“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.
Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.
Robert Reich: New Year’s Prediction
What will happen to the US economy in 2011? If you’re referring to profits of big corporations and Wall Street, next year is likely to be a good one. But if you’re referring to average American workers, far from good.
The two American economies — the Big Money economy and the Average Working Family economy — will continue to diverge. Corporate profits will continue to rise, as will the stock market. But typical wages will go nowhere, joblessness will remain high, the ranks of the long-term unemployed will continue to rise, the housing recovery will remain stalled, and consumer confidence will sag.
The big disconnect between corporate profits and jobs is likely to continue because America’s big businesses are depending less and less on U.S. sales and U.S. workers. Their big profits are coming from two sources: (1) growing sales in China, India, and other fast-growing countries, and (2) slimmed-down US payrolls.
In a typical recovery, profits lead to more hiring. That’s because in a typical recovery, American consumers head back to the malls — and their buying justifies more hires. Not this time. All the hype about Christmas sales over the last few weeks masked the fact that American consumers demanded bargain-basement prices. And the price-cutting dramatically reduced sellers’ margins. In short, profits aren’t coming from American consumers — and profits won’t be coming from American consumers in 2011.
Most Americans don’t have the dough. They’re still deep in debt, can’t borrow against their homes, and have to start saving for retirement.
Richard (RJ) Eskow: Which of These Banks Was 2010’s Most Shameless Corporate Outlaw?
Bankers. The red carpet’s still being rolled out for them in Washington, but if there’s a stain on it they’ll pout for days. Jason Linkins documents the latest set of cheap white whines from very wealthy white men. (Discrimination lawsuits are a routine part of their legal troubles, too.) This time they’re upset because nobody from the six largest banks in America was invited to the president’s CEO Roundtable.
They’re offended because they didn’t meet with the president? From the looks of things they’re lucky not to be meeting with the warden. Their collective rap sheet includes fraud, sex discrimination, collusion to bribe public officials… even laundering drug money for Mexican drug cartels. One of them is accused of ripping off some nuns! None of this criminal behavior has stopped them from sulking over a presidential slight. Let’s review the record for these corporate malefactors, and then decide:
Which of these six banks was “America’s Most Shameless Corporate Outlaw” in 2010? (I mean, really: Nuns?)
Paul Krugman: The New Voodoo
Hypocrisy never goes out of style, but, even so, 2010 was something special. For it was the year of budget doubletalk – the year of arsonists posing as firemen, of people railing against deficits while doing everything they could to make those deficits bigger.
And I don’t just mean politicians. Did you notice the U-turn many political commentators and other Serious People made when the Obama-McConnell tax-cut deal was announced? One day deficits were the great evil and we needed fiscal austerity now now now, never mind the state of the economy. The next day $800 billion in debt-financed tax cuts, with the prospect of more to come, was the greatest thing since sliced bread, a triumph of bipartisanship.
Still, it was the politicians – and, yes, that mainly meant Republicans – who took the lead on the hypocrisy front.
David Weigel: The Right To Be Wrong
Pundit accountability: Which predictions did I blow in 2010?
Last year the economist Bryan Caplan had a dream. “One day,” he wrote, “people who refuse to bet on their statements will be viewed with greater contempt than those who bet and lose.” He was talking about pundit accountability, a beautiful concept that will never be adopted, because no one wants to look stupid, and that’s the inevitable result of any such plan. Guess how many jobs the stimulus will create-then eat your words when it falls short! Confidently predict where Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction are hidden-and, well, get a book deal and a first printing of 500,000. But that’s sort of the point: There is no real downside, at least in Washington, for being wrong.
In 2010, I wrote hundreds of thousands of words for multiple publications. I wrote more words, in 140-character increments, on Twitter. I said a bunch of stuff on television and radio and in speeches. How’d I do with my own predictions? Not terrible! Because I report more than pontificate, almost nothing I wrote or said was based on pure speculation. When I bobbled a prediction, it was because I was praying to the God of Sensational Headlines-usually the kind that end in question marks-or being goaded into Caplan-esque bets on Twitter. I developed a habit of predicting the final winners of elections on the night candidates were nominated, or the seats became open, such as “Congratulations, Sen. Richard Blumenthal” or “Congratulations, Sen. Joe Manchin.” Fewer elections in 2011 means less of that and more attention to the big-picture stuff
Les Leopold: Wall Street’s Ten Biggest Lies for 2010
What a great year for Wall Street: profits up, bonuses up and, best of all, criticism down, especially from Washington. Somehow Wall Street has much of America believing its lies and rationalizations. We’re even beginning to forget that Wall Street is largely responsible for the economic mess we’re in.
So before we’re completely overtaken by financial Alzheimer’s, let’s revisit Wall Street’s greatest fabrications for 2010.
Simon Johnson: Tax Cuts Move US Closer to Fiscal Crisis
President Barack Obama is receiving congratulations for moving to the center on the tax agreement with Republicans last week.
Both sides think they got something: Democrats feel this will nudge unemployment below 8.5 percent in 2012, helping the president get re-elected; Republicans achieved long-standing goals on measures such as the estate tax and think they will get most of the credit for an economic recovery that’s already under way.
The truth is, the deal moved us closer to a fiscal crisis, just as the euro zone now is experiencing.
Who will emerge on top in the U.S. version is harder to predict; at the moment, Republicans have the edge. But it’s not clear even they will be happy with what they wished for — an opportunity to enact massive federal government spending cuts.
The central conceit behind official thinking about fiscal policy on both sides of the aisle is that investors will buy almost all U.S. government debt without blinking an eye or increasing Treasury yields. This is an endearing and heart-warming notion, rather like a seasonal showing of Jimmy Stewart in “It’s a Wonderful Life.”
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