Politics

Should All Energy Futures and Derivatives Contracts Trade on Regulated Exchanges?

1 Comment / Energy markets, Politics / By

Michael Giberson If the energy-trading world were an iceberg, public markets like the New York Mercantile Exchange would be the exposed tip. The over-the-counter market would be the vast, hidden bulk. So begins a good overview of energy trading from the WSJ, “Talking about trades,” which actually reflects a passing understanding of the commercial world. …

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“Automakers Must Be Allowed to Fail if They Are to Succeed.”

4 Comments / Economics, Politics / By

Michael Giberson Chris Davis at Discovery News: Powrtalk: Automakers must be allowed to fail if they are to succeed. To date they’ve been supported just enough to muddle somewhere above the line of failure. But failure at least allows concrete recognition that the current model does not work. Creating the possibility for new models, new …

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Attorneys General, Not Attorney Generals

4 Comments / Language, Liberty, Politics / By

Lynne Kiesling All of this Eric Holder gossip today unfortunately creates an opportunity for me to pick a grammatical nit: the plural of “attorney general” is “attorneys general”, not “attorney generals”. The “general” in “attorney general” is an adjective that modifies the noun “attorney”. The plural attaches to the noun, not the adjective. Bet you …

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Can Politicians “Fix Up the Country”?

6 Comments / Economics, Politics / By

Lynne Kiesling In yesterday’s meeting in Chicago between President-elect Obama and Senator McCain, Mr. Obama said that they were going to discuss how to “work together to fix up the country”. This language really rankles me. It also rankles Russ Roberts, whose comments on this remark reflect my dislike of the “fix the country” metaphor: …

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Crowdsourcing Can Produce New Ideas, but Run Them by Legal First…

Miscellany, Politics / By

Chris Masse at Midas Oracle links to “How Companies Are Using IT To Spot Innovative Ideas,” an article at Information Week. Among the examples cited: …Starbucks uses the same voting platform, at MyStarbucksIdea.com, and took an online suggestion posted Oct. 7 by BillMac to offer a free cup of coffee Nov. 4 to anyone in …

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If You Aren’t Reading Bailout Sleuth Daily, You Should

Economics, Politics / By

Lynne Kiesling Chris Carey’s work at Bailout Sleuth is supremely important for holding the federal government accountable for its decisions and actions with respect to their financial bailout plans. He’s carrying our water. Especially after yesterday’s change of federal strategy, much commented on elsewhere. I think Katharine Mangu-Ward sums it up pretty well at Reason …

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Different Perspectives on Entrepreneurship Under an Obama Administration

1 Comment / Economics, Politics / By

Lynne Kiesling Several commentaries over the past few days have discussed the intersection of an Obama administration and entrepreneurship. One that does so directly is Bret Swanson’s opinion piece in Friday’s Wall Street Journal, which casts President-elect Obama as an entrepreneur himself. Importantly, and correctly in my opinion, Swanson highlights the emergent, bottom-up nature of …

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On Voting and Not Voting

Politics / By

Michael Giberson “Both voting and not voting are motivated by the thought that you are better than other people.” — Tyler Cowen Or maybe you’d prefer to have Gordon Tullock’s views on voting: Here is a link to a short video called “Voting Schmoting“. [HT to Frederic Sautet.]

Price Gouging: One Way to Avoid the Law’s Reach is to Always Charge High Prices

3 Comments / Energy markets, Politics / By

Michael Giberson The headline of this Q & A exchange in the Orlando Sentinel gets it right: “It’s only price gouging if you do it occasionally.” Under Florida’s price gouging law, “it is unlawful to sell essential commodities, which include food, ice, lumber and gasoline, for an amount that ‘grossly exceeds’ the average price for …

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