Paul M. Jones

TED has developed a cool new technology that makes it possible to search, caption and translate TED talks. Each talk will now come with an transcript. What's cool is that you can click on any phrase in the transcript and you will jump to that point in the video. If you go to my talk, for example, and click on "open interactive transcript" you can see this in action. What this means is that videos will now be Google searchable.

via Marginal Revolution: TED Talks: Search, Translate, Subtitle.

The idea is to have a commission examine which procedures should not receive full Medicare reimbursement. I favor spending cuts for Medicare so for me it's a go. Megan McArdle considers some basic issues. I'll add or second a few points ...

via Marginal Revolution: Medical care and comparative effectiveness.

Outrage spread in Canada, with the Toronto Star last week bemoaning "a plague of protectionist measures in the U.S." and Canadian companies openly fretting about having to shift jobs to the United States to meet made-in-the-USA requirements. This week, the Canadians fired back. A number of Ontario towns, with a collective population of nearly 500,000, retaliated with measures effectively barring U.S. companies from their municipal contracts -- the first shot in a larger campaign that could shut U.S. companies out of billions of dollars worth of Canadian projects.

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This is not your father's trade war, a tit-for-tat over champagne or cheese. With countries worldwide desperately trying to keep and create jobs in the midst of a global recession, the spat between the United States and its normally friendly northern neighbor underscores what is emerging as the biggest threat to open commerce during the economic crisis.

Rather than merely raising taxes on imported goods -- acts that are subject to international treaties -- nations including the United States are finding creative ways to engage in protectionism through domestic policy decisions that are largely not governed by international law. Unlike a classic trade war, there is little chance of containment through, for example, arbitration at the World Trade Organization in Geneva. Additionally, such moves are more likely to have unintended consequences or even backfire on the stated desire to create domestic jobs.

via Trade Wars Launched With Ruses, End Runs - washingtonpost.com.

For now, the only two elements of the political system are Progressive Corporatism and The Resistance. And the latter does not amount to much yet.

Why I Fear a One-Party State, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty.

Count me as part of the Resistance, I guess. Fat lot of good it seems to be doing.

No, really:

President Barack Obama, calling current deficit spending “unsustainable,” warned of skyrocketing interest rates for consumers if the U.S. continues to finance government by borrowing from other countries.

“We can’t keep on just borrowing from China,” Obama said at a town-hall meeting in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, outside Albuquerque. “We have to pay interest on that debt, and that means we are mortgaging our children’s future with more and more debt.”

Holders of U.S. debt will eventually “get tired” of buying it, causing interest rates on everything from auto loans to home mortgages to increase, Obama said. “It will have a dampening effect on our economy.”

via Obama Says U.S. Long-Term Debt Load ‘Unsustainable’ (Update2) - Bloomberg.com.

He doesn't seem to be acting as if he believes it, though.

Neumont University is devoted to pumping out a steady stream of experts in computer science -- the only major that students can choose. The 6-year-old school places its graduates in high-tech jobs at such companies as EBay Inc., Microsoft Corp. and IBM Corp. If trends hold up, more than 90% of the 59 students graduating with bachelor's degrees today will find work within three months.

But surrounding introverted computer programmers with other introverted computer programmers creates unique challenges for school administrators. Employers praise the skills of Neumont's graduates but complain about their computer addictions and difficulty socializing with colleagues. For their part, some students grumble that their peers spend too much time playing video games and too little time in the shower.

So in addition to the intricacies of computer science, Neumont is trying to teach its students how to get along better in the real world. Administrators forced them to close their laptops in class, established social clubs and required them to take courses in interpersonal communications and public speaking.

The efforts have met resistance. After all, students ask, what's the purpose of attending a place known affectionately as "Geek Heaven" if you're not free to geek out whenever you choose?

via At 'Geek Heaven,' students are skilled in tech, if not talk - Los Angeles Times.

Every tax day, a handful of lefties pen paeans to the federal government, and how they do and the rest of us should feel inspired, patriotic, and invigorated when we pay our taxes.

...

The sentiment is particularly misguided this year, as we begin year seven of a misguided war waged under false pretenses; we’re hearing new revelations every day about how the federal government has systematically violated our constitutional rights, and the human rights of others; and the government is spending billions, and risking trillions, to prop up private companies that took stupid risks and should have gone out of business for doing so–despite that the majority of the public opposes the bailouts.

Still, I always want to ask people who write these articles, why not pay more than your fair share, then? If greed (i.e., wanting to keep as much of your own money as possible) is evil, and if government really is so benevolent and wonderful (provided your party is running it, of course), why not pay double or triple what you owe?

via The Agitator » Blog Archive » Why Not Pay More?.

THIS is bad news for a functioning capitalist economy: federal aid has "supplanted sales, property and income taxes as the biggest source of revenue for state and local governments". The Heritage Foundation, no surprise, flips out at the news ...

via The state of the states | Democracy in America | Economist.com.

The money is taken from state residents by the Federal government, skimmed some to line Federal pockets, and then funneled back down to the states again. Talk about redistribution.

In the first major disclosure of corruption in the $750-billion financial bailout program, federal investigators said Monday they have opened 20 criminal probes into possible securities fraud, tax violations, insider trading and other crimes.

The cases represent only the first wave of investigations, and the total fraud could ultimately reach into the tens of billions of dollars, according to Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general overseeing the bailout program.

via Crimes suspected in 20 bailout cases -- for starters - Los Angeles Times.

Can't blame Obama for this one -- the TARP debacle started under Bush. The Republicans have been almost as stupid in their reactions to the recession as anyone else.

So when DeLong, among others, says that government spending is as good as private in restoring employment, he is speaking against the whole thrust of the principle of efficient resource allocation. The essence of our recessionary problem is not the fall in aggregate demand and the lack of business confidence that accompanies it. First, it is the misallocation of resources produced by excessive risk-taking and by excessive expansion of interest-sensitive sectors. (These were generated by excessively low interest rates over the past several years.) Second, it is the uncertainty that is natural to the discovery of more appropriate combinations of resources. Third, it is the endogenous uncertainty created by the fits and starts of stimulus, bailout and unclear monetary policies.

When government adds to investment as a result of fiscal stimulus or directed monetary expansion (like buying mortgage-backed securities, student loans, etc) it does not act as a super-entrepreneur who is trying to determine the efficient and sustainable direction of resources, including the allocation of capital goods. It spends according to economically irrelevant criteria of job creation, propping up over-expanded sectors, and preventing politically painful adjustments.

Such spending is counterproductive in the medium to long term. It is also unsustainable (once the stimulus stops) since it is not consistent with the preferences of consumers-savers-investors.

via Is All Spending Created Equal? « ThinkMarkets.