Follow the links in the headlines. — Quin
Our economy’s sugar-high could lead into a coma…. [Dec. 11]
Noted growth-economics advocate Stephen Moore wrote yesterday in the Wall Street Journal that the American economy is not on a “sugar high” and not in danger of crashing any time soon.
Moore is wrong. He has been advising a president who, it was reported last week, doesn’t care at all about a burgeoning debt crisis because he thinks the bad results will not happen on his watch. (President Trump is wrong, too: The debt crisis could blow up a lot sooner than he thinks.) Moore is wrong because when deficits and debt already are at historically high levels while interest rates already are well below post-World War II norms, there’s no capacity to use fiscal or monetary policy to re-stimulate an economy that is contracting. [Later in the column…]….When the economy is in danger of drowning in debt, it’s a very bad thing if the lifeguards are asleep.
The Fed didn’t help the economy today….[Dec. 19. The Federal Reserve got the music right, but the lyrics wrong.]
Economy needs, if not an ounce, at least a Gramm of prevention…. [Dec. 13]
As the resident Cassandra here who has been warning all year that the American and world economies are nearing an almost catastrophic debt crisis, I hope policymakers will heed the same warning coming from the respected voice of former Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas.
In a Dec. 11 Wall Street Journal piece titled, “ The Debt Threat to the Economy,” Gramm and veteran economics adviser Michael Solon warn that “exploding debt-servicing costs and the new federal borrowing could crowd out private borrowing at levels never before experienced in any of the 10 previous postwar [economic] recoveries.”….
Congress should stop ‘backdoor spending.’….[Dec.16] Analysts often speak figuratively about “out of control” federal spending, but a House subcommittee hearing this week showed that most federal spending quite literally is out of control…..
