Political Equinox

Last Thursday evening I had the honor of witnessing an intriguing lecture by St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank President James Bullard who received his PhD is Economics from Indiana University.

Bullard spoke specifically on the topic of the recent financial crisis focusing on systemic risk, which he defined as “the possibility that the failure of one firm will lead to the failure of other firms.” However, Bullard said the difficulty lies in defining when there is adequate systemic risk to call for government intervention.

Three Pillars of Systemic Risk

Interconnectedness – Recent examples of systemic risk has focused on investment banks interconnecting themselves with complex financial instruments. For example’s sake, suppose Bank A purchases an option from Bank B to hedge risk, if …

Tags: economy, fannie mae, fannie mae and freddie mac, federal reserve bank, financial, government intervention, interconnectedness, investment banks, james bullard, mortgage backed securities, president, systemic risk, tution

The results are in and people are claiming Joe Biden held his own and Sarah Palin didn’t disappoint. I must agree, even though I’ll have to give Biden the nod as the overall debate winner, Governor Palin came close.

However, don’t take that as an endorsement of the potential Vice President, as Palin benefited from the poor debate format. The moderator moved the candidates quickly from subject to subject almost as if attempting to cover the entire range of issues in a single debate.

This was wasteful of the American people’s time. Why not focus on the economy, the war, and healthcare. Giving ample time to each subject instead of skipping from question to question. Instead we addressed very little on each …

Tags: America, candidate, economy, healthcare, joe biden, mccain campaign, president

If you haven’t heard of the FairTax, you really should check out the proposal. It’s a 23% national retail sales tax that replaces all current federal taxes including the income tax, payroll taxes, and corporate taxes, among others. In order to ensure that the burden of this taxation is not taken on by the lower class, the FairTax includes the prebate. The prebate gives money to every American family before the month begins up to the poverty level.

Bringing Capital Back Into America

Currently there are some $10 trillion dollars of capital that has been moved away from the United States into foreign assets in order to shelter these assets from the aggressive and oppressive United States tax laws.

All of this …

Tags: America, economy, FairTax, income tax, money, taxes

Yes, you read that right. America already has a system in which we pay for the healthcare of others that is deeply embedded into our economic system. We pay for it every single day without even realizing that we are covering the healthcare costs of our fellow Americans.

No, I am not talking about Medicare, Medicaid, or any other government sponsored healthcare plans. The universal healthcare I am talking about is employer-sponsored healthcare plans.

Let’s take a trip back to our high school economics class and take a look at how businesses price their products. All companies hope to earn money through the sale of their product or service, so they deduct expenses from the cost of the product and then you …

Tags: America, Barack Obama, economic system, economy, electronic health records, health system, healthcare, healthcare costs, medicare, medicare medicaid, money, obama, universal health care, Universal Healthcare

As the world continues to creep closer and closer to ultimate globalization, international finance continues to become a chief concern among those interested in preserving the economic independence present in the current world.

Currently, hedge funds are regarded by many Americans as the largest investment vehicle that has the power to overwhelm markets with large trades. Nevertheless, these hedge funds will soon look like child’s play when the world catches a grasp of the new financial holding vehicle, the Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF). SWF’s are like hedge funds on steroids, rolling in at nearly twice the size in equity value.

These funds haven’t made much news in the US other than a couple of articles in the financial news and few hearings …

Tags: America, china, economy, elections, finance, financial, globalization international finance, hedge funds, international monetary fund, IRS, senate banking committee, treasury bills, world equity