Cost-of-living increases for Social Security had become so routine over the past several decades that it set off outrage when news spread that for the second year in a row, there would be no increase in January. On Thursday, Speaker…
Why such surprise about the corn crop?
Grain prices, especially for corn, spiked by some 20 percent in recent days. University of Chicago finance professor Eugene Fama’s theory of efficient markets helps provides a starting point for examining just why this spike took place. And more basic…
A snappy jobs sound bite is off the mark
Former Congressman Newt Gingrich asserted in Minneapolis this week that, since Ronald Reagan, the Republicans have been ‘the party of paychecks’ and the Democrats ‘the party of food stamps.’ It was a snappy sound bite, but the assertion that job…
Laws of supply and demand affects pensions, too
With all the calls for cutting government spending, much attention is being focused on how much government employees are being paid and on promises that have been made about pensions and retiree health care. This is relevant for me because…