Bryan's Mind
Ponderances, Inanities, and other Nonsense
Tax on Banks?
Jan 14th
I read today that Obama “unveiled a new tax on banks.” From a brief skim my take is it is retribution for the bonuses paid out by the large bank corporations after the bailout money was given to them.
This, quite simply, is ridiculous rhetoric that does nothing to help the economy, but may curry favor with voters come next election.
Quite simply put, the banks are partly to blame, but most of the blame should be sent to Ben Bernanke, Time’s Man of the Year and head of the Federal Reserve Bank and his predecessor, Alan Greenspan. This is what happens when you have a central bank that has the power to create money and artificially control interest rates. The recent housing bubble was the result of artificially fixing the interest rates at like 1% for many years, followed by the eventual rise, which popped the bubble. Until the Federal Reserve Bank is gone, we will not have a free market economy.
The way that the taxpayer (read “Middle Class”) will pay in the end s that the existence of all of the money that was created out of thin air to bail out these banks will dilute the value of the dollar, internationally. It’s not that we’ll pay more taxes, nor should we: The government already spends far more than they levy in income taxes, so taxing banks will not make a dent in the deficit, nor will it do anything to help the economy. As we are teetering on the edge of some hard times (rampant inflation), I would hope our President could come up with something more legitimate. I’m sure Joe Average will say “That’s right…stick it to them banks!” But really, it is not going to do anything, IMHO.
Family Update 1/11/10
Jan 12th
I am taking a small hiatus on my frothing about the economy to fill everybody in on the goings-on around the Hobbs’ household.
Julian: Julian started crawling in earnest this weekend past. Before he would pull-up to all fours and lunge. Now he does actual crawling. What’s more, he is pulling up to standing in his crib: not just staying there, but rather both briefly and repeatedly, as if it is calisthenics. Methinks he is doing so to strengthen his legs. He already remembers where he last saw things and figures out that if you put something over them, it is still there but hidden. He appears to be quite bright and ahead in his development. Over the past few months, he naturally developed a fear of large volumes of water, which makes sense; however, this weekend, after a brief adjustment period of about 15 minutes, he was splashing and carousing like an old pro.
Sophia: Sophia is improving by leaps and bounds. She has been much better about communicating, though she still has sleep problems. We see it as a vicious circle: she doesn’t tell us when she is sleepy, but when she doesn’t sleep, she doesn’t communicate as well. She and Julian both had a cold this weekend but are now over it. So far, she isn’t missing Shamu. We’ll see if we can make it 3 months without it…for those not “in the know” SeaWorld San Antonio closed Jan 3 and doesn’t re-open until the beginning of March. Sophia is obsessed with going there. We still want to put her into ballet, but until she starts heeding instruction a little better it would be a waste of everyone’s time.
Antonella is doing well. We started at the gym (hence the pool) at the first of the year. We haven’t worked all of the bugs out of our schedule. She is still teaching at the Montessori school, though I know she is waiting anxiously for something else to come down the pike. She still isn’t getting a full night of uninterrupted sleep, but it is getting better and better little by little.
I am enjoying my respite from school, though it is quickly coming to a close. It would appear that I screwed up my degree plan of study, but I didn’t hear anything about it until a couple of days ago. This could be a problem, as I might not get my books shipped until after class starts. I still need to finish making up an incomplete in an elective that I took. It had never been offered, and it was intended to be offered in a break. Thing is, it was too much work even then, if I was lucky enough to have been offered it a year ago in the slot that it was intended to be undertaken. The class did not exist last year, though they withheld that information from me and made it seem like I just didn’t get signed up for it before the end of drop/add. It was basically learning half of a operations research book and half of an engineering/probability book (the statistics half) in six weeks. Even without the other class, the 200+ pages of reading/week with 8+ hours of lecture was too much. Doubly so with the other class I was taking. They saw that it wasn’t feasible, so they extended it out by two weeks, but then that overlapped with my MBA capstone class, which made it that much harder, since that class was extremely time-demanding and ever so crucial.
We hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and New Year’s. Take care,
Bryan
The Federal Reserve Bank and why it must go.
Jan 11th
One of the things that has been interesting to me in recent months is the Federal Reserve Bank. I won’t go into too much detail about its shady creation, but I will provide a couple of interesting tidbits, in layman’s terms.
1. The Federal Reserve Bank creates money out of nothing. When they increase the money supply, they create money out of thin air (only a small fraction is minted as coins and bills). When more money exists, then each dollar is worth less. That is just basic supply and demand. The people and entities that benefit most are the ones that get the newly-created money first: the U.S. government and the banks. They spend it when it is still worth something, before inflation reduces the value of the money over time. By the time that Joe Average gets an annual pay raise, it barely keeps pace with inflation. For wage workers, minimum wage is way behind.
2. The ability to create money out of thin air dissuades diplomacy and encourages wars. If you have to fund a war without being able to create money out of thin air, people tend to care a lot more.
3. For the same reason, spending on special interest programs is not kept in check as taxes are not raised proportionately. Most of the money spent by our government really does not exist. Which again, creates inflation and devalues the dollar. The dollar is worth $0.05 of what it was in 1914 since the inception of the FRB. If dollars were still backed by gold (and therefore could not be created out of thin air,) the dollar would still be worth $1.00.
Why does this matter? Constant inflation of the dollar decreases its value compared to other currencies and versus other investments, such as gold (which costs $1200/ounce now (compared to $35 in 1968 and $868 in 2008), not because the value of gold has gone up, but that the value of the dollar has gone down) to the point that it has no inherent value to other countries. At that point, our country is in big trouble.
The Great Gatsby
Jan 6th
I am reading F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic “The Great Gatsby.” When most people were reading it in high school, I had downshifted to a more basic English offering after Mr. Jordan’s Advanced English class. I don’t remember what we read in lieu of “The Great Gatsby,” but chances are it was something with ponies or something.
Anyway, I find I really like his writing style: too bad he died at age 44. He probably would’ve cranked out several more quality works.
Fourth person
Dec 22nd
If you are talking about a person talking in the third person, are you now talking in the fourth person?
My daughter, Sophia, now carries on conversations about herself. Usually it is her mimicking us asking her questions, to which then she provides a response. e.g. “Sophia, do you want a cookie?” “Yes, Mommy, I want four cookies.” “And cake.”
End of the World as we know it.
Dec 22nd
I’ve seen several predictions for the end of the world…2000, 2012, 2037. Even the sage/comedian Lewis Black said he had arrived at the end of the world when he walked out of a Starbucks in Houston, and across the street was another Starbucks, though his was more in reference to a place than a time. I found my portent: a ominous symbol of such cruelty and avarice that nothing more can be contrived that would parallel this: The Snuggie for Dogs. Available at your local Walgreens.
Global Warming
Dec 17th
So, if you haven’t heard, I’ll bring you up to speed: Global warming is regarded as a hoax.
Some 94% of the Carbon dioxide produced every year is produced naturally: chiefly through plant/animal decay and volcanoes. The heat of the past three decades was just a naturally occurring trend. Weird things happen…like the mini-Ice Age of the 18th century…or course they didn’t attribute it to man’s industry but rather their sins…a simpler time.
Al Gore won a Nobel Prize for his efforts with “An Inconvenient Truth,” a documentary about global warming. His solution: buy carbon offsets to purge your sins against Mother Nature and to discourage the production of carbon dioxide. Only the money for the carbon offsets was pocketed by him, which obviously he didn’t spend on his mansion to make it more Green, until someone blew the whistle on him. It was all perfectly legit. And he got the Nobel Prize.
I do like the fact that people are a little more eco-friendly, though.
Just so everyone knows: I’ve talked to several people who weren’t aware.
Mexican Coca-Cola
Dec 14th
I was in the local HEB grocery store and saw the old-school glass Coke bottles, and I noticed on both the shelf tag and the bottle that it was “Mexican Coke.” I looked at the ingredients and saw “Sugar.” So I grabbed a couple and went home to drink them. Wow! I forgot how good old Coke was… It is even worth the extra price (1.66/liter).
Tired
Dec 1st
Was going to pull an “all-niter” to work on our team final for business school; however, Sophia was sick and couldn’t lay flat without waking up in a coughing fit. So, I held her upright while she slept and I watched “Zodiac.” Not a bad movie: it wasn’t nearly as graphic as I expected, which is good. Then I found a position propped up on five pillows and a comforter that allowed her to sleep. I think the worst is over, as her fever broke and she was sleeping soundly when I left to go to my 8am dentist appointment.
Thing is, I didn’t get any studying done, so I will probably be doing that tonight. So, it will be the third night in a row with < 4 hours of sleep.
The coming Saturday is not only my lovely wife’s birthday, but we are scheduled to move into a new apartment…and our final is due Sunday. The thing that brings me comfort is the inevitability of it all. It will end by this weekend.
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