your ideas, do you think this food basket giveaway is a good way of achieving that objective?
2. Can you think of a plan that might be more effective at helping the poor?
"Bre Lembitz, a 21-year-old sleeping in the park and working as a medic, said she is opposed to the way investors' appetites for high profits and ever-greater returns force corporations to cut back on salaries and benefits for workers.
"You have this super-charged profit motive," said Ms. Lembitz, a student at Clark University in Massachusetts who is majoring in international relations and economics. "You don't have the corporate accountability that you need to have."
QUESTIONS:
Does the desire of investors for high profits force companies to cut back on worker salaries and benefits? Should corporations be more accountable?
"Ideological clashes over particular laws, policies and programs often go far deeper. Those with opposing views of what is desirable for the future also tend to differ equally sharply as to what the reality of the present is. In other words, they envision two very different worlds.
***
"Judging businesses or their owners by how much wealth they give away -- rather than by how much wealth they create -- is putting the cart before the horse. Wealth is ultimately the only thing that can reduce poverty. The most dramatic reductions in poverty, in countries around the world, have come from increasing the amount of wealth, rather than from a redistribution of existing wealth.
"What kind of world do we want -- one in which everyone works to increase wealth to whatever extent they can, or a world in which everyone will be supported by either government handouts or private philanthropy, whether they work or don't work?
"Only in Manhattan, where indoor tennis courts are rarer than personal garages, would anyone sign up a year in advance for an hour of tennis. And only on this space-strapped island would they pay as much as $210 an hour for the privilege.
Tennis players with thick wallets and ample foresight have already begun reserving hours at the new tennis facility that's being built in Grand Central Terminal in a space that used to house a CBS recording studio where "What's My Line?" and Edward R. Murrow's "See It Now" were filmed.
The price—depending on the time of day, between $100 and $210 an hour—will likely be the highest in the city for an indoor court, according to Anthony Scolnick who is leasing it from Metro-North Railroad. He predicts hedge fund executives, real estate professionals and others will be willing to pay that price when the Vanderbilt Tennis Club opens in September.
***
Indoor tennis in space-crunched Manhattan has never been for the middle class.
Aside from a seasonal tennis bubble a Parks Department concessionaire erects under the Queensboro Bridge, there are no public indoor courts on the island and the private ones are pricey. The Millennium UN Plaza Hotel, for example charges $110 to $165 per hour for the court there. The same amount of time costs $115 an hour for non-members at the Manhattan Plaza Racquet Club.
***
The bidding was won by Mr. Scolnick, the owner of Yorkville Tennis Club and Sutton East Tennis, both on the Upper East Side. He is a former athletic director at Hunter College. He will pay a starting rent of $225,000 a year to Metro-North.
Speaking of modern "liberals," Boudreaux writes that they
"overflow with ideas.... But these ideas are almost exclusively about how other people should live their lives. These are ideas about how one group of people (the politically successful) should engineer everyone else’s contracts, social relations, diets, habits, and even moral sentiments.
"Put differently, modern “liberalism’s” ideas are about replacing an unimaginably large multitude of diverse and competing ideas – each one individually chosen, practiced, assessed, and modified in light of what F.A. Hayek called “the particular circumstances of time and place” – with a relatively paltry set of ‘Big Ideas’ that are politically selected, centrally imposed, and enforced not by the natural give, take, and compromise of the everyday interactions of millions of people but, rather, by guns wielded by those whose overriding ‘idea’ is among the most simple-minded and antediluvian notions in history, namely, that those with the power of the sword are anointed to lord it over the rest of us.
"In some markets -- where information is low-cost and individual buyers and sellers are not particularly unique -- parties can quickly find each other and engage in mutually-beneficial exchanges. Any buyer is happy to trade with any seller as long as the price seems reasonable to each.
But in other markets the fit matters more. And, as Diamond’s early work in the 1970s suggested, sometimes fit matters a lot. An extreme example is the “market” for spouses. Because marriage is a lifelong joint endeavor, men and women search extensively for partners with whom their eventual marital union may fully flourish as God intends.
And because searching for just the right person takes time, effort, and perhaps many first dates, plenty of eligible men and women remain single at any given moment. Web sites like match.com and eHarmony are popular with singles because those sites help reduce search costs by improving the amount of information available to singles about potential mates.
Diamond, Mortensen, and Pissarides [the recipients of this year's Nobel Prize for Economics] have studied extensively markets with such search costs. When both buyers and sellers are unique, it requires considerable searching for each to find just the right fit. Even in a well-functioning housing market with plenty of available homes, buyers may struggle to find homes they like. So the buyers keep looking.
All three recipients of this year’s prize have carefully extended Diamond’s work to better understand why we may observe persistent unemployment in the labor market even when there are plenty of job openings available, and with interesting policy implications -- especially for unemployment insurance programs. Their work shows that more generous unemployment insurance programs will unambiguously lead to longer average unemployment spells: a result with very strong empirical support.
There are two ways to interpret this policy conclusion, and neither is incorrect. On one hand, quite generous welfare benefits may -- at the margin -- backfire in the sense that they make finding employment less urgent than it would be otherwise, resulting in less search effort by job seekers. This interpretation provided part of the motivation behind the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (the “welfare reform” bill), which shortened the amount of time individuals may receive welfare payments without working. The bill made unemployment look less attractive.
But on the other hand, meaningful work is a gift. God desires that men and women -- the only creatures that He made in his image -- imitate him through their creative work. Work is our collaboration with God’s creative purposes. Reformers such as John Calvin and Martin Luther stressed the idea, gleaned from Scripture, that every believer is called by God to certain work -- a vocation -- and has a duty to respond to that call. And John Paul II, in his letter on human labor, observed that work is “one of the fundamental dimensions of [a person’s] earthly existence and of his vocation.”
Thus while low unemployment is an important goal, we should not be too quick to put policies in place that force unemployed persons to settle too quickly for jobs that are not a good match. Doing so would deny people the opportunity to pursue their unique callings -- ones in which each person can exercise stewardship to the glory of the Creator.
"Bill Gates and Warren Buffett announced this month that 40 of America's richest people have agreed to sign a "Giving Pledge" to donate at least half of their wealth to charity. With a collective net worth said to total $230 billion, that promise translates to at least $115 billion.
It's an impressive number. Yet some—including Messrs. Gates and Buffett—say it isn't enough. Perhaps it's actually too much: the wealthy may help humanity more as businessmen and women than as philanthropists.
What are the chances, after all, that the two forces behind the Giving Pledge will contribute anywhere near as much to the betterment of society through their charity as they have through their business pursuits? In building Microsoft, Bill Gates changed the way the world creates and shares knowledge. Warren Buffett's investments have birthed and grown innumerable profitable enterprises, making capital markets work more efficiently and enriching many in the process.
Other signers of the pledge, like Oracle's Larry Ellison and eBay's Pierre Omidyar, have similarly transformed the way people all over the world exchange information and products. They have democratized the transmission of ideas and goods, creating opportunities for people who never would have had them otherwise.
Successful entrepreneurs-turned-philanthropists typically say they feel a responsibility to "give back" to society. But "giving back" implies they have taken something. What, exactly, have they taken? Yes, they have amassed great sums of wealth. But that wealth is the reward they have earned for investing their time and talent in creating products and services that others value. They haven't taken from society, but rather enriched us in ways that were previously unimaginable.
Even if Mr. Gates makes progress in achieving his ambitious philanthropic objectives—eradicating disease, reducing global poverty, and improving educational quality—these accomplishments are unlikely to match what he achieved by giving us the amazing capability we literally have at our fingertips to access and spread information. The very doctors and scientists who may develop cures for diseases like malaria will rely on the tools Microsoft supplies to conduct their research. Had Mr. Gates decided to step down from his company and turn to philanthropy sooner than he did, they might have fewer such tools.
While businesses may do more for the public good than they're given credit for, philanthropies may do less. Think about it for a moment: Can you point to a single charitable accomplishment that has been as transformative as, say, the cell phone or the birth-control pill? To the contrary, the literature on philanthropy is riddled with examples of failure, including examples where philanthropic efforts have actually left intended beneficiaries worse off. The Gates Foundation has itself acknowledged that one of its premier initiatives—a 10-year, $2 billion project to reorganize high schools around the country into schools with fewer than 400 students—was a complete bust. Good for them for admitting it. In that, they are unusual. In the failure, they are not.
I do not mean to belittle philanthropy. I represent a foundation and believe it can accomplish a great deal of good if it achieves its donor's objective, which is to free individuals to pursue their ambitions without the burden of intrusive government. My point is simply that there is nothing inherently better or nobler about using one's resources for charitable purposes than for any number of other ones. If anything, the marketplace does a better job of channeling resources toward where they are most valued, and of punishing failure. Companies shut down all the time. How many philanthropies close because of poor performance?
***
Individuals who plow their parent's money back into the economy—whether by investing it or starting a company—may well feel more rewarded and create more public benefit. Even buying a yacht creates jobs for yacht-builders. Charity may ameliorate problems, but as Carlos Slim, the world's richest man (and a nonsigner of the Giving Pledge), has said: "Poverty is not fought with donations."
Let's hope the philanthropy of those who do sign the Giving Pledge achieves great things. But let's not fool ourselves into thinking that businessmen are likely to achieve more by giving their money away than they have by making it in the first place.
EXCERPTS:
"Jetsetter and social activist Bianca Jagger has lost her legal bid to keep her knock-down-price rental at 530 Park Avenue.
A New York state judge last week ordered Mick's ex to pay $708,600 in back rent and other fines to her landlords. Ms. Jagger spent nearly 20 years in the two bedroom apartment—rent-stabilized at $4,600 a month. But then she complained about poor upkeep. The landlords in turn noted that Ms. Jagger, in the U.S. on a tourist visa, shouldn't pay the lower rent since New York isn't her "primary residence," one of the criteria under rent control laws.
A state appeals court sided with them in 2008 and last week another court upheld the decision and said she could be evicted. As part of the fine, the judge ruled that Ms. Jagger owes $246,468 for the "fair market use and occupancy" over the years she was in dispute with the landlords. They said the apartment would have gone on the open market for $8,800 a month.
The case sums up the insanity of regulating prices in one of the world's most competitive and dynamic real estate markets. Rent control, a "temporary" World War II-era measure that survives into this century, creates housing shortages, drives up prices for non-rent control real estate and contributes to middle class flight. As Ms. Jagger perhaps found out with her moldy apartment, artificially keeping down rents gives landlords the rational financial incentive to skimp on upkeep.
Worse than that, rent control disproportionately subsidizes the affluent. A Harvard University study in the late 1980s found that rent-controlled apartments were in some of the cities best neighborhoods, that 94% of its tenants were white and roughly three-quarters were families without children....
![resized_nike-lebron-x-sneaker-lebron-james-3[1]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uNCLJvdkL6Uf7RTsDg3Z_cu0-hsiOtcZZW8Fg2eEPTab-yITRU97HuspZ0QPmcrAAGvhFrYBSPEJF_GItpxf5XflbUqd8n1chmNPTAvp9lj9JY2FNEwUWRQlp0Z1AH9qrN80Snw0Ml265rw_GzUxLQXB6tGVhOtbf3lgOzoyzl5SNPaS6Gd_XPFkGaW3Jpj6gaELuBjOoHamMaCRzFu33VHTfHz4gswXG7ZiDvzeUVjBA=s0-d "resized_nike-lebron-x-sneaker-lebron-james-3[1]")