ALG's Daily Grind - Trips To Mars And RoboSquirrels Are Great, But They're Not The Job Of Government

April 19, 2013

Trips To Mars And RoboSquirrels Are Great, But They're Not The Job Of Government

Just because there are a myriad of acknowledged practical applications derived from government funded research doesn't mean these discoveries wouldn't have been made — and made faster and cheaper — without government interference.

Is student debt weighing down the economy?

New York Fed publishes study, "Young Student Loan Borrowers Retreat from Housing and Auto Markets."

Iron Lady Thatcher: Last From A Great Era

Every generation has a tendency to view the past through rose-colored glasses.  However, rainbows and lollypop reminiscing aside, the 1980's truly were remarkable. America and Britain were unified countries, evidenced by substantial electoral victories by Reagan and Thatcher.

Evans-Pritchard: Cyprus bail-out vote stirs fresh jitters as slump fears grow in Europe

"Cyprus has stunned EU officials by ordering a vote in its parliament on the terms of the EU-IMF Troika bailout for the country, risking a rejection by angry lawmakers and a fresh eruption of the crisis."

ALG - Loosening lending standards, which caused the crisis, will not solve it

April 4, 2013, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today issued the following statement blasting a push by the Obama Administration and the Federal Reserve to once again loosen mortgage lending standards to increase the pool of eligible homebuyers:

"To suggest that lowering credit standards is the solution to the financial crisis is to ignore the past 20 years of history. The fact is, borrowers can already get loans from Fannie and Freddie for as little as 3 percent down, and from the Federal Housing Administration for as low as 3.5 percent down. Prices have not been this low since 2003. And interest rates have never been this low.

"The problem in the housing market is not a lack of lending capacity, which is virtually limitless as banks are sitting on $1.6 trillion of excess reserves. It's that even with it as easy as it is to get a loan, demand is still very low in the weak economy, and therefore it's not easy enough for the central planners, so the push becomes to lower credit standards.

"The same thing happened after the 1991 recession when credit slowed down. By 1992, Congress had agreed to institute and expand the GSE 'affordable' housing goals, which required an increasing percent of government-backed mortgages to be of lower quality, which contributed substantially to the housing bubble. Since the economy is addicted to credit expansion, in order to grow, the incentive is for lending standards to become progressively weaker over time. By 2007, when the bubble popped, those goals had expanded from 30 percent of Fannie and Freddie's portfolios to 55 percent.

"This is what happens every time the government wants to facilitate credit expansion to bolster asset prices. After the stock of available borrowers based on current credit standards is exhausted, the only recourse left to policy makers is to weaken credit standards. When this leads to asset bubbles and credit collapses, as it already has, then the American people are told that the banks that made the loans must be made whole through bailouts whether from Congress or the Federal Reserve. We've seen this movie before. It is a fraud and it will only lead to a repeat of the 2008 meltdown."

To view online: http://getliberty.org/loosening-lending-standards-which-caused-the-crisis-will-not-solve-it/

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Americans for Limited Government is a non-partisan, nationwide network committed to advancing free market reforms, private property rights and core American liberties. For more information on ALG please call us at 703-383-0880 or visit our website at www.GetLiberty.org.

ALG - Unemployment rate drops as 663,000 abandon workforce

April 5, 2013, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today issued the following statement on the latest job numbers:

"663,000 Americans dropped out of the workforce last month.  206,000 fewer Americans were employed.  290,000 more Americans were unemployed.

"Yet, the headline will be that the unemployment rate dropped in March to 7.6 percent.

"Never has the lie of the improving Obama economy ever been more starkly revealed than in today's March unemployment report, where the consequences of the destruction of the American workforce by policies that promote government dependence over work are hidden behind a statistical drop in the percentage of workers who are unemployed.

"At this rate, Obama may just make history by achieving a 0 percent unemployment rate because nobody's in the workforce. You might just call that full unemployment. "

To view online: http://getliberty.org/unemployment-rate-drops-as-663000-abandon-workforce/

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Americans for Limited Government is a non-partisan, nationwide network committed to advancing free market reforms, private property rights and core American liberties. For more information on ALG please call us at 703-383-0880 or visit our website at www.GetLiberty.org.

ALG - Positive job growth doesn't stem workforce participation collapse

Labor Participation has not been this bad since 1981

March 8, 2013, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today issued the following statement in response to the latest job numbers:

"Private employers continue to move forward in creating jobs in spite of regulatory headwinds and higher taxes.  Incredibly, while the number of jobs created by the private economy continues to grow, the number of people who are abandoning the workplace also continues to accelerate.  In February alone, almost 300,000 more workers left the workforce and the percentage of workers in the labor force dropped to its lowest level since 1981 at 63.5 percent.

"It is stunning that in spite of running a consistent trillion dollar plus deficit, with the Federal Reserve propping up the housing sector to the tune of $40 billion a month, that we are still seeing a mass exodus from the workforce by Americans in Obama's economy.  In fact, almost twice as many Americans just said no to the Obama economy than got jobs in February.  This stark rejection of hope for a better future by so many, stands as a bright red warning sign about our economy's long-term future."

To view online: http://getliberty.org/positive-job-growth-doesnt-stem-workforce-participation-collapse/

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Americans for Limited Government is a non-partisan, nationwide network committed to advancing free market reforms, private property rights and core American liberties. For more information on ALG please call us at 703-383-0880 or visit our website at www.GetLiberty.org.

CEI Today: Cancer risk from foam cups?, the growing irrelevance of US climate policy, and the regulatory recession

CANCER RISK - ANGELA LOGOMASINI

Openmarket.org: Cancer Risks Unlikely From Foam Cups

Whatever happened to plastic foam coffee cups? Visit any to-go coffee shop and you will most likely only find paper cups that burn your hands and let your coffee go cold.

Cups made with polystyrene foam are disappearing from the marketplace because a bevy of misinformation about their environmental effects, including claims styrene — the chemical used to make them — is a carcinogen.  > Read the full commentary on Openmarket.org

> Interview Angela Logomasini

GLOBAL WARMING - MARLO LEWIS Globalwarming.org: The Growing Irrelevance of U.S. Climate Policy The world will burn around 1.2 billion more tons of coal per year in 2017 than it does today — an amount equal to the current coal consumption of Russia and the United States combined. Today’s Climatewire (subscription required) summarizes data and projections from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) and the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA) from which we may conclude that EPA regulation of greenhouse gases (GHGs) is increasingly irrelevant to global climate change even if one accepts agency’s view of climate science. Basically, it all comes down to the fact that China’s huge and increasing coal consumption overwhelms any reduction in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions the EPA might achieve.  > Read the full commenary on Globalwarming.org > Interview Marlo Lewis

REGULATORY CLIFF - JOHN BERLAU Openmarket.org: The Coming Regulatory Recession? The Bureau of Economic Analysis of the U.S. Department of Commerce reported the stunning news the U.S. economy actually contracted by 0.1 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012. The immediate response by many politicians and the establishment media was to blame spending cuts, or the threat of them, rather than even look at the dramatic increase in regulation over the last few years.  > Read the full comment on Openmarket.org   > Interview John Berlau

More in the news... NASA's mission is not safety Dodd-Frank law is an unconstitutional disaster The EPA's Lisa Jackson: The Worst Head of the Worst Regulatory Agency, Ever Magician Economists Like Bernanke Can’t Pull Prosperity Out Of A Hat Germs In Reusable Grocery Bags Can Prove Deadly

CEI is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy group dedicated to the principles of free enterprise and limited government.  For more information about CEI, please visit our website, cei.org, and blogs, Globalwarming.org and OpenMarket.org.  Follow CEI on Twitter! Twitter.com/ceidotorg.