Washington Examiner reporter Alan Suderman says "Maryland lawmakers are pushing for tighter regulations on the mail-order bride industry."
There is no question Maryland can write more regulations. But can regulation solve market failure?
Post ombudsman Andrew Alexander shows that he does not understand the economics of anonymous sources. More...
Recently we have posted on the so-called "public option" (see here and here). Today we look at the effect of proposed health care legislation on the private market.
By necessity, it is private insurers that have both the interest and comparative advantage to estimate these effects. The federal government, and especially the Congressional Budget Office, is almost exclusively concerned with federal budget outlays, not social costs and benefits. To keep federal outlays down, legislators focus on shifting costs off budget -- typically, onto private insurers and their customers.
Analyses recently made public by one private insurer are instructive.
More...Wall Street Journal's "Numbers Guy" Carl Bialik writes in an August 7 blog post about the claim made by Sky Andrecheck that baseball would be no different if the numbers of balls and strikes were reduced to three and two, respectively:
Specifically, writing on Baseball Analysts, [Andrecheck] presents data suggesting that a game where three balls earned a batter a walk but two strikes ends his at bat would have very similar outcomes to what we know as baseball, but get to those outcomes a lot faster — and with fewer pitching changes.
Andrecheck commits an elementary statistical error and he incorrectly assumes that at-bat data are true.
More...UPDATED. SEE "MORE".
The Panic of 2008 and subsequent recession have put a damper on the wine market, especially at the high end. As a member of too many wine clubs (still the best way to access fine West Coast wine from the East Coast), I have seen more discounting by wineries in the last six months than I observed in the previous six years.
So it should not be surprising to see a bevy of entrepreneurs pop up who are attempting to exploit these depressed conditions. The Los Angeles Times published an intriguing story by reporter Patrick Comiskey about new web-based vendors doing exactly what we'd expect ("Good deals go fast on wine websites," July 8, 2009). Of the vendors Comiskey mentions, Wines 'Til Sold Out seems to have the most unusual business plan: they sell tranches of a single wine, one at a time, first come first served, presumably (but not verifiably) until they are sold out -- then move on to another wine.
After reading the article, I signed up with Wines 'Til Sold Out to investigate.
More...The news has been full of evidence that automobile sales are way down. For some vehicles, demand appear to be undiminished by the financial crisis and recession. What do these vehicles have in common?
More...In this series we've predicted that the government's efforts to confiscate employee bonuses would have significant unintended consequences. Specifically, the highest-valued employees of AIG and other targeted firms would quit rather than subject themselves to public humiliation and the loss of income to which they were contractually entitled.
In the Wall Street Journal, Liam Pleven and Randall Smith report that this is now happening, with predictably adverse consequences for the taxpayers who now own these companies.
More...After resisting the pressure for months (years?), managing editor Richard Belzer on Sunday succumbed and joined Facebook. I rationalized it as a research project, of course. More...
The annual meeting of the American Economic Association should be expected to teach many lessons in economics. Friday's lesson occurred away from the convention hotel. More...
Today's Wall Street Journal Real Time Economics Blog has an excellent summary of the insights of Irving Fisher concerning the perils of deflation. There is one apparently inadvertent error near the beginning, however:
[B]roadly falling prices would be bad news for a country up to its ears in debt. Consumers and businesses have to pay back debt with money that is worth less than the original credit, essentially increasing the debt.
This is exactly backwards. Inflation is the phenomenon in which money is worth less. Under deflation, money is worth more. That is the reason why it is more burdensome to pay off debt during deflation. Paying off the same amount of debt with dollars that are more valuable makes the debtor poorer.
Of course, it also makes lenders richer. So one's financial position relative to deflation is significantly affected by whether one is a net borrower or net lender
More...The Wall Street Journal reports that landfills that collect methane and sell it as fuel also can sell the value of these avoided greenhouse gas emissions.
More...Delta Airlines has announced new fees for redeeming frequent flyer miles into airline tickets -- $25 for domestic flights and $50 for international destinations. Other airlines are considering reciprocal actions.
What does economics teach about the likely consequences of this action? More...
New York Times reporter Bill Vlasic says "[c]onsumers have been slow to embrace" General Motors' new Yukon/Tahoe Hybrid despite the near 50% improvement in city driving fuel efficiency. It's easy to see why. More...
The Washington Post's Ivan Carter writes that the NBA has decided to fine players who 'flop'. Will it work? More...
Recently, Sens. John McCain (R-AZ) and Hillary Clinton (D-NY) have proposed a "gas tax holiday" in which the federal government would suspend its collection of motor fuel taxes during the summer vacation travel season. Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) has opposed it because it would provide minimal relief.
The proposed gas tax holiday is an odd idea to dominate an energy policy debate. All three candidates have promised to take action if elected that would dramatically and permanently increase gasoline prices. More...
