The big 5 investement bankers asked for a rule change at the SEC — that this article said created a situation where the information that might have predicted the current crisis became invisible.
The man representing Goldman Sachs at the table, then became Treasury Secretary Paulson.
Markets do not operate well when information is obscured.
An example of where market failure is precipitated by public value failure
Filed under Market Failure, Policy
An opinion piece hypthosizes how an assumption on the isolation of risks in the Wall Street risk models was wrong…
Filed under Market Failure, Policy
This article in the New York Times recounts Bernanke’s theory of information capital (and the deficit thereof) leading to the great depression.
The failure to provide adequate information to the market — is that a market failure? If so, does such a failure require a public intervention?
Filed under Market Failure
Here are two articles and one editorial with Goldman Sachs as a common element.
Georgians were first casualties of market crisis
Wonder how many other common elements may be found?
Filed under Policy
That’s right. Information is the “plastic” of this century. Those that have information, control information, understand information and distribute information will be the masters of the 21st century economy. An examination of the policy debates in Congress concerning intellectual property, the policy discussions at the FCC concerning spectrum and who controls it, the debate over electronic health records, and the debate over who controls information relating to your identity, credit, and personal history point to the conclusion that information, and all the goods derived from information (knowledge, innovation, wealth, etc), is the key to economic success.
Today, for instance, NYT carries a story about Google and Microsoft investing in health information companies. A local Fox news station carries a story how a local city tried to ban cameras and recorders from capturing information discussed at meetings. The federal government is trying to quash a lawsuit alleging the government has illegally siphoned emails from the 4th largest Internet hub located in San Francisco. The government won’t divulge any information about the activity as it is a ‘state secret’.
There is a good essay or two here. We’ll re-visit this topic when time permits a more thoughtful repose.
Filed under Economies, Government Information
AJC has a guest op/ed discussing how much it costs to perform the Christian ministerial duties of visiting prisoners. Between the collect calls, ATM fees, and other charges (which, ironically, are imposed by private sector contractors who resist reveiling the profit margins and whose owners have gone to prison defending their take!) incurred by the person performing one’s duty, one can incur hundreds of dollars a year if one visited once a week. Here is a worthy project for Christian political activist groups – 1) Remove barriers to visiting those in prison and 2) motivate their grassroots members to visit. If the stats are true, reporting that prisoners receiving visitors have lower rates of recidivism, then this is truly one faith-
Filed under faith based, Policy
The Chronicle has a column by Naomi Schaeffer Riley, a conservative writer whose credits include the WSJ and National Review, advising students that colleges do have rules. Whether you are from the right or left — your freedoms end where the campus rules begin. More to the point:
But by now, students, or at least their parents, should know better. Students on the right should realize that politically correct speech has been a campus requirement for a long time, regardless of whether administrations are willing to acknowledge it. And that many secular universities are unwelcoming, if not
downright hostile, toward strongly religious and politically conservative students. Meanwhile, the aspiring student activists on the left might do themselves a favor by finally noticing that universities are corporations
run by grown-ups, who have to think about budgets and alumni giving and public relations.So students should follow the advice of consumer advocates and relationship counselors when it comes to picking a college. Read about the product before you (or your parents) hand over money for it. And don’t enter a relationship thinking you’re going to change it.
An editorial by the Augusta Chronicle is concerned about the costs to human freedom that may be incurred as a result of proposed abatement of global warming.
Why don’t they have the same concern when it comes to the proposed infringment on liberties created by our responses to terrorism?
If you were to calculate probabilities of being effected by either warming or terrorism — multiply that probability by the cost (or damage) incurred should such an event affect you — would there be any appreciable difference in the result? Now, calculate the diminishing value of liberty as a result of the “solution” proposed for either event. Which side of the balance sheet wins?
Filed under Policy
The Georgia Constitution has this to say about who governs the University System:
(b) The board of regents shall have the exclusive authority to create new public colleges, junior colleges, and universities in the State of Georgia, subject to approval by majority vote in the House of Representatives and the Senate. Such vote shall not be required to change the status of a college, institution or university existing on the effective date of this Constitution. The government, control, and management of the University System of Georgia and all of the institutions in said system shall be vested in the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia. (Article VIII , Section IV(b))
Now, Look at the bills offered thus far regarding admissions, management of students, etc:
HB 32 – Quality Basic Education Act; annual educational program; require
HB 72 – Georgia Homeland Security in Education Act of 2007; create
HB 131 – Georgia HERO Scholarship; surviving spouses; change definitions
SB 74 – Returning Hero Education Act
So, how does all this legislation fit within a conservative philosophy of government?
Filed under Education
A bill has just been introduced in the Georgia House of Representatives that revives discussion from 4 years ago, led by Mr. Horowitz, alleging that Georgia’s public colleges were led by communists and liberals and thus our students were being forced to learn things that they did not agree with.
Oh, Mr. Horowitz also testified to the Georgia Senate in 2003 stating that K12 administrators were even worse — calling them “Stalinists.” I guess he would know, being a Berkley educated communist himself.
Filed under Education, legislation, Politics
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